Changing gears for a day. After the studio shoots I'm cycling back to a smaller, handier camera for a spell. Blame Robert Frank.

too many gadgets? The hand grip, the thumb grip....

Here's the "stripped down" version:

Less comfortable. But less bulky.

The purist's configuration.

Have you ever clicked on to a documentary about a favorite photographer and, when the show finished you were ready to adapt his style for your own work? I've always enjoyed the work of Robert Frank. I think his photography is direct and fearless. So I was happy when someone sent me a link to a documentary with and about Robert Frank, on Amazon Prime video. It's called "Don't Blink." 

The video was done in 2015 and Frank was, at the time, in his late 80s or early 90s. He was still quite sharp, irascible and opinionated. In part of the video he was walking around on the Coney Island beach and reminiscing about a series of photographs he'd taken there 50 years earlier. He had photographed strangers on a beach packed with people and his photographic efforts went on all day and into the night. 

In this scene he talks about using a small and discreet camera and moving quickly. Shooting quickly. As he's talking about this the video camera pans to a young, current-day photographer walking around on the beach with a big DSLR, big zoom lens, big camera bag hanging off the shoulder/back. Sticking out like a huge, sore thumb. And Frank remarks that to get the images he wanted when he shot there he had to be less obvious. Less plodding. Less stiff. He had to move fast and carried only one small camera and lens.

Through the video the only time a camera is in the frame it's a small screw mount Leica camera with an equally small 35mm or 50mm lens on the front. That's it. No zooms. No light meter.  No telephotos and (obviously) no special mirror gadgets involved.

Watching the video triggered for me a memory from an earlier time in my non-linear progression as a photographer. I was working as a copywriter for an ad agency and my passion was photography. At the time I was using an ancient Leica IIIf screw mount camera. A camera model that dates back to the early 1950s. A time before the M series Leicas were introduced. 

I was always working on a budget so I rolled my own film with a bulk loader. Always Tri-X. And when using those earlier Leicas you had to trim the leader of the film in a certain way if you wanted the film to load and advance properly. Scissors were a necessary accessory. Always. Probably the sole reason I first bought a Swiss Army Knife. Always having scissors in my pocket. 

One week I took a break from work. It must have been in 1979. I was at my parent's house in San Antonio and itching to go somewhere out of the country, to have an adventure and take photographs. This was long before I was married. Long before I had any sort of responsibilities. No constraints on my time.

I packed a few pieces of clothing in a small backpack, dropped all of my gear (one Leica IIIf, one 50mm f3.5 collapsible Elmar lens, my Swiss Army Knife and twelve rolls of hand rolled film + a passport) into a small shoulder bag. A repurposed, non-photographer bag. And asked my older brother if he'd drop me off at the San Antonio airport. This was a time in which one could arrive at the airport, look around at the various destinations on offer right now and be on an airplane heading somewhere within a half hour. Security check? Didn't exist.

The destination that looked best (and cost least) was Mexico City. I paid $36 for a plane ticket and headed out. I arrived at the airport in Mexico with no hotel reservations and no real plan but I'd read about a hotel on the Zocalo (main square) and it seemed interesting so that's where I headed. I spent a week going to markets, the park, the pyramids outside of the city, the Zone Rosa, the Anthropology Museum and even the National Pawnshop. I had a wild breakfast one day at Sanborn's House of Tiles and walked without fear or trepidation through the downtown  a couple of nights at two or three in the morning. 

My constant companion was the tiny Leica rangefinder camera. So many good memories even if the photos I took were less than spectacular (no light meter, still learning to print, still learning my way around composition). It was the process, the time spent, the adventure that made the trip an important one for me.

What an interesting time. No cellphones. No internet. No credit card. No schedule and no fear. Just one very small, very rudimentary camera and  the desire to make photographs. To see things. Heaven.

So this morning when I woke up I was still thinking about Robert Frank, photographic adventures, small cameras, discreet photography and thinking....even if "discreet" isn't the pressing issue, how much fun it was to travel so unencumbered. So light. So quick and so free.

I had a camera in mind today that I thought I'll circle back to. It's the small, handy, Leica CL. The digital one. That and the smallest modern lens I could find. The little Carl Zeiss 28mm. It's like a 42mm (short normal) on a 35mm camera. The camera is also just about the size of the old IIIf...

I set the camera to shoot black and white. I'm enthralled with it. But mostly as a symbol for adventures. So much history calling out to photographers....

And here I am getting ready to shoot a portrait in the studio with a big MF camera. Odd times.

Would there be a market for a camera like the ancient Leica IIIf I shot with? No frills. No automation. No huge size. No high value. Just a lens, a shutter and a sensor. Not even a light meter? I'd buy one. But then I'm eccentric enough to part with the cash...  You?