What was your first camera?

CopenKagan · Apr 16, 2007

Back when I got into photography in 2005 I bought a Canon S2 IS. I still have it to this day, it was an awesome camera for the money, but I quickly grew out of it.

jwkwd · Apr 18, 2007

First real camera....1978, bought a Nikon F2. Still have it. Still use it regularly. But if the meter worked all the time, and some of the brass was not showing, and it was missing a few dings, dents and scratches, and the MD-2 worked the way it should, instead of just one speed, it would be like new.

andythebrave · Apr 19, 2007

My first own camera was a Kodak Instamatic 33 in the late 60s. Before that, though, I did take quite a few photos with my father's Halina TLR.

I went through a non-photographic era for most of the 70s and then, to celebrate the arrival of my first credit card, went out and bought an Olympus OM10 with manual adaptor and a Hoya 100-300. This outfit, with the addition of various other lenses, served me well until the mid 80s when an OM2SP was acquired. What a brilliant camera that was! That came along with a Sigma APO 50-200 and a 2 x teleconverter. At work one day I lent the outfit to a colleague to take to Spain for some brochure work and it got pinched from the back seat of their car. Drat!

After that came the Canon T-90, Vivitar S1 28-105, Tamron 135 Macro, Canon 200, Sigma 28-210, and Sigma APO 400. Managed to sell some of my photos even though they were taken for my own enjoyment.

Trouble then came in the form of a wife and, later, children and the photo hobby almost expired totally but I (sort of) resuscitated it with a Fuji APS and a 2nd hand Practica. I've still got the T-90 but it doesn't get much use these days, probably because lugging it and all its paraphernalia around has become onerous.

Somehow managed to persuade the other half to let me get an SP500 last year which she managed to drop onto rocks last month in the Yorkshire Dales so now I'm looking for a replacement. I'm somewhat torn between (and here I apologise for using the cringe-worthy labels) a 'prosumer' and a 'beginners' D-SLR. Just about settled on the Powershot S3 as it feels exactly like an SLR but smaller and it doesn't have too many pixels to mess up the image with noise and I love the rocker switch adjustment of aperture and shutter speed in M mode.

There. A bit long winded but I expect a fair few do that in their first post.

Steph · Apr 19, 2007

My dad's Spotmatic F + 50mm f/1.4.

Ihaveaquestion · Apr 19, 2007

I wanted to be a spy when I was little.

I got to run around and take pictures of top secret stuff with one of these.

table1349 · Apr 19, 2007

It dawned on me today that I totally forgot my first camera ever. I won it when I was about 8 years old from a claw machine at a carnival that was in town. We actually were able to find film for the thing and it actually took pictures. Well it exposed film at least. The quailty left a lot to be desired.

http://www.classic-camera.com/gallery/view_photo.php?set_albumName=Novelty-Cameras&id=Mighty

Mine didn't come with the attachments, just the camera pictured. Not sure if was actually a "Mighty" brand, but this is what it looked like. :wink:

uberben · Apr 19, 2007

Mine was a Canon FT QL with a bunch of FL mount lenses. It was a fully mechanical film camera from the 60's and boy did I suck up a lot of film with that camera. I still use it for star trail exposures over 4 hours. When i'm out shooting with my 20d I don't feel like i'm taking pictures. When I shoot with my old film camera's, its something way different and more raw feeling. Sometimes I miss it.

Rmclain3 · Apr 23, 2007

Canon Canonet (~1975)

RacePhoto · Apr 23, 2007

blackdoglab said:
I guess it's just curiosity more than anything, but what was your first camera?

Probably a Kodak Brownie, hand me down. Not the kind with the flash up top, the little black squarish, plastic box that took 127 film and had a white shutter button on the side. Three kids.

Problem (not a problem) was we had a bunch of cameras around the house, including Dad's Kodak Retina II rangefinder and also had at least one Rolliflex 2 1/4 twin lens reflex. Old box cameras, folding cameras from the 30s and 40s. I never owned a camera of my own until I was about 22. (If I did I sure don't remember it) Never even owned an Instamatic of my own.

Had a dark room in the basement in grade school. Just didn't own a camera.

First camera that was "MY" camera was a Canon FT-QL with a 1.4 lens, that I bought in the late 60s. I still have it, I still used it as a backup until I went digital. I still take it out now and then and run a roll through just for fun. Still takes nice pictures!

So for the record. Kodak Brownie! No Flash. :mrgreen: And I still have it.