Wooah!! This could be a long story!
I think the best approach to this section would be for me to merely record my first thoughts and then to return to what I've written once I've had more time to think. At that stage I will try to update the content with more "hard facts"!
It's all my father's fault really! He was a journalist who had a passion for photography, and he certainly passed that interest on to me. When I was a kid, he was shooting a Kodak Retina IIIc ...a camera I eventually used before buying my first SLR, and that I still own. I believe I got my first camera in 1967 at age 6 years. It was a "Box Brownie" design, loading 120 roll film. I was so proud of this camera, and still have it together with many of the smudgy monochrome pictures that I shot in Pretoria, East London and King William's Town in the late 60's and early 70's.
In about 1971 or 72 I was given a 120 cassette film camera. A ghastly thing that produced some surprisingly good shots with punchy colours. As you can no doubt tell, I'm a magpie, and I still own this camera too! In 1974 I did my first trip abroad with my folks, and they bought me my first 35mm camera to take along. It was not an SLR, but it did introduce me to a simple exposure meter and focussing. I also got a "Thyrissor" flash and a miniature tripod that became my favourite piece of equipment. My old mate, Jonathan Keith Boland and I started doing low light and night time pictures. With our simple gear we got some excellent shots of heavy lightening strikes over Pretoria in the summer. Exciting stuff!!
In the late 70's I started using my father's Retina, and had my first introduction to "real" photography! I was a little overwhelmed, but despite my lack of skill, still managed to shoot off some acceptable shots on my first independent trip to Europe back in 1978.
During the dark years of military conscription and active duty in the South West African and Angolan "operational areas" I packed a tiny C-110 folding camera...mainly because could hide it away. It was illegal to pack a camera in the South African Defence Force. That little camera produced some of the most harrowing and haunting shots of my life... people, places and events that I would rather forget. On my demobilisation in June 1981 I found that old habits die hard, and I continued to carry the C-110 with me wherever I went! Wow...did we REALLY party that much??! I went through literally 100's of Sylvania "Flip-Flashes" at clubs and parties up and down the country. For a cheap and nasty camera, the C-110 served me well.
In 1982 I enrolled at the University of Pretoria and got a bursary from the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR). Over the December-January vacation I worked at the CSIR to get some work experience and to make a little money. On the last day of my "vac-work" I picked up my cheque, got into my car, drove downtown, and bought my first SLR, a Pentax ME Super. This is still my very favourite camera and in 1999 I bought a second ME Super from a used camera dealer in Prague. My "ME" has been EVERYWHERE with me since 1983, and I must have shot a 100,000 pictures with it (this is a wild guess, and I will try to do a more accurate estimate!). Quite frankly, the ME (in either Manual, AP or Auto mode) has become an extension of my body! I literally do not have to think when using it. I don't have to look at what I'm doing...I know where everything is and how it works.
The ME has been utterly reliable. The only problems it has given me were of my own making. Just before I moved to the Czech Republic in 1995 I decided to take it in to Pentax South Africa for a clean (at one stage in the vineyards of the Cape I had a fruit fly in the pentaprism!) and service. Mistake! DON'T FIX SOMETHING IF IT'S NOT BROKEN! The week before leaving SA, I ran a film through the camera - the frame counter stopped working, and the film advance lever lost tension and flopped from side to side. I was pissed off and returned the camera to Pentax. They "fixed" it, but since then the winding mechanism has not been too reliable, and the frame counter seems to have a life of its own! I took it in to a dealer in Prague and found out (many bucks later) that the South Africans had forgotten to replace one miniature spring. The Czechs apparently fixed this, but I still occasionally get strange numbers appearing in the frame counter!
With the Pentax ME Super I learned about aperture, shutter speed, depth of field and film speed. I was hooked! Soon after buying the ME, I entered a phone-in competition on the radio and won another camera - the excellent Minolta AF-Sv "talking camera"! As a student this was THE perfect 35mm party camera as it spoke to you when things weren't right: "Load film!", "Too dark; use flash!" and "Check distance!" when your subject was out of range of the built in flash! My wife used this camera up to 1997, replacing it with a Canon Ixus APS camera which was more convenient for her to carry.
In 1988 I did a darkroom course at Pretoria Technical College where I met Rosemary Williams, my photography "soul mate". We set up a darkroom together, shot lots of pictures with each other, and had a great deal of fun! A few years later I went on to do the Ansel Adams "Zone System" course, and got into spot meters in a big way!! Rosemary got into Victor and kids!! ;-)
In 1989 I moved to the UK, packing my Minolta and Pentax and a host of lenses: 14mm, 24mm, 40mm, 50mm, 80-200mm zoom and a 500mm mirror lens. From London I travelled up to a camera show at the NEC in Birmingham where I saw the first Pentax autofocus camera, the SFX-n. I had to have it! Although I was low on cash, I managed to save enough to buy the camera and a 28-80mm zoom lens from Jessop on Oxford Street. As fancy as it was, I found that I still preferred my old ME Super! However, the SFX-n eventually came into it's own when I bought a Metz 45 CL-3 flash gun and dedicated SCA unit...the perfect "point and shoot" combination for wedding work! This gear made me a lot of money on my return to South Africa (on the sudden death of my father) in mid-1990.
I moved to Prague at the end of 1995. The city is a paradise for camera collectors, and I by 1998 I could take it no longer - I wanted a large format camera! I settled for a used Pentacon Six TL, an East German camera that has THE most satisfying shutter release in the world! God, it's a gorgeous feeling to release a shot with this camera! At present I have the standard 80mm Carl Zeiss lens, but will be acquiring additional glassware in the near future.
In 1997 my wife Débra and I did an expedition to the Himalayas, riding a motorcycle over the highest driveable mountain pass in the world. Debs wanted a small camera to keep in her top pocket - the Minolta was too big. As loathe as I was to go for APS, that's what we bought - Canon's first APS camera, the Ixus (also known as the "Elph" in the USA, and the "Ixy" in Japan). The very first shots we fired with this camera were in India, and the results to date have been astounding! It obviously does not have the sharpness of a 35mm, but for the size and convenience that the Ixus provides, it's been worth it's weight in gold. On an expedition to Bhutan in 1999, we spent two days on a motorcycle in torrential rain. At one point, the Ixus got wet and stopped functioning. We opened up the battery compartment and literally poured water out of the camera. I thought that it would never work again but, after a thorough drying out...viola!! It has served us well ever since, although the flash now seems to enjoy going off whenever the shutter is released!
Summer 2000 was an exciting time for me - I acquired four cameras!! The first was a gift from a friend who was moving from Prague back to Sydney, Australia. At one of his MANY farewell dinners he presented me with a Voigtländer Bergheil (produced between 1924 and 1930) that shoots a colossal 10x15 negative! It is in immaculate condition, and I'm now on the hunt for a film back so that I can get the beaut working. A week later - all fired up for photography - I walked into one of my favourite pawn shops off the beaten track in the heart of Prague's "old town". There I bought two very different cameras, namely a Rheinmetall Weltax 6x6/4.5 and a Canon Ixus Z70.
The former is a "Klappkamera" that dates from 1950 and shoots 6x6 or 6x4.5 roll film, while the latter arrived in Europe in 1999 and uses APS film. The Weltax is in superb condition for a 50 year old camera - the sharpness of the pictures it produces is rivaled only by those shot with my Pentacon Six TL. It's also very compact for a large format camera, and I know that I will take it travelling.
The Canon Ixus Z70 is the "big brother" of our standard Ixus. The price I paid was too good to be true, but I soon found out why I got such a bargain...the camera lens did not open on command. I took it to the authorised Canon service centre in Prague, and they fixed it within a day and at a reasonable price. Even after factoring the cost of the repairs into the deal, I got a good bargain on this powerful pocket camera with a 70mm zoom lens.
Passing through Heathrow Airport on my wayback from Southampton to Prague, I bought my first digital camera, a Fujifilm FinePix 4700 Zoom. This beautifully designed minature marvel has a whopping 4.3 million pixel output which is currently the highest resolution available. The camera uses SmartMedia cards and I have been impressed by the wide range of functionality crammed into this hi-tech unit. I have been equally astounded by the results - when I downloaded images and printed them on HP InkJet photographic paper, colours were vibrant in both indoor and outdoor shots, and with or without flash. The details in macro mode are outstanding too, and I know that I will be carrying this handy modern-day Box Brownie where ever I go. The fact that it shoots MPEG video clips is also great!
So, That's the short version of my life with cameras! What's next? Hmmmm? Become one with digital technology I guess, but there is no way that I will give up roll film! I enjoy the ritual and tradition of photography too much. Yeah - more black & white...and I need to get back into a darkroom!
- To Be Updated! -
MARK