I expected little from my Argus A-Four. My bias was clear: I think real cameras are made of steel. The Bakelite and aluminum A-Four falls short.
No matter that I had shot an A-Four as a teen and got usable images. I thought I had stumbled upon blind, dumb luck as a rank amateur. But when I shot this A-Four, I had developed some photographic skill — and every shot looked great: sharp and contrasty, with great detail and rich blacks.
This even though I set exposure using the imprecise Sunny 16 rule: in bright sun, set f/16 and 1/100 second. This ISO 100 film forgives imperfect light.
If I told you I shot this with my Nikon F2, I’ll bet you’d believe me.
1967 Ford LTD headlight • Argus A-Four • Fujifilm Neopan 100 Acros • May, 2010
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Excellent shot of my early life. After a low speed rear-end accident as a teen, this trim casting around the headlights was one of the parts I needed to find and replace. I always wondered why the stylists found it necessary to glue that little black triangle there. I had never even noticed that it was there before that accident.
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I’d seen a thousand ’67 Fords before shooting this photo and didn’t notice the black triangle on any of them until I got this shot back from the processor. But the car would look naked without them.
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The C-3 & the C-4/C44 family were definitely better cameras, but I really think the A-four may be the must underrated Argus.
The Argus Collector Group does a shoot with an Argus day every year, and it is coming up on the 15th. If you are interested the details are here.
http://www.arguscg.org/events/argusday/
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Ooh, what a perfect reason to get out the A-Four again. I haven’t shot it in years!
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The light burst really adds so much to this. Love old cars on film.
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That burst was such a stroke of luck. I have a second almost identical photo of this headlight without the burst and it’s just not right.
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