Mt. Olympus from High Divide Trail

Digitally photo-copied from the original Kodachrome Slide, exposed approx 46 years

ago. I am trying to remember was it ISO 40? We thought it was so light sensitive,

the earlier Kodachrome being something like ISO 10. I carried a tripod everywhere.

At the top of the mountain one can see a glacier and in the front of that, the glacier

falling away in ridge-like fractures. The peak is just shy of 8,000 feet and later in

that same trip we climbed to the small triangular peak behind the glacier. This was

taken with a Zeis Contaflex camera which allowed one to change only the front

element of a 50mm tessar lens to become either a 35mm or 85mm Pro-tessar. I

thought I was in heaven and no greater camera could be invented. This was taken

with the 85mm. My most recent walking lens is a 18-200mm zoom which fits my

Canon 50D. I know a better camera will be invented - I wonder what it will be like 46

years from now.

I like the photo, but I enjoyed the story more. I think 46 years from now, your Zeiss ContaFlex will be worth a fortune! And, probably still working...unlike the 50D.

No, I am afraid the Contaflex camera had to be discarded because it repeatedly lost it's flash synch. After the third trip to the repair shop, I traded it in for a Nikon F which I used for 40 years. I strongly suspect that there will be no film manufactured in the future (Kodachrome is on it's last legs, alas) and these old cameras will be museum pieces. Film will be something in history books, just like Edison wax rolls and lantern slide projectors. Technology,economics and history control such things; let's embrace whatever is available during our short lifetimes.

Because we are now living in the period of early technological evolution of digital imaging, cameras are improved quite frequently. I actually have in my possession a Nikon Coolpix, a Canon D30, D60, 30D, 40D, 50D and a 5D. What I save on film and processing in digital I spend on cameras - and computer storage drives! I also have an unused darkroom full of equipment, including two enlargers, but I have not touched them for years.

I used to daydream of the days when egg white and salt were painted on a glass plate of large dimensions, to be coated under a red glass kerosine lantern with silver nitrate (home made by dissolving a silver dollar in nitric acid), the wet plate to be fitted in a huge camera and exposed and developed before becoming dry. But I did not live during that period of history, nor in the earlier daguerreotype time. It has been my good fortune to learn basic photography in the final great days of film and chemicals and to be alive and active during the transition to digital imaging technology!

It has made my life worth living. The latin "amour" means love and that root is found in the word "amateur." One who loves! I am the true amateur photographer. I love every bit of it.

very interesting story, thank you very much.