As I make the transition from old-camera collector to old-camera photographer, I now tend to keep film in at least one of my favorite old cameras so I’m always ready to take photos.
Such was the case with my Olympus XA late this summer. I had bought a four-pack of almost-expired Fujifilm Superia X-tra 800 on clearance at Meijer. After putting a roll of it through my Pentax ME earlier in the summer I wanted to see how it handled in my XA.
I just had the film processed and was especially pleased with a couple shots I took at the Indiana State Fair in August. This first one is a dusk shot looking toward the midway. The extra two stops the ISO 800 film gave me over my usual ISO 200 film really helped here.
I found this young man feeding a goat in the petting zoo. I was glad to be able to make more exposures inside thanks to the Fuji 800. I cropped this image down from the original shot – the XA’s 35mm lens is on the wide side, and so isn’t ideal for close work.
The XA handled flawlessly as always, and was unobtrusive. Whenever I hang an SLR around my neck people notice I’m taking pictures; not so with the tiny XA. My only wish for these photos is that they were a little sharper and a little less grainy.
My Olympus XA2 is also a fine performer. Read about it here.
