lburriss

Late 1960’s, Journalism at The Ohio State University. Paul Peterson was the photo instructor, who stressed that the most important thing in the world was the TPN – Technically Perfect Negative. Started class on a Speed Graphic then quickly moved to a Nikkormat. Also did darkroom work.

Graduated in 1972 (AFROTC) and went on active duty at Dyess AFB, Texas. The office had a Canon FTb I could use on weekends, so I bought my own (replacing my Kodak Brownie) plus a couple of lenses. Been using Canon ever since.

Since I have you “on the line” so to speak, I’ve been trying to locate the two photo books we used in class. One was about 6x9 inches, dark red hard cover, mostly text, but I seem to remember a sequence of football pix showing a football player deliberately slugging an opponent. The second was oversize, maybe 9x11, blue hardcover, mostly photographs. I remember a color photo center section. Any ideas?

RodeoMan Loc: St Joseph, Missouri

Good Luck with finding those books.

skatz

[quote=lburriss]"…One was about 6x9 inches, dark red hard cover, mostly text, but I seem to remember a sequence of football pix showing a football player deliberately slugging an opponent."

I have a 6 x 9 dark red photo book: "Manual of Photography (formerly The Ilford manual of Photography)" ed. Alan Horder, Amphoto 1972. But no photos of football player, or anything else inside.

Paul Moshay Loc: Los Angeles, CA

Yes, Artcameraman, Stay vertical, Keep breathing in and out, after that, all is easy!

Harry02 Loc: Gardena, CA

Freakin kidz! 1977 I was already married, 3 kids and a journeyman boilermaker.
Was in the early 1960s. Family stuff. I had relatives from WW2 and Korea.
Economy changed and everyone started moving to other pastures.
I was interested in the old photos, and during a move I was given a bring back Nettar.
Fugly little folder, fit in a pocket, shot wonderful pictures. Still got it- somewhere.
My whole incentive was memories. Still is.
Bring out some 20 year old photos and watch the oohs and ahhs of remembrances.
Especially of weddings. Showing THOSE pics to THEIR kids- with stories- can be a real blast.
AND 20 years later some folk are gone. More stories develop.
ALAS with the digital age nobody prints. Everything is on disposable phones.
There are no more pictures to pass around. No more letters to re read.
An ephemeral history.

Delderby Loc: Derby UK

Some of us still print - I have home-made ten-page 6x4 photobooks, A4 framed on walls and a couple of 20x16s.

Artcameraman Loc: Springfield NH

No time to rest but there'll be plenty of time for that. Cheers.

paulrnzpn Loc: New Zealand

People often ask me this question.

I can't really give a precise answer though.
I have always been interested in photography, but I never had the money or the gear in the old days, so my crap little 110 pocket film camera that my parents gave me for Xmas when I was about 10 years old was all I had for a long time, and I didn't put very many rolls of film through it.

Then in the '90s my (yet to be) wife did a night school course and she bought a Pentax manual 35mm film SLR. So that aroused my interest once again. She bought a cable release, and then I bought her a tripod for Xmas. Then on holiday I wanted to have a go with her gear to do my first-ever long exposure. My wife guided me a bit, and we manually counted the shutter speed's seconds - we opted for 10 seconds. Once the film came back developed from the print shop I was very delighted that my long exposure came out beautifully. One of these days I will look for that print and scan it.

Moving on, digital was coming, but we'd just purchased a lovely new Nikon 35mm SLR. That was early 2000s I think. We only ever put 2 or 3 rolls of film through it, or maybe a few more than that probably.
The early digital was rubbish to start with - in a shop they had a compact 2MP camera costing a whopping $1,800 (pre any DSLR) and they showed me a print sample and it was rubbish. So I waited, and then a while later I had access to a very good (for its day) 5MP Sony from my work. I learned a lot with that camera.
After I was made redundant from that job and no longer had the use of the Sony, when found a new job that is when I got even more serious - mainly due to improving financial circumstances - and I bought my own first DSLR camera: a Canon 600D. Now it's November 2023 and I still use the 600D sometimes, but I mostly use my Canon 5D Mark 4 these days.

SteveW8703 Loc: Las Vegas, Nv

That's awesome. I started on film shooting B&W

Paul Moshay Loc: Los Angeles, CA

The best way to really learn how to do photography.

Deviantfotografer Loc: Sacramento, California (USA)

Hi there,
I was about 18 when I came across a MIRANDA EE, and it was just an old copy of a nikon..and ya know it was all metal and heavy..I shot with that for 2 years..it broke..... then I bought a Canon T Something.... film camera, new..... my first digital was a P&S kodak dx4530... then I bought a Canon t3i digital slr... from there I ended up with a Canon D50 with many lenses, which i am always buying, love it, looking to upgrade soon.... I fell in love with photography, and have had many cameras, dslr/PS cameras..... and I really fell in love with digital, i mean you can just shoot and print with digital photography, and that's all I Shoot now..... however I would love to have a b&w wet lab for a film camera...... I ended up with my photography degree in 2010.. and have been working in the field for over 20 years, with and without a degree... eh >
It worked.... and wouldnt change a thing!!!!!!!
Take care all and have a great winter holiday too!

www.jarrodcampbell.com

DavidPine Loc: Fredericksburg, TX

I started in the service in 1960. I was very young and couldn't drink and Special Services had a develop your own black & white film for free so I bought a Petri 2.8 and had a blast. Still enjoy photography and I have a large studio behind my home loaded with stuff I had to have.

neillaubenthal

1973 in college at University of Miami. Started with a Canon TLb then upgraded to an F1 and EF with a variety of inexpensive third party lenses outside of the kit 50/1.8. Mostly used a Sigma (or Tamron maybe, can't remember) 200 and a fixed F8 500mm mirror lens on one of those shoulder stock mounts. After college I almost exclusively used the F1 until it broke on a choir trip to Italy with my wife and son on 1990 or 1991 IIRC…luckily I had one of those early Nikon digitals…Coolpix 900 I think. Upgraded from that to an early Olympus then went Nikon with a D7000 (then D7100 and D7500) before moving to the Z7II about 3-4 years back. Then the Z9 about 6 months after release and added the Z8 when it was released.

OldIkon Loc: Indiana, USA

When: Early '70's. Where: Indianapolis and Muncie, Indiana. How:
My story is more about cameras than photography. I have collected some cameras and I am captivated by the mechanics of the pre-electronic cameras. I enjoy taking photographs and have tried at different times during my life to take the best pictures I could with the equipment I had. I enjoy recording the events and little things in my life. I'm also an architect, so there are quite a few landscapes, sites, buildings, and building parts in my collection.

I received my dad's Argus Argoflex E twin lens reflex as a confirmation gift the summer of 1972. I had done some "picture taking" with family Kodak Instamatics up until then. That year I also had a graphic arts class where I learned black & white developing and printing - which I continued to do through college. I didn't have the financial resources to regularly use the camera until my Senior year in high school. That year i found and purchase a complete Kodak Retina IIIC kit, with auxiliary lenses, finder, filters - the works. A beautiful camera that cemented my love for folding cameras of all types, but particularly the Retinas. Foolish teenager I was, I left my bag with the Retina in a restroom and its was gone forever. A few years earlier I advised my mom to purchase a Canon EF (I was longing for an F-1). I used that camera extensively when I was with her and it is now in my collection.

The replacement for my Retina was a Zeiss Super Ikonta A 530, c. 1937, 6x4.5 cm, 120 roll film folding rangefinder camera. I continued to use that camera up until starting digital photography 25 years later. I could still use it today if I wanted. It's a brilliant piece of technological art that can fit in a pocket. The lens is sharp and the rangefinder remarkably precise.

The summer before starting college in 1977 I purchased my real dream - an Indianapolis 500 Canon F-1 body. I was living in Indy and the local camera stores would sell equipment provided by Canon to professional photographers for the 500. I couldn't afford a lens, so at the start of college I borrowed my mother's FD 28/2.8 she got with her EF. I was starting architecture school and the 28 was a better choice than her 50mm. That became my most used combination. Photography classes helped me improve from a decent amateur to a better amateur. I had that body until I sold it to get married two years later.

While in college I found another of my dream cameras, an Olympus Pen FT, and purchased it. Since it doubled my shots per roll, it was my day to day camera until I transitioned from film to digital point-and-shoots in the early 2000's. An OM lens mount adapter allowed me to purchase additional non-PEN lenses. A 28-70-ish zoom was generally on the camera for everyday use.

A Fuji FinepPix S700 was my first "good" digital camera. After thousands of pictures and two bounces off the ground its image quality was surpassed by my second iPhone. For convenience and value, my phones have been the camera of choice. I have a Nikon Coolpix i use when I know I need the telephoto range, but it's image quality is lower than the current phones.

I don't know who will get my collection when I'm gone. My son picked up some interest in photography, but it lost out to his becoming a very dedicated chef. His wife has been a professional photographer for a while. But the cameras I love aren't of any interest to anyone I know. I don't have the same thrill from modern equipment that I get from a 1930's folder or 1960's SLR and lenses.

Dbrow411 Loc: South Daytona, FL

I first started on the photography field when I graduated trom the Daytona Beach Community College's Southeast Center for Photographic Studies in 1983. I went on to a job for a commercial studio in Tampa for almost 10 years. At that point, I decided to switch careers and went back to school for CAD Drafting and Design. After almost 25 years, I finally got the old calling that never really left. I now have the means to buy equipment and restart that passion. The future will tell where this will lead.