My Voigtlander Perkeo 1, circa 1953. It has a Color Skopar lens and a synchro-compur shutter with speeds from 1 to 1/500 second, and consistently produces lovely small 6x6 engraving-like images full of rich tones and creamy half tones, even on the 12 year old Fuji 160 film I have 20+ rolls in our freezer at home. I've been playing with 6x6 folders since about 1990-1991 and I tried various Agfa, Ansco, Zeiss various obscure brand English, German and even Japanese brands (all now sold or given away) before I finally lucked into this little gem of a camera on Ebay in 2013, for a very good price, from its original owner.
I keep it in an old Sony Walkman and have matched it with an original Voigtlander lens hood ($10 on Ebay), a yellow-green filter (a gift), and a Weston Master II (also given to me).
Its downsides are relatively minor - zone focusing (luckily, I'm good at guessing distances) and having to manually wind the film after each shot, which means I average about one shot every 90 seconds if I'm really running it hot to trot. But then I'm nearing 70 and slow photography, like slow food and slow savoring of good wines with said food and now and then luxurious liqueurs in small quantities when the budget can stretch to it, is the way for me.
Yes, cooltouch (#24), film is expensive now, 120 rolls are almost luxury items for many of us. I stocked up and froze over two decades and am now using up what I've harvested, after the 2005 Fujis are gone I have some frozen 2006 Fuji 400 which by now may be toast, then 17 rolls of circa 2007 Portra 160, so I'm set for a while. The home darkroom makes it all affordable for us. When I've used up the films (I still have more frozen 35mm cans than I care to count), my time will have come to decide whether to hang up the cameras or sell the lot. But not for a while yet.
I've always liked quirky cameras. For years I lusted after a Hasselblad SWC but my earnings as an architect didn't quite stretch to buying one after office and staff expenses were paid, so I shot almost all my architecture-related project work with a Rolleiflex TLR and a Rollei pano head. Never let it be said I took the easy way out! Later work was done with a Nikkormat and ultimately using THAT medium we are forbidden to proselytise in this holy pages lest the pixel plague striketh us down. That SWC never did come my way but shooting with the Voigtlander takes me back to the basics and induces wonderful feelings of almost monastic minimalistic bliss. The great religious philosopher Thomas Merton shot all his life with an borrowed Alpa and one lens and created several exhibitions of beautiful prints and also a book, I saw the former some years ago in the USA and I briefly owned the book in the '80s but stupidly loaned it out and it was never returned, I've looked and looked but it's now as rare as hens' teeth or the proverbials on bulls.
BMbikerider's comments (#25) are especially meaningful to me as like many of us I've had to work for the things I own, in my life I've done many varied and always enjoyable things (photographer, journalist, media promotion writer, publisher, media marketing consultant, and until my retirement in 2012 interior design architecture) but I've never earned a fortune and when I've wanted a new camera kit, I always had to sell either my camera gear or other things (similarly I managed to upgrade my shooting gear and darkroom after selling two properties and acquired the rest piece by piece). Again like many of us, I appreciate what I've owned and if anything this has just heightened the joy of shooting with my Nikkormats, Rolleiflexes and Voigtlander. Ditto old cars, period furnishings, art, books, music and stereo gear, and travels to places that interest and stimulate me. Others feel free to add to the life's-list, as we all have our own uniquely individual choices.
Old gear and old(er) photographers fit together naturally. Let the younger set have the auto-everything plastic gewgaws.
Gee golly gosh, I do go on, don't I? As my grandmother once said, as a baby I was accidentally vaccinated with a gramophone needle...
I only got one flash per bulb
