First camera you bought?

I was recently remembering the first camera that I bought, as I try to get it flying again.

 

I remembered the thread on one's first camera, but most often that was borrowed,

or otherwise not bought. (I inherited some cameras from my grandfather when I

was young, and for many years borrowed a Canon VI from my father.)

 

But maybe others have special stories about the first one that they bought.

I was an impatient young photographer, apparently, as the first camera I bought was a Polaroid 420. That was in the days of the "flash cube" and this camera had an interesting detachable flash unit that had a louvered front, linked to the focus mechanism. [The flash cube was a disposable device that had a reflector and flash bulb on each side, as well as a mechanism to trigger them. Each cube was good for four flash shots.] As you focused closer, the louvers started to close, restricting the amount of light from the flash cube. High tech distance adjusted flash output!

 

I guess that camera was a victim of obsoleted film. It is long gone, but I have fond memories as well as some photos from it.

 

Stay sharp,

Bob

First camera I bought was a Mamiya 16 Automatic - got it on St. Martin in the Caribbean as a teen ager I had fun with it for a few years, but film & processing were too expensive and 35mm film was much easier to handle. Though I had a darkroom, was never able to process the 16mm. My idea was that I would always be able to have a camera with me - that worked but the results & cost were unsatisfactory. Gave it to a PN member who likes sub - miniatures. Took a picture of it before I sent it!

The first camera I used (including my photography merit badge) was a Kodak Jiffy 620.

 

Story at LINK Kodak Jiffy Six-20 1933-1937

 

 

The first camera I purchased with my own, hard-earned dollars was

Story at LINK A Personal History of the Heiland/Asahi Pentax H2/S2

First was (and still is) a Canon AE-1, brand new. I was drawn into photography by taking a class at Sixth Form (that's age 17-18 for non-Brits). I often reflect on how much I owe to that class; doing photography at all, doing it on black-and-white film, developing and printing my own stuff, and at least a little idea of how it can relate to art, if you want it to.

Second camera was a second-hand FED 3, bought as a student in London. My mate went to get a Zorki, and I couldn't help myself. I still can't help myself thirty years on.

My first camera was a Pentax ESII w/ 50mm 1.4 Takumar in 1974. I didn't like how long it took to change the screw mount lenses, so a few months later,

I traded it in (with lots of cash) for two Leica 50 Jahre SL2's and some Leitz lenses.

My father gave me his Ikonta C 521/2 when I was in high school and as I was approaching my senior year, it looked like I was to be the primary school yearbook and newspaper photographer, so I needed something a little more versatile. The nearby Andrews AFB BX had an excellent 35mm camera selection; the Yashica TL-Electro with the standard (but excellent) 50/1.9 Yashinon was in my summer lawn-mowing price range so I snapped one up.

 

Later, in my 20s, it was stolen from my car, then in my early 50s I finally got another one; it’s an honest and straightforward camera that gets the job done!

I got interested in photography, including darkroom photography, when I was

about nine years old.

 

When I was 12, I got interested in model rocketry. (This was the time of Apollo

when rocketry was especially popular.)

 

Even though it was a little expensive, having both interests convinced me

to buy an Estes Camroc.

 

the abilty to do my own darkroom work, instead of sending away to Estes, would keep the costs down.

 

I think I only ever launched it once, though, with a picture of the empty parking lot at a nearby

community college (on a weekend). The film is a disk about 1.55 inch in diameter.

One disk came with it, which I think is the one I used.

 

I had also cut disks out of a roll of TX120, though I don't remember using them.

 

First I had an aluminum disk 1.5 inch diameter from a metal punch, but it turns out that

the film disks are slightly larger. I then cut a disk from a sheet of aluminum the right

diameter, and used that in a darkroom to cut film disks.

 

Recently my wife got intersted in rocketry (maybe because of the 50th anniversary

of the Apollo years. Apollo 8 was December 1968). So, I got out my Camroc again.

 

The shutter is powered by a B.F.Goodrich #8 rubber band. You pull a string out

(stretching the rubber band) then run it around the base of the Camroc where it inserts

into the rocket body tube. Just before launch, you remove the metal dark slide, which

allows for the exposure. The center section is a replaceable film holder, such that you

can make more than one shot without darkroom access. When the engine ejection

charge goes off, hopefully with the camera pointing down, the camera is pushed out

of the body tube, releasing the string, and the shutter.

My first camera (only just) was a Windsor (Diana clone) that I got when I was about 9. It cost 65 cents and 3 Popsicle coupons. Had a 127 and 126 afterwards, but my first 35mm was a Konica Auto S2 that I bought in 1974. I still have it and use it from time to time.

Fujifilm Discovery 80.

I bought a Yashica J7 in 1966 my junior year in college. It was my first good camera. Before that there were box cameras around the house.

An Argus C3

My first camera was a Box Brownie given to me by my parents at age eight. I don,t think I took one in-focus photo with it as I failed to hold the camera steady. Then I graduated to an Ilford Craftsman, a kind of non-tlr tlr ,with better results. A ten year gap then from photography, a real regret that I didn,t take a camera to university, before single status and a decent income meant money for toys. The first camera I bought was an Olympus OM1 with 50 1.8 which seemed incredibly fast after the Ilford. It was like a jewel and although unreliable, film advance seizures, I still have it. I added a Vivitar 28, a Vivitar 70-150 and an Olympus 200. I took my films to be developed at my neighbourhood camera store, a one man business located within walking distance. People today would find it hard to imagine how many small photo shops were around in the 60,s and 70,s. How I wish that shop was still there. One day I popped in to have a film developed just as he was closing and we were talking about thing to shoot and he pointed to the street outside, with people scurrying in the gloaming and the misty drizzle of a winters evening and he said shoot that. Thank you for allowing my nostalgia, all the best, Charles.

My family always had cameras in the house, so I got started at a very early age (5 or 6) with a Brownie and a Kodak roll film (120?) folder with a bellows. My parents added a few more Kodaks over the years. My first purchase was a Leica IIIc (w/ Summitar 50) to which someone had inelegantly added synch - the connector stuck out from the back of the frame fairly close to the finder, resulting in more than a few scratched lenses in my glasses. I loved it and carried it almost everywhere in high school and college. After reading that photojournalists with IIIs practiced changing film while running, I got pretty good at it myself.

 

When its age (possibly aided by a lack of proper maintenance) caught up with it, I got a little Olympus fixed lens rangefinder to carry daily. As a newly married medical student, I couldn’t afford even a used Leica M plus multiple lenses, so I got a Canon TL-QL with 28, 50 & 135 Canon lenses......and it was down the rabbit hole after that!

A Topcon I believe. Really didn't come to like this camera though. But my first love camera, (which I got a couple of years later) was a Polaroid land Camera 101 automatic.

I think the first camera I actually bought with my own money was a Minolta SR-T-101. First camera I connived to get my parents to buy me was an Instamatic of some kind (126) can't remember the model. Boy that was an awful camera, the Minolta was great.

Nikon FM.

Yashica FX-D, 1983, still working with an accurate meter.

A Yashica YK in a kit with flash, purchased when I was twelve years old, with a non-interchangeable 45mm f/2.8 lens and a shutter that went to 1/300sec. I could only afford a small amount of film, and less processing. Attended a summer camp that offered a workshop in photography. They didn't give us film, but provided chemicals and paper. Suffered a terrible disappointment when I discovered I couldn't breathe inside a darkroom, despite good ventilation. It brought about a hiatus in my photography that lasted until graduate school. A tax refund bought an Olympus OM-1, lenses, a tripod, cartridges of Kodachrome, and a bunch of Kodak mailers.

This was from an older thread:

The interest in having my own camera began in 1957 when I was 13. The father of one of my friends was a photographer for the local paper in Ilford, Essex, England. His name was Ken Filmer and he had access to paper and chemicals. My friend would turn the kitchen into a darkroom. He had a new Ilford 35mm camera. I had some money saved so I went the the local chemist, who also sold some cameras, to buy a camera. The chemist said that it was a mistake to get a new-fangled 35mm. I protested: it has a fast F/3.5 lens and shutter speeds that go up to 1/300 sec. But, said the chemist, this camera can do the same thing, with its F/6.3 lens and shutter speeds that go up to 1/100 sec and down to 1 sec, and it takes bigger film for good enlargements.

The inexperienced 13 year old succumbed to this gentleman's wisdom. The logic of his argument about size convinced me, and this meant I could outdo my friend. We had previously placed the enlarger at the top of the stairs and projected an ant on 35mm film down to the bottom on a big sheet of POP.

The new camera was a Kodak folder 2 1/4 by 3 1/4 that took 120 film.

With my own money I bought a Minolta SRT-101 with a 58mm f1.4 Rokkor lens, around 1970 from Camera Barn in midtown Manhattan. Within a year or two, added the135mm and 28mm Vivitar lenses. Good camera but sold it all about 4 years later to finance the purchase of Canon F-1.

The first camera I bought with my own money was a Nikon 801s (N8008s in the US). I really, really wanted an AF camera and I saved for a few months to buy it. It replaced my Nikon FM2n which I had been using in high school that my Dad had bought for me.

The first I bought was a Praktica MTL3 with a 50 mm lens.

First: Pentax K1000 with 50mm 2.0, 1978.

 

Second: Nikon FE, 50mm 1.8, 1982.

 

Still have them both, and they work great!