Cameras with a special place in your heart.

[Huss]

My first ‘real’ camera was an Olympus OM10. Strangely I have no desire to get another, I even saw one at the flea market, picked it up -meh- put it back down.

My first great camera was an OM4 but I was dumb enough to sell that for the 2nd gen super plasticky Minolta 7000i. I don’t remember having even taken pics with that camera, let alone having any worthwhile ones! I do remember the af was not able to track subjects moving away, only towards. None of the magazine review$ mentioned that…

Traded that for an F3, which was super sweet. Had to sell that not that long later because I was broke. In the last few years I finally got another F3 - actually an F3 Ltd and an F3P - because I still think the design on that camera is timeless. But still I really don’t use it much as I much prefer to use Ms which I did not know anything about back in the day.

 

[resummerfield]

My first “good” camera was a Pentax Spotmatic. I first saw one in a camera store window in 1965 or so, and I knew that was THE ONE. It took almost 4 years for this High School kid to save enough to buy it new, but in 1969 I was able to walk into that camera store and buy it. Then I started to really learn photography, and became my HS Yearbook’s photographer in ’70-’71.

I continued to use that Spotmatic through college, but eventually was enticed into moving into the Nikon system. I still have that same Spotmatic and try to shoot a roll or two every year. It still performs flawlessly.

 

[FriedLouisStudio]

Small carry-everywhere cameras that I used for decades (back before digital, when only serious photographers carried cameras daily): Minox IIIs (1995-2018) and B (1967-70; 2003-08); Petri Color 35 (1970-83).

My favorite SLR remains the Nikkormat FTN, with the OM-2 right behind. (Yeah, some of us LIKE having the shutter speed dial around the lens!) And I love using my Pen F half-frame, what a fantastic machine.

I don't shoot large format, but as far as a "place in my heart", I've still got my pro parents' Graphic View II, the daily workhorse of our little photo biz for 50 years. I'll never sell it: that camera paid for our entire childhood, my sister and I going to college, etc. It's a family heirloom.

 

[titrisol]

Asahi Pentax Spotmatic
This was my dad's camera and the one I learned to take pictures with in the 1970s.
Got it serviced by Eric a year or two ago, and it sill peforms as new.
Asahi Pentax Spotmatic - SP

 

[grain elevator]

Kodak Retina IIa, belonged to my grandmother. It's totally jammed and didn't particularly like using it before - the finder is squinty and imprecise and I dislike the bottom advance - but I intend to keep it and, if I ever feel like I can justify the expense, have it fixed.

 

[tomkatf]

This Nikkormat, bought at Gasser's in San Francisco c.1971, was my main camera in Art School and helped me earn my BA and MA...

 

[digital_archivist]

Minolta XE-7; I was working at a camera store in 1976 while I was in college, and bought mine direct from Minolta with an employee discount. I liked the smoothness of the film advance, the handling and especially the shutter; to me, it made the Canon AE-1 (which we also sold) feel like a plastic toy. Now the contemporary Canon EF - that's another story...

 

[BAC1967]

I have several, I like to hang onto things.

My first camera, got it for my birthday in 1978.
Kodak Instamatic X-15F by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

My second Camera, belonged to my uncle before he died in 1968. My grandmother gave it to me several years later.
Kodak Duaflex II by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

My fathers camera that he let me use for high school photography class. He finally gave it to me a few years ago.
Minolta srTsc-II by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

Bought this from a friend in college, he needed money for weed. I've been using it since the 1980's.
Chinon SLR by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

My mothers old camera. I got it a few years ago after she passed away. I also found some negatives she shot with it, pictures I had never seen before. The strap made of yarn looks like something she would do.
Kodak Brownie Reflex by Bryan Chernick, on Flickr

I also have my fathers Bell and Howell 8mm movie camera I used in the 1970's.

 

[mtnbkr]

Not really cameras, but the camera magazines from the 1980s had a special place for me. As a kid with no money, I would be mesmerized by the glossy ads run in Pop Photography etc by all the manufacturers. Everything seemed exotic to me! I do remember one print add for the Contax 139, 137 and RTS. I had about as much chance as getting one as I would a Ferrari!
Minolta had some great ones for their XD series cameras.

Same here except it was the early 90s for me. I especially liked Herbert Keppler's column, though at first I viewed him as the quintessential camera snob based on his byline photo. That changed once I started reading the column and came to appreciate his sense of humor and pragmatism. In college, when I was ostensibly in the library to study or work on a project, I would pour over stacks of back issues, absorbing everything I could.

Such magazines got less interesting as digital took over.

Chris

 

[mtnbkr]

Cameras that I have a soft spot for:

Canon TLQL: This was my dad's one and only SLR and became mine when I got into photography and he had switched over to an AF P&S. When film photography died in the early 2000s and my parents were prepping to move, I told him he should just toss it or donate it because it had no value (when they did sell on eBay, they would pull less than $20 with free shipping). I didn't see film coming back, but to be fair it took more than a decade. I still have the FL 50/1.8 lens that he used with that camera. Today I have it's bigger brother, the FTQL.

I saw one at a camera shop the other day and would have been tempted except they wanted $150. :|

Chris

 

[snusmumriken]

Rollei 35. Inexpensive enough that I’ll take it canoeing or on the beach, but has earned my affection more than any other camera. Small enough to never be a burden. Absurd enough that nobody minds being photographed. Awful ergonomics but full user control, on-board meter, takes filters and lens hood, super little lens and all-in-all capable of cracking good photos. And rather a pretty bit of engineering design too.

 

[MontanaJay]

My soul mate camera is a Nikon F that I bought in 1969 while still in high school. Paid $250 for a like-new FTN that I got from a returning "Nam vet.
The meter died sometime in the 1970s so I slapped a straight prism on and kept on using it through a 30-year newspaper career.
Still have it and it still works (last time I checked).

 

[Edgy01]

Over 50 years after the initial teen lust for the camera made of Unobtainium, I entered a thrift store with my wife, and saw a camera in a glass disply case. I asked to see it and opened the eveready case, not sure what to expect...it was a Topcon Super D with f/1.4 lens, for $25 ...I bought it immediately, not caring if it even worked. I took it home, ran a roll of Tri-X thru it to test all the shutter speeds, and it operated perfectly, including the TTL meter.

The Topcon D-1, was only 2.1 weeks of median US pay at $269, was only partially made of Unobtanium, so I had a great desire for one of those as a teen, too. Finding the Super D sparked a long supressed purchase bent. Three of the world's first SLRs with TTL metering.

The camera at the far right, the Auto 100, was what dad could afford to buy me...it was only 1.3 weeks median pay But now I can somewhat replicate the Beseler ad photo. All are operational, amazing after almost 58 years.

What a score! Perhaps a little late, but the price is icredible!

 

[Duceman]

For me, it was my grandfather's Minolta XD11, which I sort of inherited after he had a stroke. That was the camera I used to learn how to shoot black/white back in college. Unfortunately, it got killed on I-80 just west of Grand Island, Nebraska, after if fell off my motorcycle. Sorry, XD11... I'll pour a little beer out on the ground thinking of you later.

 

[KerrKid]

Over 50 years after the initial teen lust for the camera made of Unobtainium, I entered a thrift store with my wife, and saw a camera in a glass disply case. I asked to see it and opened the eveready case, not sure what to expect...it was a Topcon Super D with f/1.4 lens, for $25 ...I bought it immediately, not caring if it even worked. I took it home, ran a roll of Tri-X thru it to test all the shutter speeds, and it operated perfectly, including the TTL meter.

The Topcon D-1, was only 2.1 weeks of median US pay at $269, was only partially made of Unobtanium, so I had a great desire for one of those as a teen, too. Finding the Super D sparked a long supressed purchase bent. Three of the world's first SLRs with TTL metering.

The camera at the far right, the Auto 100, was what dad could afford to buy me...it was only 1.3 weeks median pay But now I can somewhat replicate the Beseler ad photo. All are operational, amazing after almost 58 years.

Wow. What a lineup! I'd sure be proud of those!

 

[KerrKid]

My dad had an Argus C3 when I was a kid that I wish I had. It is long gone.

My mom just gave me her camera. It's a Ricoh FF-7. She's preserved a lot of memories with it and I'm very grateful to have it. My mom took this photo of my dad when he went to Loma Linda Hospital to get proton therapy for prostate cancer. It's one of my favorite photos of him.

 

[madNbad]

Minolta SRT MC II; my first camera. Pure minimalism with only match needle exposure system in the viewfinder. A stripped-down camera produced for Kmart and JC Penney department stores. Bought mine at Kmart and often went back for their Ferrania "film by the yard" packs. You could get a literal yard length tube filled with about 12 rolls of color negative for $9.99 as I remember.

Fun times...

Minolta SRT 101 with the 50 1.7 lens from a Kmart. Bought it with money from pumping gas during the summer between my sophmore and juinor year in high school. Used it for yearbook pictures. Following summer I got a better job pumping gas, sold the Minolta, bought a Nikon F.

 

[Daniela]

My dad had an Argus C3 when I was a kid that I wish I had. It is long gone.

My mom just gave me her camera. It's a Ricoh FF-7. She's preserved a lot of memories with it and I'm very grateful to have it. My mom took this photo of my dad when he went to Loma Linda Hospital to get proton therapy for prostate cancer. It's one of my favorite photos of him.

View attachment 333154 View attachment 333155

So precious!


This was our family camera growing up. It's funny that I remember how much I liked its smell.

I see it for sale on different sites...I'm tempted!

 

[r_a_feldman]

For me, it is the Exakta VXIIa, which was my first SLR. I had used a Brownie Hawkeye and Kodak Bantam as a kid and my father got me a used Argus C3 in high school, but he got me a used VXIIa when I went off to college. I used it for six years, including 15 months in Peru doing archaeological excavations for my PhD thesis. When I finished up and left Peru in 1975, I sold it to a Peruvian archaeological student for a very good price (for him) and picked up a new camera in Panama on my way back to the States.

 

[Joel_L]

When I was a kid in the late 60s my dad had a Mamiya/Sekor 1000DTL that I used a bit. That paticular camera is not around any more except for the lens which I still have. About 15 years ago I bought one on E-Bay that had some issues, so I bought a second with a different set of issues. Between the two I put together a good working camera, just used it last weekend after doing a meter calibration. I have fond memories of the original one from about 1969.

 

[Donald Qualls]

This would have to be my Speed Graphic. I was about 10 years old when I read Graflex and Graphic Photography, a small (probably promotional, looking back) book that gave the basics of operation of a Speed Graphic and Graphic View -- might have covered some other Graflex-made or -branded cameras as well, I don't recall (only been 50+ years, after all). The idea of cameras with movements caught my eye, and a view camera was on the long list from that day, but a Speed Graphic -- a 4x5 camera that was meant to be used hand-held -- was the real magic. Not long after that, I read Weegee's book, found Ansel Adams (who, AFAIK, never used a Speed, but used large format a LOT), and I was hooked. It only took thirty-some years to get my first large format camera, and a few more after that to get an Anniversary Speed, followed by a Graphic View...

 

[FriedLouisStudio]

I've got a copy of that book, not to mention my parents' Graphic View II and Crown Graphic.

They started their photo biz in 1946 and used essentially all American-made gear until the mid-60s, when we began to buy Nikon and Mamiya equipment. Graflex cameras were considered primo equipment in the 40s/50s, despite how quaint they now seem compared to later "more scientific" large format cameras.



(Dad shooting on location with the Graphic View II in 1968. Tri-X shot in a Minox B, scanned from a bordered 4x5 print.)

Some of this was just due to the provincial aspect of commerce in the last century - throughout my childhood, I never saw anything but Kodak film/paper/chemistry, despite the ads and reviews in Popular Photography about Agfa, Fuji, Ilford, etc. Our suppliers didn't even carry these foreign brands.

And as American Jews who'd BOTH served in WWII, my parents would NEVER remotely consider buying anything made in Germany. So, no Linhofs, Leicas, Zeiss... Not until I insisted on getting a Minox B in 1967 for my bar mitzvah gift!

 

[Sirius Glass]

... Not until I insisted on getting a Minox B in 1967 for my bar mitzvah gift!

Mazel tov.