May 23, 2013
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Remembering how it was…
I honestly can’t remember the last time I saw someone taking a photograph with a real camera. I have to admit that I too use my camera phone for fun pictures. Please don’t write me and tell me you have a “real” camera. I know they are out there somewhere. But where?
My mom is 81. She recently got a smart phone under much protest. Yesterday, she whips her phone out and starts to take pictures of my granddaughter (her great granddaughter). “This one’s going on Facebook!”, she says. It took about 3 months and she is now on Facebook, texting, sending voice texts, taking phone pictures and surfing the web!
About 20 years ago, I started collecting old cameras. I am not much of a flea market person. But, every once in a great while, I will venture out and re-acquaint myself with the finer styles of vintage wares. I see lots of cameras thrown in piles, sitting on tables and in general, looking sad. It’s a shame that we couldn’t find a way to determine how many pictures took in the past. How many holiday parties, first birthdays, vacations and in general… just life. Now, sitting lonely on a flea market table, a camera sits with various other items that are no longer needed. Most likely, it is a little beat up from re-appearing at the same flea market week after week. No one even stops and looks at it. It just watches other people go by talking on their cell phones. Sad…… Why? Because an era of saving for a camera is over. The importance of recording an event, printing it out so that decades later, a faded yellow print sits in an album under the sofa.
I kinda feel sad for some of these cameras. Collecting them has been a small passion of mine for some time. Only the ones that are older and in good shape. I am attaching one I found about 5 years ago. Seeing it still had the flash “bulb”, I grabbed it up immediately. “Ten Bucks!”, the man who looked like a sea captain said. I didn’t argue.
This particular camera is a Brownie Reflex 20. It used roll film and was introduced in April 1959. The picture size was a square 2 ¼ x 2 ¼ . The shutter speed was 1/40th second! Brand new, the camera retailed for $17. In 1959, the hourly minimum wage was $1.00. A gallon of gas was .25 cents. A postage stamp was .04 cents.
The earliest I can recall as a little girl was a camera like this one that required round flash bulbs. I can’t remember the brand, but I do remember my parents complaining about the flash bulbs. Then we moved on to the Kodak Instamatic camera (born 50 years ago!). The film was a cartridge and the flash was now a cube. There were four flashes to a cube. My parents were finally in heaven. However, rumor had it that if one of the flashes didn’t flash, you could pull it off the camera, lick (yes lick) the bottom of the flash with your tongue to moisten the connection and try once more. I have fond memories of my mother screaming at my father to “try licking the flash cube will ya” to get it to work! (There was never any hard evidence that this worked… only rumor.)
Shortly there after they were hooked on the latest and greatest pictures… The Polaroid! Instant photo gratification took my parents to a new level of “Get together with your brother..NOW!”
So, to see my mom whip out her cell phone, I thought a few words about vintage cameras was appropriate this week. I remember the past so vividly regarding various camera types. I studied the great photography masters in college that most newbee photographers never heard of.
It is nice to see the strides we have made in camera developments. But it is especially nice to know where we have been. Now, get your brother and get over here for a photo…. NOW!
DonnaQuestions? Send me an email @ lerephoto@gmail.com, or follow the madness on Twitter @donnalerephoto. Lastly, find more information on my studio web page @ www.lerephoto.com. 457 Woodbourne Road, Langhorne, PA 19047
