#yashicaautofocusmotorIID

[somsesh]

Yashica Auto Focus Motor IID

On a Saturday afternoon in November last year, I was walking by 100ft road Indiranagar when my eyes landed up on a guy on the side of the road with a makeshift shop selling an assortment of vintage junk. The guy must have been in his fifties, his eyes were set deeply in the dark socket from where his smudged yellow eyes glistened. He had sleek black hair parted from the middle, pulled back like Bollywood heroes of the early 90s. It was a befitting look for the stuff he had lined up on his roadside shop. There were walkman, camcorders, round dial telephones, old LP records, and plenty of point-and-shoot film cameras. I am a sucker for nostalgia, but an even bigger sucker for film cameras. I had always wanted a point-and-shoot camera because its mobility of it feels like a blessing at times. Most of the cameras he had were in pretty roughed-up condition, except for a Yashica AF. This model stood out, built like a sturdy plastic soap box with some nifty features like a sliding lens cover. I also have a soft spot for Yashica cameras because my father had a Yashica SLR, so my heart for this new find at this roadside shop started to melt. The shopkeeper very smartly kept no batteries to check whether the camera worked. After my pathetic negotiating skills, we settled for a price of 2K.

Thankfully, Nidhi pitched in and agreed on 1K and 500 later only if the camera worked. We decided to take it to Prabhu's photo shop on Brigade to see if it had any life left. We put the pencil cells through the loose hinges of the battery case area. Hit the shoot button but it did nothing. Mr Prabhu obliged us by trying his experience on it. He rewound the film roll motor by pressing it, and it made a screeching noise and kicked to life. But it still won't shoot. So I had a camera that could walk but not see. Mr Prabhu offered to get it fixed, and even with the risk of paying the repair cost, it was worth seeing it through because the gains were much higher than the losses at that point. I waited for a couple of weeks, anticipating whether I will have a showpiece coming back or a camera I could shoot with. Thankfully, my luck had not gone to sleep, and the camera came back in working condition. Although, a few things were still off. The camera could shoot even with the lens cap covered, so I wasted quite a few shots taking blank shots because, after years of shooting on an SLR, you get assured of the lens cap not being on the camera because your viewfinder will tell you so! The camera also would roll through multiple shots without taking a shot. It happened more when the shutter was pressed for a slightly longer duration. It's a glitch that I had no clue how to tackle because at times it would do this even with a light press. The flash would also work groggily at times because you would have to wait for some time before it would actually fire, so there went a few shots down the sinkhole.

I don't know if monetarily it was of any gain to pick this camera up from the roadside, but the whole fun is not knowing what you would actually end up with. Took quite a few shots of Sufi with this camera,.