10 Tips on how to cure yourself from GAS

The best cure is to have a close friend who wave all the equipment you are interested in trying/owing :p

Regards,

Boris
 
Well he is right about buying film, you can actually take pictures then instead of just owning cameras and lenses. There are also lots of interesting films and who knows which one will be next to go extinct. You also have to realize that pullitzer winning photographs have been made with Kodak box cameras before...
 
GAS for quality stuff is healthy. GAS for plastics is unhealthy.

The moment I realized that I was lusting on gear composed from supermarket plastic bags and such (recycled boot soles...) I understood. No more.

Leica, Voigtlander, Hasselblad, Rollei... All good stuff and never enough! Real Quality!
 
GAS for quality stuff is healthy. GAS for plastics is unhealthy.

The moment I realized that I was lusting on gear composed from supermarket plastic bags and such (recycled boot soles...) I understood. No more.

Leica, Voigtlander, Hasselblad, Rollei... All good stuff and never enough! Real Quality!

Clint, I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Are you listening?

Plastics.

There's a great future in Plastics. Think about it.

:D
 
No time + no money + a decent basic kit of gear = less wringing of hands over what to get. Just keep busy and try to spread whatever wealth you may aqcuire in the process :).

FWIW, I think the whole one lens - one camera stuff that gets repeated in most anti-GAS sermons is waaay overrated. Maybe if photography is purely your personal hobby then you can eschew flexibility... Sometimes you just need that big tele or high-magnification macro gear or that special portrait lens. If you want your pictures out there, you need to be able to get the shots that editors, salespeople, etc. want. When a friend turns to you and asks if you could take a product shot of a, say, an expensive wristwatch he wants to sell, would you tell him "Sorry mate but I'm a purist, I only have this 35 mm lens that focusses to 1m"?
 
Visit the camera store and actually put your hands on the camera thats occupying your mind.

Today I visited Keeble and Shuchat:

Canon 6D: still almost as big as a 5D
Sony RX-1: very cool but still a p&s and I cant justify the $$$ for this camera
Fuji X-100: if my wife did not own it already. Ideally it should have a ff sensor and physically be a little bit bigger.
Leica M9: might keep on saving one more year and buy it engraved for my 50th birthday.


Other manners to solve GAS. Throw the boxes away and engrave the item to personalize it. Immediately reduces resell value and its "yours" to keep ;-)
 
the empty bank account made it worse for me.

it got better when I just bought **** and found out what I liked and how crappy everything else was in comparison in my eyes.

there is only one gas attack left for me to deal with: the pentax 67. but I will surely sell something rather than just buy one out of the blue.
 
Lately, when I am keen to buy a new toy, I seriously think through how the new toy would benefit me – IE how would it be better then what I have.

This is working because I end up with the same conclusion every time: what I'm thinking of buying will not be substantially better than what I have.

At some point, I will not reach that conclusion and that will be the time to buy/make a change.

I think the biggest reason GAS exists is that most hobbyists (myself very very much included) don't have a clear idea of what they want to photograph – the how/why/style etc. As a result, a new camera always represents an "opportunity" to solve that problem. But of course it doesn't. So the key thing is really figuring out what it is you want to be doing with photography. Once you know that the GAS should be greatly reduced.
 
The best ways to cure gas are:

1) stop caring
2) have no money
3) buy everything you've ever wanted
4) dont go into camera stores
5) DON'T USE THE INTERNET

Very true.

Actually, my GAS disappeared when I had so much that I had no chance any more to use all of it. That thought was kinda over-burdening me. I then have rearranged my gear and now I am really happy with what I have.
 
FWIW, some of us don't have as much control over what we buy due to our OCD or similar.

The only thing that keeps me from succumbing to GAS is having zero money. And then, the universe almost always drops something into my lap, be it a check or similar unexpected money... or a piece of unexpected gear. Just to remind me I am -not- in control of this ship.
 
Once you shoot several thousand rolls of film, you'll get to where you'll feel no need for new gear because you know what you're doing and what you need, and you'll have bought it long ago.
 
Once you shoot several thousand rolls of film, you'll get to where you'll feel no need for new gear because you know what you're doing and what you need, and you'll have bought it long ago.

I look forward both to the journey to this destination and the arrival there knowing I will have such a wonderful breadth of knowledge and photos under my belt.

And then look forward to the next thousand rolls and what they bring. :)
 
Once you shoot several thousand rolls of film, you'll get to where you'll feel no need for new gear because you know what you're doing and what you need, and you'll have bought it long ago.

But maybe that only works if you are buying gear to give you a certain type of result? My problem is that I buy cameras because I like pretty cameras, I don't kid myself it's about getting a certain look or result.
 
When I used to shoot more fixed-lens Japanese rangefinders I used to get GAS much more frequently because those cameras aren't usually too expensive (relatively speaking). But now that I mostly just shoot my 2 Ms and one Barnack, I don't get GAS nearly as often because I simply can't afford to! Not having much of a disposable income is an excellent cure for GAS. Well, I suppose you can still have GAS, but it won't matter if you can't act on it.

My kit is pretty simple these days, and though I still lust after certain lenses, I am happy just using the gear I do have.

Oddly, I find myself getting GAS over film. Maybe that's strange. But I'm frequently adding and subtracting film from my B+H and Freestyle shopping carts, always wanting to stock up on film in fear that one day soon my favorite films--or even films I haven't shot yet--will disappear. I just ordered a couple rolls of Tmax 3200 yesterday, in fact, because I've never shot it before and wanted to know what, if anything, I'm missing.
 
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