dianacamera.com

Welcome,

The purpose of the website is to share my images and techniques. I like to work with plastic or toy cameras, especially Holga, Diana camera, and Jamcam III. Fun with plastic!

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–Kai

I just received my Holga 135BC. I will have an out of the box video posted very soon.

A quick look at the Holga 135BC. This is a 35mm camera, built around the plastic lens from your basic Holga 120. It has almost all the same features.

With all the interest in the recently released Diana+ and Diana F+ by Lomography, the original Diana camera sometimes gets forgotten as the original progenitor of the whole plastic or toy camera movement.

Alan Detrich first started using the Diana camera when he was a student at the Ohio Institute of Photography in 1982. Soon after, he started collecting the various incarnations of the Diana camera and it’s clones. The collection grew and grew and is probably the most complete collection of Diana cameras in the world.

This book shows all the cameras from Acme to Zodiac. I paged through the entire book, and I was fascinated by the multitude of cameras. When you thumb through the pages, you get a sense of the huge number of cameras, all the same or similar, with so many different nameplates. I have a fair number of vintage Dianas and clones, but nothing like this.

I’m glad I took the time to look at each page, because also nestled amongst the many photographs, is a letter from a woman who worked for Sino Trading Company, the importer of a Diana clone called the Sinomax. The story, while not exactly about the camera itself, lends a look into one of the many companies that chose the Diana camera to import under their own name.

The book also contains the story (or at least, one of the stories) of the origins of the Diana camera.

After the last photo of the Zodiac, there are essays on the Diana camera. Jonathan Bailey, Chris Crawford and Sean Duggan are the three photographers whose words and photos grace these pages.

This book is a must have for the avid Diana and clone collector and will be eye opening for the newer breed of plastic and toy camera photographers who use Holgas and Diana+ cameras and have no idea of the history behind them.

The Diana Camera - A Pictorial History will be a fine addition to my bookshelf, where it will sit in good company with my other Diana memorabilia, between the Diana Show catalog, and a 1971 issue of Popular Photography magazine, that has an article that discussed the use of $1 toy camera being used to teach photography at the Ohio University.

The Diana and clone cameras were made and sold in the 1960s and 70s. Made in China, and imported primarily as the Diana, it was also shipped under many different labels and nameplates. The cheap plastic cameras were often given away as gas station premiums or boardwalk prizes.

The story of the Diana camera as an artist’s tool, begins in the 1970s, when the photography department at Ohio University started teaching their students with cheap toy cameras.

The earliest documentation I have been able to find on this subject, is a Popular Photography article published in 1971 on the subject. The article was titled: $1 toy teaches photography
by Elizabeth Truxell, the Chairman of the Dept. of Photography at Ohio University in Athens.

In the article, Truxell outlines the program where students were able to purchase a Diana camera for use in class for $1.83, film for 15 cents a roll. The intent was to loosen up the students by having them shoot lots of film.

Nancy Rexroth of “Iowa” fame, was a graduate student working in the program, and is mentioned in the article and also is one of the photographers whose photo was used to illustrate the article.

From these humble beginnings, the magical images these simple plastic cameras produced became more widely known, becoming the phenomena we know today.

As demand for the scarce Diana cameras grew in the 1980s and 1990s, the Chinese made Holga became an able substitute and has grown to have quite it’s own following of loyal enthusiasts.

Some 35 to 40 years later, the humble Diana camera has been reincarnated as the slightly improved Diana+. Although it resembles the original, the workings have been modernized and improved.
The Lomography Diana+ is nothing less than a camera system, complete with interchangeable lenses and accessories.

An out of the box look at the Lomography Diana+ and Diana F+ 35mm film back.

I am still working on the 35mm film in the Diana camera project. I hope to have the post and how-to video up before the end of the month.

I am going to review the Lomography 35mm film back for the Diana+ and DianaF+.

And also coming up soon will be a review of Allan Detrich’s book, Diana Camera Pictorial History.
http://www.allandetrich.com/diana.htm

This is a video I made of the eBay adapter, out of the “box”.

You should also check out my written review:
http://dianacamera.com/?p=125

This was taken at the Japanese Tea Garden in San Francisco during our visit last spring. It’s a beautiful garden, next to the new De Young museum in Golden Gate Park. The afternoon light was perfect.

Camera: Holga 120N Film: Tri-X 320, processed in D-76.

I took this photograph in San Francisco last spring. I love the quality of the light from the sun coming through the fog.

Camera: Diana+, Film: Tri-X 320, processed in D-76