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35mm cameras in the USA in 1955
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 10:46 am    Post subject: 35mm cameras in the USA in 1955 Reply with quote
From a September 1955 issue of Modern Photography, a survey of 35mm cameras by price range (this tells us something about the market segments at the time)... starts off with low priced view finder cameras, goes to the mid market, and then the high price segment. Finishes off with all the SLRs in one batch - SLR prices are all over the place, but I suppose at the time they were a specialist segment of their own.


35mm Survey Modern Photography Sept 1955 1 by Nesster, on Flickr
Huge:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nesster/5351133575/sizes/o/in/photostream/


35mm Survey Modern Photography Sept 1955 2 by Nesster, on Flickr
Huge:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nesster/5351746632/sizes/o/in/photostream/


35mm Survey Modern Photography Sept 1955 3 by Nesster, on Flickr
Huge:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nesster/5351133653/sizes/o/in/photostream/


PostPosted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 1:39 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Awesome...thanks for posting this.Those Soligors look really cool,and there are some brands I have never heard of.


PostPosted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 3:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
A trip down nostalgia lane......


PostPosted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 4:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
The days when it took a week's wages to buy a basic camera and a month's to buy a more advanced one.


PostPosted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 5:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
PaulC wrote:
The days when it took a week's wages to buy a basic camera and a month's to buy a more advanced one.


And history is repeating itself when it comes to DSLRs.


PostPosted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 8:07 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
See how the same Pentacon camera was sold under different brands at different prices, by different distributors.


PostPosted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 9:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Love it -- thanks for posting!

Mr Butkus has some vintage Sears and other camera catalogs on his site:
http://www.butkus.org/chinon/catalogs_photo.htm




PostPosted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 10:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
The tower press camera seems to have a remarkable resemblance to a Speed Graphic press camera ...


PostPosted: Thu Jan 13, 2011 10:48 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
I want them all Laughing


PostPosted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 9:21 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
I want one of them there rectaflex motors with shoulder stock and trigger... Very Happy

Great stuff, thanks for posting.

K.


PostPosted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 10:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Excellent!

Nesster, do you allow me to link to this catalog from another (dutch) site?

Thanks in advance Smile


PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 1:06 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Please do - and I post them with a 'share alike' license so as long as you mention where I posted them, you're free to repost all you want - the goal here is to transmit the past Smile


PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 7:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Quote:
the goal here is to transmit the past
Excellent idea!!


PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 2:11 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
cooltouch wrote:


And history is repeating itself when it comes to DSLRs.


Not really, I think. In the analog days, people had to pay for developing and printing as well, while many people nowadays work fully digital.

In the long term, digital photography is less expensive for most people, even though high-end DSLR's are more expensive than their analog counterparts.


PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 4:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
eeyore_nl wrote:
cooltouch wrote:


And history is repeating itself when it comes to DSLRs.


Not really, I think. In the analog days, people had to pay for developing and printing as well, while many people nowadays work fully digital.

In the long term, digital photography is less expensive for most people, even though high-end DSLR's are more expensive than their analog counterparts.


The "savings on film and developing costs" argument is one frequently dragged out by digital devotees. But it doesn't hold up once looked at a bit more closely. This assumes that the digital photographer never has any of his or her images printed. That isn't the case is it? So, even with digital, there are some printing costs. But if we dig a little deeper, what we quickly realize is the digital photographer soon has to find places to put all these very large images. And this usually means drive space. So one has to go out and invest in auxiliary storage of some sort. That costs money that film photographers don't have to worry about, since negatives can be stored so conveniently.

About high-end DSLRs being more expensive than their analog counterparts -- well, nowadays there are almost no new analog counterparts to be had anymore, are there? So I don't know how valid a comparison it is. Unless one compare new DSLRs to the expensive gear of the 1950s -- which was my original point.

And if we further consider the life expectancies of DSLRs compared to their analog "counterparts," well let's see. There's a fair number of those old analog counterparts from the 1950s that are still around, and still in regular use. Can it honestly be said that 50 or 60 years from now any of today's DSLRs will be in regular use? So this means that, to stay in the DSLR game, one will be required to update one's very expensive DSLR much in the same way one has to retire an old computer in favor of a new one because of operating system or software incompatibilities.

So, my original point is valid, I believe. Namely that if one bought good photo gear in the 1950s, it was an expensive hobby. And it remains so if a person of today buys the good stuff. The savings are largely imaginary if they exist at all.


PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 10:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Quote:
So, my original point is valid, I believe. Namely that if one bought good photo gear in the 1950s, it was an expensive hobby. And it remains so if a person of today buys the good stuff. The savings are largely imaginary if they exist at all.


Michael, well put -- although, I can see that had one bought the best in any era - 1920s, 1930s, 1950s, 1960s, even into the 1980s - and this means the best makers best products - and had one the discipline and sense to stick with this equipment, and to take good care of it - even now, after the collapse in e.g. Leica film camera prices brought on by digital - even now, one would be getting one's money back, and perhaps then some. That goes a long way to defraying all the costs along the way.

A therapist I know once said that your spouse is your greatest expense. Well, that and your #1 hobby or pursuit Wink

Buying one of the very best digital cameras is unlikely to be worth what, say, a Bessa II Heliar is worth, after 50 years. But chances are the true cost of owning one of the best lenses of today won't be as bad in 50 years...


PostPosted: Tue Jan 18, 2011 2:03 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Nesster wrote:
Buying one of the very best digital cameras is unlikely to be worth what, say, a Bessa II Heliar is worth, after 50 years. But chances are the true cost of owning one of the best lenses of today won't be as bad in 50 years...


Well, one can hope. You know, lenses of the future are one of those things I like to fantasize about. I envision a day when technology will have progressed to the point where we will have developed an ability to control fields, as in energy fields, magnetic fields, even the scifi staple of force fields. Well, control them better than we can presently, at least. And when that day comes, one of the things we'll be able to do is control the shape and density of air to a very high degree. Such that we'll be able to produce optical lenses from air. And the future photographic lenses will be tubular devices that control the shapes of the air inside them. A zoom need have no moving parts. The device just moves the shapes of the air inside it to zoom in and out. And these fields can refine the shapes the air "on the fly" to deal with optical aberrations as they occur. Just think: no flare with air.

Initially the devices will be expensive because of the technology involved, but once the tech becomes mainstream, they'll become affordable to a wide range of users -- and super fast optics will become widely available because air is free, compared to expensive glass.

I probably won't see this sort of technology in my lifetime, but I feel confident that it will someday come to pass.
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