Every now and then you come across a camera that has a brilliant concept. To see the sprocket holes? YES PLEASE. But some can disappoint. That’s how I’ve felt about the Sprocket Rocket by Lomography.

You get some okay shots, and some awful ones.

A big downside to this camera is the cost of processing. It cost me $42 for develop & scanning the photos in this post, as they have to use their medium format equipment in order to scan the sprocket holes. I don’t think I’m completely done shooting rolls of film with sprocket holes, however I think I will try to find another camera to use (maybe a medium format one with 35mm adaptor as the cost/benefit of using the Sprocket Rocket unfortunately fails.

I think the photos turned out exactly as you’d expect from Lomography – they love light leaks and imperfections, but I prefer clean photos from my favourite SLR cameras (eg. Canon AE-1, Pentax Spotmatic) that I can put in an album to pass onto my kids one day, so I’ll be sticking to those cameras for the foreseeable future.

Honestly this roll of film was so old (dates back to 2015) that I don’t really remember where anything was taken, especially the giant apple; I have no recollection of taking those photos at all!

Photos taken with Lomography Sprocket Rocket using Kodak Color 400. 

The other weekend I went up to Rocks at Seventeen Mile Rocks to celebrate a one year old’s birthday and I decided to take out my new Petzval lens for the first time. I’ve only played with it at home so far so it was a bit of a challenge to work with, but I think I got some beautiful shots.

As you can see, focusing can be difficult with this lens. It requires patience and a lot of trial & error to get it right. I can’t wait to play with this lens more as you really can get some beautiful results. I’d love to take it to the beach next time I go with my friends.

* All photos were taken with Lomography’s Petzval 58 Bokeh Control Art Lens.

Back in 2014 I purchased my first medium format camera – a Lubitel Universal. It was about $60 on eBay and for some reason I was really nervous to use it because I was not confident in my ability to focus or to set the correct settings for each shot. Surprisingly, the results were so much better than I had anticipated! I love when that happens because sometimes you are completely disappointed by a roll – even though the shots I took weren’t very interesting, I am now confident enough to take the camera out and to use it in various other settings and hopefully capture some fun shots.

Let me know your favourite 120 film in the comments below. I used Lomography Earl Grey 100 for these shots.

Well that was a pretty lame attempt at poetry, but it was fun. I’ve never written poetry before except in school when they made us, and I hated it at the time. I’d like to do it some more, it’s really interesting and fascinating to read and to hear. I love that you can convey so much in so few words, and that there could be years worth of story in just one line.

Not sure if you will remember but months ago I said I was going to do a camera challenge called Camera of the Month. The challenge was meant to be for me to use one of my cameras per month and post the results. Unfortunately, that was too big of a task for me – as film is so expensive I really try to use film when I want to capture memories and important moments, not just to capture boring daily life, although those kinds of photos have a lot of charm.

Overall, I found that the Sprocket Rocket can be quite temperamental. The exposure is all over the place. I do have a flash for the Sprocket Rocket which I’ve used with the next roll of film I’ve put in it (black & white) so I’ll post the results in another year when I finally get that roll developed. Something to keep in mind when using this camera is that you only get 12 pictures per 24 exposure roll of film. The width of the frame is nearly double the width of a regular 4 x 6 photograph. Also, I’d make sure that you switch off bulb mode after the shot you take – I think mine was accidentally left on for numerous shots which is why they’ve turned out so blurry.

Let me know what you think of the results and if you want to try out the Sprocket Rocket.

View from my balcony on a morning with the most beautiful sunrise I’d ever seen.

Beach – This isn’t what I intended to capture but I think this is really eerie and cool.

Christmas Lights ’13 | Bulb Mode

Tom – Christmas Day ’13. Unfortunately the shutter went off too late with this one so it was very overexposed and didn’t capture the moment I wanted to.

Monopoly

Selfie Fail. This picture is really weird and creepy but I thought I’d show you it anyway because you this camera is quite temperamental and you’ve got to take the bad with the good, right?

Carnival ’13

View from home – This is an edited version as the original was extremely overexposed.

Selfie | Bulb Mode

Paper cranes – I’d made 1000 of them in 2013.

I’m really happy with this picture. It was a disco light with the camera on bulb mode. I was hoping to capture pretty much exactly this.

View from home on a not so nice day.

As you can tell, not all the results are pretty, but I am inspired to use this camera again. It took me over a year to finish the roll as I didn’t want to waste any pictures – I think obviously that the best results are of landscapes so I think I’ll try to capture more of those with this camera. 

For some reason I still can’t get a hang on bulb mode. I have to admit, these turned out pretty bland and unfortunately these weren’t scanned with the sprocket holes which is disappointing. I will definitely only get Sprocket Rocket film developed with Lomography from now on.

Have you tried the Sprocket Rocket before?

I went through a long period last year where I felt a bit discouraged when it came to shooting film, but I’m honestly loving shooting film again. These were shot with my Pentax ME Super and 50mm lens on Lomography Color Negative 100 film. I wouldn’t say it’s my favourite film to shoot on – I think I need to stick with a higher ISO speed with the kinds of pictures I take but it’s always good to learn these things.

Also, just so you guys know I’ve decided to implement a posting schedule for the first time – I’m going to post every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Friday will be music-based whether it’s a playlist or something else (I have some ideas!). I also want to start doing videos and put my University degree to use.

This picture was so different in person and through the lens when I took it. I had positioned my hand to cover the sun coming in the window so my hand was backlit – I’m a little bummed it didn’t turn out and that the image I saw only exists in my head, but I do like this too.

Birthday confetti

I took this on the bus on my way to work on my last day. I really love the way it turned out.

I could take pictures of the sky forever

View from home – I never tire of it

Pink sky

Beautiful sky

I never get sick of palm pictures

We’re looking down on the clouds…

I’d spent the day with my best friend Emma and we stopped to get Petrol

Car mirror selfie

Little horse charm in Emma’s car

My mum has had this statue forever and I’ve never cared for it much. It used to reside in the lounge room but luckily we’ve moved it to a different room now.

Last day of work. I cannot stress how hot this day was!

It was so hot this day and I felt really bad for this pregnant girl who was waiting for the bus!

Mum walking at the shops

The best time of day for me is between 3:30 p.m. and 5 p.m. when the sun sets.

This was a good day. I chilled at home and read Rookie magazine and then some friends came over.

My favourite time of day to take a bath…

Do you shoot film? Let me know in the comments what your favourite 35mm film is.

Swell Festival is a local art festival that takes place every year. There is always 30-50 sculptures and other art pieces that are scattered along Currumbin Beach. I haven’t been in years but decided to go this year and took my camera with me.

Photos were taken with Zenit EM using the Lomography Color Negative 100 35mm film.