I saw a post online in one of the camera forums I frequent that it’s Kodak Brownie Month. Photographers are encourged to use their Brownie cameras and share photos taken with them. There are dozens of Brownie models. I happen to own six different models.

One of my oldest cameras is the Kodak Brownie Target Six-20. Until now I’d never used it before. I picked it up locally a while back for $15 after seeing it in a Facebook Marketplace ad. It was made by Kodak between 1946 and 1952. It uses 620 film (hence the name). It’s a very basic box camera. And I mean very basic (which is a commonality between all Brownies). It has a single shutter speed (somewhere around 1/40th of a second) and just two f-stops…f11 and f16. There’s a bulb function if you wish to do a timed exposure. There’s no focusing. Just keep your subject at least ten feet away and it’ll probably be in focus. A roll of film will get you eight frames measuring 2 1/4″ X 3 1/4″. The negatives are huge!

I’d previously purchased an odd lot of fim, including some 620 film, from the Film Photography Project. Their 620 stock is Wolfman 100. I loaded a roll and took it out for a whirl. The film was later developed in Kodak D-76 1:1 for 10 minutes at 68°.

I am always in awe of cameras this old that still function and produce great negatives. It’s a testament to their simple designs and, subsequntly, fewer number of things that can go wrong.