What was your first RF?

[ray_g]

Mine was the Olympus 35SP. It was also the first used camera I bought, and the first camera I bought on *bay. From a Russian ex-colonel in the Yukon.

That was followed by a succession of compact fixed-lens RF's, then a Zorki. On to a barnack, then a Bessa-R, to Hexar and Leica M. Picked up a P along the way.

Some are gone, some I still have. The Oly is still here, and has found a (courtesy of Gman) brown leather-covered mate. 😉


What's your story?

 

[back alley]

the first camera i bought with my own money was a rangefinder. i still have it and, like you, g'man has customized another so it has company.
it started me on the path of photography and has taken some very nice shots along the way.
i bought it around 1971 as best as i can remember.

the camera?
an olympus 35rc.

joe

 

[kbg32]

Mine was the Leitz Minolta CL, 1978.

 

[Sonnar Brian]

The Hi-Matic 9, bought with earnings from a Summer of mowing lawns in 1969. I still have it, works great.

 

[flashover]

Minolta Hi-Matic F still around here somewhere.

 

[doubs43]

Fujica V2, purchased new from an Air Force BX, Mactan Air Base, Philippines, for $42.50. That was the Summer of 1967. It was a fine camera that took great pictures.

Walker

 

[kmack]

My first camera was an Ikonta A that my father passed down to me, technically not a rangefinder but close enough. The first camera that I bought was a Ricoh 500G.

 

[julianphotoart]

Flush with a bonus from settling a case, I got an M3. 1997. Used it 2 weeks and thought what on earth is the hullabaloo about this rangefinder thingy? Gave it back to the store. Though that person back then was me, only 9 years ago, I now have no idea who that guy was. Now, life without rangefinders....impossible.

 

[JoeFriday]

mine was a GSN that I bought about a year ago.. it started the snowball that led to a Kiev 4a, Vivitar 35es, Canonet, Minox, Contax IIa, Contax T, Leica M3.. and culminating with a couple Holgas

 

[gbremer]

Mine was a Retina IIa that my dad passed down to me. He bought it new back in the day and I have many memories of him taking pictures with it. He had the film advance mechanism replaced about 25 years ago and I had it done again 15 years later. I still have it and it really needs to have its rangefinder cleaned 🙁

george

 

[Frank Granovski]

My first one was a silver Voigtlander Vitomatic 11, though I used some of my mother's rangefinders before that. 😎

 

[jpbob100]

Although I've had cameras for 40 years, the first "rangefinder" I had was a FED 2D I bought 2 or 3 years ago. Then a FED 2E and a Zorki 6. Although I liked the FSUs, I never could get either one to work properly for any length of time. I sold them all and bought a Canonet QL17 GIII. It works quite well. I've been thinking about a Bessa R, but that'll have to wait until after I get a scanner.

 

[raid]

Mine was an M4-MOT that I bought to resell quickly before I got addicted as first camera.

 

[GeneW]

A Minolta HiMatic 7 purchased in 1965. Here's a photo I took with it in the same year, on Tri-X film.

Gene

 

[VinceC]

A nonmetered Kiev. I found it in a German camera shop in 1988 because it seemed so, well, Perestroika. I saw that it took interchangeable lenses, and the store owner explained that it took old Contax lenses as well as old Nikon rangefinder lenses. I was shooting Nikon SLRs for a newspaper at the time, and the little camera intrigued me. So I bought it for, if memory serves correct, about $60, and quickly found myself immersed in the strange and archaic world of Nikon-mount rangefinders.

 

[Mike Stoesz]

Howdy from Wyoming;
My first RF camera was a Kodak Retina IIa that I purchased with proceeds from my newspaper route in 1959. This was followed by a Kodak Signet 40 about a year later, and a very trashed Leica IIIc w/summar about 1961. The Signet worked the best and actually had a good lens.
Regards, Mike

 

[kvanderlaag]

My mother's Agfa Karat IV. Apparently, it had been sitting in our basement in a box for seventeen years and I just never noticed, and no one told me. I guess everyone forgot it was there. After she died, my father was going through some old things, and found it. Good thing he realized I might want it...

...look what it's started!

 

[dexdog]

Contax II, bought while on vacation in New Zealand, 1983.

 

[Krasnaya_Zvezda]

1st RF was a Fed 5 3 years ago, and life has never been the same since.

 

[dmr]

My first was a Mamiya Super Deluxe so many years ago. I sold it a few years later and have been kicking myself for doing that ever since.

My last one is also a Mamiya SD, same exact model, sitting right on the desk in front of me now. 🙂 It was made from a mostly working one and a banged up one. I'm putting off tearing it apart to fix a hesitation on the 3 lowest shutter speeds.