If You Could Start All Over Again.....

If I could start over, I wouldn't have handed my Rollei 35T to my wife and not know that the camera dropped out of the car at some point.

I would have bought that Leica M4 + three lenses for $400 back in 1982, and I would have bought that Rolleiflex 2.8F for $300 (1983).

And when I was stationed in Germany, I would have bought some old Zeiss Ikons instead of lusting after the Japanese cameras. And I probably would have bought the Rolleiflex SLX that they had at the base exchange.

As far as skills, I'm pretty happy with how things turned out. I might have skipped going to J school (journalism school) and instead gone to the art institute for photography. Of course, that would have really altered my life's path, which has for the most part been pretty darn good. So no complaints overall.
 
Nothing to do with cameras but I had a friend who always said if he could start life over again, or be reincarnated, he would rather be a bull in Montana. The older I get the more that idea appeals to me🙂
 
The only thing I wish I had done that I didn't, was to take pictures of my all my girlfriends over the years, so that later when I am old, I could remember them better.

Well, Frank, this is one thing I did do! I have plenty of slides, B&Ws and colour prints of all of them, including nudies---boxes and boxes full. However, I wished I would have taken more. 😎
 
eIII said:
...in this wonderful world of photography what would you do different?
I would put the camera down, and take a lot of art classes. I would do some of the disciplines like painting, drawing, learn theory, learn compositional elements. Cause photography is just an extension of that. Look at HCB's work. Very very nice in terms of composition, use of negative space, use of tension. That's really good. I know someone who does a lot of street shooting. Knew him for over 15 years now. PIctures are okay, but no background in any kind of art. His composition is terrible but he insists "that's how I feel when I took the photo". But really, when you look at at photo, there has to be something for your eye to look at or else its just all dissonance.
HTH!
 
Frank Granovski said:
Well, Frank, this is one thing I did do! I have plenty of slides, B&Ws and colour prints of all of them, including nudies---boxes and boxes full. However, I wished I would have taken more. 😎

Uh, LOL, and then make a slideshow like Jack Nicholson (or was it Art Garfunkel, can't remember for sure) made? 🙂 🙂 🙂
 
Once in a while, like every 2 years, I have a look at some of my old slides and pics. The one thing that I always realize is that I had damn good taste when I was young. Nowadays---pushing 52---I'm not fussy at all. I look at everything female and dream on. 🙂
 
If I could start all over?

Start with BW instead of color. Roll, process and print my own stuff. I spent thousands on color film/processing trying to figure out what I was doing wrong.

Chris
canonetc
 
If I could start over I would stick to one camera with one lens (a TLR), a handheld meter, a tripod, and then spend the rest of the money on film instead of all the gear I have which rarely gets used. No other combination of gear I own has taught me as much about exposure, composition, and the value of getting it right in the camera as that silly Seagull. I'd also have started using black and white film a lot earlier and learned how to develop and print it myself.
 
I would not have sold some of the cameras I have owned over the years, AND I really would not have sold my enlarger :bang: :bang: :bang: :bang: :bang:
 
I'd be driving the 1970 GTO Judge convertible I passed on for $1500, living in Winnipeg Manitoba, be a mechanic, and I'd still have my Exakta VXIIa, the drawer full of "cheap imitation Contax" I passed on from an antiques dealer plus HUUUGE hordes of Pentax instead of lots of everything. Way too much of everything.
 
Buy a cheap (relatively) RF like a Canonet Q17 etc or a Yashica Electro GSN. Maybe buy a second if you have some change. These cameras should be accessible for < 75$ . Buy good film BW or colour and start shooting. Read a couple of library books on cameras and then practice what you have learned.

One year later you can lust after some of the equipment bandied about here. Check Todd Hanz or 'DMR436' galleries to see potential for these types of cameras; a lot of this work is attributable to affordable cameras like a GSN or a Canonet 17.
 
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Depends on when I get to go back to... If I could I'd buy a Super Speed Graphic and a hella lot of Grafmatics with several lenses brand new while they were still being made. Of course I was about 9 or 10 at the time...

More seriously, I would get my Speed Graphic sooner and would go with Canon LTM RF's as my miniture cameras sooner.

William
 
To start over is an idea I had for many times.
But now, I´m 52, and things I´ve done can´t be undone. So what remains is experience, nothing else.
First of all, I´ll kept the RF I had (my dad´s one, a Voigtländer Vitomatic IIb) for a longer time after moving to an SLR (after the first one, came many others and I still have all of them). Once I got used to squeeze the maximum of the Vitomatic, then I should made the shift to an M3 or M4 and some lenses, a 28, a 35, a 90 and a 135, instead of buying an SLR plus many lenses, of which I still have all of them sleeping in the drawer most of the time.
Together with the Leica Mx, I should be buying a simple SLR plus some lenses (maybe a Zenit with the Fotosniper (a Tair 300/4.5, a 2x, and a macro bellows)). It is: one RF camera with a few lenses, and one SLR with a macro bellows and a tele. This way the extra money I´ve spent in stuff would be employed in film, thus making me (through practice) a better photograpgher.

Other thing I regret is selling the Yashica 635...

Ernesto
 
Djon -- very interesting stuff about the apprenticing. To what type of photographers do you recommend apprenticing, and how do you find them? I have thought about it a bit, but most of the photography I seem to be interested in is travel and documentary photography, and most of that seems more geared towards the lone wolf photog, though I could be wrong. I would not mind trying it for a portrait photographer if i could find a good one. I would love to do it for David Oliver, but he is in Australia....

As for my regrets -- I wish i had gotten more serious earlier. I took one darkroom class in high school, which was fun, but the camera I used was a point and shoot, so it did not really get that interesting. I think if someone had put a mechanical SLR in my hands then, I would have started ten years earlier than I did. As it was, I only got interested as I started graduate school, using my dad's Canon FD setup. A year later, my first Leica, two years after that, done with grad school and desperately trying to figure out how to make photography a part of my working life. Work as a photographer? Write about it? Try to get a good job in the industry? Start a gallery/high end boutique somewhere? All have their appeal to me, but I don't have any background in any of them. That may be my biggest regret. I am overeducated -- double major in history and russian minor in chemistry, masters in history, competency in Japanese etc. But I did not take a single photo class in college, nor anything beyond basic art history. I am not a rube when it comes to art, but all i know comes from casual reading, conversation with people who do know, and frequent visits to museums and galleries. I wish that I had minored in art or art history instead of chemistry. I am sure my lab partner would have been better looking as well!

In terms of equipment...I regret buying the 80-200 f/4L zoom, not because it is bad, but because it was a zoom. And I wish I had not bought the Fuji G690...it a lemon from ebay, but beyond that, it is just too big, bulky and meterless. A view camera does a better job and if you are going to carry that much you might as well just go all the way to a monorail camera...
 
For me (as for most of us, I'm sure) photography is an ongoing learning process. I have owned, used and sold many cameras - each helping further define my shooting style and ideal equipment. I began with Pentax MG and ME Supers then "upgrading" to more mechanical and automated cameras (EOS 1-N, 3, 10D). I reached a point where I felt somewhat detached from the photographic experience (even though I almost always shot in manual mode). I then bought a Nikon F3 and shot for 6 months with only a 50mm - it helped refine my seeing and composing of pictures and brought back the joy of photography I experienced when I developed b+w film in my Dad's darkroom for the first time.

I am now shooting with an M4-P - it suits me well (although I do have my eyes on an M6 when I see one I can afford). I do a lot of backpacking so the large SLR gear clearly wasn't ideal (though I'm hanging on to my Nikon F3 and EOS 10D for other situations). Traveling light I use my M4-P almost exclusively.

I do not regret any of my camera purchases. My only regret would be selling my G1 with 28mm, 45mm and 90mm lenses. I didn't like the camera much - beautiful, but not a fan of the autofocus - however, the lenses are unsurpassed. I have just acquired a CZ 50mm Planar though so I might be about to forgive myself for letting go of the Contax G system!

Sorry for the long post - it feels like therapy - plus it keeps me away from the auction site 😀
 
eric's comments are very similar to what I was thinking as I read through this..

there's no substitute for shooting a lot of film, but that helps more in the technical matter.. studying art and composition will help you 'see' things in a more pleasing manner.. learning compositional rules like the Thirds Rule.. also looking at things from a new perspective.. considering all angles.. front, back, sides, etc.. instead of just walking up and taking the standard head-on angle.. many people have a natural sense of this.. but everyone can learn a little more

so, if I could go back (which would be to my college days).. I'd study art.. there's a bit of irony to this.. when I was in college, my girlfriend was an art student who really had no interest in even being in college.. she was there merely to please her parents.. I was a struggling business major.. because she had little interest in completing her assignments, I started doing them as a favor to her.. I've always had a talent in art, and she consistently got A's in her classes while I struggled to maintain B's in classes I hated.. but I figured a business degree was more valuable after graduation

to make a long story not so long, I'm now a graphic artist and really wish I had the formal training that I never received when I had the chance.. I'm at the verge of quitting my job and going back to school full-time while living like a poor college student again just so I can do what I should have done over 10 years ago

the lesson here applies not only to photography, but to life itself.. figure out what you enjoy.. then figure out what you're good at.. if it happens to be the same thing, you're very lucky.. go after it no matter what anybody else tells you.. it might not make you rich, but it'll make you happy.. and it's pretty hard to tell a happy person that his life has been a waste of time


eric said:
I would put the camera down, and take a lot of art classes. I would do some of the disciplines like painting, drawing, learn theory, learn compositional elements. Cause photography is just an extension of that. Look at HCB's work. Very very nice in terms of composition, use of negative space, use of tension. That's really good. I know someone who does a lot of street shooting. Knew him for over 15 years now. PIctures are okay, but no background in any kind of art. His composition is terrible but he insists "that's how I feel when I took the photo". But really, when you look at at photo, there has to be something for your eye to look at or else its just all dissonance.
HTH!
 
i'd have studied more and shot more without the several year lapse...i would have bought a Leica instead of my sexy slr, and i wouldn't have dropped out of art history in first year.
 
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