Lost Photos

the Diana Baby 110 - always the forgotten child in my repertoire of Lomography camera. granted, it is a Diana camera, and my feelings re: this particular camera tend to sway towards the negative spectrum on most days when i add it to my arsenal. still, it occupies a space in my bookshelf, with at least one roll of 110 film left to expose. my first exploratory roll was met with mixed results, and my second roll mostly reflects how i initially felt about the camera. it took me a little bit more than a year to completely expose this roll, not merely because of how life gets in the way of taking photographs, but also because i cannot for the life of me find a suitable occasion to take this camera out of its dust-ridden shelf. my experimentation with a jerry-rigged flash didn't come to fruition post-roll one, so that automatically relegates the camera as an "outdoor-only" camera. even in mildly shaded areas, the pictures come out too washed out for my tastes. not only that, my initial thoughts re: the quality of the photographs are reaffirmed with the developing of the second roll - it's just not worth the extra effort anymore. perhaps that is why it took me so long to expose the roll. i'm already half-expecting the results to be shitty even before i make the exposure.

that might certainly be the elitist DSLR snob in me ranting on about a toy camera. for what it's worth, the Diana Baby 110 is an oddity in my repertoire (aside from the Lomography Konstruktor that failed miserably to properly expose its exploratory roll, a fault in the design and construction, perhaps). it probably makes for a pretty sweet keychain. as for that final roll of 110 film - there might be a time when a suitable project or occasion would call for its services, but for the time being, it sits in my drybox waiting the reckoning. or not.

Diana Baby 110

right after the purchase of my AE-1, i found myself impulsively purchasing a Diana Baby 110 lomography camera during my recent trip to Taiwan. having no reason to purchase one (other than to "complete" my trifecta of popular lomography cameras), i found myself staring at the unopened box for several days until i finally decided to pop in a roll of film and give it a try.

the first thing you would immediately notice about this line of 110 cameras from lomography is that they are tiny, and their film tinier still. the question of how sharp the pictures would turn out lingered in my mind from the day i loaded the ISO200 film, right up to the day i sent the roll of film to the photolab where my fears were confirmed. i for one was not entirely impressed by how the pictures turned out, but then again, this is a lomography toy camera. and a Diana to boot - a line of cameras known to have that "softness" in their pictures (whatever that means).

if cellphone-quality pictures are the antithesis of  DSLR-quality pictures, then Lomography's line of 110 cameras are certainly the antithesis of film SLR cameras. what it lacks in the sharpness department, the camera makes up with its pocketability and ease of use. loading the 110 film is easy as pie (first timers are advised to get a little help from the manual), taking pictures is a breeze, and the Diana Baby 110 lives up to Lomography's spirit of "Don't think, just shoot". the downside to this camera (other than the picture resolution and quality) is how easy it is to accidentally take a blurry shot. any slightest movement mid-exposure significantly shifts the frame and causes motion blur much more exponentially that you would expect when you accidentally shake a 35mm camera. and to facilitate the motion blur, the shutter button is really hard to press and excessive pressure to the shutter button is guaranteed to cause a camera shake. that being said, if you're careful enough this camera can be one you'd bring everywhere. i think the camera's biggest appeal is its size and how easy it is to bring it everywhere with you without thinking twice.

i haven't tried out the camera's flash capabilities, although you'd need a PC to hotshoe adapter for that, which is quite a pain to find here. for now, i'm content with taking pictures with this camera on sunny outings, although i don't think i'll find myself taking this camera out everywhere with me, as it purportedly was designed for. compared to 35mm, i find the picture resolution to be too low to my liking. perhaps when i feel like it, i'll crack open another roll of 110 film and take this "baby" out, but for now, it makes for a cute (albeit very expensive) keychain.

nº 3

Background Music: Kanye West - Power

from my first roll of film using the Diana. the fact that i used a slow film, coupled with a camera that doesn't have a flash unit and a slot for tripod usage made this camera a royal pain to use. but as it turns out, the shots that worked came out quite alright. i'm pretty stoked by the initial results, though. with a faster film and a little bit of patience, i wouldn't mind holding onto this borrowed camera a little bit longer. shot using Fujicolor PRO 160S.

1. Red eye

2. Boxing day at Las Carretas

3. The neighborhood

4. Yet another shot from the garden

5. xx

6. What's the story, morning glory? 2

7. Parkinson's 2

8. Skybridge/Creeper

9. Books