What was your very own first camera?

[bobby_novatron]

Minolta Auto "S" 35mm camera. Simple rangefinder with automatic everything, except film wind. Took some OK shots with it as a kid.

Later graduated to a Nikon FG as a teenager, and that seemed like a huge improvement! 🙂

 

[Nokton48]

A Polaroid "Big Shot". A rangefinder camera! Andy Warhol would have approved.
It took High-Power Flashcubes. I had color negs made by Polaroid that I later contact printed.
Then a Kodak Duaflex II, loaded with 620 Verichrome Pan. Which I developed myself.

First really good camera was a Minolts SRT-100, which was purchased new from the local camera store. Recently I bought another one, for nostalgic reasons. Still a great camera.

 

[MikeWebb]

Halina Instamatic based camera. I believe I actually managed to process my own B&W film by cracking open the cassettes.

I then progressed to a bunch of foldies which no doubt today would be drooled over but then (50 years ago) were junk. Al least one was RF.

Great thing was I could develop the 120 film and I learned so much from using those clumsy cameras.

First 'proper' camera was a Practica FX 1 or 2 and I still have the optional mirror based pentaprism for it somewhere - which could go to a good home.

 

[brownaj]

My first camera was an Imperial Satellite II, which my mother got me with an extra book of Green Stamps when I was six. It took 127 film, and had a detachable flash.

 

[JustPlainBill]

Hi,
My first camera was a Rolleicord Ia with the f4.5 Zeiss Triotar lens. Bought it with money that I'd earned caddying and mowing lawns. I'm thankful that my success with the "Old Rolleicord" has led to a lifetime interest in photography.
JustPlainBill

 

[PaulDalex]

Bencini Comet II (in 1952)
http://fotoriflessiva.blogspot.it/2011/11/bencini-comet-ii-1951.html

 

[The Clam]

Dad's Argus C3. Then I saved my pennies and bought a Miranda REII, my first SLR. After Olympus OM years and Nikon film and digital, I'm back full circle to a completely manual RF from the 1950s, but this time it's an M2.

 

[35photo]

My dad's Leica R3 with a 50 f2... yep spoiled right off the bat.🙂 Still use the lens on my Nikon D800E.. works great!

 

[DUNKS]

First camera

First camera

Twas a Zeiss Nettar 120 My young wife bought it for me as I was about to depart on a far east cruise Royal Navy.
Alas we had a bit of a dust up with an Indian cruiser and lost the bows off the destroyer I was on. HMS Hogue. We shipped a drop of water in the forrard messdecks and my camera was submerged for a couple of weeks.
This was 1958 and funds did not run to replacing it.

 

[giganova]

Leica R4, an Elmarit 35/2.8, 70-210 zoom and a Novoflex 600/8 lens, brand spanking new from my first paying job when I was 18 (that's 30 year ago!), and I LOVED it! I made a huge mistake by selling it all for real cheap when DSLR came of age and I regret it to this day. IMHO, the R4 was the best SLR ever built.

 

[richard_l]

Argus C3. It was my dad's camera. He gave it to me in the early 1950s.

 

[cooltouch]

I'm pretty sure mine was a Kodak Brownie Starflash. Or something very close to it. I was probably about 8 or 9 when my parents got it for me. The biggest problem I had with it was film -- or the lack thereof. My parents rarely bought me film for it.

It wasn't until several years later when they bought a Polaroid Swinger when I got to use a camera a lot. I still have some pics from that old Swinger, whereas I don't think I have any left from the old Brownie.

As I got older I went through a series of 110 cameras, but it wasn't until I was on my own and making halfway decent money that I bought my first "real" camera -- a Canon AE-1 in 1982.

 

[L. M. Tu]

Minolta Hi Matic E 🙂

 

[codester80]

My first camera was a cheap Ricoh point and shoot. It was plastic. Had a red shutter button and a thumb wheel for advancing the film. Got it for Christmas when I was seven or eight. I still have a few pictures I took with it stuff away in the closet. It took surprisingly sharp photos in the right conditions.

My first serious camera was a Praktica LTL I bought at a garage sale when I was 13. I even got a couple lenses with it that I can no longer remember which specifically. I got rid of the LTL a couple years later and bought an Pentax ME Super with winder and several lenses. I added a second ME and used them to shoot for the high school yearbook.

I got rid of the those for an FM2 and F100 in college. They got me through PJ school and several years of newspaper work until everything went digital. I still have and use the FM2 but had the F100 stolen when I was living and working in Scotland.

Recently I required a Pentax ME and an MX. It felt like coming home. I had forgotten how great Pentax M cameras are. The Nikon stuff sits in the bag in the closet while the Pentaxs go everywhere with me.

 

[Dpingr1]

Kodak Instamatic 44. Long gone, I 'm afraid. I think it cost me $10 when I was about 10 years old.

 

[emjo]

My first was a Yashica FX-D (the D making it digitally controlled no less!). I have a bunch of cartons of images from it still. Funny, the best shot was one of the first ever taken with it, a shot of my sister in a salvage west. I was excited "THIS is what I want in a camera", then came the long uphill part of getting equally good shots. No, I'm not there yet...🙂

 

[grouchos_tash]

I used my Dad's Chinon until I bought a Yashica 124G (2004) which I used to take pictures of my niece last week 🙂

 

[nickthetasmaniac]

The first I used was a Spotmatic SP F, which was originally given to my mum new for her 21st birthday. We still have it and I'm planning to get it CLA'd soon 🙂

The first I actually owned was an Olympus C5060w. Absolutely loved it but unfortunately it died a cold, watery death...

 

[Beemermark]

Why isn't Kodak listed? I'd guess most of us born before 1970 started with Kodak. Mine was a 127 Brownie. Used it from about age 11 to 19. The I got enough money to buy a real camera (sarcasm) a Topcon Uni 100.

 

[Lou Iaquinto]

Hi All,

My first camera was a used Nikkormat FTn with 50 mm lens, circa 1969. Shared it and a darkroom with my much younger brother! He got me going in the darkroom and I've never really stopped.

Apologies for the stroll down memory lane.

Take care,

Lou