Why Classic Cameras?

[Andy Collins]

I've been asking myself why I choose to use cameras that are, in many cases,

older than me when I have a camera bag full of current AF and digital slr and

compact digital gear. To be more specific I have a Canon EOS 1vHS and an "old"

EOS 20D along with a few "L" series lenses, some consumer lenses, and a

wonderful Canon Powershot A720IS (a superb camera!), but lately these get more

use as light meters for my classic gear. So why classic gear for me? To begin

with, I'm fascinated by each manufacturer's interpretation of what makes the

best light-tight box, whether it's a Kodak No. 2 Brownie Model B from 1907 or a

Nikon D3, they all do basically the same thing. I really like the attention to

style and detail that seemed to be prevalent in days past that resulted in

cameras that looked elegant and worked just as elegantly. As much as I really

love digital photography I love film a little bit more, and probably always

will. The smooth, mechanical operation of many of my classic cameras feels and

sounds beautiful, and the fact that a camera from 1958 or 1938 can produce

pictures that are just as beautiful as those from my current cameras is

mind-boggling. Along with all of this, I'm simply amazed by all of the different

designs of cameras, and I enjoy acquiring these different designs and seeing how

well they work. So, what's your reason for acquiring these classic cameras?

[graybrick]

Canon A1- b/w, E6 cross-processing, fast lenses super cheap (relatively), owned one since the eighties

 

Mamiya C330- excellent quality, fun to use, square format, kick ass image quality, does portraits that my 20D can't, makes the dSLR kids feel like they're missing something, people wonder what the heck it is, fun at parties for snaps and conversation... oh yeah, doesn't need a battery

 

Pentax K-1000/135mm off-brand lens: weird vignette, interesting image quality, doesn't need a batttery, lives in the floor of my car for whatever the heck I want to shoot at that focal length

 

Vivitar panoramacam plastic focus-free: Has a roll of Ilford Delta 400 in it that's been there for three years. bought at goodwill for $1.50. I believe it actually crops 35mm to a pano perspective. One day I'll take all 36 exposures and develop it. I think it'll be somewhat of an anthology when I'm done.

 

Canon 20D: Light meter, occasional event photography, setup/flash exposure for Mamiya, chimper. I have considerably more money in this system than all my others combined. I still feel a compulsion to buy more stuff to round it out. I user it for snapshots and to estimate what my film shots will look like.

 

I

[cliffmanley]

The thing that is facinating to me is how the old cameras were made and designed. The engineers really had to know something. All of the calculations were made by hand, with a pencil and a slide rule. All of the drawings were made by hand with drafting instruments on a table with a pencil and paper. The parts were made and hand assembkled by craftsmen like watchmakers. Today everything is done with computers. They have a graphic arts team come up with something that looks nice and then the computers go to work and make a camera that looks like the concept. The program makes the prototype parts with lasers and then the robots make the castings and do most of the assembly. The new cameras are a worthless wad of injection molded garbage created from a silicon memory bank. With all of that technology, if you spend a fortune, you can get one that will Almost match the resolution of an old 35mm film camera from the 50's or 60's, and nowhere close to the large format film cameras, even older, that were hand designed, hand made, and carry the fingerprints of the Artist that created it, and gave it it's final polish before the customer got it. The only fingerprints now are from the guy that cut the injection sprue off before he stuck it in some injected foam to peddle it to some sucker. The bottom line, the old cameras are a mix of art, science and engineering from Real People. That's only my opinion !

[don_e]

I'm a user, not a collector. Most of my photography can be more easily and conveniently done with mechanical cameras than digital ones. I bought digital for shooting product catalogs for web display. I'll buy another for clean high iso performance and with IS for some other work I've planned. But 90% of my photography is better served by mechanical cameras.

 

Considering the longer history of film, there is a greater variety of cameras and lenses, plus the darkroom, and therefore more interesting things to experiment with. Digital is pretty much the same all around in results; what is important are computer graphic skills, which I've done for twenty years. I'm now semi-retired and would like to take my (too many) computers out behind the dumpster and shoot them dead -- but I'm only semi-retired 8-)

[jack_welsh]

Beacuase 120 and 4x5 cameras have a better image quality than any DSLR, and for a lot less money. The cameras today have a couch potato mentality. Auto focus, auto everything. Digitals have a built-in obsolesence. A 1918 Kodak can still take decent pictures. And, since about all of my photos are B&W, that's something that digital isn't the best at.When digital came out, the manufactures pushed it beause most people had film, so it was easier to sell something they didn't have. Alot of people bought a digital just to send an email of the kids to the grandparents.Photo mags are becoming more of just a computer mag.

[tony_lockerbie]

When I have to take a paying photo I take out A Nikon F5 or F100, and a D200 for digi stuff, however if I am just having fun it will always be an old film camera. They are just so much more involving and the reasons that Cliff has so eloquently already stated, applies to me also.

 

Sometimes (often actually) I will take out an old Zeiss or Voigtlander and just handle it, wind and click a few times and admire the engineering.

 

This will never happen with the D200, it's just a camera.

 

Tony

[subbarayan_prasanna]

There is a lot to be said for the age of mechanical elegance and industrial design of that era. Recently I bought a Praktica made in 1950 with fixed WL finder from Ebay for $9. It looked like junk with some old paint and no leather covering. The seller assured me that it was mechanically good. So I took her word and bought it. I worked on it cleaning, lubricating and adjusting the timing, and refinished the surface with vinyl covering. Gave it some polish and fitted it with an Industar lens I got from a broken Zenit. It looks and works like new! And I have not seen or felt such smooth knobs in any other latter day Camera! Every part seems to have been machined to perfection by careful craftsmen. No stamped parts, no automation. Just the feel of it is enhancing. I share that joy with you Andy and others.

[subbarayan_prasanna]

If you are not already familiar, Siegfried Gideon's Book "Mechanization Takes Command" is a fascinating account of that era of mechanical elegance and design and how it affected all our lives in a common, day to day, manner.

[ronald_moravec1]

Digi for when I am lazy. Leicas when I want a beautiful feel and and a bit of work. 4x5 or my ultimate quality. Bigger is even better,but too heavy and slow for me.

 

Can`t not beat the instant gratification of digi color.

[richard_]

1) Classic cameras are works of Art; and there simple mechanical operation is something i can easily understand. Digi-Cams are computers and not easily understood. 2) Film cameras produce real photographic images. Digital cameras produce images that look "Cartoonish" - (which is also why you need MORE computers and sofware like 'Photoshop' to correct it). MY 2-CENTS.......

[luis triguez]

Once, a classical composer said to me: Do you know the difference, I find, between playing a piano and a guitar? The piano is cold and distant: you touch the keys and they drive a little hummer which hit a tightened string which produces a sound.

 

The guitar only needs to be embraced passionately, and when you touch the strings, she sings with out any other helps. Ah! And has a beautiful feminine figure.

[chuck_foreman1]

I was seduced early on by the craftmanship and engineering. When I started getting interested in Photography and shooting B&W I happened to look at some photos attributed to Matthew Brady. One scence was something a "lull in the fighting" was the caption. He or one of hois assistants was standing next to begree being reflected in the water. I thought wow..this picture is 100 years old and could've been taken yesterday with a whiz-bang SLR with auto this and that...I was convinced

then that while of course it's the photographer not the camera, old cameras were now my main interest. I never looked back!

[vrankin]

I was introduced to photography in 1968 by a college science prof, who gave me a

Saturday assignment to take a thirty dollar German mechanical camera, a selenium

cell handheld meter and a roll of Tri-X out, and to bring him back some images to

develop and print together that same night in a simple darkroom. It was magical.

I've never seen the world the same, since. One thing lacking in my latest

experience with digital cameras is the feel of that particular alchemy of metal, glass,

silver, animal matter (the smell of a film emulsion's gelatin support) paper and

chemistry. Ironically now, my extended family and friends agree that my automated,

digitized work is more spontaneous, and it's simply better technically. My aging is

helped by the newer technologies, I guess. Something has been lost, and

something has been gained. But how much do my photos express my creativity,

and how much that of designers and engineers who developed the auto-everything

hardware and the algorithms (talk about alchemy!) that make the 1s and 0s into my

images?

[steve_bellayr]

The difference lies in the area of computers. Digital cameras are computer centered. You use Photoshop, etc. store images in separate hard drives and downloading them to disks, if you do it properly. With digitals you will shoot 5 to ten times as much photos & you will look at each photo immediately aftewards. With film cameras you will shoot less and need more confidence in your ability (especially with meterless cameras & the sunny-16 rule). Film cameras have more prime lenses which are sharper & faster than zooms that are on digitals, generally speaking. The bottom line is if you work in the industry digital is much more convenient and efficient for returning the image immediately and obtaining more photos to sell. But, if you are just enjoying a hobby...pick what you want.

[dan_fromm2]

Hmm. Well, on the the one hand one of my crazier cousins did some genealogical research and determined, to his satisfaction at least, that we're descendants of Ned Ludd. So I was born into the luddite tribe.

 

On the other, most of the technical advances in photographic equipment made since 1970 advance my photographic causes little. Exceptions include improved zoom lenses, better shutters, improved metering systems and, very occasionally, autofocus. I have an AF Nikon SLR, only manual focus Nikon lenses, find the body's focus confirmation comforting and 1/250 flash sync speed very useful.

 

Luis, the guitar is a cheap folk instrument of no particular distinction. For real sensuality in a stringed instrument, nothing matches a basse de viole.

 

Films are better than they were before 1970.

 

But the reasons I use old 35 mm cameras, older cameras in larger formats, and old lenses is very simple. They do what I need and they offer better value for money than newer equipment. That's all. If new gear beat them, I'd use it.

 

I refuse to descend to the level of, say, APUG fanatics, and denigrate other peoples' choices. Auto-everything 35 mm cameras met a need, and so do the digital cameras some of the posters in this thread have insulted. We have to respect others' decisions and recognize that people aren't all the same.

 

I also refuse to confuse inputs with outputs. I don't care whether the bits inside an old Leica were hand fettled. They should have been made better in the first place. "Craftsmanship" is often a substitute for a good manufacturing process, makes sense only when labor is very inexpensive. What matters is not how a camera or lens was designed and made but what it does.

 

Cheers,

 

Dan

[cliffmanley]

If nothing more, reading these replys, the old cameras bring out the true Passion of the ART of Photography.

[marc_bergman1]

I have purchased 3 cameras this year, a Canon 7 Rangefinder, a Moskva-5 roll film camera, and a Canon XSi.

 

I learned photography with a 35mm rangefinder camera and have had 35mm, medium format, and large format rangefinder cameras. They are enjoyable cameras to use. i also develop and print my own B&W film.

 

That being said, I also enjoy my new Canon. It has incredible resolution, color accuracy, low noise, and high dynamic range from ISO 100 to 1600. I would be hard pressed to exceed it's performance even at the low ISO settings with film. I can make wonderful 13" by 19" prints.

 

So why do I use classic cameras? They are fun. I can also get wonderful images. They allow a continuity from the beginning of my photography. I also enjoy the darkroom process.

 

I don't understand why it has to be one or the other. If I didn't like digital photography I doubt I would make any post denigrating it. I also would not try to come up with strange analogies.

 

It is all about using whatever you like to achieve the output you like.

[luis triguez]

“Luis, the guitar is a cheap folk instrument of no particular distinction”.

 

Cheap? Obviously, you never considering acquiring a <a href=" http://www.hauserguitars.com/english/docs/geschichte.htm " >Herman Hausser’s </a>model to play. Folk? Obviously, you never considering to go to the Albert Hall to listen a classical concert on Johann Sebastian Bach played by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Göran_Söllscher">Goran Sollscher </a>or <a href=" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrés_Segovia">Andres Segovia</a>. No particular distinction? Obviously your are never been or listen to a classical guitar concert. Pity.

[Rob_the_waste]

I get asked the same question by the wife. She put out some money a few years back on a digital camera that is to this day quite versatile. Then she shakes her head at me when I pull out another one of my "junk" cameras. I guess she figured that with the digicam, I'd get rid of the rest... little did she know. Truth is no camera does everything perfectly. They all have their strengths, and they have their limitations. I've taken some great shots with both digital and film, and I've wasted a lot of film and memory space. Take your pick. The camera is a tool designed to do a job. In the end it's the result you have to be happy with.

[dan_fromm2]

Now, Luis, of course I've been to guitar recitals. I've even been to a number of recitals by Segovia, with their interminable (and not enough) encores. John Williams, too. Like the piano, the guitar is a percussion instrument.

 

I've never had the pleasure of hearing the Catalan viol virtuoso Jordi Savall live, know him only through his records. But I've heard other gambists in recital, played sopranino viol m'self, have more than one recording of Marais' Couples sur Les Folies d'Espagne (and have heard the set played in recital too), played JSB's gamba sonatas and Telemann's unaccompanied gamba sonata on cello, ...

 

Bowed instruments can sing.

[Andy Collins]

Excellent responses from everyone so far, and I hope to hear even more. I do agree with Marc that it doesn't have to be one or the other, old vs. new, digital vs. film, and that's a tired argument anyway. The bottom line is that we're all photographers and use a wide variety of tools. Sometimes the tools are the latest state of the art cameras while at other times they're tools from days recently or long gone by. I absolutely love my EOS gear and my little PowerShot and I absolutely love digital photography, but I fervently love film and all of my film cameras because in the end, I simply love photography and every aspect of the art and science of it. I think one of the things that really draws me to using classic cameras is that I'm really intrigued by the fact that so many different people felt that their interpretation of what would be the best camera led to so many interesting designs. Trying to understand and experience their passion for their design along with mine for the art of photography is a true joy for me. I like making and looking at pictures, mine or anyone else's and it doesn't matter if I use a IIa, a 35-SE, an FE, or a D300, but I do enjoy using all kinds of cameras.

[alex macphee]

Why would anybody want the perfect camera anyway? What would you do for Christmas the following year?

 

There's much truth in the observation that it's the image at the end that matters. Every so often, when my geographically distributed family get together, I put together a selection from the archive of slides dating from four decades back to the present day, with a proper projector and proper screen. These images bring back a whole trail of memories, often associated with places we've been to on holiday. And often, the talk is about the journeys made on the way. Like getting lost in rural France near midnight many miles from our destination, and the petrol guage light on red, with no petrol station anywhere, packed like sardines in a little Simca. Too long a story to relate here, but the remark by John to Susan (who was driving), "someday dear we'll look back on this and laugh" and her angry snap "no we bloody well won't"which nearly took his head off is still used, thirty years later, when we reminisce. Or a fell-walking trip where we were chilled to the bone in driving rain and piercing wind, fumblinlg with uselessly numb fingers to take a picture of a horse with an old Agfa Billy bellows camera. So many of our pictures of destinations, however, recalled journeys made too.

 

I sometimes think of the photographs I take in this way. There is an image, but there is also the journey made to take the picture, and the camera is part of that journey, part of the experience of the photograph for me. Perhaps not for others, but I take photographs to please me first, and hopefully others too.

 

The tool for the job affects the way you do the job. Or it does so for me. When I am letter-writing, I use an old and familiar fountain pen, with proper ink. I handle the act of writing differently with this pen from the way I do with a ballpoint or a pencil. It slows me down, and I seem to be able to carve the words more carefully and more purposefully. I get something of the same feeling when making pictures using an old Ikonta or an old Isolette. When I look at the pictures I've taken with these, I see the journey there too.

[Andy Collins]

Very well stated, Alex. That's a rather obvious element that I hadn't really given much thought to in this thread. I realize after reading your post that when I look at my Kodak Instamatic X-15 sitting on my shelf or my Dad's Kodak Retinette sitting on his bookcase, I instantly begin to recall trips taken during which these cameras played such an integral part. I remember everything, down to the smell of the film cartridge upon opening it to load my camera and the excitement at taking a picture of so many unforgettable sights, most notably the Eiffel Tower, the Grand Canyon, my first trip to Yosemite (my favorite place on the planet ever since!), and Machu Picchu. Most of my classic cameras were owned by someone else before me, but I do often wonder what sights and people they've photographed in days past.

[richard_moore5]

It might sound odd but I work in cutting edge scientific research all day so in my own time and for my hobbies I like to use old, mechanical methods and equipment. Plus I cannot but admire the quality and feel of the engineering of classic cameras. Plus the whole process of using and keeping the "traditional" skills going appeals to me.

[mike_elek1]

Hey Cliff, that was hilarious.