Don’t Go into Debt For Your Photography

[Roger Hicks]

. . . By the way, I owned a Leica in college. . . .

So did I, in 1969. A IIIa. It cost me £30: $72.

I bought it because my girlfriend wanted her Leica II back (bought maybe a month before for £20, $48).

Both cameras came with collapsible Elmars.

Cheers,

R.

 

[Darthfeeble]

Buy the gear of your dreams while you can still live them. There's plenty time later when you can't to pay off the cards.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Buy the gear of your dreams while you can still live them. There's plenty time later when you can't to pay off the cards.

Few if any of my dreams revolved around specific cameras. Photography came first. Fortunately I chose the right cameras early on: by 1975 (at 25 years old) I was using Nikon Fs and Leica M-series.

Cheers,

R.

 

[tunalegs]

Here we go again. The topic of that thread is about whether it's worth getting into debt and financial troubles to buy something the marketing hype try to force people to buy even if they don't need and can't afford it (which is what the marketing rules are designed for). Sorry to be forced myself to get back to this but your repetitive borderline comparisons (your above example of the Box Brownie for instance) are really becoming boring.

What if you were advised to participate to this forum using a fountain pen and some sheets of paper ? 🙄

But what if writing with a fountain pen and sheets of paper is the best way for somebody to participate on this forum? I'm not saying people can't write good posts with a keyboard, that may be good enough for them - but a real forum poster with any skill at writing forum posts would use a fountain pen and paper. If they were into real forum posting. I've done plenty of forum post gallery showings, and all my forum posts were written with a fountain pen on sheets of paper. And clearly, one can't appreciate the writing of forum posts until they've had their posts in a forum post gallery show, and clearly if they did, they'd agree a fountain pen and sheets of paper is the best way to make forum posts. 😀

 

[Roger Hicks]

Most of us start out by saying, in effect, "I'll buy a camera and see what I can photograph with it."

Then, as we get a bit of experience, we start taking photography more seriously, and adopt the approach, "I want to take pictures that fulfill my vision [for want of a better phrase], so I need a camera that will enable me to do so."

The "camera that will enable me to do so" might be almost anything: a Holga, a Deardorff, a Leica, a generic DSLR. But it will vary from photographer to photographer. Ignoring the essential phrase "it will vary from photographer to photographer" is an essential part of many internet photography forums.

Cheers,

R.

 

[jsrockit]

OK what exactly is a "forum post gallery show?" Am I missing something here?

You missed his attempt at humor in response to Roger asking him if he's had any photo exhibits.

 

[creenus]

Sorry, but my credit's so bad they won't take my cash. =)

We take credit cards if it makes a difference 🙂

 

[pepeguitarra]

Divorce is not good!

Divorce is not good!

No debt = no worries.

I have an engineer friend I used to work with. He bought his first house with cash, saved up after about 10 years of working. Cash....paid for the house. Then he instructed his wife to make a "house payment" of what their mortgage WOULD have been, going into their bank account. He invested, and at one time had hundreds of thousands of dollars. Then his wife left him, taking the kids and extorting a house and a lot of cash out of him up front "so I don't have to get alimony payment for life...(the lawyer line). He got depressed and lost his job. At 50, he couldn't find another one in the Southwest. He went from $90K/yr to about $9k, just doing odd jobs. Ironically, he wouldn't have had to pay much alimony when his salary plummeted. It's been about 15 years now. You know what? He's happy, healthy, has a great girlfriend, does lots of fun stuff. Because he never had debt, and refuses to ever borrow a dime. He's proven to me that if you don't owe anything, you can live VERY cheaply. You just need food, and a little shelter. He lives better than a lot of couples I know where both work, with big, important jobs. But they have debt for their cars, furniture, homes, boats, cameras, vacations, etc.

It is better to learn to live according to the boss (wife) than divorce. Everyone loses.:bang:

 

[mwoenv]

Debt is fine if it enables you to make a good investment that allows you to do things you couldn't do before and provides returns greater than the total cost of the debt. This applies to any business. I don't think it's wise for photo gear if you don't have a business or it's not going to provide greater returns.

Of course, you are making judgments that may not work out.

I have a business (non-photography) and I agree that the conventional wisdom given by accountants to lease everything is wrong. I know a lot of people who had personal and business notes and leases to pay when the economy tanked in 2008 and the stress nearly killed them. Being debt-free personally and with the business, I just had to get by on less income but never worried about losing anything.

 

[michaelwj]

Debt is fine if it enables you to make a good investment that allows you to do things you couldn't do before and provides returns greater than the total cost of the debt. This applies to any business. I don't think it's wise for photo gear if you don't have a business or it's not going to provide greater returns.

Of course, you are making judgments that may not work out.

I have a business (non-photography) and I agree that the conventional wisdom given by accountants to lease everything is wrong. I know a lot of people who had personal and business notes and leases to pay when the economy tanked in 2008 and the stress nearly killed them. Being debt-free personally and with the business, I just had to get by on less income but never worried about losing anything.

I think there is a clear distinction between going into debt for a hobby, and going into debt for a business. One is only costing you money, while the other has potential.

 

[David Hughes]

Hi,

Hobby or business can be the same in terms of potential as both can pay a divided in happiness (not the same as money) or more money (not the same as happiness). But should you have a hobby you can't afford without borrowing? And can you guarantee the business will succeed?

Both are jumps in the dark and none of us know what the future holds, especially at the moment...

So I would be very, very cautious and just a little optimistic.

Regards, David

 

[jsrockit]

But should you have a hobby you can't afford without borrowing?

Yes....I think so. Life's too short to not enjoy what you truly want to do... within reason. Going into debt is not necessarily bad, as long as it is manageable debt.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Yes....I think so. Life's too short to not enjoy what you truly want to do... within reason. Going into debt is not necessarily bad, as long as it is manageable debt.

Quite.

"Manageable" is however a flexible concept. You are no doubt familiar with the saying, variously attributed to Solon, Aeschylus and Herodotus, "Call no man happy until he is dead".

We all make bets on the future. We have no alternative, because we cannot know the future. Some bets are more foolhardy than others; some work out, and some don't.

Cheers,

R.

 

[emraphoto]

Hi,

They all seem to do it for the silliest things, like a coffee or newspaper or anything else costing pennies. How they keep a track of the debt is beyond me. And are they paying it all off each month? I wonder...

Regards, David

statements

 

[David Hughes]

Hi,

Hmmm, I have my doubts and wonder how many of them look at them and then check through them. Most seem to assume the balance is right up to date and it can often lag a few days behind reality. And people often make mistakes, especially with several bits of plastic and so on to keep track of. And how many understand that the timing of payments is critical?

Regards, David

 

[emraphoto]

Hi,

Hmmm, I have my doubts and wonder how many of them look at them and then check through them. Most seem to assume the balance is right up to date and it can often lag a few days behind reality. And people often make mistakes, especially with several bits of plastic and so on to keep track of. And how many understand that the timing of payments is critical?

Regards, David

a pretty broad brush you are painting with?

 

[fireblade]

"Manageable" is however a flexible concept. You are no doubt familiar with the saying, variously attributed to Solon, Aeschylus and Herodotus, "Call no man happy until he is dead".

In Solon’s opinion, man cannot be truly happy until he is dead because....."God is envious of human prosperity and likes to trouble us".

In Vinnys opinion, Solon (Herodotus) is a tosser. 🙂

 

[DrMcCoy]

Seems to be a lot of one size fits all talk on this subject. It's just not that simple. It's easy not to go into debt if you have a great job. Some aren't that lucky.

By the way, I owned a Leica in college. My first Leica cost me $800 (1992). It was a cosmetically ugly, but mechanically perfect M4-2 ($400) with a V3 50mm Summicron ($400). I didn't need to go into debt... I just needed to work a part-time job.

That's $1,374.41 in today's money.

I spent about $1600 on my M5 and Summaron 2.8 at the end of last year. Not too much higher today. Though, unfortunately, my M5 broke quickly and that drove the cost above $1800. Obviously that's a YMMV situation.

 

[Highway 61]

These days I'm re-reading "Voir est un tout", the sum of HCB's interviews with various journalists and writers (1951-1998).

Roger Hicks may want to read this too. He never knows, which kind of food for thought he could find there. There are many excellent paragraphs directly related to the topic of this thread.

http://www.henricartierbresson.org/publications/henri-cartier-bresson-voir/

Quite refreshing.

Also, there are the tremendously funny and brilliant chapters about gear, gear brands, gear cost, so-called influence of gear and its cost on the photograpic results and photographic style in this 1976 book having now become a myth :

Nothing more to add but for, maybe, reminding people that Thelonious Monk was Julius Caesar's favorite photographer.

 

[David Hughes]

a pretty broad brush you are painting with?

Hi,

I worked in a bank for a year or two when I'd just left school. A small branch in the sticks and a large one in the City, so I've a pretty good idea how people treat money etc. and some of them were/are very careless about it.

These days with much higher interest rates, fines and charges etc problems can snowball pretty quickly.

Regards, David