The Dental-Eye II
Posted: Thu Dec 18, 2014 10:57 am
I had a notion I wanted one once I heard about them. Ebay has them listed all the time for just about any price somebody selling one wants to imagine. My buy requirement was less than $50 and one day I made a bid and ended up winning one. These cameras were made in three models over time. Dental Eye I, II, and III. The second and third models are nearly identical. The first model had a shorter barreled lens ....but wider at the same time.
What's interesting about the film 35mm camera is that it was made for dentists back before anybody had any idea what digital photography would ever exist and maybe before present generation xray machinery. The idea was to take a correctly lighted photo at 1/1 , or there abouts, through an open mouth, of whatever dental situation some dentist wanted a photo of, for whatever purpose he needed it. To do this a long lens perspective was needed as well as a light ring and auto exposure features.
This camera should... I hope.. be able to take sharp, clear photos of such things as gun marks or anything else I might want a closeup photo of
It runs on a standard 2CR5 battery or with an adapter for household current. You can vary the exposure by a stop or two. You can turn the flash on or off. You could also add date marks to the negative...but thankfully you can also turn that feature off.
It's large compared to a "normal" SLR film camera.
The focus is backward to what a normal lens camera would do. The further out the lens extension and the closer you get to the subject, the bigger the object becomes for recording on film up to 1/1 reproduction of image. You don't focus mechanically you move closer or back up until what you want to photograph is in focus. You can also lock the focus distance with a screw on the end of the barrel.
The max distance you can get away from a subject and take a focused photo is something on the order of 10 feet away. Get further away and there is no way to focus a clear image in the finder.
I shot a roll of color film as a learning experience and mailed it off a week ago. It's yet to return...but cheap is my requirement. If I had taken B&W I could have developed it myself but I wanted a color test run.
The big downer here that I was surprised to see is that there is no way to attach a tripod by the normal screw mount method. I guess dentists wouldn't have one to use and so there was no point.
I photographed the camera next to a "normal" size SLR to show how large it is.
What's interesting about the film 35mm camera is that it was made for dentists back before anybody had any idea what digital photography would ever exist and maybe before present generation xray machinery. The idea was to take a correctly lighted photo at 1/1 , or there abouts, through an open mouth, of whatever dental situation some dentist wanted a photo of, for whatever purpose he needed it. To do this a long lens perspective was needed as well as a light ring and auto exposure features.
This camera should... I hope.. be able to take sharp, clear photos of such things as gun marks or anything else I might want a closeup photo of
It runs on a standard 2CR5 battery or with an adapter for household current. You can vary the exposure by a stop or two. You can turn the flash on or off. You could also add date marks to the negative...but thankfully you can also turn that feature off.
It's large compared to a "normal" SLR film camera.
The focus is backward to what a normal lens camera would do. The further out the lens extension and the closer you get to the subject, the bigger the object becomes for recording on film up to 1/1 reproduction of image. You don't focus mechanically you move closer or back up until what you want to photograph is in focus. You can also lock the focus distance with a screw on the end of the barrel.
The max distance you can get away from a subject and take a focused photo is something on the order of 10 feet away. Get further away and there is no way to focus a clear image in the finder.
I shot a roll of color film as a learning experience and mailed it off a week ago. It's yet to return...but cheap is my requirement. If I had taken B&W I could have developed it myself but I wanted a color test run.
The big downer here that I was surprised to see is that there is no way to attach a tripod by the normal screw mount method. I guess dentists wouldn't have one to use and so there was no point.
I photographed the camera next to a "normal" size SLR to show how large it is.
