Fun of the Fair

Last Friday morning, I ventured out with one trusty old Rolleiflex Twin Lens Reflex camera that's as ol' as me, and some expired Fujifilm NPC160 colour film which I rescued from the depths of my fridge in amongst the eggs and cheese, in an attempt to photograph a funfair that was being set up for the weekend's local crowd.

I have not used the Flex for a long while, it was probably about 3 years ago when I photographed my mother's portrait and it just sits on my bookcase looking pretty sorry for itself. I do occasionally 'play' with it, running a series of shots through the speeds from 1s - 1/500th s, to keep the shutter blades from seizing up.

From the moment I load the 120 film into the camera, it evokes a totally different approach to photography. Less hurried and more calculated, and definitely a pleasure to use. I often think of the past press and journalist photographers who used these cameras day in and day out, having to changed film rolls every 12 shots, whilst trying to cover a story unfolding before them, no wonder when the 35mm format came out, the Leica's and early Nikon Fs took over in a big way.



Nevertheless, many documentary photographers continued using these 6x6 tlrs because of the large square format, its beautiful lens renditions and I think, most importantly, its indirect, waist level finder. Diane Arbus used it for a number of years, and made many memorable portraits from her Rolleiflex.

I got to the fairground early and the grounds people were still setting up their contraptions, rides and bouncy-castles. These fairground people are real hardy in someways. They traverse the country from ground to ground, weekends to weekends, setting up and putting down their rides, and they live mainly in tow along caravans, complete with portable gardens, pets, and clotheslines. I got chatting to the owner of the Spinball ride. He told me that time are getting tough, rides cannot increase too much as it will drive customers away, however, fuel and transport cost are soaring. Still, they must eeked out a decent living running fairground rides. I do see many luxury 4x4s towing their caravans!




The fair had yet to open to the public when I got there so all of the rides and stalls were still shut. I love the atmosphere of anticipation. The surreal quality of the late morning light and the dead quiet of the funfair lends itself to a bizarre setting. 'Just add people' and the scene before will change.

I shot 3 rolls of NPC 160 in about 30 minutes, taking time to compose each shot, and check exposure with a manual meter. I am pretty good at guessing, using the Sunny 16 rule, but conditions were changeable and the sun was peeping in and out behind the clouds all the time.

I found that using an old camera such as the Rolleiflex, instead of a great big black hunk of a plastic monstrosity, people tend not to feel 'threatened' by you, it almost always become a talking point, like ''wow, that's a really old camera'' or ''what a nice camera'', and that breaks the ice for some stirring portraits. Unfortunately there were hardly any people worth photographing as the handful that were there were all busy setting up and I did not want to distract them from their activities.

Waiting for the processed film was again, like a child waiting to get home to play with his new toy. It was ages! Well, the 3 hours wait did feel like that compared with the digital process. I was, in the end, pleased with the outcome, and had a few usable images. The sun had become too high for any sort of effect I was searching, but at least I knew that the camera is still a capable machine and the expired film was decent.

I will at least look more kindly upon the Rolleiflex the next time I am dusting the bookshelf. Mind you I have decided to bring it to KL for the upcoming workshops!