Customized cameras, anyone?

[Bill58]

I have an RD covered in RED kid from Morgan and it's a true red. (I'm not colorblind either)

This is the one I ordered (seal grain red leatherette -- not leather): http://www.cameraleather.com/colors/sgb_red.htm The red kidskin might be okay. Incidentally, I get all of my real leather off of ebay. These two guys do a good job of photographing their leather and showing the colors right and they sell leather that is thin enough for camera coverings (what you want to get, just like at Cameraleather, are the goat leathers):
http://stores.shop.ebay.com/Fashion-Leather-com__W0QQ_armrsZ1

http://stores.shop.ebay.com/glovecityleather518__W0QQ_armrsZ1

It's good leather and it works out to be a lot cheaper. You do have to get your own glue though. A glue stick will do fine, if you keep the camera dry. A tube of contact cement will stick it down really tight and it's water/humidity-proof. Your choice. I've used both.

Edit: maybe I'll use some of that brick-red leatherette from Cameraleather to releather a few C3s, as a kind of tongue-in-cheek joke.

 

[Bill58]

I'm gonna get Morgan to do my very rare, black Yashica GX in natural lizard after seeing it on this thread! Thanks.

 

[FallisPhoto]

Not sure what I'm going to put it on yet, but I just got five square feet of green kidskin leather that looks very similar to Morgan's "deep jade" composite leather.

Hmmm... I have a Kodak Retina IIc and an Agfa Record I coming...

 

[FallisPhoto]

I put this in another thread, but can't resist reposting it here. A Zorki-1 with the RF removed and the vulcanite replaced with gray griptac that FINALLY came in from cameraleather after three months! Lens is CV 25.

Last Cameraleather order I made (leatherette), only took about 5 days to get here. Do you suppose it might have something to do with the fact that I always order sheets instead of kits?

 

[Pompiere]

Has anyone ever tried covering a camera with wood veneer? You can buy it in thin sheets like leather and I think some of it is even self-adhesive. With the different stains and grain patterns available, there are a lot of possibilities.

 

[FallisPhoto]

Has anyone ever tried covering a camera with wood veneer? You can buy it in thin sheets like leather and I think some of it is even self-adhesive. With the different stains and grain patterns available, there are a lot of possibilities.

Yeah, you occasionally used to see those fake FED/Leicas with wood coverings. I've seen them covered in gift wrapping paper, vinyl shelf-liner paper, fake suede cloth fabric, glass beads, rubber, those cedar things that line cigar tubes and upholstery vinyl too. It wouldn't surprise me to find that someone had covered a camera in seashells.

 

[CK Dexter Haven]

Gray Lizard from CameraLeather.

 

[jack palmer]

The Grey lizard looks fantastic. I'm getting ready to send my Chrome MP to Morgan to be covered in the dark Brown lizard. I hope mine looks as good as yours. Did you cover it yourself or did CameraLeather do the work?

 

[CK Dexter Haven]

I did it myself. It was quite simple. The results are as clean as on the new/stock camera, and i'm not a particularly handy/DIY kind of dude.

I also did the same thing with my Leica CM.

When you correspond with Morgan, be specific about what you want. If you see a swatch on his site, tell him why you like it. You may see different cameras with the same material, but with significantly different appearances. On mine, i asked for fine-grained/small cell gray lizard. There are sample variances, depending on the materials he has at the time. My CM was done in a cool gray, but the Ikon's gray is warmer. They were done about a year apart. You may be able to ask for sample clippings.

 

[FallisPhoto]

I particularly like the sort of "nebular burst" effect where the lizard grain seems to be ratiating from the black knob. That was a very happy accident.