There are so many cameras out in the world. Some are fantastic. Most are serviceable. A few are addicting-ly fun. And some are just boring. While I have a reputation (or did have a reputation) for churning through cameras, that proclivity seems to have slowed down... a lot. As I was looking into my cache of equipment today, trying to land on just the right camera to keep me company on my short drive to and from the pool (water, not table) I started thinking about cameras that some people seem to love but which I'll probably never buy or use. It was an interesting mind game.
I will never again buy or use a Pentax 6x7 film camera. At one point, long ago, in my professional career I owned three of these cameras. Two for shooting with roll film and one that was adapted with a Marty Forescher, fiber optic Polaroid back. They are too big, too loud, have too much vibration from the mirror slap and...I don't think I could go back to dealing with ten exposures between reloads. That's definitely a never again.
Sony's original A7 series of cameras. I owned several. The A7ii and the A7Rii. Both worked okay. Both were a nightmare to hold. Both had tiny, crappy, low I.Q. batteries and both had, at the time, menus that were so convoluted and bad that Olympus menus were actually starting to look okay. Added to that mess
were really mediocre EVFs along with crappy AF. Never again. If I saw one on the bargain table at the camera store for $50 I'd walk right on by. That was not how we imagined good digital cameras... And to think, they had all those talented Minolta camera engineers who could have taught Sony how to make a camera body that was enjoyable to hold. Funny (not funny) they are able to do a good job of physical camera design with the a850 and a900 DSLRs that proceeded the pocket calculator meets bad toaster design of the first couple gens of mirrorless cameras. I hope the newer ones have gotten much, much better but I'm afraid to even look.
Yeah. Well. There I was sitting at the computer when I looked at a listing on my fave Leica Store. A pristine, used Leica D-Lux8 with a case, a thumb grip, an extra battery, a filter and all the trimmings came up at a reasonable price. I quickly rationalized why I needed to buy this camera and did so. So much for me being consistent on the blog.... Gotta beat the tariffs anyway...
And that's damn fast. People watch bowling? Really? People must get paid to watch snooker, otherwise who would ever watch that? Oh, and golf. I kind of understand people playing golf (not really) but watching people in bad pants, ugly shoes, stupid hats and 1960s Banlon shirts walking around looking serious about trying to smack balls with clubs? Insane. The only way I can imagine that people would be convinced to watch golf would be if they were in traction in a hospital room, unable to speak and a nurse inadvertently left the TV set on and golf came on after he or she left the room. Intravenous drugs would be helpful.... But same with having to keep tabs on a jigsaw puzzle of batteries. No fun. And so no cameras that take dinky, weak batteries so....no compacts.
I'll never again buy a super popular camera that's a fetish item for influencers. Yes. I'm writing about the Fuji X100Vi. Imagine you were actually able to buy one and you did. And having just that camera and being unable to afford anything else you actually used it over and over again until you mastered it. It's the one camera you know well enough to make great images with. But then you lose it or break it or it gets stolen. You need to make pictures but that's the only camera you feel comfortable using. And then you find out that you might be on a waiting list for years --- waiting to get a replacement. And it's a list that's longer than the ones for donated kidneys or hearts. And you fall into despair, give up photography and turn to golf. See how depressing it could be to own the wrong camera? I'll never fall for that again.
In all probability I will probably never buy another big, sports oriented camera; either a DSLR model or one of the new digital mirrorless ones like the Canon R1 or the Sony Alpha A1ii. Or one of the older Nikon D3s. Anything big and bulky which has as its reason for existence super fast frame rates and reputedly, super fast autofocus tracking, is off the table. They are too overwrought. Too capable. Too fraught (in a bad way) with misguided potential. And any time I use one of those cameras I think it's making fun of me for just being human. They are all one step away from being able to shoot for themselves and do a better job of it than I might. There's a reason we like to do stuff for ourselves. But those cameras would sneer at you if you tried to take it off auto focus and do it yourself. They just would. And look! We're already on rev two of a camera (Sony or Canon's R5ii) that hasn't even been around long enough to run down the clock on its predecessors warranty. At least give me a chance to wear the damn thing out.
Life is too short for Olympus camera menus. Or OM Systems camera menus. I'll just stop there. You know what I mean. And sure, I know that after you ingest the 1100 page menu you can set the camera the way you like it and never go into the menus again. But I don't always shoot the same stuff and might need to go into the menus and unlike a physical labyrinth it's impossible to mark your path with string or breadcrumbs. When you most need to understand the labyrinth that is an Olympus menu you will undoubtable meet a Minotaur of conflicts. Nothing will be resolved. Innocent images will go unrecorded.
I'm pretty sure that at this late stage of my career as a photographer I will not willingly part with the cash to own a Hasselblad mirrorless medium format camera. I'm sure everyone finds the color remarkable and the lenses pretty cool but I'm equally sure that it's like buying a sports car that's a work in progress. It looks really cool but.... performance? Not so sure about that. And who owns the Hasselblad company these days anyway? Is it the company that got famous for making drones or the one who got famous for being part of the Swedish Socialist Miracle? And who do I send it to when it breaks?
Last week I thought I could afford to buy one. Or maybe even two! But this morning I got the news from my broker that I really shouldn't be buying anything right now. And in fact, I had to hang up quickly because I'm back to just buying minutes on a burner phone so --- the high priced Hasselblad stuff is off the table.
I will never own another 4x5 or 8x10 view camera. I have owned and used both but I never want to work that hard again to make mostly well focused, well exposed static and boring images. And I never want to spend between $15 and $30 each to make one exposure. And I hated being trapped under the black dark cloth when it's 110° outside. You fry like bacon. And the pictures are never better for it. Got an older, wooden 8x10 view camera? They make great kindling.
In this continuing list of cameras I would never buy again I'd have to include the Leica R8 and Leica R9 cameras. Why? Because they require batteries to function. I'm of the opinion that the basic bar to jump over for a usable film camera is that it take double A batteries and nothing a like a 2CR5 or some other lithium rarity. Better yet, I'd draw the line at any camera that requires a battery for anything other than metering. If the metering battery in a Nikon F2 goes south the camera still works. You can actually use brain power to get into the exposure ballpark. Worst case scenario you can drag around an external light meter. But sport a Nikon F3 film camera and you need those little silver button batteries or you've got a brick on a strap. This eliminates for me a whole raft of cameras. No Nikon FE cameras. Yes on the original FM. No Canon EOS film cameras, all of which required batteries to function. I get the need for batteries on a digital camera but am religiously opposed to battery dependence on film cameras. And you should be too.
Top of the list for me of cameras to scrupulously avoid are all those big, plasticky, crappy Fuji medium format film cameras with fixed lenses. They always seemed like a good idea until you got your hands on one and tried to use it. The finders were so inaccurate and the meters sucked. The lenses were never a good match for the formats and, again, ten or fewer frames per roll on most of them. Might have been okay if you were going to scurry into the darkroom and print from the negatives but in the digital age? It's like preferring carbureted car engines. Painfully inefficient. "Texas Leica" my ass.
That's all I can trash today. This will be continued. Someone has to draw the line between usable cameras and nostalgic crap and it might as well be me. And I can hardly wait to discuss lenses.
But one last thing. Remember that even Leica was guilty of making really shitty film cameras (looking directly at you R4!!!). The 1990s wasn't a good time for their SLRs. I think they would admit it. After all, they had to repair a huge percentage of them under warranty. Amazing they survived.
On most shoots cameras are the least of my worries.
I liked the idea of monochrome only cameras until I looked at a bunch of samples posted by aging influencers. I tried a few conversions from color negatives and.... YMMV
If your lens comes with a lens hood please mount the hood on the lens correctly. Nothing looks much dorkier than walking around shooting stuff with your lens hood attached backwards. It's just sad.
No good cameras was ever designed to fit nicely into pants pockets.
Either your pants are too big or your camera is too small...
jacket? Sure. But pants? never.
All time favorite. Glad I bought it before the great depression.
America. Bringing back the best of the 1950's. One step at a time.
What cameras have you tried and really disliked?