royalrat
Member
Great story indeed!!!
So, where's your camera been?
- Thread starter reagan
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jsrockit
Moderator
Great story for real. As for my stuff, don't know, don't care.
Livesteamer
Well-known
I've wanted a IIIc stepper for a long time and finally got to buy one last November. The e bay seller was kind enough to give me some history on it. An uncle brought it back from Europe after WW2 and gave it as a wedding present to another uncle, a chemist, who traveled the world with it till his death around 1980. So I got a 1942 IIIc with a 1936 Summar with almost perfect glass. It survived the bombing and ruin of 1944/1945 Germany, got a new life with an American chemist who traveled widely with it. It sat for about 30 years and when I got it the vulcanite was crumbling and the shutter inoperative. Sherry K. revived it and put griptac on it and it is now one of my favorites, getting more use than my M6's. Mostly I use a later 50mm Elmar and a Nikkor 35mm f2.5 on it. I love the small size and the wonderful results it can produce as well as having a working, lovely piece of history. Joe
unixrevolution
Well-known
My Leica M2 was owned by a photographer who bought it in the early sixties. When his cousin, Charles Thomas, went into the USAF academy in 1960, the camera went with him. It was his camera the whole time he was at the academy, and his early air force career, until he dropped it one day in 1970.
The camera spent the next thirty or so years in storage. In 2010, with Charlie now a retired Lt. Colonel, it was hauled out because Charlie knew someone at work who liked cameras.
That person was me.
I took the aging Leica, with its cracking vulcanite and gritty mechanics, out for a test, to see if it worked. Despite the drop and the storage, it did.
Charlie then decided to give it to me. I told him I had to give him SOMETHING for the M2 and its 50/2.8 collapsible lens. We settled on $100.
After paying Charlie for the camera, I sent it off to Ken Ruth, who reworked the mechanicals and the RF. I then ordered brand new leather, and over the course of two days, peeled the old, dead, cracking, brittle Vulcanite off and replaced it with brand new Verdigris kidskin.
That's my Leica's story.
My Polaroid 600SE was owned by a photo studio, who used it to proof Medium Format shots before committing them to film. I picked it up for $200. It currently needs a full CLA of the camera and both lenses.
My Medalist is from God-knows-where. Charlie sold it to me, but even he's not sure where it came from. Same exact story with the Autographic Brownie.
My Pentax ME Super was my Dad's, since new. It was purchased in early 1982 to take my baby pictures.
The camera spent the next thirty or so years in storage. In 2010, with Charlie now a retired Lt. Colonel, it was hauled out because Charlie knew someone at work who liked cameras.
That person was me.
I took the aging Leica, with its cracking vulcanite and gritty mechanics, out for a test, to see if it worked. Despite the drop and the storage, it did.
Charlie then decided to give it to me. I told him I had to give him SOMETHING for the M2 and its 50/2.8 collapsible lens. We settled on $100.
After paying Charlie for the camera, I sent it off to Ken Ruth, who reworked the mechanicals and the RF. I then ordered brand new leather, and over the course of two days, peeled the old, dead, cracking, brittle Vulcanite off and replaced it with brand new Verdigris kidskin.
That's my Leica's story.
My Polaroid 600SE was owned by a photo studio, who used it to proof Medium Format shots before committing them to film. I picked it up for $200. It currently needs a full CLA of the camera and both lenses.
My Medalist is from God-knows-where. Charlie sold it to me, but even he's not sure where it came from. Same exact story with the Autographic Brownie.
My Pentax ME Super was my Dad's, since new. It was purchased in early 1982 to take my baby pictures.
séamuis
Established
well I have a number of old cameras and lenses, that I sure wish could talk and tell their stories. I only started traveling this year so I don’t have much to tell in way of my own stories with a camera in my hand but I know one camera though no longer with me (pictured here before)
this was purchased and used in Japan, and spent its entire life in Japan until a nice old gentlemen who’s name escapes me now, who takes old Pentax bodies and cleans & fixes them up to sell to new loving hands put it up on yahoo auctions japan. it was sent to me, where it got used hard but lovingly for several years before it returned to japanese soil this year and then onto the philippines. thats where it stayed. not the most exciting story, but I at least no par of its history and it was a travel partner and most people get easily attached t anything that takes a journey with us.
this was purchased and used in Japan, and spent its entire life in Japan until a nice old gentlemen who’s name escapes me now, who takes old Pentax bodies and cleans & fixes them up to sell to new loving hands put it up on yahoo auctions japan. it was sent to me, where it got used hard but lovingly for several years before it returned to japanese soil this year and then onto the philippines. thats where it stayed. not the most exciting story, but I at least no par of its history and it was a travel partner and most people get easily attached t anything that takes a journey with us.
39per1
Established
This is the story of the Rolley you see in the middle of this pic:
Rolleiflex MX-EVS, Automat, Standard 622 di Davide _non so cos'è l'AccaDiErre, su Flickr
It's an "Automat" with CZJ Tessar "T": the era is 1949 for the camera body and 1946 for Tessar lens (but I'm not shure).
Bought on E-Bay-Usa in 2006: the auction was for the camera and a worned leather bag.....
When it arrived in Italy, I saw there where some prints on the leatherette of the camera that said "DeFrees - Photographic Portrait by Appointment - Warren, Pennsylvania".....inside the bag that came with it I find:
1- the 👎ever-ready case;
2- a lens shade with is small leather case;
3- a Weston Master III meter;
4- a hand-written paper with esposure values for Tri-X (unknown speed);
5- a metal protractor 😕(the tool used to measure angles......hope is the right way to say it in english....).
The camera, apart a bit of fog in tessar lens, works (you can see some pics I took with it in my Flickr stream)....even the Weston meter works (and is now my main light meter!).
I wonder who was this photographer: a pro-photographer of the 50ties? he died and all his equipment was sold?.....the selenium meter works perfectly, so it remained in the dark for many years.
The E-Bay seller sold another camera like this, with his bag, in the same days.....
All the items (lens shade, ever-ready case, Weston meter) have the same print....
This camera (and the other I didn't buy....) has an History.......
Bye.
Rolleiflex MX-EVS, Automat, Standard 622 di Davide _non so cos'è l'AccaDiErre, su Flickr
It's an "Automat" with CZJ Tessar "T": the era is 1949 for the camera body and 1946 for Tessar lens (but I'm not shure).
Bought on E-Bay-Usa in 2006: the auction was for the camera and a worned leather bag.....
When it arrived in Italy, I saw there where some prints on the leatherette of the camera that said "DeFrees - Photographic Portrait by Appointment - Warren, Pennsylvania".....inside the bag that came with it I find:
1- the 👎ever-ready case;
2- a lens shade with is small leather case;
3- a Weston Master III meter;
4- a hand-written paper with esposure values for Tri-X (unknown speed);
5- a metal protractor 😕(the tool used to measure angles......hope is the right way to say it in english....).
The camera, apart a bit of fog in tessar lens, works (you can see some pics I took with it in my Flickr stream)....even the Weston meter works (and is now my main light meter!).
I wonder who was this photographer: a pro-photographer of the 50ties? he died and all his equipment was sold?.....the selenium meter works perfectly, so it remained in the dark for many years.
The E-Bay seller sold another camera like this, with his bag, in the same days.....
All the items (lens shade, ever-ready case, Weston meter) have the same print....
This camera (and the other I didn't buy....) has an History.......
Bye.
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