How long have you been doing photography for? (dated 20/02/11)

How long have you been doing photography for? (dated 20/02/11)

  • < 1 year

    Votes: 13 2.1%

  • 1 year +

    Votes: 15 2.4%

  • 2 years +

    Votes: 13 2.1%

  • 3 years +

    Votes: 36 5.8%

  • 5 years +

    Votes: 69 11.1%

  • 10 years +

    Votes: 44 7.1%

  • 15 years +

    Votes: 31 5.0%

  • 20 years +

    Votes: 38 6.1%

  • 25 years +

    Votes: 25 4.0%

  • 30 years +

    Votes: 127 20.4%

  • 40 years +

    Votes: 205 33.0%

  • I don't do photography, I just like the shiny cameras.

    Votes: 6 1.0%
  • Total voters
    622
I started photographing when I was in college in the late 1950s. My parents thought that I had taken some nice shots on a trip with an cheap Kodak 35mm camera and they thought I should have a better camera. They bought me a Zeiss Contina II which was a 35mm rangefinder type camera without a rangefinder. It had a light meter and you could focus it but you had to guess the distance. Not really a problem. Came with a 45mm Nova Anastigmat 3.5 lens which was not interchangeable. Cost then was about $85 which was not really cheap at that time. I had that camera until the early to mid 1960s when I bought a Pentax Spotmatic. Jim
 
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Well, I am one of the relatively new kids here. I bought a digi p&s 5 years ago which cost a lot of money for me back then ($240 :p I was 15). I used a lot until it got stolen. I still have some pics from back then that I still like. Then a year and a halg passed since it was stolen, and I decided to get a film p&s, since no digital p&s (Lomo Colorsplash :eek: I know, I know) would give me decent pics for that money. I quickly felt limited by that camera and got my first film SLR, a Canon Rebel 2000 which now belongs to my best friend. While I was waiting for that camera to arrive, I also ordered a Canon 10D, which I still have and love, although it doesn't get much use nowadays.
I shot with those 2 SLRs and a 50mm 1.8 for some time. I later got more random cameras and another Canon lens.
Then I learned about rangefinders about a two years ago. I got a Zeiss Contaflex SLR, since I couldn't afford a Leica, and in November last year, I finally got my M4! I haven't used any of my other cameras since (only my Contaflex for 2 rolls). I am getting a Leica IIIC with four lenses this coming week, plus a bunch of accessories.
I am now officially addicted to rangefinders.

Cheers!
 
I bought my first new camera (Yashica FR and 50mm lens) in 1983. Prior to that used my moms 110. At the time I was doing a volunteering for Biology projects with salmon conservancy groups in Washington state. The lead Bio was a Nikon user and taught me a lot about close up work and use of DOF at close range. He was a working photog as a result of his studies in the field. It was fun and sent me on my way down the silver rabbit hole.
 
I developed my first roll of film 50 yrs ago! Got my chemicals from Central Camera in Chicago which had been open for over 50 yrs and is still going strong today and I still stop in there. I do not own a digital camera.
 
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It's funny. A lot of you were inspired by your dads. Well I started about 5.5 years ago, inspired by the birth of my daughter. I was a snap shot type of guy for years before, eventually getting a 3mp digicam.

I bought a dslr about 6 months after she was born and started getting into photography. I wanted to take better pictures, then found a Canon Rebel G for $12 and started using film. I had a bessa r for about a year in between the first and second kid, but that was lost on a family trip. Now that the second daughter is a little older, I've been shooting hard for the last 6 months. We moved to a house and I built a darkroom in the basement. Oh yeah, I got it bad.
 
In the US Army 40 years ago I grossed $600 a month. I threw down $150 - 1 week's salary! - for an evil Yashica SLR. Not alot by Leica standards, but for a buck Private quite another story.
 
1951, and especially when I got my Purma Plus for passing my 11+ exams in 1954.
I still have the camera all its accessories box and instruction book.
Still looks like new. I used Adox R17 film developed in Rodinal.

Purma3.jpg
 
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I first got into photography in a very odd way in the early 1980s. My ex wife and I took up Scuba diving and through that sport bought a Nikonos IV camera. I quickly found that underwater photograhy was too difficult for the likes of me and ended up using the Nikonos for above water photography almost exclusively. It did not take too long before we bought an SLR and the rest, as they say, is history. As is my scuba diving. But fortunately not so for photography. I contnued to do it even though sometimes it was only at a low level.

I should add that my photography really took off when I started digital photography seriously. Like many here I did not take digital seriously for a long time, mainly in my case because the technology was not mature and was far too expensive for the results you got. But having put it off for several years I bought my first serious DSLR - a Nikon D70s and I fell in love. I could shoot endlessly at little real cost (unlike the expense of film where every click of the button cost money) and best of all I could learn how to be a better photographer as I got instant feedback from my efforts. This was my photographic rebirth when about 6 years ago I really got serious.
 
Neare said:
How long, as of 20/02/11, have you been practicing photography for?
And by practicing I mean starting with the point of investing serious personal funds and/or time into photography. ("My parents gave me a 110 camera when I was 6" doesn't count :))


I am currently at 1 year, 4 months.
Click to expand...

. . . 1959 . . .
 
Over 40 years. At 12 my mother gave me a Brownie. At 15 I had a Memorex, later a Pentax, even later a Nikon F. I was doing my own developing in my lab. at 15
 
Just about thirty years since I bought a Canon AE-1 & 50/1.8 at the PX.
 
31 years. I am counting from when I acquired my first SLR, Canon's AT-1 (still with me). I was a schoolboy and had to save up for it, even though my parents chipped in for my birthday...
 
I bought my first serious camera (a secondhand and very battered Nikon F2sB) at 20. For the 4-5 years before, I used my dad's FM which he just had used for 1 roll (btw, that FM is the only camera I never sold)
 
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