Here you go, my 2 first prints.



Notice the water mark... DOH! missed that. This experiment didn't work very well, plus I got the DOF wrong. Film is Hard...
Oh, btw, look at those arms... Noob! I have to work on my shooting stance.



I like this one, although it doesn't really gain anything with B&W.
Dunno what that white mark up there... I hope its water again.
More lessons learned:
ISO 400 is too noisy, and way too much speed than necessary for these. I got it because of Edinburgh's weather, but luckily most days lately have been sunny.
The Uni's scanner is c**p.

Good things: No clear problems with exposure, so the MX seems to be working fine.

I have maybe 2 or 3 other prints to make out of that roll.

Having the resources of the Photog. society really helps. It makes shooting film much cheaper. Its also quite fun, although you are risking the results at least in the beginning...

Yesterday, and I was a little nervous.

I'm talking about developing film in the darkroom, of course.
I had a friend from the Photog society explaining again the procedure, but I did everything by myself. It went ok... Unfortunately there were a few glitches.
The practice runs of getting the film into the coil went fine, but for the real deal, it got all tangled up...
I had the chemicals all prepared, but forgot to align them in the proper order...
DOH!
So developer > fixer > stopper > fixer was the actual procedure... Needless to say the negatives got a bit overdeveloped...

Still... No blacked out roll so I'm still happy.

Today I went back in and made two prints (do you call it prints?) Which turned out ok, one has a water mark which I hadn't noticed in the negative (I didn't use the pincers because they were causing probs for my friend).

I'll see if I can scan them tomorrow and I'll show you the results.

BTW, these were negatives of Ilford HP5 400 on the MX (MX 1 for those following my MXs dilema).

Besides the obvious lesson regarding the mess I mention above, it was really good because now I'll do it again much more relaxed.

So YOU won it. I had it on watch, but no money

This is now on ebay.

There are always genetic aberrations... You're right hefty1, its hard to find others, the following bodies, although keeping the the distorted prism casing which I don't like starts to look much better.

Any of the SF series bodies.

What about you, which is in your opinion the ugliest Pentax?

Ok, maybe I'm over dramatizing but I do need to decide which one of the MXs to sell and which one to keep.

What I really need to know is an approximate value of each body.
If there's a significant difference, then I'll keep the worst cosmetically.

Pentax MX 1
















I got this better picture of the line I talked about in the other thread.
The second MX has a line as well, same place, its thinner than a hair and isn't dark like this one. This seems to have dirt in the line (?). I couldn't focus on the other MX, but if you can see the thin line in this pic between the blacks dots, that's how the other line looks like.
This line isn't a problem because you focus your eye on the focus screen, but you do see it when you take your eye to the viewfinder. This does not happen with the second MX, you really have to look for it.

Pentax MX 2





















Please take into account the camera would be supplied with this tatty case:


One of a variety of straps, original and not (including one commemorative, says Pentax 10 million). A remote shutter cord, the viewfinder cover (if I can find it ), a body cap and an old viewfinder hood thingy (curved which isn't very nice for my glasses).

I currently have a roll of film in MX 1, it has been working fine. I'm gonna develop it today.
They both work perfectly mechanically as far as I can see. I have not timed the shutter to make sure it is working properly, and I the exposure meter, although responsive will only be assured working after I develop the film.
Cosmetics and the line problem are the differences between these cameras, both have been resealed, both have clean battery compartments and will be supplied with batteries.

If you have accompanied my "Praise for the MX" thread you know almost as much about these two cameras as I do.

So, what say you of the two cameras?*

*I know you guys are honest and wont low ball me to buy it cheap, right?

Price dropped.

If the situation/subject permits it, you can use the in-camera multiexposure.
I've used it in my K10D and it works quite well for say... a stream or waterfall.
Nonetheless an ND is a great tool to have.