Shocked and in pain....

I'm simply spechless, devastated, frustated, depressed and full of

rage.

All my photo equipmentment has been stolen...from the trunk of my car.

Traffic in my city is horrible in week days, so i had some business

to attend in Downtown and I parked my car in the Metro Rail Parking

Lot and went in the Metro Rail. At my return I notice that my license

plate was missing and my heart start pounding faster than normal.

My car is not a new one, almost a year ago, the key that open the

trunk broke inside, but since I can open the trunk from inside the

car I got lazy and never fixed that. Well,I opened from inside and

everything was gone my Domke F-2 with my black FM3A, 11 AI prime

lenses,two SB-30 Speedlight, one PK-13 extension tube,assorted

shades, assorted Hoya filters,assorted miscellaneous accesories and a

new Slik tripod.

Quite a few dollars that I had been saving for long time(I am

dissabled)..but well that is ,life sucks!!!

I guess that unless I win the Lottery I can't get into my passionate

hobby again.

Sorry,folks, too early to ruin your day with this depressive rant.

I live on disability benefits too, so I know how you feel. It must be devastating, especially a terrific camera like the FM3a. Do you have auto insurance that would cover the loss?

No,Pierre.My car is not new and the insurance that I have on it is the minimun required by the law in the State, which does not cover loss or damage, neither I have renter insurance,that one would help me too as I hear. Thanks for your concern.

I will have to give up and rely in my other hidden talent: painting.Not my first chice, but well as the song says..you can't always get what you want..

I understand, Remy. But look it from the other side of the fence too. I barelly could afford that equipment,as I said,I saved for long time.Not that I am dissabled, but I am also the father of three children (well now two,my daugher is 19 and in Collegue)and they have been under my custody and raised by me, without any financial aid from the mother or the Government or State( nor that I like it)since 1997).That is plenty of financial burden on my shoulders depending on my dissability.

With all due respect ,I don't know your relative but most likely she is not in the same situation.

I agree with Remy...insurance is not an option...perhaps if you had one less lens you

would have been able to pay for insurance for a year or so.

 

Hopefully others will learn from this.

I would be crushed if it happened to me, Robert.

 

Here's a thought: instead of focussing on the $5K that you have lost, think about what a minimum camera/lens setup might be to get you going again. I just bought an FG/50 E/SB-15 for $130 on ebay (doing a little shopping for a friend who has a budding photographer graduating HS).

 

You might give some thought to what you 'really need' and just buy that one (two?) lens and a minimalist body to get you up and running. You might even find it liberating in a strange way. Many times I have set out with so much gear that I feel like I'm always juggling. After I realize that, I usually settle in for one body and a fast 35mm lens.

 

It's a buyers market right now for used Nikon MF gear. You can get a chrome FE2 for $159 (keh, bgn) and a 35/2 for $99. Last year I priced out my cousin's F2 Photomic, 28/3.5, 50/1.4, 105/2.5, 200/4 (all pre-AI). At the keh bgn pricing last August (I haven't checked today) that fetched $425. I double-checked the figures and wrote him a check. That seemed like a whole lot of capability for $425.

 

Maybe you can't afford $425 or $275 or even $130 right now, Robert. Just thinking out loud to get you off the '$5K or nothing' thought process.

That's really a shame Robert. The only suggestion I might have is to buy a cheaper camera for now, and start saving. As I said, I know the situation, but you have to take it as a lesson learned. What else can you do?

Remy and others friends, you're right.

Maybe because my parents raised me overseas and I lived in a different culture and enviroment for too long, I never fully appreciated the value of the insurance and to me was a "silly term",....until yesterday.

Todd...I'm getting paranoid!!!..either you worked for that con of Ms Cleo, you were the security guard on the parking lot that asked me what happened when he saw me waiting outside the car ( I called the police to file a report)or you were the business man that returned from work and was friendly and also asked me?

I didn't not mention the value here!...but I did mentioned on the report and to them-not that I had calculated exactly yet,but that is my guess!!!...Yikes!!!!!

If I sin I don't post.....!!!!!!

Take all the serial numbers and put them on the Internet.

Find the local police and sheriff's department: file a theft report.

"Make sure" they take a copy of the serial numbers of your equipment.

 

You may consider contacting a lawyer and find out if the parking lot

-- you paid to park there -- has any liability coverage for theft on their parking lot.

 

Don't give up and do nothing.

I'm not trying to be a smart ass, but there may be a positive side to this. You can return to the basics - one camera and one lens. With a good used slr and a 50mm lens maybe $250.00 tops. I'm getting more and more hooked on shooting with just a 50mm lens, and it's easier on the back too. My goal is three good shots per roll of Velvia. This number goes up when just limiting myself to the one lens. And, no, I'm not quite ready to sell the zooms yet.

A lucky guess, Robert. That and having spent my college years buying/selling cameras retail. I did a lot of business with insurance adjustors, and the ability to ballpark a quick guess is valuable to them (subject of course to seeing the details and amending). n.b. anybody in retail: cultivate relationships with insurance adjustors, they can throw you a lot of business....

Robert, sorry to learn about your misfortunte. It reminds all of us that we need to be extra careful with our photo equipment. But this can also be a new beginning for you. Think about what cameras and lenses you really need and gradually build up your system again. As my college advisor once said, there are ups and downs in life. I am sure that there will be better days ahead.

 

Good luck.

Both Todd and Sanford are giving you EXCELLENT advice. I would sieze the opportunity to turn lemons into lemonaid and get back to basics. Might I suggest the following ideas, to get you back into creativity and away from the value of your lost equipment.

 

1) Try Medium Format: A nice Yashica Mat TLR can be gotten for $60-75

A very spartan, but serviceable Ricohflex IIIB could be gotten for $40. The large negative, along with surprisingly good optics, makes these capable of terrific results.

 

2) In Nikon SLR land, get an old Nikon F2 (~$200) or Nikkormat FTN ($80) and a few pre-AI prime lenses (Pre AI primes tend to cost less than half of what AI lenses go for: You could get a 28mm f3.5, 50mm f2 OR 55mm f3.5 Micro, 105mm f2.5 and 200mm f4, genuine Nikkor glass ALL together for under $300

 

Of course, there's no reason to confine yourselves to Nikons. Perfectly good Minolta, Pentax, Olympus or Canon Manual focus SLRs can be found for well under $100, and tons of GREAT lenses are all cheap and available on ebay.

 

3) Get a 35mm fixed lens Rangefinder - One of my favorites is the Konica Auto S2. With a working meter, they go for $60-75, with a broken meter but otherwise perfect, $25. The 45mm f1.8 lens on it is as good as any Nikkor 50mm lens. I am dead serious. It was the camera that I first learned on, and it is capable for astonishing Leica-caliber results.

 

If you would pay $10 for the shipping, I would be prepared to donate to you either a Konica Auto S2 with a broken meter, OR a Ricohflex IIIB 6x6 TLR which never had a meter to your cause. You'll need to go back to basics as far as setting the exposures. I will add to the donation, a Weston zone handheld meter that I found for $5 at a camera show, and which works fine. Or you can just follow my advice and buy something basic among the 2nd hand 35mm SLRs that are now glutting the market.

 

Don't be shocked it the best photos you take with these classic OLD and basic cameras, is as good as ANYTHING your stolen gear ever shot. You may just get back to the reasons you loved photography in the first place.

 

The point is, nowadays, with everyone switching to Digital, you could EASILY get a very stimulating and useful film camera for nearly NOTHING. So go to it. Sure, some lowlife scum thief stole your thousands of dollars of Nikon gear. But that stuff was going to depreciate so fast over the next 5 years that it would have made your head spin anyways. Ignore the price you paid, and get some very capable basic 2nd hand Manual Focus gear, and get back into the hobby for the RIGHT reasons.

 

If you want something a bit more capable than the items I've offerred to donate, I also buy, collect, and sell classic Manual Focus camera gear. Give me any budget from $100 to $500, and I could put together a VERY useful set of gear for you to get back shooting. For $500, I could get you SURPRISINGLY close to the functionality of the gear you had stolen. But there's no need to spend nearly that much to get back into it.

 

For $200 or so, you could get a very serviceable 35mm SLR like a Canon AE1, Minolta X700, Pentax K1000 or ME Super, or Olympus OM1, along with wideangle, normal, and telephoto lenses, and a basic flash. That is MORE than sufficient to start with.

Arg... that is the pits! Sorry to hear about that. I know how you feel...

 

This won't make you feel any better I'm sure, but it will help you feel like there's

others who feel you pain -- me!

 

In 1994 I got hit by a car; I was crossing the street. In 1995 the driver's insurance

company offered $10,000 because I was in physical rehab for my knee. Ok! Later that

year I bought a Nikon N90, SB25, 35-80mm 4.5-5.6, 80-200 2.8 ED AFD, nice bag

etc. :-D

 

1997 -- The Nikon gear and bag got stolen from my apartment, right out of my

closet! Never saw it again. Never had the income again to replace it. No insurance. I

was 25 years old and held crappy, low-paying jobs back then; the Nikon gear was a

gift from up above, and I went wild with it and got some super photos, especially in

Mexico.

 

Only now am I piecing my Nikon set back together with a (sorry) FM3a and 50mm 1.8

AFD. I'm glad to have Nikon equipment once again.

 

BTW, what city do you live in? Just curious.

It isn't auto insurance that covers contents of your car, it is your homeowners policy. This happened to me and my Homeowners replaced everything with brand new equipment.

We start over many times through out life. Buy a compact digital to get you over your grief. Something inexpensive with a high fun factor, like an Olympus C-730.

Well, you have suffered quite a loss.

 

If you decide to get back into photography, when you can find a few dollars to spend that your daughters and yourself don't pressingly need, here's some quick suugestions.

 

1) Consider video, since it includes audio, and is realtime action, something that you and your children may find entertaining and precious.

 

2) If you get back into SLRs, and you loved the FM3A (which is by no means inexpensive), consider a used F90X. Gives all the latest and greatest flash options as a F5 or F100.

 

Limit yourself to 2 or 3 lenses. You owned 11. You know what you can carry, and what you like to use. Fast primes versus zooms versus wides.

 

If money is tight, the 75-150 f/3.5 zoom is sharp with good bokeh and is often not much more than $100 unless in pristine shape.

 

Coupled with one fast prime (say a 35 mm f/1.4) and you are done.

 

That's a lot of money to think about, right now, when you are heatbroken.

 

But if you have get back into it,

 

a video camera OR (a fast 35 and that short zoom), as an example, would do a hell of a lot.

Sorry for your loss. There are lots of good suggestions here and fundamental to all of them is the saying, "it's not the camera, but the person behind it." A $30 Signet, $100 Retina, $75 Yashica TLR or RF, should be able to take many of the same shots your Nikon did. And with almost no perceptable loss in quality. If I lost every piece of photo gear tomorrow (and I sure hope I don't) I'd head over to the nearest store with used equipment (or eBay) and pick up whatever servicable classic was on the shelf. For <$250 I bet I could not only find a decent camera, but equip a servicable darkroom as well. It's a buyers market for this stuff right now. On the one hand I feel your pain, but the most productive thing I can do is give you a gentle kick in the butt to get over it and get moving ;-)

Thanks to all of you for your support. It will be not easy but I'll manage. Sandford, that's how I started. I did not saved all the money to have it complete to buy all the equipment. I started with The FM3A and a 45 2.8 p (don't get surprised..from ebay),a good deal.Nice person that live in the same State and striked as honest,the camera and lens was 3 months old, used twice and 100.00 bellow B&H price,S&H 10.00..a bargain, later I sold the lens to a mate in Australia,a good deal to me too(I din't like the difficulty of the two rings in such small lens), not that is bad. And got my first lens from KEH : a 50mm f 1.8 AI, then little by little the collection grow up.It was like my family ,I married at 24, in a flash time had passed by, I'm 45 with 3 "kids". And you all know the feeling, the carving, the urgue, our own vice,has no cure, is not detectable with any normal chemical lab test,even evade lie detectors: we carve for one more lens...yes,we're conviced that we needed or our photos will be not be perfect and our system will be incomplete. ;) I have only one cure. I have to live like a samaritan or a zen monk..but with a camera,a lens and and film...or I die!!!!

Gerald,I filed the police report and I gave all the serial #'s.But I don't hold high expectactions. Here in Miami ,this kind of crime goes into a drawer and is collecting dust unless the criminal is dumb enough to go into a pawn shop. I know my city, I drive, I walk, I observe, well..whom which do take photos don't do it, right? Most likely all the equipment is already sold on the street at a ridiculous price just to feed the addiction of some criminal.

 

The police here do not take those cases too seriously.In 1997,right after the separation of the now ex-wife, I lived for a short period of time in a rented room in a no so good neighborhood and one day while working someone boke in and stole some of my personals goods. By then I had nothing of great value,but I had a Pentax K1000 with a Pentax flash and some film in a cheap bag, it was also stolen. The police even took fingerprints. Have you hear from them? Neither I. This time I also asked for fingerprints being taken.They even didn't bother. Go figure.

No,I do not have home owner or renter insurance and I live in Miami.

 

Digital??...!!!!..I rather die...I'm a traditionalist old fashioned hippie look almost bold complete white(I wonder how)45 old man.

Thanks, Green,I'll email you if you don't mind.

Who was kicking my rear...no, thanks. I had enough with my loss. Go and find another target. ;)

 

Note:If you notice any bad grammar or misspelling in my English, pardon me. Either is a typo (Itry very hard to avoid them or is my bad English.) Regarless the fact that I was born the city where I live ( Miami ) , and therefore I'm an U.S. citizen, I was raised in Cuba and therfore my main languague is Spanish.

That is really awful to read about. When you are robbed, you feel rage in addition to the sense of loss. Also, things you have worked for do not represent money alone: they represent the time it took to earn the money. And time cannot be regained. If the same thing happened to me, I honestly think I would save up, get a really good used Rolleiflex, and just forget about any other camera for a while. A Leica M3 with a 50mm lens might do the same thing for you. Those cameras offer such inexhaustible opportunities that you will heal more quickly with one of them in hand. Again, consolations. That is horrible news.

Robert this is terrible news and terribly ironic after our recent e-mails. I hope you'll be able to recover quickly and get back to enjoying photography.

Byrd..rage!!!,I have not gone out of the apartment since yesterday for anything.I barelly speak to my kids, this have to stop.I'm afraid that if I go outside I'll explode at somebody just for looking at me; that is not healthy at all.

Lex, my friend, yes life is ironic, I had plans. I was even considering to open my own website to promote a business as webpage designer and graphic designer, I have study a bit of that and the equipment will aid with some good photos in the website.

There is a saying or slogan in Spanish that says "Bienvenido seas mal, si no vienes acompanado", roughly translates as" Welcome bad thing(or bad day, or badhair day,I'm not sure of the right word),as long as you come alone".

It's not coming alone. There're bad days ahead, but we can talk about it on email later.

Well, I was a non believer of human kindness, I got a smack on my face today.As you can see ,some people have offered to donate a camera to get by untill I can get on my feet again.

I'm a fighter,I lost most of that spirit 15 years ago, but there is a sparkle still inside, somehow I'll manage to stay afloat and then on top of the raft,soon I'll be walking on the island,give a bit of time and I'll conquer it.Dreams are free.

Robert, so sad to hear you story =/

I got a little upset...

But thank god your kids are alright... equipment can be replaced a human life, not.

Thank YOU weren't on the car at the time it was opened...something could have happened to you... thank god.

 

Hope everything from now on go alright for you!

 

sorry for my bad english!

Yes,it is a good thing I was not there.My kids were at home,I went that day to the Court House, their mother is "now" filing for shared custody.I'll fight against that.

Yes, it was a good thing that I was not there at the moment of the robbery or I don't know what problably happens.I have a S&W .38 Special in the gloves compartment, and miracouslly,they did not opened the inside of the car.My guess is that they were after a license plate,they realize how easy was to open the trunk and opened out of curiosity and bingo, teir lucky day!.The police officer told me that my type of car was an easy target for robbery and sahowed me with a Leatherman plier how easy was to open the trunk, of course the key is already inside, all is needed is a piece of surface to grab an turn an voila!..is open.I haven't fix it yet, but I don't keepany valuables inside the trunk, and they can't go inside the car from inside the trunk as some cars.

Some good has come of this; I realized that I didn't have a list of serial numbers / descriptions for my gear! I've spent the last couple hours ferreting out all the little bits and pieces and entered them in an Access database. I'm sure I've forgotten something or other, but I feel better.

 

For all you AF shooters, you have to use a little flashlight to find Nikon's latest 'laser etch' serial numbers. They're damn near invisible 'black on black'.