Agfa Iso Rapid I
12 29 Share TweetAs simple as it gets: The Agfa Iso Rapid I was a real beginner camera during its time with not a lot of controls to fiddle around and dirt cheap. For only 42 Marks, one got a modern 35mm Camera with Rapid Cartridges.
…well, Rapid Cartridges. Inserting the film should have been easy and fast these days in 1966 since loading film seamed an of the most difficult parts of photography. Well well, Rapid Cartridges. That´s where the trouble starts nowadays. As you may have guessed right, Rapid Cartridges are no longer manufactured. But since we lomographers tried everything from 35mm to 120, and 110 film formats, Rapid Cartridges bear no horror for us. Not if you, like I did, find a Agfa Iso Rapid at the flea market complete with both cartridges. There’s been a film in it too. After developing it looked like this:
Rapid Cartridges bear normal 35mm flim, in fact. You just need to of them and only have to feed them with film just like that:
Originally there have been 16 24×24mm exposures in one cartridge, if you load it by yourself you should get about 24 exposures. When you shot 16 photos you need to open ten back of the camera just a little, best done in the dark or under your coat, to reset the counter or you can´t take more photos.
After this free tipster I want to tell you some details about the camera.
The Agfa Iso Rapid I sports a 42.5mm lens with a fixed aperture of 8.5 and a shutter capable of two times: 1/40 second for clouded weather and flash an 1/80 second for sunny weather. Everything fixed-focus.
Nothing special here. Special is that the photos are square.
The Iso Rapid is handles like your average point-and-shoot camera: point, shoot, transport film and cock the shutter via a thumb-wheel. The photos come out really lo-hi: a bit blurred due to the long exposure times, soft focused due to the inferior lens.
My Iso Rapid 1 got its 15 minutes of fame at the wedding of a 50ties and rock´n´roll loving friend as a good looking and functional accessory to my girlfriend’s outfit:
It looked great with her dress and I wasn’t the only one taking photos.
So don’t be afraid of Rapid Cartridges, just have a look inside and if you see two: Buy it!
written by zark on 2011-08-19 #gear #people #review #lomography #zark #film-camera #user-review #1966 #agfa-iso-rapid #partone #fixfocus
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