Faultfinding.... Yay...

[Spleenrippa]

Hey guys,
I should've been more clear- I did check everything out on the Bessa prior to my previous posts:
- Aperture on the mounted Jupiter-8 checks out fine.
- Shutter (checked with back open) opens and closes appropriately at all speeds
- Film advance works. I checked using the "sharpie-marked frame method" which -until now- I thought I had made up 😉

As far the Bessa's metering goes, I just set it and my Alpha 350 beside each other. They're pointing at the wall and set to the same ISO, shutter speed, etc.
Both meters read '0' so I guess that rules that out.

 

[Spleenrippa]

Or maybe he doesn't know how to operate a manual camera.

Power on, point camera whilst looking at LCD and hit the shutter. Duh 😀

 

[bmattock]

Power on, point camera whilst looking at LCD and hit the shutter. Duh 😀

OK, don't take this the wrong way, but are you setting the shutter speed and aperture correctly? The Bessa R has no autoexposure setting, so you have to adjust either the shutter speed or the aperture (or both) until you get the middle LED lit up in the viewfinder. Just pointing the camera while looking at the LED (not LCD) isn't going to set the shutter speed/f-stop correctly for you.

If you are, then sorry, just trying to help and it sounds a bit like you're not doing that.

 

[Al Kaplan]

I store my chemicals in 2 liter soda bottles. If you're not into drinking Coke or Pepsi then buy the store brand for 69 cents and just dump it down the drain! Cheap enough for a 2 liter bottle. They come with plastic caps and are about as air tight as you'd want ~ they have to resist the pressure of the carbonation if the bottle gets shaken a bit. Fill one bottle to the brim and put the rest in the second bottLe which is the one you use first.

 

[Spleenrippa]

OK, don't take this the wrong way, but are you setting the shutter speed and aperture correctly? The Bessa R has no autoexposure setting, so you have to adjust either the shutter speed or the aperture (or both) until you get the middle LED lit up in the viewfinder. Just pointing the camera while looking at the LED (not LCD) isn't going to set the shutter speed/f-stop correctly for you.

If you are, then sorry, just trying to help and it sounds a bit like you're not doing that.

Yeah, I know how to use a camera. I was just joking... It's okay, I never pull them off in real life either 😱