So back at the tail end of November I put it out in my favourite Facebook group, the negative positive film photo group, that I was interested in the idea of getting hold of one of the Olympus 35 range of rangefinders. The SP, EC, RC, and im pretty sure there’s some other models as well. I asked owners for their thoughts on the cameras and it quickly became apparent that everybody who had one or used to have one fell in love with them very quickly and respected them a lot.
I cant remember if it was a direct message, or a comment on the thread, but a user named Toby Vandevelde offered me his 35RC as a loaner to see if I liked it! Well I couldn’t turn him down. I’ve met toby in person once in the past and he’s a genuinely great guy but this was something else. He’d already told me that he loves his and uses it regularly so to offer it out to a guy he’s only met the once was just amazing.
I thought about it for a little while and offered him a counter offer. I offered up the idea of a camera swap. I offered him my Ricoh 500G as a trade with the idea that we would run a few rolls through each others cameras and do a little write up afterwards. The 500G is a not too dissimilar camera, with a similar range of features.
Well, it arrived this morning and before any film even went anywhere near it I could see what everybody is raving about.
First thoughts: It’s small and compact, and everything is where it feels like it should be. Im a massive fan of Olympus cameras and I felt right at home with it in my hands. Well hand. As I said its pretty tiny!
Similar size to my Trip 35 but a bit heavier and feels more robust.
Auto mode, you set the shutter speed and it selects an aperture. If it feels its going to under or over expose it seems like it will just stop you taking the shot.
It would appear that you can also operate it in fully manual mode. You can select shutter speeds of 1/500, 1/250, 1/125, 1/60, 1/30, 1/15 and bulb. Apertures from f/2.8 to f/22. ISO settings from 25 to 800. Little annoyance, or just possibly something odd. If you have a filter attached you need to remove it in order to set the ISO. Maybe thats not an issue seeing as you’d only do it once per roll in theory…
Well thats it for the moment. I’ll check in once I’ve shot and developed some film!
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