Camera Chat

If I'm honest, I spend more time thinking about photography and producing photos than I do railway modelling.

Perhaps that isn't surprising, given that one of my key career decisions was not to pursue photography professionally. Oddly, had I done so, I would still have met one of my best friends. The world works in odd ways.

Anyway, this week, I have mostly been thinking about cameras.

I don't, at least I don't think I do, suffer from GAS. Gear Acquisition Syndrome. That dreadful affliction makes sufferers think they always need the latest and best equipment to take photos.

Some cameras work for me, and others don't. I've learned, expensively, that the camera everybody raves about might differ from the one that works for me.

And I've mourned when many a much-loved camera has died a premature death. 

The last few years have seen me slowly returning to a more manual approach. First, with a few of the new cheap manual lenses flooding the market, then with the Leica.

In parallel, my phone camera has been getting so much better in a very automated way. It can take photos in a range of situations that would once have been unthinkable.  But that is the catch. All I do is press a virtual shutter button. The phone is actually in control of the shot. 

So I find myself thinking, "What next?"

One option is obvious, if expensive.  It would have been slightly less expensive if Leica hadn't discontinued the series that spoke to me just as I became aware of it.

Let us park that option for now.

And also, please let me park my obsession with dreadful instant film cameras. OK, I know I will never kick that addiction.

Let me say it out loud.

I'm considering buying a vintage film camera.

I blame the combination of  Chris Nevard and 35mmc.

They both keep posting experiments in the genre.

And I am tempted.

There is something indefinable that I miss, especially if 120 film is involved. It isn't the process and the smell, though I miss the solitude of the darkroom. 

It is something else. The grain, the commitment to both the moment observed and to the image when you press the shutter.  And it is about knowing exactly what the final image will be.

So, where is this taking me? I'm not sure. I don't want to spend a fortune for what will still be a a niche part of my hobby.  There are more accessible decent vintage 35mm cameras than 120 ones - An Agfa Silette with the f2 lens would be my 35 mm choice. But there is something about a TLR.

Perhaps cameras are like cats. You don't find them, they find you.