Is a film camera just a tool, or something more?

Wow, your blog has come a very long way from when I looked last. I should look at it more often.

I used to be caught up in the whole " I need a better camera, I need a better lens"train of thought. These days I have settled on really 4 cameras and just a few lenses.

The Fuji X-Pro 1 because the spot metering is pretty accurate. I like to wave the metering spot around the frame and look at the readings before I set the shutter, ISO and aperture. Also because I like using the OVF because you don't necessarily get what you expect. I like to line up the composition to what I think I will like. Often I find that the actual frame has something different that I probably would not have thought of. Sometimes not good, but I can always crop but other times something good, and better than what I was aiming for. The spot metering on my old D7000 was useless to me as it usually indicated overexposure way before it was actually going to occur. I use the 35mm and 27mm lenses with the Fuji because they allow me to get in the frame what I want. That's it.

The Sony RX-100 because it is easy to use manually in the same was as described above and it is small so I can pack it easily when I travel. I always take it away with me. The lens is pretty bloody good too. The spot metering is bang on too and I always can tell when the onset of clipping is going to happen and where.

The Fuji GS645S which I love using in dark conditions as I prefer working on scanned negatives when the subjects are underexposed. plus being a rangefinder it has a similar viewfinder to the X-Pro 1. It is light and easy to carry too. If I could find the same with a spot meter that would be great!

A Nikon FE with a 50m 1.4 lens but this is just to use up my remaining stocks of 35mm film. Once they are gone I will probably just stick to MF with the Fuji.

One thing I get from all of these camera is that I don't feel that they are in my way when I use them. I can just decide what I want, change the settings and use.
 
Cheers Paul, yeah it's going quite well really. But of self indulgence really ...

Have you read my Leica M7 review. It sounds as though we use cameras similarly. You would like the m7.
Another great camera with a spot meter is the minolta tc1... Still writing that review though :)
 
Hamish, I had a quick glance only with a view to reading it all later. But whether a camera is film or digital, old or new, (and I use both) I do find them to be the tools. The more important tools lie elsewhere;).
Looking forward to reading the full article this evening when I won't be so busy.
 
Have just read your very indepth and interesting article Hamish and there is nothing there that I could really disagree with.
My response to your initial question remains the same. Simply put, I see my cameras as I do my car; the car to get me from A to B (and hopefully C sometimes) the camera to record as acurately as possible the image I see in the viewfinder. What lies beneath the bonnet of both does not particularly interest me;).
In your article I think you answered your own question to a fair extent, that ultimately the camera is the tool to record (or steal if you like) the image that that has been captured by the eye and the heart.
At the moment I am enjoying the film tool far more than the digital one.
 
Come to think of it whenever I have heard or read the words of a gearhead raving about one camera or another it tends to be things like "56 AF points instead of 39" or "0.02% barrel distortion and I just can't live with that 0.25 of a stop drop off in the corners", blah, blah.

When I have listened to professional photographers they say things like "my D4 is great because I get a high hit rate of shots for wedding clients when I don't really have time to think about stuff" They seem to be more interested in what allows them to get the result they want under the circumstances they have to work in.

It does make me wonder how much of SLR and accessories marketing is really for non professionals (probably most of it) and for the pro's the marketing tool is really the manufacturers service and support networks.
 
Enjoyed the essay, H. Must say I agree with your thesis. The camera is more than a mere tool, just as a car is more than a mere conveyance. (No disrespect to @Tom Dunne's point of view, which I understand totally and appreciate.) I love my XA which seldom gets left home. I love my F1. I love my Oly OM-2n. I have other cameras that I do not love so much. My Canon 7d, for example, is a mere tool. It is just a computer with a hole in the front. I get little (almost zero) satisfaction from its wonderful programmable picture taking attributes. But hand me over my Mamiya C33 or my Yashica 635 or one of my Holgas and my heart goes all aflutter, despite light leaks and other, sometimes exasperating proclivities. Its not just about film vs digital cameras either. I have a number of film cameras,...SLRs of one variety or another that I have acquired over the years,...that are perfectly capable picture takers but do nothing for me. But, yes, with some cameras there is an attraction, albeit arguably illogical, inexplicable, and sometimes silly. (What does that sound like?:rolleyes:)
 
Brian and his mamiya c33 up a tree, ki.......

;)

I'm with you all the way Brian! - Not up the tree with a mamiya, I prefer my m7 - on the opinion I mean ... ;)

Do you, see you relationship with certain cameras as completely rational, and more positive because they just function better in your hands? @Tom Dunne

Just interested in the rational point of view I suppose...

@Paul Lange ... There is more to this conversation in a follow up I'm writing about automation vs manual cameras ... I actually mention my d3 ... So I'll poke you with that when it's up re. a reply
 
Hamish Gill said:
Do you, see you relationship with certain cameras as completely rational, and more positive because they just function better in your hands? @Tom Dunne

Just interested in the rational point of view I suppose...
Click to expand...
Hamish, I like my cameras, some more than others, how they sit in my hands etc how comfortable they feel, how successful they are at doing what I hope they will do. I obviously don't have the emotional attachment to them that you seem to have. Hopefully I will have an emotional attachment to the images any of them might produce.
Loving my camera, for whatever reason, does not detract from the fact that it remains my tool for the job and not something else. If you consider this to be irrational, then fair enough;).
 
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Loved the article and am really enjoying this discussion (and the one we had last night in the bar). I do know what you mean and, like Brian, I have more attachment to certain cameras than others. The analogy I see is with say, a cabinet maker, who has certain chisels that sit just right in the hand and, for some reason or another, result in cleaner cuts and better joints. Certain cameras (my M9 and MP for example) just feel right and I barely notice them if that makes sense.
 
Pete Askew said:
Loved the article and am really enjoying this discussion (and the one we had last night in the bar). I do know what you mean and, like Brian, I have more attachment to certain cameras than others. The analogy I see is with say, a cabinet maker, who has certain chisels that sit just right in the hand and, for some reason or another, result in cleaner cuts and better joints. Certain cameras (my M9 and MP for example) just feel right and I barely notice them if that makes sense.
Click to expand...
Bar...?
 
After having read your blog Hamish, I can truly say as you and more so as Tom. The camera is a tool!
But, there are butts and there are butts. Some bigger, some smaller and some very cute and some tools are liked more than others. That’s life and as people, cameras are different and different to each and every one and should be respected as such.

Now I have always looked for, since digital came about, a camera that would operate as my old Nikon FM2n. Measure the light, remember this was slide film time, set the aperture and shutter accordingly and shoot. It was a nice feeling and my Fuji X-E1 brought back that feeling. And here I am at feelings, emotions and the love of what I was doing when doing it. Now whether there is analog or digital, to me anyway, is irrelevant. Whether it is this brand or another is also irrelevant. It’s seeing, composing, measuring light, all there in the back of my spine that’s done, hopefully in a flash of a moment that makes me go on the way I do. Sometimes the outcome of it, the image, is not that important. These moments relieve me of all but the share moment of joy I have while doing it. So in that respect I must be in tune with my tool, which it is. So I like my two Fuji X-E1 very much, each with a 18mm and a 35mm in that format. Now I would not say that my Fujis do not lack anything. They do, but insignificantly so. Then why do I go and buy a Pentax K30, for those who know what that is. Well a tricky question and after having used it already for a week, I must say I’ve come to like it very much. I’m only looking for a 70mm/2,4 pancake for it now and I am settled.

You see, it gives me confidence in bad weather situations as good ones. In other words it can take rain. The viewfinder is crystal clear and large and the camera is a tiny bit bigger than the Fuji and feels very good in my delicate hands. These three are now my working tools. So simply put, they are tools and some people have more feelings towards their cameras than others, as we all are different. I do believe though, that so-called professionals that do not have any relationship with their tools shall not make any better pictures than the so-called amateur who has a great relationship with what she/he does and her/his cameras.
It's the love of photography that really shines through, but the love is greater when you feel that you have a great tool.:D
 
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