The Cameras in my Life

We were never a particularly photographic family. We didn’t have albums and albums of family events and from my dad’s time at sea when he visited large swathes of the world. For a while I don’t think there was even a camera in the house.

This changed in 1975. I had large surgery in early July (the week the Americans and Soviets linked up in space) and for being good while in hospital, my parents bought me a 110 point and shoot camera. 12 or 24 shots on a cassette and the flash was a cube with some kind of pyrotechnic material that you plugged into the top and it rotated when you wound the film on. It had no controls apart from the shutter release but I still tried to capture the big events in my life. Somewhere I have blurry photos of my house from the air from a trip in a light aircraft with a friend’s dad who had a pilot’s licence, my dad pulling the face he usually had in front of ‘A’ turret on HMS Belfast, clambering on rocks on The Lizard in cagoules that packed into the chest pocket on a rainy holiday in Cornwall. There are a few of distant specks that were my attempt to capture aircraft at an airshow.

I went away to school and found a range of Time-Life books in the library were full of amazing photojournalism as well as introducing me to Cartier-Bresson, Capa, McCullin and more. I started to see pictures as more than just the snap recording the event. I was lucky, my housemaster was a keen photographer and had a Nikon SLR that he let me have a go with. He taught me to process and print my own images which was like some kind of alchemy. After pestering my parents for what must have been over a year, I got a Zenit E SLR for Christmas. It was a tank of a camera. Fully manual with a built in light meter for calculating exposure I remember being made up with it and shot as much as I could afford to with it. I was never particularly good but I loved it, especially when I saved up and got a longer lens for it. It was clunky and I wasn’t paying much attention to things like composition but was happy when I got results that were in focus and properly exposed. Eventually it suffered a mechanical failure that ripped film to shreds in it and I couldn’t afford to get it fixed.

I left school and got a job and once I’d covered the big expenses like learning to drive and getting my first car, I bought my Olympus OM-10. This felt like my first proper ‘grown-up’ camera and I tried to be a bit more arty with it. I experimented with light trails at night, stalking garden wildlife, portraits of friends and family who’d sit still long enough. I managed to get the airshow shots I’d dreamed of as a kid. As things do, life got in the way and I let the photography slide until I realised that I was just neglecting the camera. I found someone looking to get into photography and gave the camera to them. I had a rugged point and shoot that I used for trips and family events etc that met my needs at the time.

 Then in 2010 I found digital photography and bought my first digital SLR, a Canon EOS 300D. It was very entry level but helped me learn. When I could I upgraded the body and passed that and one of the kit lenses to a family friend who had borrowed it a couple of time and loved using it. I’m not brilliant by any means and definitely not good at landscape or street photography but suspect that’s as much about me not having done it enough to learn what to do or not do. I love shooting people and had some shoots with models where I’m really pleased with the results so I’m getting there slowly.

From the internet I’ve got chatting with people who shoot with film and I bought a film SLR body that fits my digital SLR lenses but due to the last 18 months I’ve not had time to play with yet. It will be interesting having to think through each shot as there are only 24 or 36 shots on a roll. I’ve just bought one of the lenses that came with my Zenit which will be fun to experiment with. Also today, in a complete circle I was offered an OM-10 body so looking forward to the feel of that with what I’ve learned since.

I need to get out there, shoot more, get critique and challenge myself if I want to do photography rather than just being someone with cameras.