What was your first RF?

[dcsang]

I was but a young lad.
Maybe all of 13 years old.
I was wide eyed and bushy tailed... errr.. scratch that.. just wide eyed. 😀

I had joined the camera club in elementary school. It was so cool !! We had our own darkroom, enlarger etc. and it was a great deal of fun. We started with pinhole cameras (of coruse) and went on from there. The teachers that were involved were kind gentlemen. Mr Kelly was of Irish descent and was the geography teacher while Mr Wise was your standard "Canuck" and taught science. My good friend Ron had been able to convince his father to buy a Minolta SLR for him to use. I was jealous, just like most kids with friends who had toys that they saw as being "better" than anything they owned. I went whining to my parents.

My dad produced for me, at Christmas time that year, a new camera that I could use. It wasn't an SLR. I frowned for a bit but eventually grew to love the little camera. My dad still has it to this day and I've oft considered "reclaiming it" as my own.

My first rangefinder, wayyyyyy back some 26-27 years ago was the Konica Auto S3.

Cheers
Dave

 

[kbg32]

Ever since I got into photography, I knew that a Leica was for me, even though I never handled one. In 1978 I purchased a Leitz Minolta CL. A few months later I traded it for a M3 with a Canon 50 Serenar. That subsequently was traded for a M4. It was stolen when my apartment was broken into. I replaced the M4 with another - a 1967 chrome one. I was in school and working at Camera Barn in NYC, where I was able to purchase a second body - a M4-2. I purchased a 28 Elmarit for my 23rd birthday. I can still remember the exact price - $343.27. I added a 21 3.4 Super Angulon later that year. These are still with me over 25 years later.

 

[dcsang]

In 1978 I purchased a Leitz Minolta CL. A few months later I traded it for a M3. That subsequently was traded for a M4. It was stolen when my apartment was broken into. I replaced the M4 with another - a 1967 chrome one. By then I was working at Camera Barn in NYC and was able to purchase a second body - a M4-2 .I purchased a 28 Elmarit for my 23rd birthday. I can still remember the exact price - $343.27. I added a 21 3.4 Super Angulon later that year. These are still with me over 25 years later.

Oh to be able to purchase the 28 Elmarit now for $350.... 😀

Dave

 

[kbg32]

I love that 28!

 

[dcsang]

I love that 28!

I would too if I only paid $350 😀

Nowadays I think you have to fork out upwards of $700-$900+ for a used one.

Dave

 

[kiev4a]

Ansco Super Memar with the f2 lens -- about 1960 -- still have it.

 

[Kin Lau]

Yashica GS, acquired only about 3 or 4 years ago. I still have it and really should take it out more often. Like many here, I've got way too many cameras.

 

[jtzordon]

The Canonet GIII started me off. At first I loved the photos MUCH more than I loved the mechanics of focusing a RF. Part of it was that the focusing wasn't so smooth on the GIII; it needed to be loosened up a bit. Then, the sticky shutter syndrome relegated my shooting to SLRs. Still haven't gotten the GIII fixed yet, but I can't part with it having seen the photos!

I just recently got a Zorki 4 and have been shooting away. Focus is smoother, RF patch a bit dimmer. I plan on getting a VF for the 50 as I can't see the whole frame with my glasses; and a light meter, of course!

 

[jan normandale]

Zeiss Ikonta B , a big brick of a camera. Big 120 images. Wonderful stuff. Cheaper than my Mamiya 6 RF by a mile. Followed by the ' newly released Olympus XA' I was talked into by the camera shop I went into to buy a Minox 35. Never regretted it.

 

[JohnL]

My first was a late model (1931) Leica I. I bought it for 16 pounds in the UK in 1964. I mentioned late model because it was one of the first cameras to have the standard 39mm LTM. It had an uncoated 50/3.5 collapsible Elmar IIRC. I traded it - together with some other stuff - about 1971, when I upgraded to a new Rollei SL66.

Come to think of it -- that camera didn't even *have* a rangefinder ...

 

[DougK]

I hadn't a clue about RFs until I stumbled on this site by accident, then I got really curious so I bought a Ricoh 500G. It's got either a light seal issue or needs a good CLA on the shutter but the photos still came out amazing. I'd never gotten photos like that from any film camera before and the camera itself was so easy to use... thus began my fall, and coincidentally my redemption from digital 😀.

I now have the Ricoh, an XA, a Konica C35 Auto, an RC35 (which needs major service), a couple of Canon A35Fs, a Rollei XF35, probably a couple of others which I've forgotten, finally culminating in my recent purchase of a Bessa R.

 

[macymills@mac.c]

My first RF was the Mamiya 7II, which I have since sold. I then purchased the Leica MP, which of course I absolutely love!

 

[popitz]

My first RF was a Kiev-2. I was happy with it...until I found RFF. That's when things started going crazy. Now I have 3 dry boxes of rangefinders, boxes of film has started to take over our fridge, our toilet has turned into a darkroom, and now my wife has a medium-format bug.

When will it ever end?????

 

[Stu W]

Popitz, I too can't stop. It all started innocently enough with a ContaxII and a 5cm Sonnar. Then another, then a III, IIa, another IIa, IIIa, another IIIa, M3, another M3, more lenses-I just can't stop. Please help me.

 

[rovnguy]

In the mid 60's I was shooting a Pentax Spotmatic, then I fell in love with an Olympus 35LC. It kept up quite nicely until my brother borrowed it, left it sitting on the seat of an unlocked car... gone. I'd sure like to get my hands on another, but they seem to be quite rare now.

 

[Benjamin Marks]

M3 & 50 Summarit

 

[CleverName]

Seems like I've told this story recently, but here is again.
When I was a kid in the '70s, my Dad had a Yashica GSN. I played with it all the time and my Dad actually let me use it sometimes. He "upgraded" to a Canon T-50 with "the only lens you'll ever need", a Vivitar 28-200 zoom. He later "upgraded" to a P&S and gave me the T-50.
I labored in ignorance for many years, sometimes not taking a photos for years at a time. Then Zoe, (see avatar), knocked my camera off the desk and broke the lens. While looking for a new lens on eBay, I stumbled across a Yashica GSN. I bought it and a battery adapter and found RFF while doing research. I gave away the T-50 and replaced it with a FTb, an A-1, and a whole bunch of FD lenses. I also bought a Canonet QL-17 GIII, then another, and more Yashica rangefinders than you shake a stick at.
I managed to combine two of my hobbies, photography and drinking. I have photos featured on local band websites of live shows. I've had photos in two exibits here and have actually sold a few prints.
I blame and thank RFF.

 

[Fred]

In the late seventies a school buddy had an old Agfa Silette when I had my very first 35mm camera, an old Halina3000 that did the job for me. The RF focussing was just incredible in the Agfa, more so after I migrated to SLRs with slower lenses where the slit image would go black. It took me more than 20 years to get an RF of my own.

I went shopping for a Bessa R at Robert White in the UK but stumbled after handling an M7 Leica so left empty handed, that time. Within a few months and some creative accounting to justify to myself that I could afford it I went for an M and some CV glass. Still pondering getting that Bessa to make use of my CV screw lenses following the purchase of kit from the estate of a very good freind who passed suddenly away in April.

 

[zuikologist]

When I logged in here for the first time, I was getting over the fixed-lens cameras. But to answer to your question: it was a Canonet G-III QL17 that I still have.

After the Canonet came a Yashica GS, and a Konica S2. I later added a Contax G & two lenses, and at the end, in 2003, I sold most of my cameras (except the Canonet and the Contax), and purchased my first Leica.

It sounds like a looooong time ago... And I do remember Rich Silfverberg's "family pictures" (weren't those 11 Olympus bodies?), and that above his avatar he had "The Devil Shoots With an SLR."

Very fond memories! 🙂

I too remember the "family pictures" - it was around the first time I logged on to the site, referred from Karen Nakamura's site for the Yashica GSN. That was my fist rangefinder. It was only about 12 months ago!

Needless to say, the list has grown to include Oly SP, XA, Canonet G111 17, Yashica GX and CC, Vivitar 35ES, Voigtlander VF135, Rollei 35XF, Zorki 4, Bessa R2 and Chinon 35EE and a few others I have forgotten. Some of the above have duplicates of course. Strangely enough, I do not covet a Leica, not sure why. Current favourites are the 35ES, Oly SP and Bessa R2.

 

[TEZillman]

My first was a Voigtlander VF 101 obtained in 1977. I went mostly into OM land in '79 for the next 25 years or so and came back to RFs a couple years ago. The voigtlander kicked around in the family until no one was using it and I traded it for something else in '94 or thereabouts.