Does anyone know anything about old manual cameras and how to work them?

Question

I have a 60 year old Zeiss Ikon camera and am having a hard time figuring out the settings for the amount of light to let in.

Answer 1

Read about aperature settings and film speed ratings

Answer 2

Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth and Ikon rangefinders were the pinacle of technology, photographers used the 'sunny 16' rule of thumb. This states that on a sunny day, just set the aperture to f/16 and use a shutter speed that's the reciprocal of the film speed. So for ISO 100 film, use 1/100th second. For ISO 200 film, use 1/200th. And in poor light use a longer shutter time (duh). If you do the math correctly, are generally lucky, and if the planets are aligned just so, you're bound to get a proper exposure.
That's the easy bit. The tricky part is understanding the relationship between aperture and shutter speed.
Sometimes you want to blow the background out of focus and that's just not going to happen with f/16. So what do you do? You open up the lens a few stops. When you change the aperture ring from f/16 to f/11, that's one stop. From f/11 to f/8 is another stop. From there, you go on to f/5.6, f/4, f/2.8 and with fast lenses to f/2, f/1.4 and f/1. You can also stop the lens down. From f/16, you'd go to f/22, f/32 and with some lenses even to f/44 and f/64.
Every click on the aperture dial is called one stop.
When the number you select on the aperture dial is very small, you'll get very little in focus (apart form you subject) and you can use a fast shutter speed.
And when the aperture number is very large, you'll get a lot (of background) in focus, but you'll have to use a slow shutter speed.
Here's the math.... with every stop that you open the lens up, you can cut the shutter speed in half. So if you needed 1/100th of a second at f/16, you'll get the same exposure with 1/200th of a second at f/11. And also with 1/400th at f/8. And with 1/800th at f/5.6.
If you open the lens up but don't compensate the shutter speed, you will over expose the picture.
This concept can be pretty hard to grasp, but once you 'get it', it becomes intuitive.
For more on the sunny-16 rule, try this site: http://medfmt.8k.com/mf/sunny.html (you might want to put on some shades before you click that - he chose a radio active blue background.)
For some Zeis Ikon history, try this: http://johnlind.tripod.com/zi/zeissikontext.html
Best wishes!

Answer 3

Don't worry it's not so hard. There are only 3 things you can do to modify the amount of light hitting the film (the "exposure"):

1. The aperture (or f/stop). This controls how big the opening of the lens is, you should see settings like f/2, f/2.8, f/4, f5.6, etc. Remember that the bigger the number the smaller the opening and the less light you're letting in. And with each bigger number you're letting in half as much light.

2. The shutter speed. This controls how long the shutter will be open. You should see settings like 30, 60, 100, 250, etc.. which stand for 1/30 of a sec, 1/60 of a sec, etc. So the larger the number, the shorter the time the shutter is open and again the less light you're letting in (again half as much light).

3. Your film speed! OK, this doesn't really control the amount of light you're letting in, but it allows you to control how much light you need to let in. ISO 100 film needs more light than ISO 400. Remember that doubling the film speed (from 100 to 200, for example) means you only need half as much light. On older cameras you may find you "run out" of shutter speed or f/stops (you might not have speeds more than 1/500 or 1/1000 sec) so picking the right film for light conditions is important.

The important thing to remember is that you control things with (1) and (2): if you make the lens opening (aperture) smaller (bigger f/stop number like f/16 as opposed to f/5.6) you need to make the shutter stay open longer to get the same amount of light on the film and vice versa. Makes sense, right? So, many combinations will give you the same exposure. How to pick a good one? Generally, a faster shutter speed means your subject will blur less due to movement (camera shake due to jittery hands, etc.) and a smaller lens opening gives you more "depth of field" which on a manual camera can make getting proper focus easier. You see that these two work against each other, so you need to find a good compromise given how much light you have.

Which brings us to the main problem. How do you find out how much light you have? You've already got some good suggestions such as the Sunny/16 rule and some film boxes still print "suggested settings" on them. Of course, the most accurate way is with a lightmeter if you have access to one (you probably do but don't realize it): any modern camera will have a built-in lightmeter!

You can use a small digicam as your lightmeter, set the ISO setting on your camera to the same as your film (say, 200) and see what shutter speed and aperture settings it suggests. Then if you need, say a faster shutter speed, just remember that every time you use one shutter speed setting faster (going from 60 to 100), you need to use one aperture opening larger (going from 5.6 to 4, for example).

I realize that it might seem strange to carry a digicam in order to use your old Zeiss, but it's a good way to: (1) get a "feel" for what settings to use (how to apply sunny/16 when it's a bit overcast etc.) which in the old days people learned through "experience", meaning lots of bad photos! and (2) to verify that your old camera is actually calibrated and functioning correctly. It is 60 years old after all and the settings may no longer be as accurate as when it was new...

With these basics, hopefully you'll be able to have some fun shooting photos the "old school" way, and when people comment on how smart you are for being able to do that only you'll know how simple it really is... :-)

Answer 4

Carefully read the inserts included with the roll of film you buy. It will have recommendations for settings of f-stop and exposure time for given light situations. Log your exposures, and if the picture is important, bracket a step above and below the recommended settings.

After using it for a while, you'll learn what settings work best for each light level, and you'll take better pictures. Your log of settings will help you to understand just how to set the camera.

Answer 5

A good starting guide is the "sunny 16" rule. Set your shutter speed at the reciprocal of your film speed. So if you use 200 speed film, use 1/200 or whatever is closest. Then for full sun, set the aperture to f16. Go up a stop for your aperture for snow or bright beach shots. Go down one for partly sunny, down two for overcast, three for full shade.

Answer 6

Get yourself a light meter and a good book on conventional photography.