EEVblog #816 - Chinon Film Camera Teardown

[EEVblog]

Find out what 20th century camera technology was like.
Inside a Chinon Genesis II
http://www.butkus.org/chinon/chinon/genesis_ii/chinon_genisis_ii.pdf

[hamdi.tn]

it look like assembly nightmare to me

[Mashpriborintorg]

I already took apart dozens, if not hundreds of films cameras. Solder bridges on flex PCBs are really a common thing. The worst to take apart I can remember of are  Olympus OM-10, insanely complicated and tedious. On the other side, I repaired a Ricoh KR-10 someday, it was a pleasure to work on this one, really simple and well made.

[@rt]

I pulled apart a cheap Canon Powershot that looked the same.
Got zapped by the flash capacitor and then zapped again I did!
Do all these videos make it to Podcast?

[G7PSK]

Thing is those "memory cards" which were more tapes than cards will last a hundred years or more, not sure that SD cards will. My father has some amorphous  silicon analogue storage cards from the early 20th century that are still holding their data after more than a hundred years.

[Jr460]

I still have a bunch of those film devices, and film at home.  They still work great.  I also have a few DLSRs. 

Don't worry about the body so much, it is just a light tight box to hold the film/sensor.  Invest in the glass.

BTW, I saw them in a few shots, but Dave missed pointing out the contacts that read the DX codes from the film can.

The question about the view finder and full frame or not.   I can tell you it is not close to full frame.  Above the the mirror you need a pentaprism to flip the image correctly, not a mirror.  For close to full frame in the view finder, these prisms start to become large and heavy.  I know Nikon gear, from what is published and from using it, consumer cameras the viewfinder shows about 75% of the frame, prosumer models 80 to 90%, the flagship pro models, 95 to 97%. 

To consumer cameras, they don't expect you to really watch your framing well, so if you are slightly off, you don't cut off half of someones head.  A pro, at least one should, checks the edges of the frame along with a bunch of other things.  That is why you can give a pro a crappy point and shoot camera and you still like their shots.  They know how to frame, they have the eye for it.

I would have liked to see it in operation for a bit before it got opened up.  How fast was the autofocus, and the shutter lag.

My biggest issue with the low end cameras, and a few pros I know have the same issue, is the shutter lag.  For a shot when everyone is standing still and you have time, the delay is not a big deal.  Any other time, I want the camera to fire when I push the button.  I don't want it to think about the focus at that time, or give a short blast of flash to anti-redeye.  Just try to get a good shot of a person talking, and they have to look down at notes.  Timing when they look up and out and don't look the other way, or have their mouth open in an silly way, is a lot of fun.

[max666]

Thing is those "memory cards" which were more tapes than cards will last a hundred years or more, not sure that SD cards will. My father has some amorphous  silicon analogue storage cards from the early 20th century that are still holding their data after more than a hundred years.

I don't know if a polyester film, with a bunch of emulsion layers each containing a buttload of chemicals, will last "a hundred years or more". Of course transistor based flash storage won't retain it's charge, in the floating gates, for hundred years either, but at least I can rewrite it every couple of years without loss.

[Kostas]

Thing is those "memory cards" which were more tapes than cards will last a hundred years or more, not sure that SD cards will. My father has some amorphous  silicon analogue storage cards from the early 20th century that are still holding their data after more than a hundred years.

I don't know if a polyester film, with a bunch of emulsion layers each containing a buttload of chemicals, will last "a hundred years or more". Of course transistor based flash storage won't retain it's charge, in the floating gates, for hundred years either, but at least I can rewrite it every couple of years without loss.

How much it will last depends on many factors. Surely, the kind of film is the first signifficant factor. Old school black and white film will last a lot. You see, the image is formed by silver, which is an effective fungicide. This ensures that the emulsion layer, based on gelatine, will not be attacked by germs. The metalic silver itself can last as is, but by using a typical sepia toner, and turning it to silver silfide, it can become even more stable. Some of the microfilms used for archiving have a stated life expectancy of 500 years, when properly processed. These have a polyester base, a triacetate base would have quite smaller life expectancy.

Now, colour media (negative and positive films) are quite different. They don't retain any of the silver used, the image is formed by dyes and don't have that great life expectancy. These dyes can fade after decades, but a lot of the fading is due to improper processing (a lab cutting costs). Normally, they wouldn't be attacked by fungi, the last processing step (final rinse) uses a biocide to take care of that. Of course, all of these films will last long if stored in reasonable conditions, ie not too humid and relatively normal temperature.

Finally, all of them can be "read" without very sophisticated equipment. A film can be scanned quite effectively by a digital camera with a macro lens. Even deteriorated colour films can be salvaged with digital processing and get very good results.