Once upon a time National Camera Repair trained most of the camera techs in the US via home study training. Their courses were, and are, outstanding.
Alas, they went out of business in the age of camera electronics, about 1995.
Happily now the courses are back in a revised online form for FREE!
Camera Repair training does not get much better than this!
Visit their new site at
https://learncamerarepair.com/productlist.php?category=1
Stephen
Alas, they went out of business in the age of camera electronics, about 1995.
Happily now the courses are back in a revised online form for FREE!
Camera Repair training does not get much better than this!
Visit their new site at
https://learncamerarepair.com/productlist.php?category=1
Stephen
retinax
Well-known
That's really cool, thanks for the link!
monopix
Cam repairer
Unfortunately they are now charging to download. But most of the course can be downloaded for free from Camera repair guide : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive and if you check the Wayback Machine you can find more of it. Wayback Machine
MarkWalberg
Established
The charge is truly a pittance. This is an actively maintained site full of high quality information about many aspects of camera repair. Please make the tiny contribution requested to keep this site going.
KoNickon
Nick Merritt
Thanks for this, Stephen! Maybe this will be the impetus for some younger folks to carry the torch forward.
I am going to share the page with my son who has a knack for this kind of stuff.
monopix
Cam repairer
Not a pittance if you consider there are about 45 to 50 documents in the course and they are charging $2.58 for EACH. And, yes, there is a lot of useful information on the site, most of which they acquired for free from other sites, and which are still available for free from other sites, yet they are charging for them on the pretext they need to pay for storage. There are lots a free storage around the internet including the aforementioned Internet Archive so they don't need to pay for storage. They are basically ripping people off. And, OK, it's up to individuals to decide if they want to search for something or just pay-up and be lazy. But there are many people getting into camera repair who maybe don't know this stuff is available for free elsewhere so I like to make sure they are able to make an informed choice.
And for the record, Learn Camera Repair took several manuals off my site, manuals which I had paid for and spent many hours making PDFs of so I could share them for free with others. When I asked them to acknowledge that on their website they refused. Go figure.
WoodallP
Pragmatist Barnack lover
I agree that maintaining such a resource takes money, and an income is needed but the charging model is a bit blunt. Maybe tiered rates for multiple downloads or a subscription for a fixed number per month (they may do that now but I haven’t looked recently). I also feel uncomfortable that they are charging for documents that enthusiasts have put out there free; including possibly people from this forum.
KoNickon
Nick Merritt
Good to know. So you mentioned you have a website; I think folks here would be interested to know the address.
Steve Goldstein
Newbie
In their defense, they went to the trouble to obtain permission from the NatCam copyright holder to make the course available. And I know that the site owner has laid out real cash for quite a few non-copyrighted original manuals that he's then scanned - I personally pointed him to several manuals on ebay that he purchased for $25-$30 each to add to the site. This money has to come from somewhere, they aren't running a charity.
I don't disagree with the charging model for repair manuals that he paid for.
I do strongly disagree with them charging for downloads of manuals scraped for free from other websites without acknowledgement.
What I'd like to see is all the files needed for each course bundled into a single zip file making for a single download with a single charge. This only just occurred to me - I'll suggest it to the site owner. I downloaded all the then-available course materials well before he started charging for them.
I don't disagree with the charging model for repair manuals that he paid for.
I do strongly disagree with them charging for downloads of manuals scraped for free from other websites without acknowledgement.
What I'd like to see is all the files needed for each course bundled into a single zip file making for a single download with a single charge. This only just occurred to me - I'll suggest it to the site owner. I downloaded all the then-available course materials well before he started charging for them.
Steve Goldstein
Newbie
There are three links at the bottom of the post mentioning this.
Coldkennels
Barnack-toting Brit.
This is the brunt of the issue for me. I had a look at their site before they put the paywall up; a lot of what they had on there was already sat on my hard drive, procured from various places - including official service manuals.
A model more akin to Butkus.org would be fairer, and leave less of a sour taste: "send us donations if you want, but this isn't our content, so we shouldn't be charging for it" would be the way I'd set it up.
Hosting isn't as expensive as people make it out to be.
WoodallP
Pragmatist Barnack lover
I suspect Butkus.org doesn’t get it’s dues given all that buying and scanning! Curation takes time and effort. Kudos to Butkus!
You are right, storage costs little now, but bandwidth can be expensive if you have a hit. Add Taylor Swift to that repair archive and the wires melt (Leica don’t even think about that brassed pink TS edition)!
You are right, storage costs little now, but bandwidth can be expensive if you have a hit. Add Taylor Swift to that repair archive and the wires melt (Leica don’t even think about that brassed pink TS edition)!
ddutchison2
Well-known
Gee, why can't everything be free for meeeee, I deserve it!
monopix
Cam repairer
Manuals at Contax 139 Resource - Documents
Repairs I do at contax-yashica-repairs.uk
Thanks for asking.
Godfrey
somewhat colored
Many eons ago, i had business dealings with these folks. It was fraught ...
Recently, i was looking for a shop manual for the Plaubel Makina 67. They list parts diagrams. I paid their pittance for it, and it's nothing more than a low rez JPEG exploded view, just one page. That's a shill in my book.
G
Recently, i was looking for a shop manual for the Plaubel Makina 67. They list parts diagrams. I paid their pittance for it, and it's nothing more than a low rez JPEG exploded view, just one page. That's a shill in my book.
G
Coldkennels
Barnack-toting Brit.
For the record: I have a very in-depth website for my "other life"/actual career that's currently at 70 guides, each with a 10-20 minute video, a photo sequence, and a text guide. Each one of those guides takes me anywhere between five and ten hours to produce, inc. filming and editing time.
I'm putting in a lot more work into that than these "learn camera repair" people have put into their site in every way, and I still don't charge a single thing for it. I consider it a form of "community service"; if knowledge isn't spread freely, it dies along with the people who are hoarding it. Donations are optional; some pay, most don't. The server space and bandwidth is what's not being used by my main website (a niche/specialist e-commerce site), so the only rolling cost is the domain name, which runs about £15 a year. Even if I was hosting it on its own account, it would cost so little to do so that it wouldn't even be worth setting up the payment gateways.
Besides, as @monopix pointed out, you can find most of what they're hosting on the Internet Archive for free. The website could just be a front end to point people to curated collections on the Internet Archive, meaning bandwidth and storage would be basically be non-existent.
And yes -
- he definitely doesn't. I've sent him some documents myself and made a point of thanking him for his time when I did so. It's an important resource and I'm sure we've all benefitted from it.
Godfrey
somewhat colored
I make a point of donating $25 a year to butkus.org ... regardless whether I've downloaded any new manuals or not.
G
Duofold RF
Well-known
Learn Camera Repair, I believe, started as a private group on Facebook. I don’t find their manuals particularly useful, as most of them are freely available on the internet. It’s site served as collection of collection of free service manual on the internet.