"Photography is like music. You need good instruments, good technique, and, above all, artistry. When a picture sings, you've got it right!" (Bonzo's "Book of Wisdom", Epilog)

"Of all things that produce distorted images, lens tests have the least artistic value." (Bonzo's "Book of Wisdom", Chapter one, verse one)

"We don't own our old lenses. They are, like old musical instruments, entrusted to us - and may they outlive us and give joy for generations to come..." (ibid.)

Just call me Bonzo! I am a camera-collector and Pentax fan. My father was a journalist and picture-editor for a daily news-paper and magazine-publisher. In the mid-1950s he discovered his passion for photography and set up in business on his own. I grew up surrounded by names like Graflex, Rolleiflex, Rolleicord, Linhof, Mamiya C33, Asahi Pentax (35mm and 6x7), and Hasselblad, as well as Ilford, Agfa-Gevaert and Kodak - in the golden days of black & white and the early days of colour photography, spending many hours "helping", both "on the job" and in the darkroom. My first camera was self-made (with only a little help!) - a pin-hole effort, with an exposure-time of at least 60 seconds on 400ASA HP5 Ilford 120 roll-film in bright sunlight. In 1972 I was given a Pentax SP500 with a Super Takumar 55mm f:2 lens plus six cassettes of Kodachrome 25. (Yes, 25 ASA [not DIN!] - and by the way the SP500 will shoot at a thousandth of a second, although it is unmarked on the dial!) It's a lovely camera, which I have to this day, and the lens will give any modern lens a run for its money. With the fall of the iron-curtain in 1989, I decided to buy an M-42 screw-mount Praktica MTL 5B before they would completely disappear from the market, in order to have an affordable and compatible second body. From then on, I started to haunt second-hand camera shops the world over, looking for Takumar lenses and Pentax accessories to extend my photographic possibilites. In 1993 I bought a second-hand Durst enlarger and started to make my own black and white prints. The siege of digital photography was for me a deep and unexpected shock!!! To feel my way into the new medium, I bought a Pentax K-200, followed later by the K-5 and the adorable little Pentax Q and Q7. With the Pentax K-1 "full-frame" SLR, I can enjoy using my extensive collection of M-42 screw-mount and Pentax K-bayonet lenses to the full, with all the marvellous possibilities of the new medium. A Sony a7C enables me to make digital use of Leica screw-mount and Contax/Kiev range-finder lenses, as well as SLR lenses in other mounts, such as Exakta bayonet.

"I used to buy lenses to extend my photographic possibilities... now I take photographs to explore the possibilities of my lenses..." (ibid.)

"Every lens is like a musical instrument. Learn to resonate with it, and take good loving care of it." (ibid.)