It’s been some time since my last post, and this isn’t going to be a long one.
However, it could be useful for anyone who, like me, shoots 35mm film to develop at home and who isn’t great at judging when to stop rewinding the film back on to the spool in the camera.
I’ve had a number of frustrating experiences where I’ve shot a roll of film, been all ready to develop it… and couldn’t retrieve the leader from the cassette. I eventually found the following blog post, which clarifies the way that the Kaiser Film Retriever is best used: How to use the Kaiser Film Retriever
The key elements seem to be:
- winding the film anticlockwise after the retriever’s been inserted so that the leader flicks over the retriever, and then…
- winding the film clockwise until resistance is encountered to push the leader between the two pieces of flexible plastic
The retriever’s smaller second tongue can then be inserted, catching the sprockets of the leader, and then retracted to extract the film. I find that it can sometimes help to gently turn the spool clockwise whilst sliding the lever to retract the smaller tongue.
Hope this link and the additional information’s of assistance to a frustrated film extractor at some point.