Kodak Brownie Holiday: Ultimate Point & Shoot

[raftman]

I bought one of these at a garage for $1, and it really is neat. No focus (the manual says everything farther out than 5 feet should be relatively in-focus), no aperture adjustment, the shutter is single-speed (my guess either 1/30 or maybe 1/60), its only controls are the shutter release and the advance knob. It takes 127 film and seems like a fun camera, even though I haven't been able to use iot yet because I've not been able to get the film for it.

I was wondering, who else owns this camera or one like it (I understand there were quite a few cameras that were a lot like this one) and how have the results been? I know it's probably foolish to expect great things, but I never know...

 

[dmr]

The big B&H print catalog still lists 127 film. It's not cheap.

My very first camera of my own was a Brownie Starflash, same vintage as yours I'm sure, but had a built-in flash. Mine had a 2-position aperture setting, one for "color" and one for "B&W". IIRC, it was like 1/60 or 1/50.

As for results, I guess my results were typical for an 8 year old enthusiastic amateur photographer. 🙂

 

[Trius]

The first camera I had of my very own, was a Brownie Bullet, which I think was the same as the Holiday in different livery. Indeed it was fun ... so simple to use, and I actually got some good shots from it.

 

[nemjo]

Hi,
I thought this old fellow to be at least simple.
But hey, it's a real high-tech with it's three step aperture, manual and T timer...

Cheers,

nemjo

 

[varjag]

But.. it has a red dot!

 

[vodid]

I've got a couple o' these hangin' around, but I've never used one. I started out on an Argus 75 twin lens reflex camera when I was about six years old, and I have some pretty nice photos from that camera that i took in 1959-1960, when I was about twelve years old.

 

[triplefinger]

http://www.jandcphoto.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=185

FYI. 127 film!!

 

[raftman]

Heh, too bad they don't have any in stock.

 

[filmgoerjuan]

I got a Kodak Holiday Brownie recently, but the shutter wasn't firing. Had to unscrew the front part and reseat one of the little levers to get it to fire. I haven't run any film through it yet, though next time I order from Freestyle Photo, I'll have to add a couple of rolls of Efke 100 in 127 format (seems to be in stock).

There was an exposed roll of Kodacolor film already in the camera; it's C-22 process, so it's gotta be from sometime in the 60s to early 70s. Kind of a shame that it's C-22 as I'm loathe to spend $30+ to get it processed at one of the few speciality processing places (if the camera came from my family I'd definitely pay the money to try to retrieve the shots). I suppose I might be able to process it myself in B&W chemicals, but haven't been able to find any reference times.

If you want to cut your own 127 film (assuming you have or can get the proper reels), you can use a junker 120 camera to cut the film down to size: one person's version (scroll down the page)