I was gifted this Pentax ES II back in September of 2018. I believe this model was the last of the Pentax screw-mount cameras. I put a roll of black and white through the camera and then it just sat on a shelf until recently when I read some nice things about it online. So, that got me to playing with it, and I discovered the meter no longer worked even after inserting some new batteries.
I took off the bottom cover and found that the problem was that the contacts that activate the meter were not quite coming together when the shutter release was depressed. It appeared that the red painted adjustment screw was as tight as possible; it seemed the available remedy was to slightly bend down the two little tines under the adjustment screw. So I did that.
The immediate result was that one of the tines broke off. Fortunately, the Clumsy Craftsman's luck held and the meter seemed to be working perfectly once I got things back together. I loaded some Kentmere 400 and shot it at the usual places around town and in the riverside forest.
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| (Find the fledgling Coopers Hawk) |
5 comments:
I'm glad you were able to bring it back to life. I always enjoy seeing your photos of cars.
The ES II is a pleasant camera to shoot. The open aperture metering is a big improvement over the Spotmatics.
Pentax got a lot of mileage out of the Spotmatic body with the SP, SPII, 500, 1000, SPF, ES and ESII. I really like my black SP without the hot shoe...nice clean design. And the SPF is nice for open aperture metering. The more I use the Spotmatic line, the more I like these cameras.
Still have the one I picked up in 1970 and it works fine. The Takumar lenses are all good.
Nice negatives! You appear to have mastered the Kentmere film and its development. I like the close-up of the leaf. Your 55mm f/1.8 lens is often said to be one of the best 50s of the 1960s-1970s era. Exercise it more often.
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