In late September, I managed to acquire an expertly-overhauled sample of the first "serious" camera I ever got my hands on: my father's "miniature" (i.e., 35mm) Zeiss Contax II, which
his father had purchased in 1938 and which ultimately was passed down to me. I haven't had much time to use it other than to shoot a few rolls of film to verify that everything was working properly, but a couple of weeks ago I had to be in Washington, D.C., on other business and I diverted on my way home so I could make a few pictures on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol Building.
The Capitol on FilmFood Trucks on the Capitol GroundsThe camera I purchased, which was manufactured in 1937, came with the same 50mm f/2.0 collapsible Sonnar lens as my father's Contax. Wholly aside from the nostalgia value of shooting with a camera I used as a teenager, I'm quite favorably impressed with the image quality. The pictures above were made on 100 ASA Fujifilm Acros II and I scanned them at 7200 dpi. Other than tonal adjustments and some minor spot removal, they didn't require much post-processing.