This One Is Mine: Shooting a Praktica MTL3 Again

It was a Saturday in September, and my son was going to forge a knife.

I had been asked to drop him off in Le Gâvre, a small town north of Nantes, where he would spend the day with people who knew what to do with a hammer and a lump of hot steel. I knew what to do with a camera and a cup of coffee. It seemed a fair division of labour.

So there I was, two coffees in, sitting in the Gâvraise café with a roll of RPX 400 loaded and a roll of HP5+ as back-up. I had the car, a full tank of diesel and the Praktica MTL3.

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The first one

This is my camera. There are many like it, but this one is mine.

I had a camera like it in 1987. Same model, same lens. My first proper camera. Dad had been shown that I had learnt how to use it, and that was the deal: learn how to use one, then maybe we might have to get you one. I was proud as punch. That camera went everywhere with me.

I stuck the photos on my wall, and I still have some of the images from them. USA in 1988, France and Switzerland in 1987, Russia in 1990. It is the camera I learnt photography on.

The MTL3 was made in East Germany, when it really was a different country, and the phrase “brick shithouse” springs to mind. Mine had been dropped when I fell off my bike in rural France in 1987, on an exchange visit just outside Lyon. And to think it would come back to France with me as an adult.

It recorded my life in Paris and in Nantes. My set-up was basic but a good starter kit: the camera, a 50mm Pentacon f1.8, a 135mm Helios f2.8, a flash, a side mount for the flash and a cable to connect the two. A strap and a bag. By 2009 that kit had died after a long and loyal service. It owed me nothing, and it was responsible for launching me into this photography lark. Little did I know.

It has been known for me to have a tendency towards being a sentimental old fool. True to form, I now have Version 2.0 of the Praktica. Same set-up, give or take. The only survivor of the original is the camera strap.

The body came from a collector in Montbert, and it had been well looked after. I now own a 50mm, a 35mm, a 28mm, a 135mm and even a 600mm, which I have never used, but never say never. A Helios 44-2 is waiting to be tried: a lens most people associate with Zenith cameras, going onto a Praktica that was built to take it all the same.

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In the hand

The first thing you notice is the shutter button on the front of the camera. The other noises were ever so familiar: the mirror slap, and the wind-on lever, which falls under the thumb exactly where it should. My hands took to it as if I had never put it down.

The viewfinder is adequate in daylight and a little tough in low light. Focusing is by split prism, and if you are not sure you can zone focus with the lens and trust yourself. The built-in meter is a needle. On the right-hand side of the finder you have a circle, a plus above it and a minus below, and as you change your settings the needle moves. The idea is to get it into the middle of the circle. I remember being obsessed with that circle. Strangely, nowadays, less so.

One feature I do like is the marker on the left-hand side of the viewfinder: a small black triangle that appears and disappears when the film has been wound on. A small thing, but it is the sort of small thing I appreciate.

Since I’ve had this camera I’ve had fully automatic, shutter priority, aperture priority and autofocus, and despite all that it is good to be back to choosing everything. It was like meeting up with an old friend. A fully manual friend, of course.

I still remember noting each shot in a notebook, with my settings, which you need with film because there is no EXIF data on the image. My Canon 6D Mark II even records the GPS position of every frame. How times have changed. But I enjoy the slower pace of doing things. I’m built for comfort, not speed, and I’m fine with that.

I started with the 35mm Soligor f2.8 and decided to see where it took me. The view reminded me of what I get from my X100F, so why the heck not. It was nice to have that view for the day. It was overcast, hence the RPX 400, which I had good results with before and which needed using up anyway. Its negatives stay as flat as pancakes after development, which I do at home. The HP5+ will be the next film through the camera.

I took what I’d call a mental health walk round the village, said my rosary in the local church, a pretty little place, and swapped between the 50, the 35 and the 28 all day. Fourteen frames. I potter.

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Should you buy one?

Why not. They are not particularly expensive and there is a great deal of glass out there for them. It is a basic manual camera that would suit a fourteen-year-old boy. The fully manual aspect is exactly what a young photographer, and an older one too, needs to learn this craft. Mine cost about 15 euros from a collector in Montbert; online, a tested one with a 50mm tends to ask between 80 and 130.

Mine has one thing to watch. Two frames on this roll came back half black, which smells like the shutter at its faster speeds. I went through the range from 1000 down to 60 that day, so I will test it before the next roll. Otherwise it feels solid in the hand and I know it can take a knock. I enjoyed the Soligor. The view was like using my X100F. Is it exceptional? No. But I have one, it works well, and I was after a 35mm lens and this one was available.

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The rest of the day

The plan went like this: lunch in Nantes, a visit to Tessier the florist because Kate had dropped a few hints about her birthday, the castle to finish the roll, and then confession at Sainte-Croix from three.

Lunch was at the Bouillon de la Paix: very French, not too spicy, traditional bistro food done very well. A very happy chappy. They were doing a fair trade and you could see the role of every member of staff: one girl on the drinks, the maître d’ placing people, the waiting staff in and out of the kitchen. For dessert I chose the brioche perdue with vanilla ice cream, and I joked in my notebook that I might lose my brioche. I should have been more careful what I joked about.

Somewhere after lunch I found myself in a pub, and my body made its own decisions. I will spare you the details. It was explosive, it was already too late by the time I reached the loo, and I would not recommend it. Luckily for me the duty manager took pity on me. He turned up with a cleaning kit, a bucket and a sponge, and let me clear up after myself. Then he brought me a pint of water to rehydrate. That man is brilliant.

I got home pretty damn sharpish, cleaned up and became almost presentable. Confession at Sainte-Croix would have to wait.

Then my son rang. The man who was supposed to be bringing him home had let him down, so I went to fetch him. He had had a lovely day forging a knife, and he told me all about it: the forge, the knife, and the welcome from the family, which had moved him. We ate MacDo that evening. Kate was having party number two.

The film waited in the car, twelve frames still to shoot. A few days later I drove into the country and finished the roll, slowly, which is the only speed the camera and I have ever agreed on.

If you'd rather have one of these on a wall than a screen — prints from €99.99, Ilford or Baryta paper, made by WhiteWall in Berlin. The shop →