Matus
Well-known
OK guys - here is what I have learned (finally) after about 30 rolls shot and developed. It may be trivial to many, it was not to me.
When you load the film in the camera - the is a sign up to which you should load the film (every 120 film has this double sided long arrow) BEFORE you close the camera. Well - I usually stopped 1 - 2 cm sooner as that was where the loading stroke would stop.
The result was - I was missing a bit of first image after I got my films back from the lab. So I gave them a call and they told me that the film is cut with scissors from the paper backing (in the dark of course) and if the first image is too close to the gluing point (it definitely was - I have seen it with my BW films) than it may happen that it will get cut. In any case they apologized and ask that with my next order I will include one example of this problem - which I did. - I just got my next 3 films back and one is missing like 1/2 of the first frame. The also send back a message telling me that I should load the film a bit more before closing the camera.
Only this made me realize that my modern electronic wonder camera - contrary to 50 years old Rolleiflex T - does NOT know where the film starts. So if you load the film too little it will start exposing too soon.
This is of course no problem - one just has to load the film as described in the manual. Period.
End of the story
When you load the film in the camera - the is a sign up to which you should load the film (every 120 film has this double sided long arrow) BEFORE you close the camera. Well - I usually stopped 1 - 2 cm sooner as that was where the loading stroke would stop.
The result was - I was missing a bit of first image after I got my films back from the lab. So I gave them a call and they told me that the film is cut with scissors from the paper backing (in the dark of course) and if the first image is too close to the gluing point (it definitely was - I have seen it with my BW films) than it may happen that it will get cut. In any case they apologized and ask that with my next order I will include one example of this problem - which I did. - I just got my next 3 films back and one is missing like 1/2 of the first frame. The also send back a message telling me that I should load the film a bit more before closing the camera.
Only this made me realize that my modern electronic wonder camera - contrary to 50 years old Rolleiflex T - does NOT know where the film starts. So if you load the film too little it will start exposing too soon.
This is of course no problem - one just has to load the film as described in the manual. Period.
End of the story
tj01
Well-known
Took 30 to discover this ! Anyway, been there done that. Thanks for the rant
thegman
Veteran
I got this wrong in my Mamiya 7 on the first roll, but never since. I moved onto Hasselblad after the Mamiya and before loading a single film, I found some videos on YouTube showing how to load. I expect you can find the same for just about any camera.