Originally posted by Arjay Bee Student = no money
Seriously, the instant feedback is the biggest help to learning. I know you said you want film but think about why you want to submit your student to the same slow process as you had to follow when he/she can master their skills so much faster. My student son is now producing better images than me with zero analogue camera experience.
Whenever I hear old people say "
I learnt on a film camera, that had fish-tank glass for a pentaprism with an algae stain as a focusing screen, and you had a handheld meter that took fifteen minutes to get a reading that was only accurate to four stops - and that was with film that had less than 1/4 of a stop latitude - and the only way to wind it was to was to wrap a certain part of your anatomy around the film advance wheel that was edged in razor-sharp spikes and twist. Hard. Four times. And if you were female or Jewish...well...ah, let's just say bad luck.
"Oh, and these cameras were all made from from weapons-grade uranium, so they weighed nearly seventeen pounds. Radiation would fog the film if you didn't shoot it all in six hours - one, if you shot any film faster than 64 ISO. And because of this, there was no chance of teaching your kids photography...because you weren't gonna be having any..."
...I immediately think, yeah, but that's because you had no choice. Naturally, these people think they're good photographers - fair enough - so, ergo, the only way to learn, is
the exact way they learned. Even if that means popping iodine pills every time you raised the camera to your eye.
Methinks that the easier it is to learn something, at the beginning, the more someone's likely to stick with it, which is why I'm willing to bet that there're more photogs around and learning than back then - because it is easier to get into now.
The K1000, for example,
was a good student camera. Not anymore.
You all heard me.
Today, if you're not a collector and if you're looking a camera that can take good pictures in a timely fashion, then it's not for you. As stevebrot said, it's expensive - for what it does. It's become more than what it was ever designed to be, and that's why it's got a slower meter, no Av, and is more expensive than an ME Super.
Most K1000's got for over a hundred AUD. You can pick up a great ME Super for about $50, 'round these parts anyway. So now it's actually cheaper to buy a more advanced camera than the K1000.
Ricoh's are great as well. A KR10M will cost you less than a sixpack of beer. Got a good viewfinder - diagonal split screen and shutter speed indication, plus motor wind. Takes 4 AAs.
The KR-10 Super is the Ricoh equivalent of the ME Super. It's even better in some cases - 1/3 stop EV compensation, and it goes to ISO 3200. And it'd be cheaper.
For digital, you're probably better off finding a K100D Super or such.