Your Lomo Settings

Note: This is the third post today, please don’t forget to scroll down and see what else is new.

Sunny and Cloudy.  N and B.  Pictures of little people on your Holga?

Now that we know something about metering, wouldn’t it be nice to tie that in when using a Holga or Diana?

First, Holgas.  Here’s what the pictures on your focusing ring mean.

Now, forget your cloudy or sunny settings.  Seriously, unless you’ve modified the camera or had someone do it, you have ONE F-STOP that is approximately f/13. 

You do, however, usually have 2 shutter speeds.  B and N.  N is around 1/100th of a second.  B stands for Bulb and will stay open as long as you want.

It’s okay, put in the film with an ISO that will work for you.  Film speed is your friend.

Dianas.

These are a little more precise.  First, your focusing ring has distances listed instead of pictures.

On your aperture ring for the Diana F+, the cloudy aperture is f11, partly cloudy is f16 and sunny is f22. The pinhole is approximately f150.  For the Diana Mini, the cloudy aperture is f8, sunny is f11. 

Just remember, all the apertures on these are approximate and vary.  If you are really curious, tear the thing open and measure the diameter to calculate your f-stop.  Having opened my Holga twice and accidentally disconnected the wiring that controls the flash twice and having to go back in and rewire twice, I won’t be doing this anytime soon.

The shutter speed is approximately 1/60th of a second on N, and Bulb on B.

How to Use Bulb

Remember, Bulb will stay open as long as you press the shutter.  So here are some handy lomo tools to go with your bulb settings.

The Diana F+ has a little plastic piece attached to the strap.  Once you’ve pressed the shutter, you put the end of this into the slit where the shutter button is, above the button.  This should lock the button down.  It’s a little clumsy, but they sell a cable release collar that can make it less clumsy.

Holga also has a cable release collar.

The Diana Mini reigns supreme in my eyes, by having a built in cable release attachment.  Just screw a traditional cable release cord in.

Alright… that was educational.  I meant to start my night photography series today and got sidetracked… Oops.  I just wanted to make sure you had all the relevant background information.  I fully plan on doing some night photography with my Holga or Dianas!  Hope you will too!

See you tomorrow

Shasta Betty