Collections
I collect cameras. I have done so for a long time, and I love to take pictures with the ones that work as well as just look at the ones too old to use. It’s an easy thing to collect, because with the advent of digital, cameras that were once the exclusive area of the very wealthy can be had very inexpensively.
Case in point, I just recently acquired a Contaflex. Now, not too many people in north american even know what a contaflex is, most people are familiar with Canon, Nikon, the other Japanese makers. Contaflex was a postwar company that made cameras far and away more complex and sophisticated, for their time, than anything from any other manufacturer. And they had Carl Zeiss lenses. For those of you in Rio Lindo, Carl Zeiss practically invented light. I mean, the finest lenses in the WORLD. Shit, Hasselblad has zeiss even this day. In 1957, when this Contaflex was shipped from Deuitschland, it cost as much as a good used car. Today, it’s bloody difficult to give one away.
So for a couple hundred dollars I have a collection of cameras that once would have cost a kings ransom. And I’m accumulating more all the time. Oh, a few hold their value, like blads, and leicas, and of course there will always be a market for a good Nikon F, but for the most part, the very fine cameras of the last two generations are now nearly worthless. Because of their cost, people took exquisite care of these cameras as well. It’s as if you could go buy a perfecly preserved 1957 Thunderbird for $400. Amazing the things of great value that just become worthless. Like ten year old computers- the difference being, a vintage Argus C3, or Bell & Howell 16mm movie camera, will still work perfectly at it’s chosen task, while a ten year old computer is worthless.
What do you collect?
Dust, mostly. (Not on me, for which the ‘Mate is thankful). Dang, but that’s hard to keep up with.
Something hubby’s also thankful for is that I no longer collect baskets (Longaberger, Henn Workshops) or pottery; just consumables, like candles, but not so much anymore. We still have plenty. Years ago I sold them and was known as the “Candle Lady”. Never burned down the house, knock wood… er… steel.
People just need to practice “safe burning”, dogonnit! Trim those wicks! Put those votives in a proper container! (They liquefy, people!) And have you hugged your pillar today? http://www.partylite.com/detail/lang_au/page_care/sectname_products/subsect_care/detail_candlecare.htm
[The preceding announcement was brought to you by a slightly off-balanced blonde. (Umm.. Is that redundant?)]
%-)
Cameras are a great collectable and as you said, they come cheap these days. Unfortunately all I’ve been able to collect recently is pounds.
It’s sort of a little snapshot of the soul, you know, seeing what people value, what they hold dear, the things they collect.
For me, the lure is musical instruments and old sheet music. I haven’t added to the collection in a while — time and access and money all being tight — but for years I haunted music stores and sales of all kind, just looking for neat old stuff, most of which I found and is now in crumbling piles in boxes all over my house.
I also have a nice little pile of instruments, some of which would probably do best service mounted on the wall at the Bennigans, but what the heck, I enjoy them.
One of these days I’ll get the music organized. And more of it played. I’ve been able to help other people with musical projects of all kinds, mostly because whatever they asked for, by god, I had it. I find that very cool. And the work itself is beautiful; nobody engraves like that any more and the cover art is often amazing.
I don’t have to search quite so hard these days. A lot of sheet music (in the public domain) is online now. (See http://www.music.indiana.edu/music_resources/musiclib2.html for a list of resources across the country; fascinating reading for any musical geek with access to a web browser and a printer.) Only the fact that there are only 24 hours in a day keeps me from looking for more stuff. ‘Tis what obsessions are made of, and isn’t that what collecting is all about?
Jenny
your humble TubaDiva
I collect bolt action military rifles.
And camp stoves, you know, the little ones. Primus, Optimus, Svea, Phoebus. So far about 60 of each. It’s really cool being able to use an item made to be sold for less than half a day’s wage 70 or 80 years ago which still works perfectly today. How many $130.00 packstoves will be in perfect working order in ten years, to say nothing of 80? I have a Primus 71 camp stove purchased in 1953 for less than $5.00. It has one moving part, the regulating valve. I retired it in 1986 in favor of an MSR Whisperlite that cost over $80.00. It has half a dozen moving parts and a spares kit that came with the stove new. That should have clued me in to what was coming. Take a wild guess which non functioning 19 yr old stove now gathers dust on a shelf in the garage and which 52 yr. old stove goes camping, hunting and fishing with me?
Go ahead, guess. I’m waiting……….
Had a C3 with a telephoto lens for it. damn thing did every thhing I ever asked it to do until I replaced it with a Ricoh 401TLS…
I still have my very first C3. As well as ten or twelve others. You can often find c3’s for under ten bucks at flea markets, there were 13 models in all, and my goal is to have one of each.
Old motorcycles. And receipts for parts to repair old motorcycles.