brad_hersch Posted March 7, 2005 Share Posted March 7, 2005 anyone know what ever became of Spiratone? They used to be a good source from some odds and ends...sort of like Porters.Thanks,Brad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hugh_crawford1 Posted March 7, 2005 Share Posted March 7, 2005 Fred Spira retired and Spiratone is no longer in business. He wrote a very interesting book, "The History of Photography: As Seen Through the Spira Collection" I miss Spiratone, I'm still looking for their "bird's eye" adapter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
al_kaplan1 Posted March 7, 2005 Share Posted March 7, 2005 I've many fond memories of visiting there store in New York while there, and always looked forward to their ads in Modern Photography and Popular Photography magazines. I still have a 1976 "Bicentennial Catalog". Up until I stopped shooting with a Hasselblad 5 or 6 years ago I always tried to get a shot of the entire church interior from the front of the balcony using their fish-eye conversion lens on the 80mm during the ceremony. They marketed stainless steel developing tanks and reels that were about half the price of Nikor or Kinderman, all kinds of neat darkroom goodies, inexpensive but decent B&W enlarger paper ($4.88 for 100 sheets of single weight 8x10), under $40 400mm lenses, some of the first zooms for 35mm SLR's, slide duplicating equipment, and it seemed like every month was some new thing you just couldn't live without! The best thing about them was they didn't try to get rich on inflated "Shipping Charges"~an item would say the price, like $2.98, followed by shipping $.35. Yeah, a lot of us miss Spiratone! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikestryinagain Posted March 8, 2005 Share Posted March 8, 2005 Now thats a name I havent heard in a long time...Used to have one of their 200mm lenses. Dropped it down a flight of concrete steps at a rock concert in 1973. It wobbled on its mount and still took great pictures for years afterwards, until someone stole my camera bag. Always wanted one of their affordable 85mm lenses. Thanks for the walk down memory lane. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
djphoto Posted March 8, 2005 Share Posted March 8, 2005 In 1971 or '72 I photographed my first wedding with a TLR (Rolleicord or Yashicamat, can't remember which) and M3 flash bulbs. For my second wedding I had a brand new Spiralite Jr. electronic flash unit which ran on AC current. No kidding -- I went around with an extension cord, plugging in my flash so I could shoot. Sometime after that, I got their Spiralite power pack -- a leather case which could be mounted on one's belt or slung over one's shoulder. It provided fast recycling and a fair number of flashes per battery set, but the batteries were neither cheap, rechargeable, nor easily obtainable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steve_levine Posted March 8, 2005 Share Posted March 8, 2005 Their store on Northern Blvd in Queens was like a candy store for a teenager in the 1970's! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James G. Dainis Posted March 8, 2005 Share Posted March 8, 2005 I still sometimes use the slave flashes that screw into ordinary light bulb sockets. James G. Dainis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roy_des_ruisseaux Posted March 8, 2005 Share Posted March 8, 2005 In 1959 I was a high school senior and was in NYC for a big journalism conference. We stayed at the Taft? hotel which was mid town. Hussled down to Spiritone and bought a Watson Bulk film loader (model 66 a real work of art that I still have) and 100 ft of Tri-X which might have been cut down from a larger roll, cheap stuff and pretty good. When I had my own photo buisness in the seventies I know I bought a bunch of there 35mm & 120 stainless reels. Really cheap and worked fine.I still have most of them in the basement. I'm pretty sure I got a few other "oddball" things from them over time. It was a great place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brad_hersch Posted March 8, 2005 Author Share Posted March 8, 2005 Man...you guys got me all teary eyed with nostalgia! Guess I kind of dated myself by remembering Spiratone!!! Imagine Spiratone in the age of the web. Brad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
john_wintheiser Posted April 22, 2005 Share Posted April 22, 2005 Coincidentally, I've just obtained a Spiratone Bellowscope in nearly new condition. Unfortunately, the t adapters were not included. I don't see any for sale on the bay and the spiratone adapters don't seem to be the same as those used on lenses, etc. Does anyone have any compatib;e adapters they don't need or know where they could be obtained? FD, m42 or kmount would work for me. I miss Spiratone too. They seemed to have a gadget for almost anything! Lots of things in their catalog that you didn't know you needed until you saw it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mb photography Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 Spiratone was the JC whintney of photography. As a photography student they always had the cool and inexpensive stuff to make your setup complete.Unfortunately I was always on a budget back then now that Im not Spiratone is gone. Mark Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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