[ChrisPlatt]

My interest and experience is exclusively in film photography, so you may want to stop reading here.

My first adjustable lens camera was a 35mm rangefinder, a Ricoh 500G.

My first SLR was a Canon AE-1; I used Canons for about five years.
I bought a Nikon FM and used Nikons for about fifteen years.

Then about ten years ago I discovered Pentax, starting with a KX.
I now have a slew of Pentax cameras, though I probably use my non-SLR cameras more.

Chris

[RobA_Oz]

Not sure about this "Old timer" thing. Does being an old-timer make you old? Groucho Marx said "A man's only as old as the woman he feels", which is a philosophy I'm not going to argue with. You may call that a sexist remark, but he didn't pretend to speak for women. After all, Mae West had said most of it for her gender, some time before.

While we're talking about cameras, I started with a Pentax S3 (Honeywell H3, I believe for the North Americans among us), secondhand from a fellow who was into Pentaxes, but needing to cull his collection. That was followed by my father's old SV (complete with coupled lightmeter), a SP-F, an ES, an ESII, a K2DMD, a *istD and now a K20D.

Now I look at the SP-F and the K2DMD and wonder if I'll ever use them, or the Minox or the Leica IIIf-RD again. If I do, I'll probably process the film and scan it. Can't see the enlarger ever coming out of the covers again.

Someone mentioned CibaChrome: I had a dabble with that in the 1980s - great stuff, and not as fussy as other colour systems when it came to time and temperatures. I also used the Agfa colour system, which was excellent on skin tones, as all Agfa films were, of course, but which didn't have the sheer visual impact that the CibaChrome prints had (let alone their transparencies).

I guess we're probably operating in a safer personal environment in the digital era, but I can't help wondering whether or not the general environment is better off now, with us using inkjet printers instead of pouring waste photo-chemicals down the drain. The counter argument is that we didn't tend to throw the used equipment out every three years or so, for a start.

[baltochef920]

Not sure about this "Old timer" thing. Does being an old-timer make you old? Groucho Marx said "A man's only as old as the woman he feels", which is a philosophy I'm not going to argue with. You may call that a sexist remark, but he didn't pretend to speak for women. After all, Mae West had said most of it for her gender, some time before.

While we're talking about cameras, I started with a Pentax S3 (Honeywell H3, I believe for the North Americans among us), secondhand from a fellow who was into Pentaxes, but needing to cull his collection. That was followed by my father's old SV (complete with coupled lightmeter), a SP-F, an ES, an ESII, a K2DMD, a *istD and now a K20D.

Now I look at the SP-F and the K2DMD and wonder if I'll ever use them, or the Minox or the Leica IIIf-RD again. If I do, I'll probably process the film and scan it. Can't see the enlarger ever coming out of the covers again.

Someone mentioned CibaChrome: I had a dabble with that in the 1980s - great stuff, and not as fussy as other colour systems when it came to time and temperatures. I also used the Agfa colour system, which was excellent on skin tones, as all Agfa films were, of course, but which didn't have the sheer visual impact that the CibaChrome prints had (let alone their transparencies).

I guess we're probably operating in a safer personal environment in the digital era, but I can't help wondering whether or not the general environment is better off now, with us using inkjet printers instead of pouring waste photo-chemicals down the drain. The counter argument is that we didn't tend to throw the used equipment out every three years or so, for a start.

Roba_Oz

I have studied the film versus digital debate from the perspective of harm to the user / environment quite extensively as a prelude to deciding on whether or not to establish my own wet darkroom at home..

When all factors are taken into consideration, and if the comparison considers the ENTIRETY of ALL wet photographic processes from the very beginnings of photography to the present; then I came to the conclusion that film photography and digital photography are approximately EQUAL to one another in the amount of harm done to the environment..

When one removes from the equation the most toxic wet photographic processes which are seldom practiced any longer, and that when they are practiced are generally heavily regulated as to the disposal of the chemical wastes from those practices; then an entirely different picture emerges..

With the rapid decline in color film processing over the past 15 years, which most people will admit is more toxic than black & white processing, the overall harm to the environment from film processes has drastically decreased..

The picture that emerges is that film is by a fairly large percentage less harmful to the environment than the camera-to-print digital process..

A large factor in the equation is the relative simplicity and longevity of film equipment versus the relative complexity and short lifespans of most digital components..Most digital components have a 5-20 year lifespan, often times with huge amounts of maintenance and upkeep; whereas most film components have lifespans measuring 3-10 decades with relatively little maintenance and upkeep, by comparison..

Digital creates heat pollution (output from all of the various micro processors running on electricity), noise pollution (fans in all of the various computers cooling things off, as well as the noise of the printer heads moving back and forth), air pollution (mainly from the ink jet printers which put a surprisingly HIGH amount of pollutants into the air every time they run), and water pollution (micro chips require a HUGE amount of water during the manufacturing process, and the water tables world wide are being polluted from the decay in landfills of the toxic metals in the various computer chips in all of the many digital photographic components)..

My conclusion??..

Film processes have ALWAYS smelled bad which has NEVER really allowed the relative toxicity of these processes to be very far from anyone's mind; regardless of whether it was the manufacturer, or the end user..

Digital pollutants are mostly hidden in the manufacturing process and when using the various components of a camera-to-print system..The noise pollution is so pervasive in our lives that we seldom take notice of it..No society on earth, with the possible exception of the Japanese, has spent very much time, energy, or money on landfill issues, or manufacturing-to-end user-recycling..

Sorry for hijacking the thread!!!..

For myself, I started out with a Pentax MX in 1977..After a 10 year layoff from photography I acquired a K1000..In 2006 I purchased a K10D..If all goes well, then in 2009 I will finally purchase a 67II and several lenses..Film is where my passion lies, not digital..

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!!

Bruce

[RobA_Oz]

This is a fairly rambling thread anyway, Bruce, so I don't think you've really hijacked anything.

Your comments about the pollution caused by digital processes reflect my own thoughts, though I've never attempted to actually quantify things (my old structural engineering lecturer used to say "put a number on it", which is always a healthy check on vagueness, mythology or ideology).

However, I also think that we're coming to the end of the throw-away era, simply because people in crowded countries are running out of space to throw things into, and there is a growing awareness in less-developed countries that they're being exploited by taking rich people's junk for little gain to them.

Australia and the US are behind the times in the West, simply because we share the common curse of abundant open spaces, but even there it's getting harder to hide the quantity of refuse we generate.

I know that things are not so flash in rapidly-developing places like China, because I've been there, but there's only so much that people will put up with, even in authoritarian countries.

So I'm not so pessimistic about the future impact of digital, even though I agree we could be doing better right now.

Having said all that, this thread has possibly talked me into getting out one of my film cameras, and using up at least those last few rolls of (expired) film I have lurking around in cool, dark places...

Happy New Year to you, too.

Rob

[Curmudgeon]

After reading many of the posts in this forum, I believe I may win the award for the oldest Pentax enthusiast. I started out in photography, around 1950 with a Kodak Brownie Hawkeye box camera. Around 1955, I purchased an Argus C4. Then graduated, around 1958 to a Konica rangefinder camera. Still wish I had that camera because it had a terrific lens. And then, around 1960, I bought a Honeywell/Heiland Pentax M3 that I still have today, but the focal plane shutter is out of sync, according to one camera repair expert who said it would not be worth repairing. Previously, around 1970, I paid another well-known camera repair shop in Chicago to fix it, but after charging me, they did not fix the problem.This forum has led me to Eric the repair specialist to whom I will soon be sending my M3. I have taken hundreds of photos with the M3 and I just love the feel and results I received from the camera. I have been exploring the Web for about two months to find out what DSLR would suit my needs (want to do interior real estate photography). First thought about Nikon and Canon camera, but after finding about the backward lens compatibility of Pentax, for which I can use my 55mm, f1.8 and 135mm, f3.5 Takumar lenses, I am sold on Pentax. Have zeroed in on a K100D Super that is at closeout prices in my area. Still deciding on what wide-angle lens would best meet my needs. This forum is just great and has given me several options for a lens to hang on the K100D.