Lomo have launched a brand new daylight tank that avoids the necessity for a altering bag. They had been form sufficient to lend me a duplicate for this evaluate.
As a result of the tank depends on having the movie chief out of the 135 cassette, Lomo provide a pacesetter retriever.
The tank itself is made up of many elements which assemble right into a fiendish machine that’s able to transferring your movie right into a reel for growing with out the necessity for a darkish bag or different blacked-out areas.
The tank (and the way it goes collectively)
The spiral is properly made. It slots collectively in a single place solely and twists to lock.
The bizarre factor is that the spiral feeds from the centre fairly than the sting.
The shaft incorporates a purple tab which is able to solely have interaction/disengage with the feeder insert when the gate slot (seen right here over to the left) is closed. In impact, the gate is a guillotine with a sharpened edge that may minimize the movie after it has been loaded.
Above, you’ll be able to see the shaft and spiral locked collectively – the open slot of the spiral is now positioned simply behind the closed guillotine blade. If you lock the feeder the purple lever is pushed over, opening the slot for the movie to move by means of, whereas ensuring the feeder can’t be unintentionally eliminated.
The feeder insert has a purple swap to open and shut the guillotine door, a white knob that reveals when the cassette spool is in movement and a black socket to take a crank.
The feeder has a door flap that retains the cassette in place, some sprockets related to the crank socket, and a receiver to interact with the cassette spool to maintain it in place and present that the movie is being fed out when cranked.
Put the cassette in place with the lengthy finish of the centre core partaking with the receiver for the white knob.
Guarantee that the sprocket holes within the movie are correctly engaged with the tooth on the feeder’s drive sprocket. Misalignment or skinny movie might result in shredding of the sprocket holes!
As soon as the feeder door flap is closed over the sprockets, make certain the sting of the movie is flush with the flat floor in order that the feeder slots in properly.
Notice that the feeder will solely match a method and solely then if the ‘gate’ is closed.
Be sure you transfer the purple swap clockwise to open the guillotine ‘gate’ earlier than turning the crank clockwise.
There needs to be little or no resistance when the crank is turned clockwise and the white knob must also begin turning clockwise (as soon as any slack is taken up). Pay attention out early on for any nasty noises – when you hear any, cease because the movie is unlikely to load (perhaps examine the purple swap place). As a basic information, one flip of the crank should advance the movie by 8 perforations (one body) into the spiral. A slight resistance on the crank might be felt when the movie is totally wound out of the cassette. Shifting the swap anti-clockwise ought to minimize the movie and unlock the feeder.
When the feeder is out of the way in which, chemical substances are merely poured into the center of the shaft. The really helpful 350cc of liquid ought to attain the ‘step’ within the shaft.
The lid and strap are fairly substantial and provides an actual retro really feel to the entire tank. The rubber lining of the lid, plus the strain of the strap ought to cease any leaks whereas the tank is inverted.
When poring out, fluid exits by way of the hole between the lid and the tank which kinds an efficient mild entice. Keep in mind to permit additional time to undo the strap and take away the purple water-tight lid for developer, cease, repair and wash.
In use
Now I need to confess that I’m usually a kind of ‘discard the directions and leap straight in’ type of guys, however as I used to be trying to write my experiences up as a evaluate, I took time to observe the educational video on-line.
I have a tendency to go away leaders out on all of my used movies, so took the acutely aware resolution to intentionally wind the chief on a roll of Fomapan 400 again into the cassette and take a look at the chief retriever.
Mistake. Strive as I would, I couldn’t get the retriever to work. I feel it was right down to me fairly than the product (see the bit in ‘Conclusion’ on the finish of the article) – nevertheless, as I now had no possibility however to interrupt open the cassette, utilizing the Fomapan as a check roll was out – as a substitute it went right into a darkish bag with an everyday Patterson tank and spiral.
The opposite roll I had was some Fuji NEOPAN 1600. I couldn’t keep in mind how lengthy it had been sitting ready for improvement, nevertheless it was a movie with its chief out, so it regarded an excellent candidate to make use of for a primary movie.
The directions are clear that you just minimize off the chief to go away a sq. finish to the movie with the minimize being between two units of perforations. I adopted by means of with the method as I had seen within the on-line video, however was greeted by a nasty graunchy sound as I turned the crank. Perhaps I used to be not cautious sufficient with positioning the movie over the sprocket holes, perhaps the bottom of the NeoPan was simply too skinny and brittle to take care of being pushed into the tank, or perhaps I forgot to show the purple swap clockwise… Regardless of the motive, one other mistake – and one other candidate for the darkish bag and Patterson tank. When developed, it turned out the NEOPAN was from about 16 years in the past, so age of the movie might additionally have contributed to its brittleness.
After my abortive makes an attempt, I made a decision to sacrifice about 12 frames of movie and cargo it right into a reusable 135 cassette to make use of as a dummy. Checking myself in daylight after which repeating as a ‘dry run’ I confirmed that, when loaded correctly and thoroughly into the feeder and remembering to function the purple swap, movie was certainly delivered as anticipated into the spiral. In reality, it labored impressively effectively. Time after time it labored flawlessly, with the dummy movie getting shorter every time it was minimize from the cassette. I don’t know what went improper with the NEOPAN, however I don’t assume it was because of the product.
The tank does precisely what LOMO declare it is going to do. It lets you load a movie from a cassette right into a tank with no altering bag, It’ll additionally cleanly minimize the movie from the cassette, permitting the feeder to be eliminated. All with out the movie getting uncovered to any undesirable mild.
Upsides and disadvantages
Upsides
- This can be a properly made little bit of equipment. It goes collectively effectively.
- Regardless of being fiendishly sophisticated, it really works. It appeals to the little bit of me that appreciates an intricate little bit of equipment.
- As soon as you might be conversant in the tank, loading a movie might be remarkably fast and easy.
- There isn’t a hazard of touching the working floor of the movie till after the movie is fastened.
- It actually fits growing partly uncovered movies as you’ll be able to choose the variety of exposures to develop (counting turns of the crank) and hold the rest of {a partially} uncovered movie within the cassette.
- It has a particular ‘retro attraction’.
- I don’t have to recollect to take away my luminous watch earlier than loading a movie for improvement.
Downsides
The draw back of this product might be encapsulated by ‘three Cs’:
- Capability – The tank solely helps processing one movie at a time. It might additionally solely accommodate 135 format movie.
- Complexity – Whereas the man-child in me is genuinely impressed by the intricacy of how all of the bits work collectively to realize a outcome, the programmer and software program tester in me bridles at options which are sophisticated. ‘Hold it easy silly’ was a mantra impressed upon me from early days – cemented over a few years of making an attempt to repair different individuals’s undocumented code. With the Lomo tank – if one thing goes improper with the loading course of, you might be probably going to wish a darkish bag and a traditional tank as fallback. I’m unsure how the tank will stand as much as put on, or how sharp that movie guillotine will keep.
- Value – for the value of the Lomo tank at launch, you should buy a reasonably roomy darkish bag and a real Patterson 4 tank and doubtless nonetheless have some change left. Though it isn’t an enormous issue for anybody doing their very own processing, the tank additionally requires 60cc extra chemical substances than a regular Patterson 4 tank for one movie (350cc towards 290cc).
Conclusion
In case you handle to get it on the proper worth, it’s a good little bit of equipment and it does keep away from having to maintain observe of bits of tank, cassette openers, scissors and movie in a darkish bag. It will be very helpful to anybody who ever has a have to develop part-rolls of movie. In case you don’t end up getting on with typical tanks it would effectively be price a glance. I’m an enormous fan of the Paterson Tremendous System 4 tank and its reels, however would fortunately use the LOMO tank for single 35mm movie rolls (realizing I’ve the Patterson tank and a darkish bag as a fallback).
I can now verify that the chief extractor device does work. After the unique draft of this evaluate was accomplished, I unintentionally rewound a movie I needed to switch between two cameras again into the cassette – because the on-loan extractor was there ready to be despatched again to LOMO, I assumed I’d give it a strive – It labored completely with out hitches. I feel the earlier fail was as a result of I are likely to crease over the chief on used movies to distinguish between them and unused ones – as I had performed on the Foma movie – this appears to cease it working with the chief extractor, however just isn’t prone to be an issue in any other case.
Normally I might advise {that a} darkish bag is a very helpful factor for any analogue photographer to have round (even when you do have to recollect to take away your watch).
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