The Thursday Ramble: Cameras - would I Leica?

His parents were buying a new Leica. 

It is no secret that I enjoy good cameras. I have owned a long list of them, starting as a teenager - and I keep saying this will be the last one that I buy - and then buying another. Back in the 1970s I started with Canon, my oldest brother bought a Canon FTb in Asia in 1971 or 1972, and my father seized it in exchange for money he had spent bailing Dale out of a couple of tight spots in the preceding couple of years. I don't know as Dale intended that camera to be repayment.  Dad gave me the camera a few years before he died. I gave it back to Dale after Dad died. Closing the circle. 

I used the FTb a fair amount, and bought a couple of lenses for it. When it came time to buy my first good camera, I bought a Konica from a local shop in Florida. It was inferior to the Canon, I was never happy with it. About 18 months later, I sold it to a classmate (who dropped it down a flight of stairs a few days later,) and used my summer working on the farm money, to buy a Canon F1. The F1 at the time, this was the fall of 1975, was the top of the line professional camera in Canon's line up. It was an amazing camera, built out of brass and titanium, it was rugged, reliable, and fast.  I added more lenses. 

A year later I added a couple of medium format cameras to the bag, a Yashica 124G twin lens - a Japanese copy of a Rolleiflex.  And then a Pentax 67. This was a massive single lens reflex camera that produced 2.25 by 2.75 negatives (6 by 7 centimeters.) 

The real workhorse was the F1. It's only drawback was weight, it was very heavy and the high quality glass lenses were very heavy. A decade later I had a few really profitable years, and found a reliable used camera dealer in Maitland Florida.  I added to the collection a Canon AE1 Program with a motor drive, and a couple more lenses. The AE1 went to Europe with me in 1990 and 1991. I was young and fit, and part packmule.  

Sometime in the late 90's I traded all of the Canon gear on a Nikon N65. I had stopped using the Canons because I didn't want to haul around the gear. I still have the Nikon. I haven't used it in 20 years, but I still have it. At the time, the Canons were just a bag of old gear, the F1 was about 20 years old. Cameras had become much lighter and more compact, and also did more. Instead of the motor drive being a half kilo add-on that took a handful of AA batteries, the motor was built in, and driven off of two tiny batteries that lasted for months. If I had held onto the Canons they would be worth more today, but I don't regret trading them on a camera that I actually used, used a lot. 

I have never owned a Leica, I probably never will. They make some of the worlds finest film and digital cameras, but the price is frightening. And I could take better photos with what I have, a better camera won't make me a better photographer. Still they are fun to look at. 

Leica has retail stores in major cities. There is one here in Washington DC, on the recent trip I was in two stores, Milan and Vienna. The stores sell Leica cameras and lenses, and the two I was in also feature coffee bars and small galleries. I love looking at the works of great photographers. And the shops drip with elegance as they should when the prices start in the thousands and go up. I am glad I stopped in. Would I ever own one? If I won the lottery (unlikely as I don't buy tickets) I might, but I would probably buy a Hasselblad and then complain about how heavy and bulky it is. But their top of the line is now 100MP, with amazing lenses.