It is very easy for collectors to get hung up on cameras and lenses, and to forget that photography is a lot more than this. Many small and not-so-small accessories are technically fascinating in their own right, and remind us how things used to be in an era less affluent but more diverse than our own. For the collector, or simply for those with an interest in the past, they have the twin...

It's made to use with your classic Leica; it's a long-established accessory, first introduced in 1931; it's in gorgeous black wrinkle paint, exquisitely engraved with the E. LEITZ WETZLAR logo; there's a beautiful red safelight glass built into the back; it's in mint condition; it's boxed, with instructions; when it was new, probably 50 years...

Beware: heresy is about to be spoken. It is that you might care to take one of the most sublimely constructed and complex of all mechanical cameras, and butcher it.

The sacrificial victim is a Linhof Technika 70, which entered production (as far as I know) in the early 1960s: certainly...

"You don't actually use that thing, do you?" This was a question one reader asked me when he saw a picture of my Kowa/SIX in one of my books or magazine articles (I forget which, now). And the answer is that yes, I do, and increasingly often at that.
The...