New In Box, Should I Shoot It?

This funny looking guy seemed to like that Chinon point and shoot. 🙂

WarholPic1.jpg
 
I tend to look at questions like this in economic terms. Forget about cameras needing to be used, and forget for a moment that your camera is NIB. What is a NIB Chinon Intrafocus 35F-MA worth? What is a good-used Chinon Intrafocus 35F-MA worth. Now subtract the latter value from the former. Would you pay that much to use this camera for a while?

I know very little about this camera, but based on a very quick ebay search, I am guessing the differential is about $10-20. (anyone please correct me if I am wrong!) If it was a camera that I had a desire to shoot, I doubt that monetary loss would keep me from using it. Now, if we were talking about a NIB black paint M2 . . . .

Jeremy
 
You might as well use it, it will still deteriorate even if you leave it in the box. I just picked up a Yashica Electro GT which is NIB, with the case, caps, scrap, telewide kit, tripod, Toshiba filter, and even a Yashica mercury battery still in it's original box. Unfortunately, even though the camera was never used, the telewide lenses have fungus, the battery has got green crud on it, the light seals are rotted, and the shutter mechanism sticks. The camera would probably have been in better shape now had it been used from time to time.
 
The monetary value of the camera is close to nil - it is not a classic, it is not rare, it is not an underrated camera etc etc etc. Personally, I don't even think it is pretty 😛
But: That chubby little thing is easy to grab and go, so my suggestion is to use it in circumstances you would normally never dare to take a camera. Heavy rain, mudslide, bar fights, sandy beaches - take your pick. Normally, we tend to not fully engage in activities that most likely will harm our beloved ones (that is - cameras, our relatives can take care of themselves...). As a result we end up with pictures that look kind of unattached - they are the results of a photographer watching the action, not being part of it. So may I suggest a small project for you: "Rainy streets", not as you see them when you stand under a balcony, but how it is to be in the street when the rain is pouring down.
 
Thank you everyone. Reading all of your replies has been fun and interesting. Some see photography in technical terms. Some of you look at photography from a dollars and cents prospective. Some of you embrace the joy of photography for its own sake. I can appreciate all of these points of view.

For me, I love photography in its own right and I love both the great and the quirky cameras. The Infrafocus certainly is a quirky looking beast. I have put Kodak Ektar 100 in the camera, and the camera in my workbag. I even shot some sunset pictures with it this evening. I am looking forward to seeing the results.

As an aside. Warhol may have been a middle aged man, but the Chinon was the next new thing in autofocus. It was launched late in 1981, just in time for Warhol to take it to China in 1982. Go Andy! or gone...as it were. 😀

Here is a link to a blog on Andy Warhol's cameras. http://theshuttergoesclick.blogspot.com/2010/07/andy-warhols-cameras.html
 
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Hey, I have one of Andy's cameras too, a Konica C35 EF. 😀

...well, not Andy's actual camera, but the same model that he was seen with while sporting around with another classic vintage model, Bianca Jagger, according to the blog that Wayne posted above...

I should probably get around to fixing it one of these days, if I can only figure out where the other end of the positive battery wire is supposed to go. :bang:

I bought a camera a couple of weeks ago at a garage sale just because it was the only camera that I saw during a full day of specifically looking for cameras at garage sales and thrift stores, and I was stubborn, bound, and determined to not go home without a damn camera.

It's not a "special" camera, nor is it particularly rare, or unique. It is a Nikon, but not the vintage Nikon rangefinder or SLR that I was dreaming of finding, rather, it is a fairly solid, stolid, and ordinary fixed-focus, wide angle, all-weather point and shoot (AW35, aka Sport•Touch). I was figuring that I could always use a rainy-day camera, but just my luck, it hasn't rained a drop since the day that I bought this camera. So I am going to load my baby Nikon up with some Superia X-tra 400, and take it out tomorrow on a sunny Saturday morning, take some street shots, and enjoy myself with this little old camera. Because when you take away the preconceptions, the dollars and cents, the "my dog is better than your dog" brand loyalty, and any and all of the other extraneous flotsam and jetsam involving the equipment that you carry, what is left is the real reason that you take photographs.

Because you enjoy it.

So, Wayne, go out, have some fun, and enjoy your Chinon. I'm sure that it is a fine picture-taker.
 
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For those with a similar problem:

Why not keep the box on the shelf but replace the camera and instructions with a half brick or similar? Then sell the camera.

That way you'll still see the box on the shelf and someone else will have a nice, new camera to use. So two people will be happy. Also boxes are easier to dust. don't rust and "no batteries required"...

Just my two pen'orth.

Regards, David
 
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