GAS mask

[Roger Hicks]

Something that surprises me is the assumption that Gear Acquisition Syndrome is universal and not to be deprecated.

Sure, I used to suffer from it, and I still get it very occasionally when I handle something especially desirable, such as the 75/2 Summicron I've had on loan for the last two or three months. But since I sold my Leica collection some 30 years ago, my criteria for buying gear have been:

1 Will I use it?

2 Can I turn a profit on it?

Admittedly, because I write a 'Classic and Collector' column for Shutterbug I can justify pretty much anything under heading 2, but even at that, I generally prefer to borrow stuff rather than buying it -- unless it is something I would use (such as a Thambar I borrowed recently) or can sell on at a profit once I've finished with it.

Some stuff I own because it's not worth the effort of selling: the article is the profit. But the camera (like the Baldessa 1 in the May Shutterbug) just sits around, too good to throw away, not worth selling, though I'm hoping to unload a lot of it at Bievres next month.

But more and more, I feel as if I have just too much STUFF -- the capital letters being an expression both of its volume and of the extent to which I no longer want so many possessions. I want to travel and take pictures, not buy yet more cameras. I find increasingly uncomfortable with the cheerful way in which so many people talk about GAS and assume that everyone has it.

Anyone else feel the same way?

Cheers,

Roger

 

[taffer]

Hmmm

There are two things I'd like to add

First is what I call the bargain factor. Almost each time I've been GASified, it has been by a very good if not fantastic price for something, and not only when comparing to European prices (which usually are crazy as you know) but also with their normal US/Worldwide/eBay regular ongoing pricing. That may also have some relationship with the profit concept you mention if you sell it later.

Second, is the fun factor. It's a pity fun cannot be measured physically, but we may agree that owning and using some specific item, reading about its history, quirks, or even writing about it can be way fun. Also, if you write or give opinions or information about it (as for example you do on your RF book), you're also creating a knowledge value for us, readers. Again that's impossible to measure, but I (and I'm sure many others too) have enjoyed reading yours and others opinions on this or that kind of camera, lens, etc.

It's all very subjective in the end. If (for example) I was on cool clothes, I'd use Nike sport shoes that would be 120 euros a pair, instead, I got two pairs of Decathlon 20 euros sport shoes. That's 100 euros of difference per pair, or 3 FSU cameras, or also what I paid for my Canon 50/1.2 or 35/2.8, which I can fully use and enjoy wearing my Decathlon shoes 🙂

OTH, I fully agree, there's no bigger photographic joy than going out there and using the equipment you like for what it was made, taking pictures. But that doesn't mean that having fun in owning/repairing/reviewing them is something bad per se, IMHO the key is not to obsess with anything but try to enjoy everything.

Just my humble 2 cents...

Oscar

 

[TPPhotog]

I think for me the phrase GAS is a little tongue in cheek and having a little fun, after all taking life seriously can be bad for ones health. That said I think some people suffer from it as can happen with all possessions.

Turning a profit isn't in my equation when I buy new items as I am really looking at it's use and what pleasure I may get from using it.

Recently I got hold of my first Canonet after reading a great deal of praise for this little beastie . Also I love street shooting however my Nikon F100 is just too big and I spent as much time telling people that no I'm not shooting for the local rag or no there isn't anything going on than everyday life. With the RF I can go out and shoot without constant interruptions.

I do have a joke with people that GAS has taken hold as I am looking at other Canonets. But to me it is justified on the grounds that with that age of camera a backup is very useful and yes I will be using them. So to my mind adding another or a couple of variations is justified as a logical progression.

I have acquired other cameras over time, they are all of a different format and have a historical interest to me. However they do not just sit on shelves as they all work and do get out for exercise.

What I have had to think seriously about as I hate having gear that I don't use, is what to do with my F100 as it has it's place being a very good performer. However after much soul searching I've decided that I will sell it. I'll not get anything like I paid for it proving that the profit factor isn't important for me. However I will be able to continue to justify to myself and my beloved wife that the gear I have is useful and not just a GAS collection.

Sorry for the waffle, hopefully this makes some sort of sense.

 

[Kim Coxon]

Hi,
I don't think GAS is Universal. There are many who are immune to it. However, if you have it, it tends to be incurable.

I think a lot will depend on your interest in photography. I feel that peoples' interests tend fall into several separate areas.

There is the "collector". These people probably suffer from GAS most of all. This is the person that has 2 or 3 or more bodies basically all the same but may have different badges or paint work. You know the person, they will pay 3 times as much for a black body rather than a chrome one. If a mint one or a boxed one comes along he will get it and sell the old one. Generaly found in forums discussing the technical details og gear.

There is the "tinkerer". A moderate "GASman". They search ebay for very cheap dodgy cameras and keep asking for the bust ones on the forum. Fix some of them, canabalise others and then offer them on. Quite often for much the same price, they have to get rid of them because they need to the space/money for the next project. Generally found lurking in the technical columns. This person may tend to blend with the next type.

There is the "dealer". Another moderate "GASman". Always on the lookout for cheap cameras that he can sell on for a profit. His browser is always open to "snap" up the next bargain. They can be found all over the place as make, model etc are not important as long as it is cheap.

There is the "taker". Generally immune to GAS attacks. They may only have one camera though they may have a separate body for different film stock or format. This is the person who is always out and about shooting. The main bargains he is looking for is cheap film stocks. You can find these people browsing the picture boards and the threads on technique.

There is the "darkroom king" similiar to the taker and generally immune to GAS attacks. The only real difference is that having taken the pictures, they will spent hours in the darkroom getting the perfect print. Generally found talking about different developers, papers film stocks etc. The most likely reason for a GAS attack is searching for the lens with the best resolution, contrast, flare resistance etc.

There is the "user". To this person, photography is more a means to an end rather than an end in itself. This person takes photographs because he needs to. As a result, the photograph is the important thing and the camera is just a tool. Because of this, The GAS count is very low. They will only aquire what they need to to complete the job. Many pro photographers may fit in this area.

I know this is a huge generalization. However, it does help to explain why there is so much talk about it. The people that are most likely to be immune are either out taking photos or thinking about their next shoot. On the other hand, GASmen who have any spare time at work etc, will be trawling the boards and discussing the next aquisition. They may feel slightly guilty about the last one, so it gets blamed on this mythical disease which eases the conscience.

Now before everyone shoots me down in flames, not many people will fit exactly into a particular category. For instance, as far as RF is concerned, I am mostly a tinkerer. With SLR's I am part taker and part collector. So overall I have a high GAS count. However, at the end of the day it doesn't matter what you are as long as you get enjoyment from it. To me a car is a mode of transport, it has to be reliable and cost effective to run. Personally I can't understand why people spend 1,000s buying gizmos for their car and completly filling their boot (sorry trunk) space with audio equipment that could do permanent damage to their ears. But to each their own and if that is their thing, good luck to them.

Kim

 

[wierdcollector]

I guess I'm in the percentile that collect as much as use these oldies. As stated earlier, I buy goodies many times for the sole reason that the price is too good to pass by. Profit has never even occurred to me. I never thought profit when I bought my house, just comfort/style/location. I never thought profit when I bought my Hyundai, just style/comfort/performance/economy. Same with my mountain bike, classic Rambler automobile, computer, etc. I buy what I know I'll enjoy, price is a factor sure, but resale value doesn't enter the picture since I enjoy my things and the value others place on them means very little to me. To each their own, just my take on things. Life is too short to let dollar signs blind you to the enjoyment factor. I wasn't born a millionaire and the way I'm going I won't end up one either, LOL.

 

[john neal]

Oh dear! I can see sound arguments in all of the above. When I get GAS, it is generally due to the "bargain" effect and I don't worry about profit. I do enjoy having cameras that I use, and feel the necessity for having two of each as backup (or to allow colour and B&W shooting at the same time).

I think (hope) that I'm gradually getting immune to GAS, or I will be when I have sourced some M series lenses. At that point I will seriously consider thinning out the ranks of other rf stuff I have. I suppose, in the final analysis, that I will have to dispose of some old friends to afford the 3 lenses I want due to Leica prices in Europe (and not a little pressure for my wife 😉 ).

I am also seriously considering selling my Nikon SLR kit, but it is so upsetting to see what a mint F2 Photomic fetches these days (I am adamant that I will not PX it due to the rip-off prices offered by UK dealers) so it may be that it will end up in my will. Don't get me wrong, I love it and it works just fine, but I have old man's eyes (presbyopia, getting worse over time) and cannot focus on the screen and subject, even with dioptre correction lenses. I simply don't have that problem with 99% of rf cameras, so the Nikons don't get much action due to ease of use. On the other hand, if I want to shoot a macro shot......

Equally, I find digitals extremely difficult to use, probably down to the fact that I cannot afford a high-end DSLR and have to rely on the smallish LCD screens on compacts. My loss in this area has been my wife's (and daughter's) gain - she now has a nice Canon G2, while my daughter has a 2Mp Fuji of some description. I stick to scanning my negs when I want a digital image.

I suppose I could solve some of these problems by wearing glasses, but I find they get in the way of creativity when I'm using a camera (I don't have a lot to start with) - I also have the problem that if I can read the dials and the screen, I can't see the subject at the same time <grr>.

Finally for this waffle-laden message, I was brought up on rf cameras - Retinas, Agfa Silette and Contax, so I have always been more comfortable using a rf. I saw a beautiful Agilux yesterday, mint with an original "square" rubber hood - aaaarrrgghhh! I feel GAS coming on again :bang:

 

[cbass]

Interesting thread, Roger.

I'm probably one of the few who is mostly immune to GAS, succumbing only when I find something that fufills a need or is interesting to me. Like you, one of my chief criteria for acquisition is "will I use this?" I own four user cameras in two lens mounts (some might say even that is too many) 😉.

GAS can be positive, though. It's great that there are so many people here who "rescue & recycle" older cameras and return them to use. In many cases a GAS attack leads to another GSN or Hi-Matic being returned to service. More than a few photographers probably got started using older equipment that someone else had restored. Every Canonet that is saved from oblivion could be another young person's gateway to a means of artistic expression.

Plus, it's fun just to say "GAS attack". Tell me you don't love it! 😀

 

[peter_n]

Yes I thought I was wearing a GAS mask until I joined this forum! The posts about equipment becoming available don't exactly help do they? 😉 I did like Kim's GAS behavior taxonomy above! 🙂

 

[kiev4a]

If you collect FSU cameras "profit" certainly isn't a factor.
I guess I am a reformed collector of sorts. A couple of years ago I had more that 30 Zorki 1s--no two of them exactly the same. I have pared that number down to about 10 (which is why I know profit isn't a rational reason for buying them). My current goal is to find a "Red" Zorki 5 that is actually in operating condition. I think the solution to that problem is to ship one of the examples I have to Oleg for a complete overhaul.
I am not a GASoholic
I am not a GASoholic
I am not a GASoholic
I am not a GASoholic
I am not a GASoholic
I am not a GASoholic

 

[Bertram2]

[QUOTE. I find increasingly uncomfortable with the cheerful way in which so many people talk about GAS and assume that everyone has it.
Anyone else feel the same way?
Cheers,
Roger[/QUOTE]

Hi Roger ,

a bit I feel the same way. I do not believe that this is a "desease" we all suffer from, more or less so to speak, necessarily so to speak as a side effect of our metier.
I know a lot of amateur photographers who have no GAS attacks , and tho I also buy some gear from time to time I think one cannot call that a GAS attack. The more becasue I always try to keep it cheap and useful.

The only thing I bought within the last two years was Bessa L for CV my 4/25 to use it as a fixed combo and this got the most often used camera for me .
The other camera was a Ricoh 35 P&S qith a 4/30mmm because I wanted to have a wide-angle P&S for the breast pocket with manual settings for AF and aperture.
As a photographical notebook.

I admit that I often think about how nice it could be to try this and that but to BUY it and maybe to find out soon that it wasn't the right thing ? No.

If at all my desires point to other systems, LF for example could be a challenge, a lot new things to learn, a lot of new photographical experiences.
But I just have not enuff money left for such expensive experimental trips into another system world and to be honest I am old enuff for not feeling any serious regrets about it.

To buy gear just to own it ? To buy set of six 50mm RF lenses for example just because I want to own all good ones ever built ? Not enuff fun for me. I got 6 cameras of different systems and sometimes I feel that this is already to much. They are all thought for a special purpose but wish I could concentrate more and I envy those who have found their definitive solution.
Changing from RF to SLR is always difficult , and using the TLR after a year of exclusive RF use means to learn it new again if we are talking about really GOOD results. Others may have less probs.

I'd never critizise anybody for buying and collecting stuff because he wants to own it but I want to have the right to say I personall find that boring.
Maybe this buzzword GAS was invented to cover a bit the background or make tha pheneomen more presentable

 

[Bertram2]

bit the background or make tha pheneomen more presentable..................

Sorry ! hit the button too fasT !! The rest here:

....................nonetheless it is what it is: A general phenomenon of our consumer society, but nothing which has something to do with the issues of photography 😉

Best regards,
Bertram

Aquitaine ? You are lucky, wish I could setllee down there too with my biz but no way.

 

[kiev4a]

As Roger noted the nice thing about this area is that it can be approached from so many angles -- collecting, shooting, repair, darkroom, etc. You can get involved a deeply or as lightly as you desire. I had a collecting phase followed by a fixing phase, then powered down almost completly for a few months. Now I'm playing with medium format and gradually trying to get all my existing FSU gear into top working order. My passion is controlled by the fact that my mate and I have an agreement -- I can only spend what I get from sales of existing equipment (and a small amount I receive each month for a newspaper column) -- not raiding the main family finds. That's why even though I would like to have a nice Leica M2, it ain't likely to happen unless I divest myself of most of my other equipment.

 

[kmack]

The best defense against GAS is CSB

The best defense against GAS is CSB

I have been in acquisition mode for a few weeks, but the acquisition was shaped by what found on this site, not caused by it. I had been an avid amateur photog from my early teens until my early thirties. Other pressures. My darkroom went first then my cameras. Including the Leica IIIf. I bought the leica in Italy from a street vendor for $45 US (and two packs of Salem cigarettes.)

Ironically it was my wife who started the GAS. She became enamored by the cheetah cubs born at the National Zoo, she insisted I dust off my only remaining camera ( a Canon AE1) and we trek to the zoo.

I had so much fun... GAS... I missed my Leica.

Imagine my surprise at the price of used Leica's after twenty years of paying no attention to equipment prices.

The best defense against GAS is CSB (Cheap Stingy Bastard). Now I have a Fed and a Zorki, both shooters on the first try, certainly not Leicas but close enough to satisfy the GAS, cheap enough to mollify the CSB. I have put my RF kit together for less than $75US.

I don't want to collect. I just want to start shooting film again.

Anyone want to send me a leica mount 35 cheap? 😀

 

[Fedzilla_Bob]

I guess I am a "Tinkerer/Taker." My acquisitions have largely been about finding nice Japanese and Russian Cameras that I can use and work on myself. This doesn't stop me from wanting to try the slightly "out there" items like my C-44.

I have always been a gear head, as a guitarist, as a graphic designer and now as a rangefinder photography enthusiast. My usual purchasing pattern is almost the same in each case. I try a few different things. I take them apart. I desconstruct then reassemble (figuratively and literally). Then finally, I refine my selection to the things that satisfy me most in use.

Along the way I trade up and down. Sometimes the cheap guitar or the FSU camera will do exactly what I want. Sometimes better than the more expensive choice. I actually enjoy having instruments (cameras, guitars, software) with differing characterisics. For me its part of the tinkerers spirit.

My collections tend to settle down to a few trusted "users." At that point my available set of tools are the most trusted ones, those that I know I can go to and get a specific result time and again.

So yeah, it really is a case of GAS with me. But it settles down eventually.

Bob H

 

[jtzordon]

Unfortunately GAS takes me from time-to-time. Mostly it's when I accumulate a decent sum of money. I was doing fine until I started selling a bunch of stuff on ebay the past couple weeks. Since then I'm investigating, researching, and searching for deals on equipment that will help me to realize my photographic potential. It's rather sad, really. Maybe I should just spend the money and be done with it. Then I probably wouldn't give it another thought...until my birthday...and Christmas...

 

[ray_g]

Very thought-provoking thread, Roger.

My main problem with having these cameras is that it actually interferes with my improving my craft. It's like a tennis player using a different racquet every day. Maybe someday, I will have only one or two, that I can use with my eyes closed.

 

[Roger Hicks]

As ever, too many excellent replies to respond to them all individually. Thanks everyone. This forum really does help to clarify one's thoughts.

A couple of points and then a few responses:

First. 'will I use it' and 'can I turn a profit' are (to use the lawyers' phrase) disjunctive not conjunctive. 'Yes' to either is sufficient: it doesn't need to be yes to both.

Second, the 'profit' may come from taking pictures that I will use in books and magazines, or from writing about the camera, not from selling the camera on. It might even be non-financial: learning to be a better photographer, or as someone said, simple enjoyment. But i think that enjoying a particular camera is a bit different from GAS.

I loved 'CSB' and yes, the point about changing is very important, though I had tended to think of it in terms of different cameras and shooting styles: a rangefinder phase, an LF phase, a bit of roll-film, back to RF again.

Great point about recycling. My Zorkii 4K came with a duff RF: easily fixed -- and I also have a jammed scrapper for parts. Any offers for the pair? And I'm just about to do some more work on the 12x15 Gandolfi I bought last Sunday.

Irresistible bargains certainly afflict us all, like my 15-euro Retina IIa which I am now going to have to have cleaned (after a couple of years' use). The cleaning will cost more than the camera -- but I do use it.

And finally, it does seem to me that at least some of GAS is, as Bertram2 said, a jokey way of covering up an aspect of the consumer society that we don't always want to recognize in ourselves.

Cheers,

Roger

 

[Roger Hicks]

Ray-G

YES!!!

I HAVE to 'test' all kinds of kit and materials in the course of earning a living, and I am sure it stands in the way of my being a better photographer.

Cheers,

Rogere

 

[Little Prince]

You know what, I hate money. It's the root of all evil (there are a couple of others 😀 but we won't go into that now). I can't stand the sight of it in my account. That's why I get rid of it in a hurry buying stuff. :angel:

On a more serious note, for people like me it provides a distraction. A relief from the monotony of a day at the desk. Of course, it extracts payment by engaging our thoughts even when we can do something better with our time. Whether this bothers us or not is different for each of us.

I guess when you're young and just earning your money it's easy to blow it in material pursuits. As you grow older (speaking from the experience of others) you reach a stage when you've 'been there, done that'. It isn't the curiosity that it once was. Which is a good thing as it allows you to free up 'mind space' for better pursuits.

For a professional, I daresay it's different than an amateur. Sadly, I believe it makes a difference whether it's your vocation or a hobby. I don't lust after high frequency vector network analyzers. That's probably because I encounter them all too often as part of what I 'have' to do. I'm taking a rather pessimistic view here, but only to illustrate my point. Then again, there are many professionals here who might suffer the same GAS symptoms. It's a lot more forgivable in them. There might also be people who were once professionals and are now born-again hobbyists. I bet GAS holds little sway over them.

As many here have said, if you enjoy the process, why care? If it bothers you (like it does me often enough), I think there'll come a time when you will be immune to it. If that doesn't happen to me, I won't worry myself too much. I'll know that I wasn't as attached to it as I had imagined myself to be. That said, when a large bunch of folk here spend time and effort chasing $10 hoods and so forth, it's nothing to be concerned about. My hunch is that we always crave for something to look forward to. That's what keeps us going. Even if it's a small tidbit. And that is a good thing.

In any case, I don't have the experience to talk so loosely about such things. I'm only laying down my analysis of the situation. If this sounds too depressing (a known side effect of conversing with me) go back and read the first paragraph. There are some smilies in there.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Dear Anand,

Yup. Time, the great healer.

Cheers,

Roger