OMGosh do I ever love my old camera collection, but unfortunately my desire for instant gratification, coupled with my lack of desire to spend money on film and processing, (and lets not even get to the issue with the envionment-chemicals are such a bummer)… I have pretty much neglected them. They now populate a spot in my basement, and they have done nothing for like 20 years.
But now that can be over! I found this little gem on the internets and gives me some hope that maybe those cameras, or at least the glass will be utilized. See, when digital was just becoming a thing, I was graduating from college with a soon to be useless degree in commercial, analog, film photography. I was totally broke with a very sweet Toyo GX yaw free 4x5 and a bunch of other stuff, but all anyone wanted was digital.
I always wished there was a digital thingy you could stuff into a camera, maybe shaped like a roll of film so you could take digital shots with your Holga, or Lomo, or maybe that Russian made CMEHA camera with a plastic lens. Well maybe you can, and someone tried to do that. Well kinda like that.
Check out this vid below by Becca Farsace telling the story about her build of a Raspberry Pi camera with the c mount lenses:
Well…it sounds like its not quite ready for prime time but I’m sure some nerd will get the code right sometime in the future, and who knows what will be possible then? My C-Mount lenses might have a purpose after all. My strange cameras with weird glass might be coming back out. Maybe I can even dig out the old enlarger lenses I saved for who know what reason.
Maybe some interesting light leaks and distortions too. None of that crappy instagram fake stuff for me!
Stay tuned!