http://mattdentonphoto.com/cameras/yashica_d.html see this link for more
"I very nearly got a used Rolleicord instead--and I would have been good with that. The Rolleicord is better constructed and one of the greatly underestimated cameras today."
I own a lot of Yashica's. All of them make up a respectable collection by themselves. They were all spawned by my good experiences with that first Yashica 44 LM from my youth in the sixties. It led me to buy new my first Yashica D 6x6 camera. I would have preferred a Rolleiflex, but I couldn't afford even a used one then. I very nearly got a Rolleicord instead--and I would have been good with that. Honestly the Yashica D didn't impress me as the revered workhorse it seems to have a reputation for now. But It was an acceptable camera. This was during the late sixties.
This link is for the Yashica D Operators Manual in downloadable PDF http://www.butkus.org/chinon/yashica/yashica_d/yashica_d.htm
One of the biggest contributions the Yashica D camera had to my photographic skill came when a friend challenged me, or I him, to use the camera exclusively for a period of time. It seems it was for six month--which is a long time when you are an active freelance newspaper and school class photographer. You see the Yasihica D is very manual--right down to the film-transport knob and the shutter cock. No rapid-wind crank here. Even my Yashica 44 LM had had a rapid wind crank and an on-board light meter.
This early challenge provided a valuable learning curve that has served me ever since. I learned old-school. I became a manual photographer. I sold the Yashica D camera to my friend eventually, and replaced it with a Minolta Autocord TLR 120 as I recall. But another Yashica D was destined to play a vital role in my career a few years later.
Link Comparing the Yashica D with the Minolta Autocord (not really apples to apples): http://photo.net/medium-format-photography-forum/003U0A
I guess a person could collect just about anything. When I traveled all over the place on my business, I brought complimentary matchbook advertisements home and gave them to my oldest daughter, who was then just a kid. I was always looking for little shared ways in which I could have something special to cement bonds with each of our four children. I was gone a lot---and these little things helped me share a bond with each.
Eventually we filled up a large clear plastic container. It was displayed where it got a lot of attention and certainly was a conversation piece. I told Yaya that it might one day become a rare and valuable collection, if it was cared for. Truly it might have.
This is a good link for all Yashica 6x6's including the D http://www.williamsphotographic.com/yashica.html
Yaya went out West to college; our family had always enjoyed wood heat to augment our less comfortable heat-pump. Wood was plentiful in those parts just by driving out and cutting dead wood left at construction sites and in the wake of storms and what not. Those who live in areas where wood is not so plentiful, may presume to be good ecologists, but they are mostly just more protesters seeking attention to offset the things they are rightfully guilty about. Trees, unman aged, are like any other resource. They get out of balance and the trees become under-nourished and scraggly.
I am not saying that we couldn't all be better stewards over our environment, but I believe Sheryl Crow would be best to confine her save-the-world antics to great ballads. A few years ago, the singer made an intended environmentally knowledgeable statement about how everyone should ration themselves to one section of toilet tissue per occasion. I suppose this news tid-bit achieved its purpose. Publicity. Perhaps even greater awareness. But I doubt that it caused anyone to reduce their tree consumption--or humus production.
Sheryl Crow can write pleasant tunes and thoughtful lyrics (she can likely spell too). I suppose by world standards the gal is successful. By her own account, she suffers major depression. She has never been too successful regarding relationships, except as a fairly obvious groupie. She seems to have maximized living. I really can't blame her for any of that. Nor, do I necessarily need her to tell me how to wipe. Everyone's plumbing is probably slightly different. It actually sounds as if she might be suffering from some sort of gallbladder disorder, if she can actually achieve what she calls for.
Although I still tend to regard Sheryl Crow as a new phenomenon, she's not that new. If fact, Her original album, which I have a copy of somewhere if not lifted by one of my progeny. If I am careful with it and the other old albums made for various media of antiquity, the collection will one day be worth some bucks. I like Sheryl Crow, not for her statesmanship, but her retrograde old-hippyishness. She's a solid and comfortable old gal. much like the Yashica D, She is predictable. Presidential material she is not.
As for the matchbook collection it apparently became convenient for family members to raid it whenever any sort of flame was required, especially for the fireplace. The carefully collected match book collection has long since been dismantled and left as scraps or ashes. It is if only to me, kind of sad. But you know hat is said of the best laid plans.
"...the 635 is a D with 35mm capability. I never had a problem with the results. The Rokkor lens [found in the Minolta Autocord] is very sharp, edge to edge, at almost all apertures. If that's what you need, then look for an Autocord. They have a focus lever that is uncomfortable for me...below the lens and the knob tends to break. That's why I like Rolleicords and Yashica D style cameras...focus knob on the right side. If you want to sell the D, let me know. A really good Autocord will cost about $200.
"http://photo.net/medium-format-photography-forum/003U0A
Fortunately, my cameras did not go the way of the matchbooks. Many of them were preserved, and others were replaced by similar models I have owned and used over the years. Just when I seem to have focused my preference upon one manufacturer or the other, or style or at least broad category of cameras, I always seem to rediscover something else that made me reach a different conclusion way back when--during my journey through camera-land.
"The Yashica D was made in a variety of configurations. The later ones used the better Yashinon 4 element lenses."
I have owned many Yashica brand cameras. I have owned an excessive number of Yashica 120 6x6 TLR's. I have owned exactly three Yashica D cameras. Only one was a disappointment, and it was not the camera's fault but some half-baked eBay merchant, who failed to disclose its true condition.
Buying on eBay can be a remarkable experience.
I have long sold Military Optics over eBay. A British Colombian resident who ripped me off for a $600 rifle scope a couple of years back thought he was smart; ir mazes me how few people truly believe the Law of Compensation as expressed in Ralph Waldo Emerson's Essays on Compensation. The princliples ar not unique to Emerson--every major philosophy or religion expresses the same some way. The Bible succinctly sums it up in the parable of the sewer. You DO reap what you sew. Even Australlian aborigines know that wrong actions can behave like their boom-a-rangs and come back and smack you in the head when least expected.
I teach some preparedness classes, along with a lot of personal and family defense--life-saving things that I have been in a position to learn over a fifty or so years. What I teach is not a is not a sport. It is neither sporting, nor well-choreographed--although I have long counted Master Lee of ATA fame as a friend, although I have not seen him in a few decades. This may also account for one reason I am a week in recovery from a day long surgery to try to repair my cervical spine. I am now old and rickety, and I hurt a lot.
But if I were to give one bit of advice above all other regarding self-defense--armed or unarmed--it might surprise you that it would be something akin to The Golden Rule. Or more simply put--to respect everyone.This past week one apparent good family man, came out of a little Italian restaurant we sometimes enjoy, and either correctly or incorrectly misperceived his wife and another customer fussing over a parking place. Apparently the woman was shoved or fell down.
The intervening husband shot and killed her real or imagined assailant (The area where this tragedy happened is considered among the safest living areas in the world.). This kind of thing should not happen over parking places. But it does--and less. Men's hearts fail them. WE SHOULD NOT BE PUSHING THE ENVELOPE WHEN IT COMES TO MESSING WITH PEOPLE. .
Respecting our neighbors is essential to living well--or even at all. There are too many residual crazies out here among us to smartly do otherwise. And although I have used distance and seclusion to good avail to foster those things that may still be going around from coming around--the most remote style in Canada is no guarantee that an eBay offense insulated by North Canadian ranges, wide rivers, and international borders is simply not always enough to become smug.
"The insignificant grocery clerk you dis' this morning may become your executioner tonight."
Thus the Golden Rule becomes more pragmatic than mere pleasant ideals.
When buying a cameraa over eBay, if the description says, "I have no real expertise about cameras. Although I think it works, I have no waying of know--therefore this camera is sold as is", this is code for "this camera does not work, or at least I don't think it does, but maybe you can get a deal if you buy it anyway." Lazze Farre (sp). And I won't take it back!
If you plan to fix such a camera, then maybe you can get a deal. I have fixed quite a few such cameras. At this point in life, my time is at apremium, I don't mind paying a fair price, but don't lie to me or withhold all the truth. That's the same as a lie. So the third Yashica D that I have, I got off of eBay and it doesn't work. I may sell it for parts or if I really get the chance while hospitalized or something--I may fix it. But this Yashica D is just another petty aggravation.
I don't send stuff back. It is not worth the effort. But just because I don't go for blood and negative feedback and a whole cluster of other things that I could do to get even--doesn't mean that the law of compensation won't get even for me. So throw that boom-a-rang and let it hit you in the head. It is a true principle and it will. The smug Canadian who stole my rifle scope--may or may not know it, but I have already severed my pound of flesh from him. You never want to leave your calling card regarding such stuff.
I know an eBayer who routinely gets even for people who cheat him on eBay. He is a buyer. If he gets ripped off, he lets them know that he is unhappy and gives them the opportunity to make amends, but he will not send an item back, nor will he pay for the postage. He leaves it up to the seller. If the sell or doesn't do what my friend feels is right--he looks and orders a few more inconsequential items. then, in short, he cleverly demolishes their feedback reputation, using some of these items as auspices. I'm not like that, but he swears by it.
"I got a nice Yashica Mat EM for $62. That said, you still need to stop it down for best performance. Not too long ago I took a picture of a building, using the exact same set-up, but with one exposure at 1/60 s around f/10 and one at 1/30 s around f/15. The difference in the sharpness of the lettering on the building was quite apparent, even on a 5x5" proof. Even the Yashinon lenses are at their peak somewhere around f/13-f/16." http://photo.net/medium-format-photography-forum/003U0A
The second of the three Yashica D's that I owned, was one I bought at a pawn shop. I was a young husband and father, and had sold most of my private belongings for family needs. I traded my banjo for a washing machine. I recall selling my 2.8 Rolleiflex TLR for a little of nothing in order to buy some family items that we needed. I rightly viewed the condition necessary and temporary. We do what we have to.
The Yashica D would have to do as I finished my degree, worked a full-time job, and started a photography business on the side. The camera was not in such good shape, but it worked and was able to make good pictures with it. I got the Natural Home Portraits business going and it worked out way better than even I could anticipate. I tell an inspiring is an inspiring story about how I acquired a new Mamiya C330 within hours of my Yashica D cratering. Inpiration is not the pint of this post--so I'll tell this story elsewhere.
As far as optics and making good pictures is concerned--as is the case with many cameras, you''ll want to choose the f/stop appropriately. There were D's made with 3 ems groups and those made with 5 (or is it four). The latter Yashinon are very good lenses. The Yashikor, are not that bad. When I say "the appropriate f/stop, this means in order to deliver the kind of depth, sharpness, and background blur you want (to be hip you must call this bokeh.) If you are looking for Sharp images it is best to use a meddle of the high road f/stop such as f/8 or higher. If you want a pleasant focus fall-off with the outer edges for pleasing portraits--you be better to go with a larger hole (smaller number f/stop).
A few other thoughts are to back up from the subject or crop less closely, for greater depth of field. The larger negative than the standard 35 neg or equivalent ccd on a digital camera, allow for some of this. Tele, wide, and close-up attachment can also render an array of creative optical tools. Use a tripod and shoot a slower shutter speed when possible. Use a faster (ISO) film. There are better cameras made but if you learn all the physics available to you and the capabilities as well as the limitations of the Yashica D--it will not be evident to anyone, whether you used a Yashica or a Rollei, or a Hasselblad or a Mamiya, or a Minolta Autocord. Don't get too caught up in the lens tests say. they only tell a small part of the story, and are largely for photography magazines and scientists.
The point I suppose to make here is that two out of three of the Yashica D TLR's that I have owned broke--in ways unacceptable to me. My experience tells me that their film transport system sucks. But that just me. Others love them I suppose. The do have great optics for the money. They are simple, and they can often be fixed but breakage is never convenient. All in all, the 40 bucks I spent for my Natural Home Portraitscamera, paid for itself many times over--so why complain. The cameras can be had for a little of nothing. On the other hand, my money is on Yashica or Yashicamat 124--or the 124 G model, which has more reliable electrical contacts.
Read this for portent TLR info: http://notesandnods.typepad.com/photography_for_profit_or/2008/12/rollei-6x6-twin-lens-reflex-cameras.html
http://notesandnods.typepad.com/photography_for_profit_or/2008/01/how-to-jump-sta.html
