Long Beach on the Horizon

I took this shot from Sunset Beach looking north toward the skyline of the city of Long Beach, California.

I used my circa 1938 Voigtlander Bessa and Tri-X 400 film. Since I don't own a light meter I guessed at the exposure. (Can't remember now what settings I used.)

I don't know what caused the light aberration on the left of the image. I suppose its a flare from the sun which was lowering in the cloudy sky to my front and perhaps a ray peeked through a gap in the clouds and infiltrated my aperture. The other images on the roll were not similarly marred. I kinda like it, though.

The Bessa is a delight to use, although it's completely manual. This is part of it's charm to me. It creates large 6x9cm negatives, 8 per roll of 120 film.

You have to estimate (or measure) distances to your subject since it has no rangefinder. This isn't a problem taking landscapes or anything distant such as above because you'd just set the focus to infinity and fire. But with portraits and other closer-up shots you'd want to be more careful, and perhaps use a measuring tape for precision (You may want to carry a light meter, too.)