Getting started on thinning the herd

[farlymac]

Today, I gave away my golf clubs.

Now, that might not sound like something that has anything to do with photography, but it has a lot to do with my habit of hanging on to camera gear I hardly ever use.

I'm a gear head at heart, so I built that set of clubs up like I would a camera kit. Metal woods, a couple of hybrids, and some nice irons (even a left handed one for those odd moments). Covers for everything, good cleats and glove, and a nice case to carry it all.

Like my Nikon F100 kit with the Tamron AF zooms, it was a mix of brands, nothing cheap, but not extravagantly priced either. Quite a bit of it was bought on sale too, say at the end of the season, or when the stores were clearing out last years models.

But I haven't golfed in well over five years. I kept telling myself to give it another go, but my body is not hearing it. The final straw was the diagnosis of a degenerative back disease that is genetic in nature, and will not get better. I was hoping to find someone to give them to, but like anything else that is custom tailored to the owner, there were no takers. So I hauled them down to the Salvation Army. I gave my neighbor below me all the new sleeves of balls I had, and a box of used ones that my Dad had collected whenever he went golfing (always coming back with more than he left with) to another neighbor down the hill. It all seems pretty strange though, seeing as we live on a former golf course that's been turned into condo city.

It felt good to finally put that all behind me. I'm inspired now to start cleaning out the excess camera gear. Get back to basics in 35mm, with one main shooting brand, and one or two sentimental favorites to fool around with every so often. I'll still have something in more than one format (not giving up the Rolleiflex or rangefinders).

Likely, I'll be winding down the repair end too, finish up a couple of projects, and forget the rest.

It will be interesting to see how I handle it all. But I keep asking myself, why did I need to accumulate so much stuff? Curiosity got the best of me I suppose. Trying out all the camera systems I couldn't afford when they were new. And too much time on my hands.

PF

 

[kshapero]

I gotta get around to this one of these days.

 

[FrankS]

I've done a bit of this. Recently got rid of the minolta, topcon, Miranda, exacta, some Nikon SLRs, and a yashica electro.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

Golf clubs ans Nikon F = martian water. To me.

 

[BW400CN]

Very interesting - I´m close to this point.
I feel that my collection is getting to big for me and so even my creativity get lost when playing with to much cameras.
Cut down to one system in 35 or 120 is something in my mind too, but I ain't sure what to keep and what should go.
My heart is with the Voigtländer Bessamatic, but I love my Nikon FM2n too and Canon FD was the one where all started with.
120 - keep the P6 or one of the Voigtländer folder (Avus + Bergheil) or just keep the newly acquired Graflex Speed Graphic Pacemaker 4x5" for all over 35mm.
I just know that I need a big cut, but didn't find the right ax ;-)

 

[lynnb]

It's fun to play with different systems and lenses, but too much choice can divert one's attention from anything - including making pictures - IMHO. 'Decision block' is real 🙁

Congratulations on making a start. I'm guessing the real test will be, can you resist building up another collection!

 

[Rick Waldroup]

I used to be like this. But many years ago, I realized that I simply did not want to be a camera collector. Now, I am slimmed down to two cameras and just a handful of lenses. I can always use more lenses, but buying more cameras- never. The only way I will buy another camera is to sell one of mine first to help finance the cost.

I am not sentimental about my camera gear.

 

[btgc]

I feel this is a period in life to go through. I also enjoyed long period of buying, repairing, trying and comparing. After this ends there's another challenge - keep motivation and curiosity to take pictures at all, find new driver in place of previous "I'll see how this camera works and feels like" - at least, for me.

What is really liberating - not feeling urge to score through heaps of listings, camera boxes and lens piles.

At the same time I admit period of ever changing gear has trained me to detect advantages and limitations of gear, and pick optimal tool for certain occasions. It was fun time, I've tried bunch of stuff I have never heard as a kid, not even being able to afford, now I enjoy fact I'm able to change.

 

[02Pilot]

I have periodic thoughts about this, and even make (half-hearted) attempts at it, but thus far at least I'm accumulating more than I'm thinning.

Part of it is that the mechanical tinkering with broken cameras is a sort of meditation or therapy for me, especially going into the winter. I like to have a few projects lined up to work on while the weather is miserable, which inevitably leads to me ending up with a few more cameras. I sell some, but the net is always positive.

I've basically divided my cameras into working cameras and playing cameras. If I'm going out to do some semi-serious photography (all-day street expedition, some other specific project), I use the working cameras; the playing cameras (many of them cameras given to me as gifts by family) get pulled out once or twice a year for walking around or bag duty.

I don't really have any desire to be a collector in the traditional sense, but I know it's not realistic for me to pare down to just one or two. So, I simply accept the accumulation, try to manage it, and keep shooting.

 

[ornate_wrasse]

My friends now ask me when we go shooting "What camera will you be using today?", knowing that I have several cameras and camera systems.

I have one friend who keeps pointing out to me how much simpler life would be if I didn't have to make so many decisions each time I go out shooting!

I'm getting to the point where I think he's right 🙂

Good for you for finally being able to let go of your material possessions. I need to do that, too.

 

[mcfingon]

I like finding unexpected things to motivate me. After several years enjoying and learning more about rangefinders at considerable expense, I have rediscovered SLR's at no cost because of what I have sitting around or been given. It's the Celtic chaos gene I think. So I won't thin out the collection yet.

 

[lxmike]

l do not have to much in the way of camera gear........as for fishing well thats another story

 

[raid]

I am still enjoying having lots of options for choosing which camera gear to use. No thinning the her at my hend. It is more about "better feeding the herd" by carefully adding once in a while a new lens ....

 

[FrankS]

I still have plenty of options, just got rid of some not being used. Nikon is my 35mm SLR system, but I've got some classic cameras in Canon, Contax, and Pentax mount. Then there is the ltm/M mount cameras and lenses, medium format SLR, tlr, and RF cameras, and a 4x5. Also Fuji digital. I'm good.

 

[Canyongazer]

I Used to Think I was Indecisive But Now I'm not Sure

I Used to Think I was Indecisive But Now I'm not Sure

It's fun to play with different systems and lenses, but too much choice can divert one's attention from anything - including making pictures - IMHO. 'Decision block' is real 🙁
I hear you, Lynn.
It's especially dangerous/vexing with digital.
Before that all 35mm cameras operated pretty much the same...if you knew how to operate a Minolta 101 you could just pick up a Nikon F, Pentax Spotmatic or Canon FT and use it.

Today I am struggling with the Fuji and Sony digital systems.
I recently was frozen to inaction 'cause after a couple of months of using just the Fuji I couldn't remember how to format the SD card in the Sony. Wasted 15 minutes scrolling through the *%$^** menus.
"Aha!, there it is!"
Fortunately, Sasquatch did not come strolling by in the interim.

There have been other, similar menu-brain freeze occurrences (almost always with the Sony)
For efficiency's sake I know I should settle on ONE system...OTOH, they both have their own virtues, virtues so compelling that I have yet to act.

 

[bucs]

I'll wait for all of them in the classifieds 😀

 

[sreed2006]

...Curiosity got the best of me I suppose....

PF

If you didn't go broke on this venture, I do not see a downside.

Curiosity is the spark that leads to learning. Learning new things is a great pastime and is personally rewarding. Sharing your knowledge benefits others.

I too have more cameras and lenses than I will ever wear out this lifetime, in several brands and formats, plus I have more film than I can use in a year. But it is nice to have an answer for someone struggling with, or curious about, a bit of equipment or media. Having the item at hand makes it so much easier to give the correct answer - I can look at it while composing the answer.

Perhaps before you let each item go, write up what you know and have learned about the item. Take pictures. Collect those writings and images and put it all on a web site?

Don't let everything you know be lost, with the mistaken assumption that nobody cares. There's lots of curious people out here.

 

[mdarnton]

As I said in another thread yesterday or so, I have reached the age that I think if I start giving stuff away at the same rate I acquired it, if I die on the schedule my family traditionally follows, I'll leave a clean estate, so I've started to de-accession. But I haven't gotten to camera gear yet. I'm starting with things in the attic, or buried under piles, that I never use but have been holding on to anyway.

Along the way I have discovered something interesting. Remember how they said book megastores would kill publishing because they'd only stock what people wanted to buy, nothing obscure? What I found at the time was that any store that was 6X the size of the supposedly-endangered local book store was more likely, not less, to have books I wanted. Now Amazon has everything I want, used if not new. However, all those obscure but important books that I gradually found over the years: the supposed saviors of the book culture, the small used book stores. . . they don't want my obscure books any more than their new book small store predecessors did--they won't even take them if I give them to them. All they want is best sellers in each category--the rest go in the trash. Think of that the next time you curse Amazon's business model. /rant

 

[icebear]

I'm already there... One film camera , two lenses
in the Coming Year I will Add a digital M or the Xpro2 and stick with it... Just not sure which one 🙄

MM, there is only one...😉

 

[gb hill]

I don't have nearly the camera's you have Phil but I stopped acquiring long ago. to me I found it was a distraction from why I got back into photography in the 1st place. I keep contemplating selling off the Bessa gear & CV lenses but will probably keep them. I really don't have that much anyhow.

At the moment I have gone back to using my Canon FD system shooting B&W & enjoying it. My C-41 color film has me depressed in trying to figure what to do with it. Almost all my local options for getting it developed have diminished. The few places that are left want an arm & a leg just for developing the film. I have 3 rolls waiting for developing & am contemplating on throwing it all in the trash because the photo's I doubt are any good. Just start out fresh, I say to myself. Buy a color C-41 kit & do it myself.

Then there is the money factor of my hours at work being cut so to do that I need to sell off a camera. It's just a roller coaster of feelings that's been going thru my mind lately. I feel better just getting it out here.