At 60 years old, I still remember seeing the SLRs I work on in store windows myself. I was even able to afford one of them, the Minolta X-700, as a student after doing summer piecework at a factory. It was my constant companion for 15 years.
This gives me an emotional connection to the electromechanical SLRs of that era, which drives me to contribute to their preservation.
Professional service is becoming rarer and cannot keep pace with the current resurgence of film photography. Some of these SLRs receive virtually no professional maintenance anymore.
But who will be enthusiastic about these historic 1980s SLRs in ten or twenty years? Will people still be taking photos with them, or will there be new cameras by then? Or is the trend shifting toward solid mechanical SLRs that don’t rely on complex electronics? Or will there be a completely different development?
That’s why I’m wondering if it makes sense to put work into this that may ultimately be irrelevant for the future?
This gives me an emotional connection to the electromechanical SLRs of that era, which drives me to contribute to their preservation.
Professional service is becoming rarer and cannot keep pace with the current resurgence of film photography. Some of these SLRs receive virtually no professional maintenance anymore.
But who will be enthusiastic about these historic 1980s SLRs in ten or twenty years? Will people still be taking photos with them, or will there be new cameras by then? Or is the trend shifting toward solid mechanical SLRs that don’t rely on complex electronics? Or will there be a completely different development?
That’s why I’m wondering if it makes sense to put work into this that may ultimately be irrelevant for the future?
