Collecting cameras is all very well, but we can often learn more about the history of photography--and about the difficulties under which our photographic forebears labored--by looking at accessories. The Practos exposure meter is a prime example. It is one of the last of its kind, and...
Reloadable labyrinth-style cassettes are nothing new: they were launched with the original Leica when it became clear that darkroom loading and unloading was not going to be outstandingly convenient. This is why a standard load is 36; the original Leica...
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...
One reason why digital camera users may hesitate to make the switch to film--better quality, proven archival keeping, and lower cost--is that the cameras aren't complicated enough. For example, my Nikon D70 has around 24 buttons, levers, knobs, dials, trap doors, and switches, many of them multifunctional, plus an LCD read-out and a screen on the back. For...
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...
The Samoca 35 LE definitely wants to be taken seriously. The box is a classic piece of high 1950s design, and proudly announces "Exposure Meter Built-In" and "Lens - F 2.8." Open it up and there's a really classic leather ever-ready case with metal-rimmed, red velvet-lined removable top, so you can use the camera in the half case. Or you can take it...
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...
Just hold a Pentax. That was the slogan, 30 and more years ago--and very clever it was. The light, svelte, elegant SV (also sold as the H3V) was so lovely that if you did hold one, you wanted it. Next to its...
"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...
One of the joys of classic cameras, indeed, of classic anything--is the absence of "me-too" design; and the Nikonos II illustrated is about as far from "me too" as you can get.