Time-travel back to 1988...what were you using?--B&W

Vaughn · Aug 5, 2013

(1) Top most-used camera? Gowland PocketView 4x5 with a Caltar IIN 150/5.6
(2) Top most-used film? TMax100
(3) Top most-used paper? Agfa Portriga Rapid (111) and Ilford Gallerie (glossy)
(4) B&W enlarger, color enlarger, other printing equipment? BW -- Omega D5XL, with 135mm lens

flatulent1 · Aug 5, 2013

I was taking photography classes at the university around 1988.

Canon T90
Tokina 80-200 f2.8 ATX
some miscellaneous wide angle zoom
pair of 300TL flashes plus Quantum batteries
Domke F1X bag
TMax 100
Lloyds Lloader
College lab supplied the chems. Paper I got at the U Bookstore, though I don't remember what it was. I was doing all my own B&W; color was done by Jet Color Labs in north Seattle.

Also an FTb landed in my lap about that time, with three ancient primes... 28, 50, and 135, I think. Didn't use them much, though.

Today I have (among others) three T90s in current use, plus a bagful of primes. I have a Tokina 80-200 f2.8 ATX, but I think it's a Minolta MD mount. Don't have the Quantum batteries, still have the Domke bag. My most-used films during the summer months are Ilford FP4+ and Portra 160. When it starts getting dark and/or cloudy I switch to TMax 400 and Portra 400. My most-used slide film is E100GX in 120.

hdeyong · Aug 5, 2013

Nikon FM and FE
Tri-X and Kodachrome 64
Kodak RC something
Durst F30
Good times.

BradleyK · Aug 5, 2013

1. Nikon F2AS, Nikon F2A and a pair of Nikon F3HPs for 35mm shooting. A 500C/M with a 50, 80 and 150 for medium format work.
2. Kodachrome 25 and 64for all my colour work, Kodak Tri-x, Ilford PanF and HP5 for black and white.
3. Kodak paper (Polycontrast?)
4. An Omega D2.

So...beyond updating my 35mm bodies, adding in a Leica rangefinder system, and accumulating a lot more lenses (in both 35mm format and 120), I have made only minor changes (Ilford for all my paper and the lion's share of film and chemistry, and Ektachrome for almost all my colour work) to my photography (if the tragic loss of Kodachrome can be deemed minor).

Pioneer · Aug 5, 2013

skystrick said:
Okay, back in 1988, what were you using for:
(1) Top most-used camera?

Pentax K1000 SE. This was my only camera for many, many years. Still own it.

skystrick said:
(2) Top most-used film?

Kodachrome, Kodachrome and more Kodachrome.
Occasionally I would shoot some Kodacolor.
Once in awhile I would shoot some TriX but I really did not get into black & white until about 8 years ago.

skystrick said:
(3) Top most-used paper?
(4) B&W enlarger, color enlarger, other printing equipment?

I really didn't start printing or developing my own film until just a few years ago when it started to get very difficult to get film developed and printed locally.

chriscrawfordphoto · Aug 5, 2013

I was 13 years old, shooting with the Olympus OM-G that my dad bought me for my 11th birthday. I had a 50mm f1.8 and a 28mm f2.8 lens, both Olympus Zuiko lenses. I had never used black and white film or done my own processing, that would have to wait till I took photography in high school a few years later. I shot Kodak's amateur color neg films. I think it was Kodacolor VR-G, usually in 100 speed. Got it processed by a local lab.

I don't have the camera anymore. It was broken in a car accident when I was 16. Totaled my car, too. Replaced the camera with an Olympus OM-4T

K-G · Aug 5, 2013

1. Hasselblad 500 CM ( same as today ) , Nikkormat FT and Rollei 35 S .
2. Tri-X professional in 220 size and Kodachrome 64.
3. Agfa Brovira and Ilford Ilfobrom.
4. An old Durst in a fotoclub darkroom. I Think it was called M 60.

The Hasselblad is still running but the Nikkormat and the Rollei have both left active service.
The Nikkormat has been replaced with a Nikon F3 and an FM2n.
The Rollei 35 S has been replaced with a 35 T. Besides that a Leica MP has also entered the gang and they all seem to get along quite good.
Today I also have my own darkroom with three enlargers. I use mainly ADOX MCC 110 , Ilford MGWT and Ilford Galerie paper.
When it comes to film I do very litle colour photogrophy today and for the black and White I have almost completely switched to Ilford.
Things are changing, but even if I miss 220 black and white film and Kodachrome I still Think my situation has improved.

Karl-Gustaf

perkeleellinen · Aug 5, 2013

In 1988 I was 15, our family had a 110 camera for the annual holiday to Cornwall and I guess one or two rolls per year were shot, film/processing was a luxury for our family. I had a paper round earning £5 per week which I used to pay for off a HP on a bike.

George Papantoniou · Aug 5, 2013

It was my first year in art school...

I mostly used a Sinar F 4X5 with Agfapan 100 (@ 50, ID11 1+3) and printed on my all-time favourite paper, Agfa Record-Rapid...

Before that, I used my Canon A-1 and shot lots of slide film, as well as some B&W...

Muihlinn · Aug 5, 2013

For 1988 this:

1) IIRC a 1959 nikon F
2) Kodachrome 64
3) Whatever the lab returned, or for BW, ilford/agfa/valca depending on offers
4) by then I just moved across countries and I bought a cheap & unknow secondhand enlarger which was slightly wobbly, at that time most were slides.

ozphoto · Aug 5, 2013

1) Left high school 2 years earlier - 18th birthday present a very, slightly used AE1-Program Black body and 50mm lens.
2) Agfapan 100 & Agfachrome 50
3) Agfa Brovira
4) LPL 66II

Built a wonderful kit around that body - traded it in in the early 90s got same $$$ for it as when I purchased. An old F1 and A1 were then in my bag until d*****l was the requirement for work in the early 00s. Miss the 300 f2.8 enormously, but I'd moved away from sports photography so it was crazy to purchase an EF version.

Ian Grant · Aug 5, 2013

Wista 45DX
150m Sironar N
90mm f6.8 Grandagon
65m f8 Super Angulon

Still using the same kit 25 years later

Leica M3 50mm Summicron

1988 - Agfa AP(X)100 (5x4 & 35mm) & AP(X)25 120 Agfa Record Rapid paper

Now though after APX100 disappeared - Delta 100 (5x4 & 120), Delta 400 (120) & HP5 (%x4), I did use Tmax for some years until it became unailable where I was living. After Record Rapid disapperaed I used Agfa MCC, now I use Forte Polywarmtone (still have some left).

I no longer use the Leica instead I use a Yashicamat124 (Turkey) or Rolleiflex E2 or Automat (UK).

Ian

fotch · Aug 5, 2013

Nikon F3HP
Plus-X
Kodak Kodabromide Paper
Beseler 45M w color head

bdial · Aug 5, 2013

A Nikon F3 which I still have
Didn't do a lot of B&W at the time because of #4, but my preferred film was Plus-X
Agfa Brovira
No darkroom at the time, though I owned a Beseler 4x5 (which I still have, and which I still do not use, though I do have a DR and another 4x5 enlarger now).

Taraxacum · Aug 5, 2013

My 1st year at college I think so my own stuff apart from the enlarger (how times have changed there students dont need any of their own kit!)

1) Olympus OM10 or Rolliecord
2) Ilford Pan F
3) Ilford MGRC/Agfa Protriga Rapid FB
4) Beseler (No idea which but very like the 45 MXT)

joh · Aug 5, 2013

1) Nikon FM2 (n) ...still in use
2) Ilford HP5
3) Ilford Multigrade II
4) Beseler 23 C

Harry Lime · Aug 5, 2013

Kodachrome in a Kodak Instamatic. Probably some Agfa or Kodak color negative film.

MattKing · Aug 5, 2013

In 1988 I was a couple of years into starting a new law practice - no time for photography!

1) my cameras were almost unused, but they were an OM2s and a Mamiya C330;
2) 35mm Kodacolour in its most basic version, for the few lab processed shots I took. May have been a couple of rolls of Kodachrome 64 in there as well;
3) Whatever the current Kodak colour paper was - I made sure that the labs I used were Kodak labs. ABC Photo most likely;
4) My Beseler 67C enlarger was in storage at my parents' home - it was calling across the water to me though.

Paul Howell · Aug 5, 2013

Nikon F 3 J
Tri X
Kodachrome 64
Kodak Color Negative for MF and LF
Last of the Agfa Bravia grade 2 - 4
Polycontrast

theoria · Aug 5, 2013

Oh well, in 1988 I was an 11 years old boy living in a rather small town in communist Romania. It was about that time that my father bought me my first camera - a Fed 5 sporting a 50mm industar 61, that I still own. I was using mostly ORWO and Romanian Azomures films. I have no idea how they compared against their western counterparts, but they did the trick for the kid I was. My father also taught me how to process films and print. I still remember the red azomures paper envelopes and the stripped orwo cartboard boxes my father stored in a drawer in his reading room. As regards the enlarger, it was a fairly basic Meopta model from the 70's that my mother accidentally broke a year or two later, so nothing is left of it, except for the lens.

pgomena · Aug 5, 2013

Camera(s): Rolleiflex 2.8C (still own and use) Canon F1 + selection of lenses, still own and use but not much these days, Wista 4x5 field camera. Bought a Zone VI camera in 1990, but I still have the lenses I bought in 1980.
Main film then was Tri-X, HC-110, and various chrome and color neg films. (I was in photo school at the time, and T-Max had just come on the market. New films seemed to show up all the time, and I was trying them all.)

Paper then: Original Zone VI Brilliant, now long gone. Now I use that dry stuff that goes in the big plastic printer-thingys that hook up to my computer. Film and paper now are almost all Ilford for my limited wet-work.

Enlarger: Beseler then, Beseler now, although I did replace my original with a much newer, less abused model.

TheToadMen · Aug 5, 2013

Back in the 80's (1982?) I bought my first camera 2nd hand from a friend: a Yashica FX3. It developed film transport problems in 1985, so I couldn't use it anymore (but still have this camera). I mostly used Fuji color film - sometimes a B&W film - and had it developed in a local lab. Later (1988?) I was given my first Nikon by my aunt, who bought a new Canon herself. It was a black Nikon EL2 with a 35, 50 and 105 mm lens. This was my only camera until 2001, when I bought a Nikon D1X, a F4s and a F5. 2001 was the year I took up photography seriously. I still use the EL2 and had it CLA'd a few years ago.

Prof_Pixel · Aug 5, 2013

My go everywhere with me camera at that time was an Olympus XA.

Alex Muir · Aug 5, 2013

1. Miranda G and Sensorex with 28,50 and 135mm lenses.
2. Ilford FP4 (and various colour negative/reversal films).
3. Ilfobrom Galerie grade 3.
4. Gnome Universal with Wray Supar 50mm (2 inch) lens.
I got married in August '88, and am about to celebrate 25 year Anniversary. Alex.

madgardener · Aug 5, 2013

I was just getting ready to start college that year. I had a point and shoot 35mm camera and was using York brand film. My X-15F instamatic was getting less use those days because film was starting to be harder to find along with the flip flash thingies.

Time-travel back to 1988...what were you using?--B&W

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