What brought you to RFF?

gb hill

gb hill

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Out of couriousity, and noticing alot of new names, What brought you to RFF?
For me it was really accidental. I was going to buy a ditigal slr, looking hard at the Olympus evolt 500. I started obtaining old photography books in the library and came across some works of HCB. I started to look at Leica cameras and one day while at a camera store looking at a Leica camera and also the enormous price tag with it, the salesman showed me a Canonet ql17 and that was it. Had to have it & bought it. I wanted to know more about these little jewels and went to the internet and the rest is history. BTW haven't thought anymore about the Oly, or any other digital for that matter. Whats your story?
 
Accidental as well as I was looking up more RF info on the net. Lurked for quite some time and noticed that it was a pretty friendly & helpful community so I joined. Plenty of good folks around here....
Now I haven't been here for a very long time, but I too noticed an increase of unfamiliar names/handles.
Cheers.
 
I found RFF with a google search for info on the Canon QL17 I was enjoying using along with my 35mm slr's and MF cameras.
 
iirc, i joined the day rff came online.
after a few days jorge asked me if i would be interested in being the moderator.
the rest is history...;)

joe
 
I was rekindling my interest in rfs, and had discovered Karen Nakamura's website, Photoethnography.com. In one of the pages on that site there was a link to RFF. I checked it out, lurked for awhile, and then joined up.
 
When the R-D1 was being developed, and I had only a Canon Powershot, Sean Reid used to steer a lot of DPReview people here to find out what rangefinders were all about.
 
I had known about RFF for a while as it's mentioned on APUG once in a while, so I have popped in from time to time in the past. When I had noticed how much cheaper ultra wide angle lenses were for rangefinders compared to SLRs, I considered purchasing an RF, more specifically a Bessa. RFF and CQ were the two best resources for research.
 
I needed help with a Yashica Electro I picked up at a fleamarket. It's long gone; I'm still here... ;)

William
 
Long time member and contributor SolaresLavarre used to be a contributor to the PopPhoto forums. In fact he started what I think was the longest thread there in praise of the Canonet. Shortly after he joined this site, he mentioned it there and gave the url. I came here and liked what I saw. Truely this is one of the better photography forums in general, and especialy for RF.

Thank you sir.
 
I bought a Zorki just to get the lens (famous last words.) When the camera arrived, being the first Zorki I'd ever seen, I was surprised that it looked to have potential. So I googled Zorkis and found RFF. (my other famous last words.) :cool: But it's fun, ay?
 
Not long ago while surfing the web looking for a new hobby that A) was cheaper than cars B) I could share with my kids and C) would be less frustrating than my point and shoot digital. I came across the Manual Minolta users group as I still have my first camera, an XG9 SLR. That led me to this new word “rangefinder”…I thought initially “those cheap crappy little cameras you travel with when you don’t want to risk your “Good” camera or want something light and portable!”…how wrong was I eh. Soon I was here http://www.rokkorfiles.com/7SII.htm , what made it more relevant was that this was my home city so I could relate to the images, I just had to have one of these little Minolta’s. THEN I found RFF! I knew I had GAS I just hadn’t put a name to it, technically I have just transferred from Car GAS to Camera Gas, and even though I now have my 7Sii along with a Fed3 and Bessa somewhere in the mail, I can still say I am satisfying A B and C above!
 
So, Oftheherd and I share a common origin. :)

Back in July 2003, a few days after RFF went online, I found out about it through Photo.net (I believe) and joined in right away. Joe was already at work, posting constantly, and there was an effort from Jorge and a couple more dedicated members to stir life in the forum with questions like "What's your favorite film".

The rest is history... :)
 
First camera I used was a GSN...never picked up a SLR.
I was using another forum, when one of the members there directed me here.
I had been impressed by his photos and ventured over here...most of what I saw and read here has kept me coming back.
 
Since I'm a Mongolia fan I used to check out RML's site shards of Mongolia. He also had a site called shards of photography and that linked me to RFF. At the same time a buddy from work was trying to snag a Fed from ebay and I thought these old cameras are pretty cool. I'm not sure if it was just what I was interested in at the time but the forum seemed not so Leica heavy and a lot more oriented toward FSU stuff and the Japanese rangefinders like the canonet etc.

So I got a 4am and an Iskra from Ukraine and started learning the basics of photography with help from RFF. It has been a cool way to spend a lot of time and has provided an interesting little refuge from the trials and tribulations of daily life
 
I believe I saw a link to RFF somewhere online, and arrived a month or two after it began. Then and for some time thereafter it was easily possible to keep up with all posts in all threads daily, and to welcome each new member at their first post. That's far beyond possible now, and I really don't know how Joe keeps such good track of what's going on!

We took pride in our post count figures, there being a bit of one-upsmanship, but Joe was always well ahead. Unfortunately everyone who was active early-on lost significant count numbers in at least two migrations of the forum to other servers. Thousands! So all the early members should have post count numbers signficantly higher than now shown. We've been trying to drive them back up ever since, huh? :D
 
The folks on Usenet (please don't hit me!) suggested this to identify the model of RF that I had sold years ago and wanted to re-acquire.
 
Usenet rules. Or used to, before it got killed by spam, competition from online fora like this one, and Google Groups.

Anyway, I wanted to learn how to use my dad's old Leica. I went to Photo.net first, where everyone initially accused me of being someone named Frank, and was directed here. Then I came here by preference both for the obvious reasons and because the user interface looked like it had been updated since 1994, unlike Photo.net.
 
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