Andrew Jacombs' photostream

Those letters were originally a lot closer to the water.

Twas all good; it seemed.

Twas in fact, not all good.

It was almost all set up, was but a a few letters away from the end. When a wave came much further ashore than any prior waves had dared. Knocked all the letters over. Frustrating, but not too big a deal.

Much worse than the letters being knocked over, was that the same wave had also washed right over a nearby rock. A rock which was being used as a convenient place to place objects too important to put on the sand. Where they might get wet. Camera. Light meter. Tape measure. Yes, in a comicly ironic turn of events, the wave washed right over the rock, breifly submerging and then rolling along the sand, among other things, the camera.

Thankfully, the hardily built Lubitel – little more than a light tight box – is seemingly somewhat water tight as well. No moisture made its way into the film chamber, the aperture can be adjusted, and the shutter fires fine. The controls to change shutter speed and aperture are a bit stiff, but that seems to be the only damage. Which i reckon is pretty damn awesome.

Angus; you have freaky toes.

Composing the frame – I believe the first – through the (terrible) viewfinder of the Lubitel.

Here is a photo of the viewfinder of a Lubitel. The central circle is the 'ground glass' part, i.e. the bit with which you can determine the focus of the image. It's bad enough that you can only use this central portion to determine focus. But on top of that, this central circle is in fact absolutely rubbish at it's job. Like abysmally bad. Like you can barely notice any change. It's dark, and foggy, and pretty much just utter bollocks.

As frustrating as this is, it does have one excellent side effect. It promotes (ensures) the use of a very laid back, "she'll be right" approach to shooting. Which is awesome. And realistically, the depth of field at f/16 – which i was shooting at most of the time – is deep enough that is difficult to not get something in focus.

And really, one does not use a Lubitel expecting a quality camera. So while the viewfinder sucks, the style of shooting that results does not. And on the whole, its a charming wee camera. Which produces beautiful images. Which is really all that matters.

I assure you this photo was not posed. I am however aware that it really really looks like it was posed. You'll just have to take my word for it =).