When you were at school did your friends have cameras too

In the early 60’s I used my dads Rolleicord V and 4x5 Pacemaker Crown Graphic. When I got to high school I started shooting for the school paper and making money shooting publicity photos for several bands. All of my friends were into photography too and had some nice gear. One had a Yashica TLR and a 2x3 century graphic and another had a Retina and another had a new Rolleiflex. I can’t remember what my two other friends had though.

In my senior year I bought a new SRT-101 with a 50 1.4 and 200 3.5. Great camera.

In college I started shooting for the University news paper which was a 5 day a week publication often with 10 or more pages. I started working as a stringer for AP and UPI and was making enough money to buy 3 Leica M bodies and 7 Leica lenses, visoflex 2 and bellows. I worked my way through college and made enough to apprentice in a commercial studio with no pay for a year and a half.

I wound up as chief photographer in college and my friends all worked as photographers too. One had a similar set of Leicas, another a Nikon S3 and SP with a nice set of glass, another had a Rolleiflex and another an M4 and 35, 50 and 90.

During that time I added a Rolleiflex and 5x7 Deardorff and lenses.
 
I used my dad's Retina IIa that he bought at the army PX in 1951, then as soon as I'd saved up enough money promply bought a used Mamiya C22 which carried me through to college in the early 1990s after which in the pursuit of excessive detail I pretty much entirely switched to 8x10.
 
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This makes for an interesting topic. I started taking photos back in 1971 when I received a Kodak X15 Instamatic for my 9th birthday (I've kept this camera all these years for sentimental reasons). Eventually I purchased my first serious camera, a Hanimex Praktica LTL 35mm SLR which I found being sold at a good discount as part of a scratch 'n dent sale. I stuck with the Praktica for a couple of years while saving for my dream camera at the time, Minolta's XD11. I managed to buy an XD11 in 1978 when I found a store demo model being sold at a significant discount. (Like the X15, I've also hung on to my XD11 despite it no longer being usable.)

By the time that I started using 35mm SLR's, my family had moved to a very small town in rural Illinois (with a population of 1,400). The high school that I attended was shared by a number of towns in the area, but it was still very small (around 400 students in total — I believe that my class had exactly 100 students). As such there were not too many others involved in photography. The XD11 was the camera that I used when I joined my high school's newspaper staff (most of us were also involved in putting together the school's yearbook). My friend Jeff and I shot the vast majority of the candid photos used in our yearbook. Jeff owned a Pentax ME. However, Jeff's real interest was in making movies (which he began doing around the time I was first taking photos). Though I eventually lost touch with Jeff, I do know that he went on to achieve a good deal of success with his film making. Meanwhile, I plod along taking photographs far less often than I should.

While I can't recall any of the details of the equipment involved, our high school did have a small darkroom. It was built in a space that consumed the front corner of the chemistry lab/classroom. Jeff and I would use the darkroom during the time allotted for our media class or during our study hall slots if we wished. To get to the darkroom we had to first enter the chemistry lab. While we would do our best to not disturb the class, we ultimately did have to slip through a door just a few feet from where our chemistry would typically stand while teaching to enter and exit the darkroom. It was rather comical in hindsight. Thanks to my high school darkroom experience I was able to land a job as a darkroom tech while I was in college. Sadly, I haven't spent time in a darkroom since my college years. At least I have my memories, or what's left of them that is.
 
I bought my first camera when I started my engineering studies in 1972, it was a used Nikkormat FTN with a Nikkor-S 1.4/50. Apart from me there was one active shooter and we had the school's darkroom all to ourselves. I cannot remember what camera he had, but it was an SLR with a normal lens. But I do have a pictureof him in action.

School01.jpg
 
I got a Pentax K1000 for my high school graduation. Prior to that, I had little Kodak 110 and 126 point and shoots that were family cameras. I quickly moved to Nikon and then to Leica and many others after that. A friend of mine had a Minolta X-700 and another had a Nikkormatt from his dad. None of them really used them though...
 
shawn said:
In school I started off with a SRT-101 and then later on a N2000 for the aperture priority. Most of my friends were in the photography club and we spent much of high school in the darkroom thanks to our advisor writing passes for us to get out of study hall.

One had a F3 (and a follow focus Novoflex rig), another had a Topcon, an AE1 program and then a couple of other model SLRs I can't recall.. think they were Nikons although maybe another Minolta SRT in there too. At one point someone donated a Pentax 6x7 with the 105mm to the school and it ended up as part of the darkroom equipment. We were all astounded at that thing.

Darkroom has two 35mm Omega's and a much larger Bessler. Don't recall the model but it would handle MF, had a crank on the side to raise/lower it and it could pivot 90 degrees to project on the wall.

I can still smell the fixer......
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Thanks for your reply, a friend with an F3, this would have put them into legendary status at my school.
 
nikon_sam said:
Not really...you had to be a Sophomore in high school to take the Photography class (1975).
The class had a bunch of Kodak 126 Instamatic cameras one could borrow. If you were good enough you might be able to checkout one of the two or three Minoltas bodies they had too.
I do remember a Senior Teacher's Aide having a Nikon F2, my parents bought me my first real camera (Vivitar 400SL) so I used that my Junior/Senior years...my good buddy Brett H. had a Vivitar 250SL and another classmate had something, might have been a Nikon...not a lot of students had their own SLRs...
Darkroom wise most enlargers were Vivitars, there was one Omega (for MF) and a Beseler 4x5...

After high school I bought my own first cameras...Two black body Pentax MXs...I still have those bodies along with the owner's manuals and the booklets showing all the different lenses and accessories...
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I love MX especially the black variant, and pocketable to if you match a body with the SMC M 40/2.8
 
Pál_K said:
Nobody had cameras in the lower grades below university level. Nobody.

At 12 years old in the early 1960’s I was unique in having saved enough money to buy a simple 8mm ciné camera. I also used simple 127-format cameras. There were no photography activities at school.

I knew of no kids or even adults interested in photography - the exception being my grandmother’s neighbor: a lady who subscribed to photography magazines and would give some to me - I still have them!
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Have you still got your 8mm footage?
 
p.giannakis said:
None of my friends had any cameras. My cousin had a zenit 122 and I had a Praktica. Later on, at year 12, some other kids had some free focus p&s compacts.
Somewhere in the early 90s my brother came for holidays from the UK where he was studying and brought a OM-10 with the manual adapter. Brought some slides also he took in the Lakes District - I was fascinated. That's where my fascination with the OM system started.
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Way back I always wanted an OM10 especially with the manual adapter, great little camera and the glass dont get me started!
 
ddutchison2 said:
When I first walked into high school, I discovered they had a fully equipped student darkroom that wasn't being used by anyone. I promptly took it over for the duration as no one else was interested in running it. All were welcome to use the darkroom, but of the 1500 students at that school, only 3-4 seemed to have any long term interest in photography.

This was the '70s, Mid-range Canon SLR's and Spotmatics were the main cameras kids might have (Nikkormats were more expensive, and Nikon's prohibitively so), one of my friends had a Braun Paxette, . I started out with a fixed-lens RF, but eventually raised enough to buy a Pentax Sv. The School also had a late model Rolliecord which I checked out every September and returned every June.
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what fixed lens RF did you use, I am a big fan of the Oly 35RC
 
Tim Murphy said:
Dear lxmike,

When I was in junior high circa 1974 my friend Pete got an Exakta RTL1000 as a birthday gift. I thought it was cool, almost as cool as my grandfather's Nikon FTN in a weird sort of way.

I got by with an Kodak Instamatic and a Polaroid 600 camera I won by selling more Philadelphia Bulletin newspaper subscriptions than any of the other paperboys in my region. But for Christmas one year my mom and dad saw how much I loved to take bad pictures got me a pretty darn good camera. I became the Murphy family photographer because I got a brand new Canonet 28 and Canolite D that served me well until I went away to college.

I wish I still had that camera!

Regards,

Tim Murphy :)
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Exaktas are beautiful cameras to loo at, never actually owned or used one.
 
ddutchison2 said:
When I first walked into high school, I discovered they had a fully equipped student darkroom that wasn't being used by anyone. I promptly took it over for the duration as no one else was interested in running it. All were welcome to use the darkroom, but of the 1500 students at that school, only 3-4 seemed to have any long term interest in photography.

This was the '70s, Mid-range Canon SLR's and Spotmatics were the main cameras kids might have (Nikkormats were more expensive, and Nikon's prohibitively so), one of my friends had a Braun Paxette, . I started out with a fixed-lens RF, but eventually raised enough to buy a Pentax Sv. The School also had a late model Rolliecord which I checked out every September and returned every June.
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My art teacher had a Rolleicord too
 
wlewisiii said:
I don't remember the kids owning any, but my high school had a pile of Nikon F & F2's that students in various classes could use. I graduated in 1982. In that same time frame my mother upgraded to a Canon AE-1 from her Instamatic and took classes as part of her course work at the University. I bought my first camera - an AE-1 Program w/the 50/1.8 - from the PX in Germany in 1983. I made the mistake of later selling it for a Rebel XS with a s**t kit zoom that only succeeded in convincing me I needed a real camera and that set me on a thashing course that slowly led me to where I am now with my D7100 & Leica M 240.
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The venerable AE-1, a local lad called Barry used to have two and used them to photograph locomotives, I wonder if he still does today, that was forty year ago I feel old.
 
Tim Murphy said:
Dear lxmike,

When I was in junior high circa 1974 my friend Pete got an Exakta RTL1000 as a birthday gift. I thought it was cool, almost as cool as my grandfather's Nikon FTN in a weird sort of way.

I got by with an Kodak Instamatic and a Polaroid 600 camera I won by selling more Philadelphia Bulletin newspaper subscriptions than any of the other paperboys in my region. But for Christmas one year my mom and dad saw how much I loved to take bad pictures got me a pretty darn good camera. I became the Murphy family photographer because I got a brand new Canonet 28 and Canolite D that served me well until I went away to college.

I wish I still had that camera!

Regards,

Tim Murphy :)
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How did you find using the Canonet 28?
 
Canyongazer said:
None until I went to Brooks Institute of Photography. There it was 4x5 view cameras which we all had.
Later, while working on an MA in graduate school it was all SLRs, Nikon F, Canon FT, Pentax Spotmatics and Minolta 101
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4x5 a format that has so far avoided me, would love to dip my toes in larger formats.
 
In elementary school I had a series of 126 and 110 Instamatic-type "PHD" cameras.

My first adjustable lens camera was a Ricoh 500G 35mm RF camera in high school.
I took a shop class in photography. IIRC I was the only one with a "good" camera.

At graduation in 1978 IIRC I was the only one with a 35mm SLR, a Canon AE-1.
Later I tried a Canon A-1. I really disliked it and so abandoned the Canons.

In college I used Nikon FTn Photomic and FM cameras with MD-11 motor drive.
An Anthropology class in Ethnographic Photography was most memorable.
This was the first time I was with classmates who were also photographers.

Chris
 
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