I recently came across a Kodak Single Use Camera called the “Zoom”. I don’t remember seeing one before. It had the film removed for processing, and it appears that the back is designed to fracture at a certain point to facilitate that happening. A deliberate weak spot to crack open. You can see below where I taped it up.
It also had a mechanism, not only to change between two focal lengths of lens, but also change viewfinder too. That’s a lot of design and mechanism to use just once and then throw I thought! The obvious thing to do was to pop another film in and re-use it. It is slightly mis-named of course as technically it doesn’t zoom at all, it offers a 32mm or 45mm lens. So Kodak “Twin” may have been a better name – however, I’m being nit picky! I loaded in a Kodak Gold 200 24 exposure film, which means, in the dark bag, rolling out the film onto a take up spool, so that as it is exposed, the camera winds it back into the cassette. I had another job to do first however, as that, by itself, wouldn’t work. You see the wind on is made by a jagged cog at the top, it’s directly under the wind on wheel. This meant I had to source an empty cassette from another previously used camera with said jaggedy edge, wind the film into that, and then, into the dark bag, pull it out again onto the feed spool, so that the camera would wind it back in again! Phew!
I made a couple of pictures from each spot, using either lens. I’m sure cost of manufacture must have been the deciding factor of the choice of lenses, but there isn’t much of a dramatic difference between 32mm and 45mm.
As you can see from the above image, the weather in these parts recently has not been conducive to going out and making photo’s. I haven’t really got started on any of the projects I had hoped for this year. In fact as I sit typing this, it’s raining again!
I wonder about the validity of making these cameras in 2023, by which I mean “single use cameras”. It seems like so much waste, and that’s just what one holds in ones hand. Then, add on the waste that happens in manufacture, and the energy used up. They are VERY wasteful. With so many second hand cameras around, that are re-useable, most of which would out perform any plastic lens. I hope that as we all try to become a little greener, things might sway…. While I’m on that rant – I still can’t figure why a 35mm film needs to be packed in a plastic pot, while a 120 film doesn’t! Now for a little crochet 🙂
S.H.O.U.T. 