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Invest in 4x5 equipment?

Ardpatrick said:
Interesting link. How does he get a decent shot with that 8x10 wobbling like crazy on the end of a long tripod column! Its really bouncing around.
Click to expand...

That's a great question. Maybe it was a setup for just making a video.
 

I believe it was affected Feb 24th.
 
Already in effect. But how can anyone adjust their "paperwork" that fast to these sudden changes? Even a corporate systems programmer can't take a lunch nap. I'm not in any hurry to buy new gear from abroad, so will just watch the melee unfold from a distance. What has happened to the professional German and Japanese power tool lines I sold just a decade ago involves stratospheric price hikes, more than 100%. Most of that is tariff related. Even the pseudo-contractor junkier American-branded (but Chinese made) tool lines have gone up ridiculously. I'm sure glad I'm not shopping for equipment, either shop-wise, or for photographic purposes. Horse-trading more locally makes the most sense now. There's a lot of that going on.
 
How can you tell what is "in the works" if it operates like a meat or paper shredder, even to your own wallet? How much of the next round is just bluster, tempting another standoffs with the Courts? The only thing predictable is the unpredictability of it, which is the worst aspect of all. I think a lot of businesses and manufacturers are holding their breath, and hoping they don't suffocate in the meantime. - not a political comment - just logistical reality if one need to seriously invest in equipment or imported supplies. Probably everyone has noticed by now that lots of vendors of used cameras and lenses have significantly raised their prices in recent time to hedge their own risk. But if that doesn't work, maybe they'll lower them instead, and start a downward trend. Hard to say.

But even domestic used equipment has gone way up ever since this melee began. There's a lot of frazzled psychology to it, and not just financial variables. I've always based my own serious equipment purchases by carefully reading these kinds of tea leaves, including exchange rate trends; but now it's getting particularly tricky. All I plan to buy in the near future is some color printing paper, which seems to already be well stocked enough in this country to be immune from price fluctuations for awhile.
 
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