new toy - gakkenflex 35mm twin lens reflex camera

I just got myself a new toy - Gakkenflex 35mm twin lens reflex (TLR) camera. Comes bundled with parents' nagging.

While I am not really a photography person, I've always read about the scientific kits that come with the Japanese magazine Otona no Kagaku (大人の科学). I also find the colourful Blackbird,fly, another TLR camera, pretty cool. But like Lomo cameras, it's not really cheap (and I don't usually spend that kind of money). So when I saw the Vol.25 Otona no Kagaku comes with the camera kit, I brought it home.

I unboxed the kit pretty much expecting something like when opening a box of Gundam, but the parts were already in their individual pieces, saved the trouble of plucking and leaving behind ugly bits. Oopz, I forgot to mention, you are supposed to assemble it yourself. There were lots of screwing involved and a handy screwdriver came with the kit. It took me more than an hour to finish assembling the camera.

It really felt great to assemble a camera yourself. You could see all the mechanism inside and the physics involved. To see the image on the viewfinder, +1. By the way, on a TLR you look down into the viewfinder, not horizontal. And the image is laterally inverted.

Next step, get some 35mm film and start shooting. Time for some analog fun.

EDIT: first roll of film developed!