A Beginners Guide To Loving Holga

Holga, you’ve just started your little affair with this delightful black box! You don’t even know how to load 120 medium format film, and where is the view finder and how can you estimate the shot? And why on earth should I cover a new camera with scotch tape!?

If these kind of questions are filtering through your head, then this might be of help to you:

WHY A HOLGA?

It’s a toy.  Yes! I am a kid. Leave me alone and let me play.

Let the child inside run riot and you’ll never be quite the same again.  As a grown man (questionable) I glean a great sense of satisaction from pointing this rediculous lump of plastic at people, who actually, feel less threatened by what can only be viewed as a toy.

However, little do they know that inside lies a professional medium format film which, when used imaginatively, renders what can often be stunning, prize winning, photographic results.. supporting any view that it is the photographer (not that 5000 dollar Hasselblad) that really produces  pictures of character and depth: see award winning shot of Gore:

www.davidburnett.com

So what is this character of the Holga?

• The plastic lens and infamous light leaks produce vignettes; strangely etheral, retro pictures.
• Medium format negatives, considerably larger than 35mm ones, store professional standard saturated images
• It’s the most affordable way to get into medium format photography.
• You can produce square images, which is a real change from the traditional oblong photos of 2×3 or 3×4.
• It’s simplicity allows you to concentrate on composition rather than pixels. In fact it’s throw away feeling is part of its charm as you find yourself not thinking at all, or thinking so much more before you take a shot.
• It allows you to experiment with  multiple exposures effortlessly
• It’s light, surprisingly sturdy, and you don’t worry too much about losing it at $30, so you can take it everywhere and generally abuse it as much as you like.
• It’s so inexpensive and so easily replaced, you can modify,  tinker  and poke the thing without much worry.
• film schools have even adopted the camera for students
• it’s a conversation starter

I use a HOLGA 120 CFN which is a revamped model with built in flash and 3 colour gells (woohooo) and two speeds ‘N’ for day shots ‘B’ for long exposure shots at night for example.

Preparing Your Holga For The First Shoot

Get some tape an scissors before you do anything. Trust me, you’re going to grow in character and get some very rewarding photographs… just be patient..

The tape is to stop the light leaks in your camera. The camera will let light in so you need to run black tape along the borders of the camera back once you’ve loaded the film.  Gaffer tape is very good but can leave alot of residue behind so go with a black electricians tape – it’s clean and unobtrusive. Alot of Holga users thrive on the like leaks so you can decide what you want – loads of light, less light and if you want as little as possible, I’d actually paint the camera inside with a matt black paint as this reduces light flare dramatically.

FILM

The Holga takes 120 ‘medium format’

Your Holga comes with a plastic mask that produces a vertical rectangle format: 16 photos per roll, 4.5cm x 6cm (also known as “456” format). The mask is removable. If you would like to produce 6 x 6, remove the cap – pull and it will come off.

 Assuming that you stick with this format for your first roll.  Each roll of 120 is spooled onto a plastic spindle; your Holga comes with an empty take-up spindle that is on the right-hand when you open the back of the Holga. Load the film in subdued lighting as low as possible.

Tear the plastic wrapper protecting the film, break the paper seal (ring) holding the roll.  To load your camera, you need to notch the beginning of the film roll into the empty spindle,  insert the film spool in the left-hand compartment. Wind the film about half a turn and close the back.

Start cranking the winder:

you will see

• some arrows appear in the red window first
• keep cranking gently
• some dots may appear on certain films
• keep cranking
• the dots/arrows are guides
• keep cranking
• when you see #1 stop cranking
• you are in your first frame for shooting
• all preceding frames will be numbered
• shoot
• crank to next number you can see in the red frame

Which is the best film?

Highly debatable!

I would recommend ISO 400 for all round use but the nature of your Holga will pretty much decide the best results no matter what you put in there, so experiment.

So, you are now ready to shoot:

• take the lense cap off
• seal the sides with tape
• hit the streets

You will, sooner or later, leave the lense cap on (I did) and while you get used to working with the Holga you might like to get into the habit of alway winding on after you shoot. Make yourself do this to avoid wondering if you’wound on’ or not. You can multi expose on one frame, so again, unless that was your plan – train yourself to wind on after each shot…  you’re in the real world now and there is know clever digital chip thinking for you.

The focusing is simple (a guide if you like)

1. the first image is for close work 3 ft

2. the family for 6ft

3. the goup for 9 ft

4. the mountains for infinity

check out www.holgamods.com for advice on changing your specs on the Holga and more information on the camera.

 

Photographer: Prague

Photographer: Prague

 

adapting a Holga to 35mm

If you are feeling creative, patient, and want to try something new with your Holga, you can adapt it easily to use 35mm film. The images will be something special and include the roll perforations

There are some companies selling an adapting kit for about 12 dollars!! You don’t need it.

Basically, you need the following:

– some scotch tape (maybe some scotch for a drink too)
– scissors
– elastic bands (not 100% required)
– two pieces of foam you can find from that old box the DVD player came in for example
– a little patience
– stay in low light.

Ready to rock n roll.

1. set the two pieces of foam in your camera on the left above and below the film roll. Make sure they sit tightly and hold the cartridge roll in place. Make sure that the film has the pointed side down.
2. pull the film across to the feed roll.
3. you can attach the film to the roll with a piece of tape
4. if you want to make sure the film really does not move, then wrap elastic bands at the top and bottom of the take up roll.
5. once attached wind the film on untill it is tight, say one full turn.
6. seal the camera and close, if you keep your thumb against the back of the camera, you’ll feel the film moving.
7. seal the camera with tape to avoid light spill
8. you are now holding an adapted medium format camera 🙂
9. wind it on 34 clicks and you are ready for your fisrt shot

NOTE: the film will process the whole of the 35mm and will include the perforations, so expect a few bemused looks form the processor when your films come back.
The difficult part is trying to understand how many shots you will have and where each exposure will be. Stick with about 34 clicks on your winder. After each shot manually count 34 clicks to the next exposure. As a rule of thumb this should work and get you about 25 shots.

The fun is in the process. You might get something amazing, unique, and special… you might get zilch but try it and let me know how you go.

Merry Xmas..

 

 

Prague: a Photographers paradise

Prague: at the centre of Europe

City (pop., 2001 est.: 1,178,576), capital of the Czech Republic. Situated on both sides of the Vltava River, the site was settled as early as the 9th century AD. By the 14th century it was one of Europe’s leading cultural and trade centres. It was the focal point of opposition to the Habsburgs in the early 17th century (see Defenestration of Prague). The treaty ending the Austro-Prussian War was signed there in 1866. It became the capital of an independent Czechoslovakia in 1918. Prague was occupied by Germany during World War II and by the U.S.S.R. and other Warsaw Pact military forces in 1968 (see Prague Spring). In 1989 it was the centre of a movement that led to the peaceful overthrow of the communist government. Prague is the country’s major economic and cultural centre, famous for its music, literature, and architecture.

For more information on Prague, visit http://www.Britannica.com.

What I enjoy about prague are the cafes. Smokey, tastey and very relaxed where dogs and cats groom each other as people sway around oblivious of the extremities of British hygiene rules.. it really makes you feel like you’ve escaped the wrath of what has become the oppression of life style in England.. here.. you get this sense of living… no nannies pointing fingers at you and, frankly, eroding your civil rights at every turn.

The Czech people are not particularly friendly. I can’t help comparing my experiences with Russia and the Balkan states, and, I have to say, The Czech republic is not friendly (sorry) but it is still quite a nice place to be. You don’t have any anonimity here as the city is full of tourists and I, as many Czech people obviously do, try to avoid the tourists as much as possible. The city has become a pool of American and British.. the American’s walking dreamily, confident, that being in Prague will bring some sense of europe to them.. but it generally doesn’t 😉

So what to shoot here?

Charles Bridge? Church Of Our Lady? Dancing House? Golden Lane? Jewish Quarter? Klementinum? Mala Strana? Loreta? Old Town Hall? Old Town Clock?

The list goes on…. scrap them.. go and do something else:

Maybe like this:

Look up and you will see so many possibilities in Prague.