I got a pair of Holga cameras for Christmas that I’ve been messing with. They are cheap plastic cameras made in China. They are widely loved in the artsy crowd for their many idiosyncracies:

• The plastic lens gives soft images around the edges, and sorta sharp images in the middle
• They take medium format film, which makes for big honkin negatives
• they frequently leak light, giving some interesting effects, whether you want them or not
• there is no real control of the aperture, despite having 2 apparently different settings, which it turns out are meaningless!
• the shutter speed is not adjustable, it’s in the 1/100th of a second range, more or less
• The focus has 4 differnet settings, but you can’t preview what you are actually focusing on. Technically this is a rangefinder camera. Technically
• They are incredibly low priced, mess with them if you want. If you really, really mess up, you haven’t lost a lot

All this stuff means the camera is fun, and part of the process. Really, all you can do is be in the right place, see something interesting and take the shot! See what happens. You’re embracing pseudo randomness!

In that spirit, some folks have figured out that you can use 35mm film in the camera by using foam to wedge the cannister where the regular film is supposed to fit. They also figured out your photo could include the sprockets if you wanted. Of course you want to, this is a Holga! Here are some images I did yesterday.
It was funny, the clerk at Scam’s club apologized because they all came out wrong. Technically there are a bunch of “issues”, but, this ain’t Kansas anymore! Here are 2 of many images to come. I need to figure out how to use the scanner software better, and faster!

Way up top is a close up of Peaches in the snow. I love the part of the image that’s in the sprocket area! That square reddish thing is the film counter window that wasn’t sealed enough with some gaffer tape. Next time I’ll add some aluminum foil under the tape to make sure this much light doesn’t get through.

The bird feeder in the back yard. You can see the film details here, this is Kodak 400 speed film.