claire
protosphere.me
claire
@protosphere.me
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Some 2 megapixel CCD goodness from my Kodak DCS 620, an early professional digital camera based around the Nikon F5, from 1999.

#photography
Got some charge into the battery. 2500 shutter actuations on the camera!! Explains why it looks brand new
Seems to be running fine on 9 V centre positive!
Zooming in on the one reference photo I have, I think the output voltage (just above the CE logo) is a single digit, so probably 9 V
I took it apart. There’s a voltage regulator feeding the PIC 5V so it’s likely around 9 V or 12 V, I think. I do wonder the danger of undervolting the supply, given its a battery charger
Given there’s a car adapter this makes sense! A car is going to deliver about 14 volts out of the cigarette lighter port, so I guess there’s a 12 V regulator inside and it just has to be a little above 12 V to allow for power loss in the regulator
They’re slightly smaller than AAs unfortunately. And soldered in with some electronics
Research suggests it’s the same voltage as the OEM adapter, but I can’t find info about that either….
Original wall adapter is a SPAN ADS 241-1 but I can’t find anything about its specs
It has a 12 V car adapter so chances are I can give it 12 V and it’ll work. But given the extreme rarity of these chargers I need to be absolutely sure. It does at least have the polarity printed on the label
Can only find really blurry images of the power supply, nothing hi res enough to read the info :(
Got the charger! It’s a aftermarket one(?): Span DRC12D-17. No power adapter for its DC in so will need to do a bit of googling and/or reverse engineering
Dropped off 8 rolls of medium format film from my holiday to be developed. Going to spend a *lot* of time scanning; it’s 2 hours per roll for my Coolscan 8000.
Despite a concerning-looking imperfection on the rear element, the pictures look fine!
Me: “I want to test my new Biotar but I only have a Nikon F to L mount adapter with me”

(Remembers Nikon F mount flange distance is similar to that of M42)

“I can just hold the Biotar against the F mount adapter!”

The result:
back fell off my rolleicord while i was loading film and doesn’t fit properly anymore 🫡
visited a cool camera store
It came with a Leica II from 1932 in unknown condition (lens seems to be from 1931? like my model C). Will probably run a test roll through it and if it doesn’t work it can just be a display piece for now. Maybe I’ll get it serviced at some point.