Your first camera and the story behind it...

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Although currently I have Canon and Pentax camera equipment....my first camera was the basic Pentax SLR of the 1960's, the model S1a.

I was 19 years old and bought it in 1968.

The S1a topped out at 1/500th of a second, with no self timer, no hot shoe...not much of anything but a rugged metal body and a lens.

I recall that the camera, with it's 50mm Takumar (F 2.0) lens and beautiful black leather ever ready case came to $ 159 CAD.

It also didn't have a light meter. As a result, I needed to buy a hand held Sekonic Light Meter for $ 9.95.

Both still work.

I bought it for my work at a publishing company. I was an editorial assistant and the publisher told me that in addition to my editorial assistant duties, I would have to take photos....in order...' to make myself more useful.'

So I did, although I don't know if my usefulness increased.

I asked him what kind of camera to get. He said a 35mm SLR...either a Nikon or a Pentax. I knew nothing about photography or cameras for that matter so I asked the head of the company's photography dept. for advice.

He suggested a Pentax as it was around $ 10-20 cheaper than the basic Nikon (Nikkormat) camera.

I've never been without a Pentax since then.

What was your first camera and what was the story behind getting it ?

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Hehhehe...my first camera was a Olympus digital point and shoot. Don't remember the actual name. It has something like 3.4mp. I sold it to a friend because I didn't use it much. Fast forward....more like 7 years ago when my co-worker bought a Canon point and shoot. Something like 8mp for $125. I was impressed with the price considering my last digital point and shoot cost me over $250 and it was only 3.4mp. It was all downhill from there. I got the Canon A890 or something with 10mp, a digital point and shoot. I wasn't a photographer back then but realized that even at ISO400, I am getting annoying digital noise. To me, it seems like my $200+ 10mp point and shoot wasn't much better than my 3.4mp Olympus camera, like 4 years ago. I returned the camera and got the Powershot S3. Ok now, my point and shoot is beginning to look more like a DSLR. It was an improvement but the noise at ISO800 is still bothering me.

I sold the S3 and bought my first DSLR, Canon XTI. Few months later, I sold the XTI and got the 30D around the same time the 40D came out. Then, the 1dmarkII. And finally, my current 1dmarkIII. I was fairly gear obsessed like everybody else. I didn't really get photography until I begin to shoot film. There is a point in which you will realize that it is not the gear that makes your photos. I also spent 3 years shooting for money and to realize that the field of photography isn't a very glamorous and respected profession, at least in these day and age. Right now, my Olympus OM2n is my most used camera, 35mm films. I also have a Mamiya RZ 67, medium film body. I only use my 1dmarkIII when I need to take photos of things I want to sell.

Hmmm... First was a Kodak Brownie that my grandmother bought me back in the 50's, while I was still in about 7th grade. Over the next 15 years I had a couple of Instamatics. It wasn't until the 70's, when I hit my mid 20's and was a bit more solvent that I finally got a real camera, my beloved Minolta SRT-201 match needle SLR. I used that one for 20 years.

My first camera was a Nikon FE, bought used in the early '80's when I was 13 or 14 years old. I was always disappointed with the results. I wanted to "freeze" fast-moving animals in low light (dawn and dusk conditions). Film simply wasn't up to the task . . . well, at least I never got the tack-sharp, grain-free look I wanted to get when shooting that fast stuff in low light. So, I pretty much put photography on hold for about 20 years. When digital camera sensors became good enough to give me results I could be satisfied with I bought a DSLR and started photographing again.

Bell + Howell FD35 (aka Canon TX) with a Canon 50mm f/1.4. Dad gave it to me in 1978 when he upgraded to a Canon AE-1. I was 12/13, and had a blast with it. Back then, I had no problem taking street photos, and did pretty well (all things considered). Not much of a story, but that was it.

My first was a plastic thing that sold for 20 pence (same price as a vinyl album) in the Naafi (servicemens club) in Libya circa 1969..........yes, the Brits had a presence there as Gaddafi took over.

Took crap pictures......those below are from it, but it got me interested and i stepped up to a yashica mat EM

IMAGE LINK: http://s19.photobucket​.com …dia/Sterlingmgu​n.jpg.html

IMAGE LINK: http://s19.photobucket​.com …/QuickkipLibya6​7.jpg.html

IMAGE LINK: http://s19.photobucket​.com …media/desertbee​r.jpg.html

I think mine was a 110 camera when I was a kid. But I didn't get going until years later when I found a Yashica rangefinder. First SLR was a Canon AE-1 which I scraped pennies together to buy second hand. Actually, I wanted the A-1 but lack of money got in the way.

My first camera (1950s) was my father's old folding Kodak. The first camera I bought was a 2x3 Busch Pressman, which was replaced after a year or two with a Praktica 35mm slr (still in the 1950s,)

It was Smena 8M. Thanks to her I learned film, developing, etc. Damn, I'm old

As a kid a Kodak Instamatic. When I look back I sure took a lot of B&W snapshots. Unfortunately I was no Vivian Maier so I won't be rich.

I gave up on photography in my teens. Girls and fast cars.

In my early 20's I went to Hawaii with a friend from work. He had Minolta. I used it as was really impressed so when I got back into and picked up my first SLR - Minolta X700. Today he shoots Nikon and I shoot Canon. Once a year we go on 3-4 day photo trips somewhere in the world. Beijing next month if all goes to plan.

Also I got into Ansel Adams and built a 4 by 5 field camera kit.

Mid 90's I got tired of film. 2005 picked up my first DSLR - 20D.

I played around with my parents instamatics (they had one you wound up and it would automatically advanced the flash cube and advance the film. Then I borrowed my yearbook advisor's Canon ExAuto when I was in 6th grade. Thought I was hot stuff then. ...

I used my high school's Canon FTb while I took a photography class in 11th grade before getting a Canon AE-1 summer of 82 for an early graduation present so I could take pictures my senior year of school. ...

My first camera was given to me in 1978; it was a Holly Hobbie camera that took 126 film. http://www.flickr.com …angeinscenery/5​648674666/ I had a strict limit of one roll of film a month.

After the shutter died on that, my mother gave me her old Kodak Instamatic 104, which took 126 film and used flash cubes. The limit of one roll of month of film still applied.

My first SLR, which I purchased in 1987 when I was 14 from a pawnshop, was a Canon AE-1 with a couple of lenses. For working so hard at saving my pennies for two years so I could buy an slr, my parents gifted me with a roll of film a week. My father bought me a used Heiwa tripod (if you look at my gear list, I'm still using the beast), and a fisheye adapter.

The AE-1 traveled everywhere with me, for six years (until I replaced it with an EOS-1, which I eventually drove over while out ice fishing). It is the camera I captured my teen years with, and it is the camera I did my first pro work with.

Sadly, during a bout of financial desperation in 2002, I had to sell her and my FD lenses (along with most of my gear). I've never really gotten over it. I have purchased another AE-1, but it just isn't the same.

My first "real" camera was a Canon AE-1 program- I got it in 1992 when my dad upgraded to the EOS Elan. The good news was I got to keep the FD lenses since he went to the new system. I was 12.

You guys go all the way back. I am much newer than all these stories. My dad had a Nikon and an interest in photography but being the kid I was, shunned photography.

I started with an interest in photography with a borrowed camera from Epson. I was working there at the time and they would allow you to check them out on the weekend. 2.1mp I think it was. Taking it out and trying the different auto settings and having no idea what I was doing. Interesting snaps and memories, but nothing fantastic. Then my future mother in law was convinced by my future brother in law to buy a Digital Rebel (300D) for an upcoming hawaii vacation. he had no idea but he wanted to have a nice camera so convinced her to buy it. She is about as technologically inept as you can be so she of course hated it. But she took it with the kit lens to Hawaii and on the first day, she inserted the CF card wrong and bent the pins. Needing a camera, I told my GF to buy an Olympus I had seen. So they finished the vacation with the Olympus. So I shot with the Olympus as the Rebel sat there after being fixed with no use. I finally took it out of the box in 2005 and used it until 2008 when I got my T2i which is my currently main camera along with my M.

bidkev wrote in post #16680242
Took crap pictures......those below are from it, but it got me interested and i stepped up to a yashica mat EM

Thanks for sharing those awesome old photos.

I think that today we get too hung up on nitpicking things apart. We want perfection, perfect colours, perfect composition, perfect lighting . . . the list goes on and on.

I think the photos from your "plastic thing" are great.