Yashica Electro 35 FC personal observation

[nukecoke]

First I must thank btgc's post about the FC, it helped me deciding things when purchasing this little camera.
http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=66604

Here are some personal observations/tips on this camera:

Build quality:
Maybe the only Electro rangefinder lighter than half a kilo?
Regardless of feeling plasticky in the hands, the top and bottom plates are mainly aluminium. (35 CC's are copper I believe?)
All the markings on the camera are not only printed but also engraved, including the Holga/Lomography-ish distance scale.
There is no "thump" sound when winding as in many other Electros.

Lens:
YASHINON DX 40mm f/2.8
4 elements in 4 groups, modified Tessar according to a Japanese optics book.
Well, does this one extra grouping make it better? Tessar is a hard to ruin lens type though.
According to a Flickr user, it is acutally Unar lens. He's quite sure that many of the "modified Tessar" in Japanese compact 35 cameras are Unar.
The "coatings colours" are amber/magenta. So I'm expecting a green-blue tint on the images (or it's just Fujicolor c200 ).
Focus distance: 0.9m - 7m - infinity

Viewfinder/Rangefinder:
My camera came with a very clean finder.
It has about 0.7x magnification. I wear eyeglass and i have no problem with it.
Projected frame line with parallax correction marking.
Diamond-shaped rangefinder patch as in many other Electros.
The area outside the frame line is tight.
Bright enough to use even indoor.

Shutter Loudness:
Much more noisier than 35 CC, and subjectively saying, a little quieter than my Zorki-6s. It has a hallow "kiiing" sound.
The shutter blades are not located in between the lens elements but exposed. You can actually touch them with your finger sticking in. I guess that's one of the reasons why it's louder than the 35 CC?
Edit: It doesn't have the "Copal" brand name anywhere on the camera as on some other Electros.

Aperture blades:
are not in between lens elements but between the last element and the shutter blades (feels cheap?). Closing the aperture gives a square shape.

Shooting without battery:
Gives 1/1000s speed only, same for the flash mode. Don't try to cheeki-breeki and get greedy here.

FlashMatic:
There is GN setting on the lens barrel. In flash mode, spinning the focus ring changes aperture.
One should use M mode (instead of A) on flash units when shooting with flashmatic.
Shooting in flash mode (with battery) gives a speed of 1/30s and the orange arrow is on.

Metering Accuracy:
I compared it with an M4/3 Olympus digital camera (which has quite accurate metering). When comparing with the digital camera with centre-weighted mode, the FC tends to underexpose for about 1/3 stop. Not a big problem. I'm using LR44 batteries.

"Removing/Not contacting the PC sync pin to have full speed sync" myth:
I didn't see the tiny pin in the middle of the PC socket as I saw it on my 35 CC.
Edit: The half-plugging-in hack doesn't work since you must enter flash mode to trigger the flash. And it's fixed 1/30s in flash mode.

 

[oftheherd]

I don't know much about the Yashica P&S cameras, but I would have expected a bladed shutter to X-synch at all speeds, and M-synch at 1/30 sec.

Enjoy the camera. The Yashica P&S cameras enjoy a good reputation here at RFF.

 

[nukecoke]

I don't know much about the Yashica P&S cameras, but I would have expected a bladed shutter to X-synch at all speeds, and M-synch at 1/30 sec.

Enjoy the camera. The Yashica P&S cameras enjoy a good reputation here at RFF.

Thank you!
The thing is most Yashica Electro 35s don't support full speed sync even though they have bladed shutters. AFAIK Electro 35 GL&GX are the only ones support full speed sync.

 

[sevo]

Thank you!
The thing is most Yashica Electro 35s don't support full speed sync even though they have bladed shutters. AFAIK Electro 35 GL&GX are the only ones support full speed sync.

They can be hacked to full speed synch by removing the switch pin that sets them to a fixed speed when a flash cord is inserted. But be aware that they are permanently on aperture-priority AE in that setting - by compensating both flash and camera film speeds accordingly that can be abused for a nice fill flash, but in that condition they are quite useless for most other flash techniques!

 

[nukecoke]

They can be hacked to full speed synch by removing the switch pin that sets them to a fixed speed when a flash cord is inserted. But be aware that they are permanently on aperture-priority AE in that setting - by compensating both flash and camera film speeds accordingly that can be abused for a nice fill flash, but in that condition they are quite useless for most other flash techniques!

Thanks for the tips sevo!

 

[btgc]

congrats on your new passion!

Thank you!
The thing is most Yashica Electro 35s don't support full speed sync even though they have bladed shutters. AFAIK Electro 35 GL&GX are the only ones support full speed sync.

I think full-body 35, from model G to GSN, supports sync at all speeds. Do I miss something?

 

[nukecoke]

congrats on your new passion!



I think full-body 35, from model G to GSN, supports sync at all speeds. Do I miss something?

Hi. At first I read on the net and I saw some people say yes and some people say no, and I got really confused. So I went to read manuals. For the original 35, GT, GTN/GSN, and CC, the manuals only say 1/30s for flash in flash mode (☇ ) and/or when PC socket plugged. In the manuals of GX and GL, they said that you could sync at all speed because they have the "Daylight Syncro" technique, as you see the "AF" marking on the camera.
I'm completely new to flash use and maybe I understand them wrong.

 

[sevo]

congrats on your new passion!



I think full-body 35, from model G to GSN, supports sync at all speeds. Do I miss something?

The full size 35 series was to be explicitly set to a 1/30s fixed speed flash mode by turning a ring on the lens - they have no other "manual" mode, so the choice of exposure time is either 1/30 or whatever the AE system chooses (or, removing the battery, the shortest time of the shutter). The small size ones (at least all I've owned) have the flash mode switch integrated in the PC socket or (the very last ones) hot shoe, so these are forced into flash mode whenever a flash is attached, unless you disable that switch.

 

[btgc]

nukecoke, sevo - probably I over-simplified, by syncing at all speeds I did mean getting evenly exposed frame, instead of partially dark areas when shutter travels slow at speeds faster than synch speed. Leaving G-GSN shutter in Av mode and firing flash at daylight works fine, in my memory at least.

 

[sevo]

nukecoke, sevo - probably I over-simplified, by syncing at all speeds I did mean getting evenly exposed frame, instead of partially dark areas when shutter travels slow at speeds faster than synch speed.

They have a leaf shutter - so flash will always be evenly exposed!

The issue is with their flash/AE integration - on models that switch to a fixed and relatively slow shutter speed when a flash is plugged in, you can use flash only very traditionally, in low light or close distance settings, and it is pure luck whether you'll get an appropriate amount of background illumination in a given situation. On models that allow for shooting flash while in AE (whether by virtue of a manual selector switch, or by disabling the above "automation"), you can do fill flash (by setting the film sensitivity to double the value on both flash and camera) at every shutter speed!

 

[nukecoke]

Finished the first roll yesterday. Developed with Tetenal C41 kit and scanned with PlusTek 7200. The negative is Chinese brand Lucky Charm 200 (the last batch expired 2013), I call it "forever blue."

There are more if anyone is interested in:https://www.flickr.com/photos/98455087@N02/sets/72157649812530763/