Opened up Leica M3 with film inside :(

adamjohari

adamjohari

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I'm not sure if anyone else has done this before. In one of my films, I forgot to rewind the film first before opening up the bottom plate. Arghhh. I wonder how it's going to turn out.

Do any Leica's have some kind of warning before opening the bottom plate? Something like "DON'T OPEN IT BEFORE YOU REWIND YOUR FILM". Fail :(

Adam
 
You could put a big sticker on the bottom-plate to remind you, perhaps... I've done it with an M6TTL. Not all of the film was ruined but the number of salvageable frames was surprisingly small... Chalk it up to experience, I guess.
 
I'm sending my film out today. Should get it back by Wednesday or Thursday. Will post the 'results'. Such a sad thing to do. Hopefully it won't be affected that much as I opened it in a cafe with not that much light. Lesson learned.

Adam
 
It happened TWICE to me ... :eek: ("maddoc" !!) The first time in a dark hotel room and nothing happened, the second time in a well lit place and the last frames were totally ruined.

Now I always check the position of the rewind lever (camera empty = rewind lever in rewind position) and turn the rewind crank a couple of times. So far it helps ... :)
 
This was my first time doing that mistake. My cutie pie niece was crying a lot and my brother and sis in law were trying to appease her and I wasn't really focused in the moment. It kinda sucks cause I finished that roll right after I went to the top of the Eiffel Tower (was visiting Paris for 3 days).

Luckily I took some pics with my Dlux4 and my bro got a few nice keepers with his D90.

Adam
 
The light only gets to the last few frames, I've done it in Mediterranean sunlight and sort of go away with it ... I plead heat-stroke that day
 
You'll soon get into the habit of trying the film rewind knob without releasing the rewind lock, every time you pick up the camera.

Fun aside: during the recent Royal Wedding street party malarky one of my neighbours asked me to look at an old camera that his father-in-law had left behind. Out from under the kitchen sink comes a plastic bag, inside which resided:
- One Leica everready case with
- One lever-rewind/self-timer M2 and
- One matching 50mm rigid Summicron and
- One Leica meter (forget which, but it looked like a match for the M2) and
- One strap case with small accessory-shoe-mount flash, bulbs for the use of, and even
- One clip-on diffuser for the meter, tucked neatly inside the ER case
- And all in extremely neat cosmetic condition, with just the shutter speeds slow from lack of use.

Seems the lot had been forgotten for over a decade, ever since the old man passed away - and trying the rewind knob showed that there was indeed a roll of film still in the camera. I suggested that they keep the camera on a shelf out in the light from now on, and I'm hoping to find out what was on that last roll.
 
File this one under stranger than fiction: Some guy wrote into a Flickr forum a few months back that all of the pictures on his film came out blank, how come? After a few questions and suggestions from other forum members, he added that he had opened his camera without rewinding the film, so, without closing it back, he rewound the film. In what I thought was great constraint, one forum member replied, "How dumb is that?"

So - at least your were not that dumb. :)

Opening a camera before the film is rewound is terrible when it happens, especially when there are irreplaceable pictures on the film, and I've done it, too. My experience is that usually only the last few frames (maybe 5 or 6) are ruined. But I closed the back really quick, too.
 
i made this same mistake while travelling, lost the last third of the roll completely, the remaining 2 had light streaks, some frames I could crop slightly and use, converting to B&W helped with some, but most were not very useable... it really sucked to lose all my photos taken in Genova, which is a pretty amazing city.

not cropped, converted to B&W


narrow by Marcelo Colmenero, on Flickr

slightly cropped on the top and left


cinqueterre by Marcelo Colmenero, on Flickr
 
Sparrow said:
The light only gets to the last few frames, I've done it in Mediterranean sunlight and sort of go away with it ... I plead heat-stroke that day
Click to expand...

Yep, add me to the list. Once in korea in very bright sunlight, with Fuji slide film. Only the last few frames were ruined. Surprised me. Total distraction and idiocy on my part.

Another time, I was certain there was no film in the camera (a 120 folder, so no rewind check, and a dark window in low light), only to be sadly surprised.

I don't think anybody has missed doing that at least once, unless they had a very good mentor.
 
It happens. A few months back, the tape at the end of a roll of Tri-X failed (I self-load) and I was forced to open the back of my MP to get the film out. I processed the roll anyway and was pleasantly surprised by the results. Here's one I like.

michelle75.jpg


Jim B.
 
A couple weeks ago I was rewinding and felt a sudden change in resistance - assumed the film had come off the spool. It had not! I was close to the start of the roll though, only lost a couple frames.

So even if you are paying attention , things can go wrong.

Randy
 
My method is a variant of the tape method mentioned above. I have a bunch of pre-cut cardboard tabs that I keep in my camera bag and that I slide into the hotshoe to remind myself of which film I have in the camera (I wrapped the tabs in clear tape to make them last longer and to make them grip the hotshoe better. They now never fall out on their own). When there's a tab in the hotshoe, I know that there's a film in the camera. When there's no tab in the hotshoe... you get the idea.
 
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