How did you get started in RF photography?

[Calvin]

I am the first born son (out of the three) of my parents. My Dad decided to have a camera to capture my many first moments. To my recollection, it is a RF but I've forgotten the brand. To recapture and appreciate of my Dad, I decided to get one as well as his one was lost after some years. I found CV Bessa is a good one thou as far as I noticed the comment here. I really hope that CV will have a role in the history, like Leica, and I will pass mine to my child in future.

 

[markinlondon]

When I realised I wasn't using my SLR to it's full advantage I went looking for something quieter and with a brighter viewfinder. I bought a Bessa R. I then chopped the Bessa in for a Leica because I wanted something more robust. Curse you, Cameraquest 🙂.

 

[manfromh]

After using an SLR for a while, I bought a Minolta Hi-Matic F to keep in my pocket. Now I prefer RF's over SLR's for everyday shooting. Im mostly using a Zorki-6 now. Minolta died

 

[Pablito]

Must have been around 1967 or 68 my father showed me how to use his Nikon RF (from what I remember an S2). Then when I was in high school we traded it in a Willoughby's in NYC for a Nikon FTN. I remember to this day we got $40.00 for it (sure would love to have it back..) So I learned photography with RF and it became 2nd nature to me. Fast forward many years and many cameras to 1996. I bought two M6's and three lenses and have been using them ever since. Along with lots of other stuff including medium format, 35mm slr when called for and yes, dslr..... But nothing comes as natural to me as the RF.

 

[ErnestoJL]

All this started about 44 years before.
I was 10 y.o. and dad gave me his folding Wirgin 6x9 to shoot some pictures of the family on vacation, then in Montevideo.
Three years later the first RF came into my hands, a Voigtländer Vitomatic IIB, (later stolen). Meanwhile, a friend of mine showed me a Contax III and decided that this was my dreams camera.
At 18, I moved to SLRs and got stuck to it for a few years, but in 1982... came the Kiev 4.
This camera became a part of my body, and my best pictures of that period were taken with it.
So, I almost started with RFs, using as many others MF, SLRs and other cameras as I need, but my favourite are the Contax and Kiev which live together with some lenses and accesories in the same carrying box.
If today I would be forced to keep a minimum set of cameras and lenses, no doubt I´ll pick them both and my old Miranda.

Ernesto

 

[jaapv]

This is quite some time ago - I started out on the age of 7 with my grandfathers pre-war box camera, then graduated to an Agfa Clack and then got my hands on my father's Agfa Silette Prontor. I bought an OM2 when a student and 32 years ago saw a Leica M3+Summaron 35 in the "used" corner of the local photo shop. I've never looked back and still own the Summaron.

 

[venchka]

My mother made me do it

My mother made me do it

It's my parents' fault. The first camera they gave me was a Brownie Hawkeye. No rangefinder but a viewfinder. Second camera was a Canonet 2.8 which I foolishly traded in on a Mamiya 500 SLR. Next came a Canon IV-S2 with 50/1.8 lens in 1967 or early 1968. I was in the local camera store, drooling on the Leica display case. I got what I could afford.

I almost forgot. Dad had a Konica I he brought back from Japan in 1951. The first adjustable camera I ever touched and used. I still have it. I still use it.

 

[Wayne R. Scott]

I started photography with a Kodak Instamatic that used 126 cartridges from there I got into Olympus OM system which was stolen. I used the insurance money to buy into Nikon SLR system which I still have and use. I wanted medium format so tried Mamiya C330 tlr and then Bronica ETR system which I still have.

Then one day I was surfing the net and came upon this:

http://www.netaxs.com/~cassidy/images/equipment/ql17/ql17.html

I thought to myself, "I'll see if I can use my strange powers to make a QL-17 magically appear at a garage sale or thrift store." A couple of weeks later at a thrift store I found a QL-17 GIII with flash, 4 rolls of film, never ready case and a leather camera bag for $15. I was told the shutter did not work, so I moved the shutter off of "A" and it worked on the manual settings. I bought the camera, drove across town and purchased a Wein battery and the camera worked perfectly.

I then searched the internet for rangefinders and found RFF. I have since added a few more range finders to my cache.

Wayne

 

[sf]

I have a vague memory of my father telling me to look into a manufacturer called "Leica" once...way back when I was obsessed with image quality. But...

My first rangefinder was the Voigtlander R3A. I wish I could say that there was some sweet story behind my entry into RF photography, but actually it was just the lust in the air at RFF that drove me to buy it. I came to RFF (as an SLR user) looking to learn about photography - I fell in love with the style, and bought the camera.

I had always been a medium format guy - since the very beginning (with a Mamiya 645e), so I decided one day to look for a medium format rangefinder. The Bronica was ugly, made by a manufacturer I didn't respect, and only available to me from overseas retailers. So I bought it. Now, I can't sell it. I won't sell it.

That is how I got into this mess - and it isn't that I love RF photography in particular, but that the RF645 owns ME and I have no choice.

 

[dee]

Diagnosed permanently '' disassociated / derealised '' ... and kind of demoralised ... I had given up on taking photos until I stumbled on a Zorki article a few months ago.
i found that hands and eyes, for once , worked together, to make the little Leica II /IIIc's and Zorki 1 and S ''real '' in an otherwise dreamstate world. Believe me, this never happens !
Having also stumbled upon an inheritance , I now have a ''family'' of leicas and Zorkis to ground me .
Oh, incidentally , they take wonderfully pictorial colour slides !

newbie dee

 

[Robert]

For years I used my Minox 35ML then bought myself a Nikon APS camera.
Along came an Olympus C50 which gave very good results but I found, though I took as many photos very few of them were ever printed.
I started getting the notion of a bigger camera and did a lot of internet research, resulting in my buying a Contax G2 system.
The camera is superb and I never looked back.
I also started reading about Leicas and bought an M6ttl,
An Olympus E1 was added to my collection to get me into the digital SLR

 

[charjohncarter]

There weren't any SLRs when I started. (Except european reflex cameras, which I didn't even know existed.)

 

[rolleistef]

My first camera was a very slow and noisy Olympus IS200, the lens was fantastic but the back cap of the lens was so bad...
So I bought a Rolleiflex, it broke, I had another Rolleiflex, and then my grandpa's pentax SP1000 with it"s fantastic Takumar 2/55.
Let's skip the 6 months with the battery-greedy nikon F75 and its plastic zoom (blah! a zoom!)
After that I wanted a RF. my wish was a Bessa R but too expensive, then a Leica IIIf but the prices suddently jumped. So I had a Kiev IIIa, so trendy, chromy and silent, and finally a Zorki 4. And I haven't used anything else than the Kiev and the Z4 since that moment, their Jupiter lens are fantastic!

 

[Gabriel M.A.]

I got tired of people turning around or giving me the evil look when I released the shutter. As simple as that.

Then I found my Leica M6 😀

 

[clarence]

Couldn't focus in the blasted dark. I also got bored of landscapes and carrying too much gear around.

Clarence

 

[trittium]

My photoclub friend gave me a Fed 5C and told me to try it. Reluctanly I did, and I was hooked. Within 4 months I bought my first Leica.

 

[tkluck]

Years ago when I was lowest on the shop pecking order I had to use the old Leica gear when the big kids took out the new Nikon goodies. Thought I'd see if I missed some thing at the time.
Turns out I didn't. My OM system gear works better.
But then my SUV "works better" than my 30 year old motor cycle too...

 

[ruben]

I remember myself in front of a camera shop vitrina by the late 70's. There was a new Canonet QL GIII and another strange camera without viewfinder window. I asked the seller how do you view the subject with the windowless one, and he explained me that camera has an internal mirror allowing viewing through the lens.

Too sophisticated for me then, so I picked up the Canonet.

True story.

 

[Russ]

I don't recall how I discovered rangefinders. But gee, I've got about fifteen of them. Maybe they find us...

Russ

"If you're photographing in color you show the color of their clothes - if you use black & white, you will show the color of their soul"

 

[canonetc]

A photographer at Associated Press Los Angeles named Damien had a Leica M3 with a collapsible 50, snugly fit into a pouch on his belt. He showed it to me and said, "Whatever you do, save your money and buy good glass." I couldn't afford a Leica at the time, so I bought a Canonet to learn how to shoot RF. Got hooked. Was able to afford an M6 about three years later. Well worth the wait.

Chris
canonetc