Halina Paulette EE II Film Camera - Adox CMS 20 II Pro Film

The best of the sorry bunch that I call photographs taken with Halina, or maybe the second best or the third best or the... you know. So hard to choose when they are all so bloody good. Anyway, this is the sharpest.

Yet another "quality" camera that I've purchased with under 20 euros. Yes, that's my limit nowadays. First it was 10 euros, now it is 20 euros. And if the same pattern continues, by the year 2030 it'll be approximately... 40....ish thousand euros. Give or take.

Uh, I better get a second job.

The Halina Paulette EE II is a viewfinder camera for 35mm film. It has a Halinar Anastigmat 45mm f2.8 lens in a leaf shutter speeded from 1/30s to 1/250s with flash sync via both hot shoe and PC socket. It has a built-in uncoupled selenium photometer, reading Light Values, which are set via a window on the lens controlled by the aperture, film speed and shutter rings. It was made by Haking in Hong Kong.

http://camera-wiki.org/wiki/Halina_Paulette_EE_II

Dust, dust, dust. Everywhere dust. I think the camera bag creates most of the dust on the camera.

Fun fact, hali is a Finnish word and it means a cuddle. Halinalle on the other hand (two words, hali and nalle) is the Finnish equivalent for care bear. So although some of the reviews of Halina Paulette that I've found from the depths of the internet, aren't actually very flattering, the word Halina gives me a somewhat warm and fuzzy feeling. So it may be crappy, but lovable. Just the way I like things. Wouldn't want things to be perfect anyway.

Lightweight and looks like a toy. Super! I glued the camera bag so it wouldn't look so... shabby and homeless because it's not. Not anymore. I gave it a home.

That awesome 70's design.

Finally I know what those decoration stones are for. To keep the rolling leather or leatherette down after gluing.

A tiny plastic part missing there from the hinge but as the back cover seems to stay put and work just fine it's not a big thing.

As it happens, the camera all ready had a film in it. It was half way filmed and I decided that I'm going to use it. So of to the dark closet I went, rolled the film back to the cassette (almost all of it) and started the film again.

Off to shoot with it and then took it to be developed and...

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Nothing.

Absolutely nothing.
_Empty.

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My film developer guy did warn me not to get my hopes up because if not stored correctly, in cold, old color films tend to go bad. And of course there was the fact that the camera perhaps had been opened several times in the flea market where I bought it. The same mistake that I did at home but as I though that it wasn't that bright when I opened it and as about half of the film was still inside the cassette then maybe... perhaps... there could be a slight chance... but no. Nothing.

So I tried with a fresh film. An unexposed one.

I should warn you that most of the photos are underexposed. (If you're like... the kind of person who easily goes insane or mad if you see dark photos because everything needs to be white and bright and whitebright and brightwhite and all that.) I also seem to have a slight tilting problem when photographing with Halina. And also I could have pointed the camera perhaps a little more up than down. More sky, less ground. But as usual I've done nothing to the photos. Few of them might be better if post-processed but as I mostly want to know what kind of results does this camera and this film give in different conditions, I'll leave them be and show you the photos as they are. As the photos came from my film provider. Developed and scanned in www.photostella.fi.

The camera has an exposure meter and as it seemed to work, I followed it and did what it told me to do. _{(Follow your master, the Exposure Meter)} The meter and the method is actually really simple and genius. The meter measures the light, pointer in the meter points a number and then you choose the shutter or the aperture and then turn the other one so that the number in the lens is the same number that the light meter points. If it goes over scale, too dark or too light, you adjust both again until you get the same number as in the exposure meter scale. If you're lucky and you have just the right amount of light (also thinking about the film ISO) you have more than one combination to choose from. Faster shutter, smaller aperture, which ever you think is better in the current situation which hopefully has not yet passed as you were adjusting your camera and thinking that does the exposure meter pointer point the same number when you look through the viewfinder and when you carefully look at the meter trying to point the camera to the same direction as it points when you're taking the picture.

Yeah. That surely is how the world works. When you notice a moment worth taking a picture of, the WHOLE WORLD STOPS AND WAITS FOR YOU TO ADJUST YOUR CAMERA.

Sure.

I chose this photo to be the best because it's sharp. And it's not underexposed. And it doesn't have too much of that dark grey layer that I would rather being more black than grey. I'm not sure if the lack of contrast is because of the film or the camera but I'm thinking it's the camera.

Then again as I'm not sure, this is the first time I've photographed with Adox 20 ISO and also my first time photographing with Halina, I know more after I've taken my Halina for a second ride with some other film in it. And I also already bought more Adox CMS 20 film so that I can try it in a different camera. So some day I have pictures to compare these with.

I could have chosen the best photo to be one of these four. Top row on the right. A photo facing directly to the sun. My favorite way to take pictures.

I also could have chosen this one to be the best photo. I really like the composition but there's the dark grey layer again. Perhaps it's the sun coming from just the right direction and Halinas lens just is so crappy that it handles it this way. Again this can be easily fixed, just little more contrast, but I'll save those pictures to Instagram. Or to some other post where I need random photos to give tiny breaks in between my rant, prattle and twaddling.

On the right photo there's the same bush as in the Balda Baldixette post. I think Baldixette did a better job. In being interresting.

These pictures are from the same trip where I also had my ZIAG with me. As you can see, there wasn't enough light for ISO 20 film. Or would have been if I only would have caught any of the tiny moments when the light coming behind the passing trees and inside the tram windows nicely light every other bench row all the way from the back of the tram to the first cart. But I didn't. Lots of dark photos and this one.

The tram photo outside could have also been the best one as it's sharp, but unfortunately a little too dark and I hate that it's not straight or tilted a bit more.

This one is actually my favorite photo. And it would have been the best photo also if it wasn't so underexposed. This is like the little girl photographed with ZIAG. A tiny moment of someones life, taken really quickly, me sitting inside the tram.

This could have been it. But it isn't. If you want to see these same photos after post-processing, you can see them in Instagram. I'll be posting the slightly better versions over there over the next days. And I'm just saying that these pictures are so much better after few tweaks. But don't believe me, check them out yourself.

https://www.instagram.com/insaneworks

What did all this cost me?
Halina Paulette EE II: 18€
Adox CMS 20 II Pro: 6,90€
Film developing: 9,90€ _{^{(The film that had nothing in it.)}}
Film developing: 14,90€
Film scanning to TIFF: 10€

When I got into old film cameras (read: when something snapped in my head) I thought that I'm going to buy only cheap ones and that the purpose is also to take pictures with the cameras. Not only collect them and sure as hell I'm not going to buy anything else related to cameras.

Oh well, that promise is broken now. But in my defense, the flash cost only 2 euros and the very moment when I decided to buy it was when I looked inside. It had this adorable battery inside that looks like a tiny oil canister! I mean, is that an accessory for Mana or what?! And it still had 0.2 V left in it! Not worth liking but sure is worth saving. Such a cutie.

_{(Besides, incredibly hard to lick properly.)}

Here's all my film but not all my cameras.

Such a huge problem, which camera and film should I make a match this time? Kodak Junior isn't ready to be paired yet and Yashica FX3 actually has a Babylon 13 film in it. I just wanted to include them in my group photo.

Now I finally know why some fridges have those small boxes with lids. Those are really convenient in holding all the film inside the fridge when you open the door.

Until next time my dear camera fans and others equally important who are just here to read my pointless babblings!

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_{Film cameras
Balda-Bünde Baldixette
1
Closter C63
1
Cosina Flash 35E
1, 2, 3
Felica
1, 2, 3
Kodak Box 620
1, 2
Kodak Brownie Six-20 Model C
1
ZIAG Colora F
1}

_{Digital cameras
Sony A6400, 16-50mm
1
Sony A6400, Laowa 25mm f2.8
1
Comparison: Sony A6400, Canon EOS 550D, Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ7, Sony Cyber-shot DSC-P32, Canon PowerShot A550
1, 2}