Just bought my first Brownie yesterday and am about to load my first roll of film.

But I'm dying to know more about the autographic feature. Using modern standard 120 film Kodak VC or whatever, will I be able to get an impression with the stylus?

Doesn't that opening and the flap leave you open to light leaks? I usally use a Holga and my approach is to mummify it with gaffers tape. Same approach here with the autographic window and "light safe" film advance window?

-- lknowles (shnarfer@hotmail.com), November 05, 2001

Answers

It seems as though you would suffer light leaks if you opened the autographic door. Autographic film, if memory serves me correctly, had an extra layer of paper in the roll that provided some kind of shield for light while allowing the user to scribe information onto the film. I don't know what additional qualities the film itself had.

If your camera has a swingout type window cover, that should suffice for protection, if you wind the film on in the shade.

How you do it is up to you, but I would mask the autographic door from the inside of the camera with heavy black paper and gaffer's tape, so the camera would still have some cosmetic attractiveness.

-- Pete Lutz (mariner8378@hotmail.com), November 08, 2001.