These are the first images from my new Kodak Flash Bantam, shot on Tri-X at the War Eagles Museum in Santa Teresa, New Mexico.
This camera was built to use 828 roll film, which is the same width as 35mm, but having just one sprocket hole at the beginning of each frame. I decided to use some regular 35mm for my first efforts. I attached the film without paper backing to the little 828 reels with masking tape for loading into the camera. The frame counter viewing window on the back was securely covered with black tape to prevent fogging, and the film was loaded in a dark bag. About 30% of the 828 format is lost to the sprocket holes and film borders on 35mm, but the upside is at least twice the normal number of eight exposures per roll of 828. On this roll, one-and-one half rotations of the advance knob between shots got me twenty images.
The Flash Bantam dates from 1947; it was based on a 1935 design by Walter Dorwin Teague. The simple construction of the strut folder used features developed even earlier by Kodak, but the quality was greatly enhanced and a number of advanced post-war features were incorporated into an ultra-compact camera that is about the same size at my Olympus Infinity Stylus. The flip-up viewfinder is compact and bright. The four-element Anastar lens is very sharp.
