My my my Mamiya

Diamond Bar, California, 60 Freeway, Mamiya-Six, f22, 1/500, Fujifilm Neopan 400, expired 6/11

This is the first time I have written about the Mamiya-Six.  This will probably be the last.

This is not the same Mamiya 6 that is popular among film enthusiasts.  This is a Classic Mamiya-Six folder camera.  It looks better and definitely retro vintage certifiable.  Because it's a folding camera, one can pocket it in a large coat.  A nice feature if you travel a lot.  It uses 120 film roll so the resolution beats my Canon 5d and 60d.  In a good working condition, this camera can take fabulous images. 

A segue:  Back in the 70's, the only camera I could afford was a Diana. Anyone using a Mamiya was considered pro.  (It's like playing a Gibson Les Paul instead of that copycat mongrel.)  I've never used it back then so I always dreamed of owning one.  Thirty odd  some years later, I got my hand on a Mamiya.  I was stoked.

My Mamiya-Six is temperamental.  The pictures on my first roll were all blurry.  That indicated to me that the rangefinder didn't work.   So on my next roll, I decided I was going to focus to infinity for all my shots.  The result is the image above.  Nice one, huh?  Doesn't that look like Northern Europe like Scotland or somewhere?  Fooled you... that was shot on top of the roof of my office building (Diamond Bar, California).  Pretty retro and creamy shadows and highlights.  And this was using an expired film.

But... The problem was this was the only shot that came out in that roll.  I think the shutter probably didn't work on the rest of the shots.  My wife assured me that it was worth it.  I'm not sure if I want to shoot with this camera again.  It's great when it works.  But I'm not sure when it will.  This is why I think that this will be the last time I will write about this camera.

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