My very first camera was a Kiev 4A (it is still in the family, but far away from me now.) OK, that was actually my father's, but I was able to use it 100% of the time, so that's as good as my own. Here's one photo I took with it in 1978.
The first one I bought with my own money (not that I needed a lot of it, LOL) was a Smena 8M. It's no longer in existence, but it wasn't a bad camera at all. It was really really cheap, can't remember how much though.
Not surprisingly, I preferred to use the Kiev, a much more "serious" camera, giving discernibly better results (though the Smena wasn't anything to sneeze at.)
The first one that I bought that actually required me to save a bit was a Praktica VLC2, in the early 1980s. Some say that my better photos were taken with that camera, and perhaps they're right (though it most certainly is not due to camera, but other reasons, like lots more time to work on photography, and the fact that I self-developed everything in those days). This camera is still with me, but I'm not using it any more.
The first one I bought with my own money (not that I needed a lot of it, LOL) was a Smena 8M. It's no longer in existence, but it wasn't a bad camera at all. It was really really cheap, can't remember how much though.
Not surprisingly, I preferred to use the Kiev, a much more "serious" camera, giving discernibly better results (though the Smena wasn't anything to sneeze at.)
The first one that I bought that actually required me to save a bit was a Praktica VLC2, in the early 1980s. Some say that my better photos were taken with that camera, and perhaps they're right (though it most certainly is not due to camera, but other reasons, like lots more time to work on photography, and the fact that I self-developed everything in those days). This camera is still with me, but I'm not using it any more.