My journey to DSLR photography

 

It was way back in the 60’s, when I was still in short pants, that my my interest in photography began. My father showed me his Zeiss Ikon bellows camera and I liked the way it folded up. But it was the results of his family portraits that really sparked my interest.

 

My first ever camera was a Kodak Box Brownie. I don’t remember where it came from, perhaps I picked it up at a second hand market? With its wonderful leather aroma and the foolproof mechanical construction it was my constant companion.

 

In 1973, loaded with a roll of 120 black and white film and carefully packed in my duffle bag the Brownie was bound for weeklong school camping trip. I was 9 years old and the sole photographer out of my entire school. Imagine that today, where many 9 year olds have camera phones!

 

Even though back then it was still possible to have 120 film processed and printed at the local chemist my hunger for photographic knowledge was growing. So on return from school camp, and with the help of a kind but foolish neighbour I learnt how to process and print my first efforts. The results weren’t too bad, even if I do say so myself. (You'll have to take my word on that as they are stuck in an album back at my parent's house. One of these days I’ll dig out those shots and scan them.)

 

By 1975 I was allowed to wear long trousers and almost as exciting; we were off around the world to be introduced to our distant relatives.

 

At a stopover in Singapore, whilst we were asleep in the terminal, my father snuck about and bought his first 35mm SLR. A start-of-the-art Minolta SRT 303 with an MC Rokkor 50mm f/1.4 lens. When he took it out of the box suddenly I was wide awake, and hooked.

 

I was dying to get behind that viewfinder and expose a few frames of his precious emulsion. But his new toy was far too valuable for an 11 year old to play with. Instead I was handed his previous; the Elmo film camera (similar, but not as good as this one) and allowed to hose off rolls and rolls of Standard 8mm. Any wonder I ended up working in television.

 

However I was more interested in still photography, so in London, with a combination of Green Shield Stamps and cash presents from the strangers who I was told were family, I bought a Kodak Instamatic Pocket 200 110 format camera from Boots on Southampton Row. This camera was truly pocket-sized even for an 11 year old wearing jeans. So tiny it would rival many current digital examples.

 

That little camera served me well and I shot as many rolls of that silly format as my pocket money could afford to process and print. The results were terrible, but I was learning all the time.

 

And I kept on learning until 5 years later when the Kodak Instamatic was dropped. Literally. With the case cracked even copious layers of electrical tape failed to block the light that leaked into that nasty cassette format. And so it was confined to the back of my junk drawer to gather dust, until a few years later my mother forced me to trash my first modern camera purchase.

 

But 5 years of comparing results to my father’s taught me two things:

 

1. My old man is really quite a good photographer

 

2. A 110 point and shoot is no match for a 35mm SLR

 

I needed to get one of them for myself.

 

I don’t know why he did it, but in 1982 my good friend Paul Clarke lent me his brand new 35mm SLR; an Olympus OM10. Permanently. Maybe he thought he was a rubbish photographer (he wasn’t, on the odd occasion when wasn’t drunk or stoned), or perhaps he just wanted to finally get into some shots himself, (not a good idea, he wasn’t at all photogenic) but I made good use of that sexy little number. Finally I had something that could take photos as well as my father's Minolta.

 

I cherished that camera like it was my own, and gave it a good workout photographing Aussie bands in concert such as; Midnight Oil, Matt Finish and INXS.

 

But after two years of constant use I begged him to take it back.

 

I really appreciated borrowing “Darkie’s” (not at all racist, he's a white Australian who is always creeping about in the dark) OM10, but it was holding me back. It was high time I bought my own 35mm SLR.

 

In 1986 my parents went off around the world again, this time without me and my sister to look after them. Instead of wishing they would stay away permanently for once I couldn’t wait for them to come home.

 

For in Singapore, somewhere on the Orchard Road, my Dad had bought me the hottest SLR of the moment – the Canon T90.

 

I loved this camera. Still do. For a semi-pro 35mm SLR it's packed with high end features and a svelte form factor that would rival most modern DLSRs.

 

However it only took a few exposed rolls before I became disillusioned with the purchase. My brand new, sexy, electronic marvel took worse photos than my father’s 10 year old, clunky manual beast. How could this be?

 

Comparing the glass provided the answer.

 

Stupidly my camera order hadn’t specified a lens, and so my dad chose a no name 35-200mm f/4.0-5.6 zoom. OK, it did have a name, but I’ve erased it from memory. Whatever the brand it was no match for my father's MC Rokkor 50mm f/1.4. I had just learnt something new; the lens maketh the camera.

 

Even though the T90 was light-years ahead of any other camera, it arrived too late – Canon released their first EOS auto focus body just one year later.

 

For me this was a “good thing”. With the world going EOS the second hand shops were slowly filling up with lots of pre-loved FD glass. That no-name zoom lens was history.

 

The second hand collection grew thus: Canon new FD 24mm f/2.8, Canon new FD 75 - 200 f/4.5, Canon new FD 15mm f/2.8 fisheye, Canon new FD 500mm f/8 Reflex, with a 2x adaptor (1000mm hand held on a bright day!) and a 300TL flash. All I needed now was to find something other than bands to photograph, because despite it’s massive land mass Australia was growing too small for me. I needed to get out and see the world.

 

Parts liberated from my camera bag were fashioned into a padded chamber in a backpack and with my Canon SLR outfit securely packed inside I took my passports, flight ticket and credit card and travelled the world.

 

New Zealand, Great Britain, Switzerland, France, Italy, Austria, Hungary, Germany, and the Czech Republic. Climbing to the top of Mount Rhuapeu, skiing down the Klein Matterhorn, Shooting children playing Lacrosse in the estates of Prague, junkies shooting up in Zurich’s “Needle Park”, poseurs in Rome's Piazza del Popoplo, hustlers in the Alexanderplatz East Berlin, locals queuing for a shoe shop in Budapest, I took my precious Canon kit everywhere, no matter how risky the situation.

 

Little did I realise the most treacherous location was to be in East Dulwich, London. For it was there in the early hours of Sunday 19th January 1992, while I partied away in a West London nightclub, someone broke into my flat and stole the lot… I was gutted.

 

Left with nothing but my point-and-shoot Canon Sure Shot Ace (I had taken it to the club) I couldn’t face building another SLR system up from scratch. Besides the travel insurance on the kit had run out the week earlier, and after skiing and partying my way around Europe I had a credit card bill of over £5,000 to pay back.

 

For the first time in 9 years I was SLR-less.

 

The SureShot was eventually replaced with a Minolta Riva 70W (an excellent 35mm compact with a 28-70mm zoom), after it was run over by a police van in Majorca. (story told in this thread if you're really interested) And that was my sole camera for the rest of the nineties and the beginning of the noughties.

 

In 2003, twelve years after Kodak made the first professional digital camera, I finally said goodbye to 35mm film. I was given a free 2Mp Canon PowerShot A40. It was a leaving gift from a breakfast TV show that I directed, but it was the best present I had ever been given from a production company, and not just because it was the only one.

 

So why hadn’t I bought a DSLR earlier? Well mainly finances, but primarily because I insisted on owning a camera that was equal to or better than my beloved T90. Now too familiar with the Canon operating system to warrant changing brands my heart was set on an EOS 1D. My wallet was set considerably lower.

 

It wasn’t until 2004 that I actually used a DSLR in anger. I had concocted this crazy idea for a TV series I was producing that involved shooting a street panorama. With no-one having a clue what I wanted it was down to me to shoot the component parts. Surprisingly the transition from film to digital wasn’t a problem and I got on just fine.

 

Over the course of the production we hired an Canon EOS 10D, Canon EOS 20D and a Canon EOS 1D, always with the same lens: a Canon TS-E 24mm f/3.5L. The results were terrific, but something was missing and I just couldn’t put my finger on it.

 

One day Calumet Hire didn’t have the 10D, 20D or 1D available for hire and wondered if we might be happy with the 1Ds MkII? What a stupid question! I was ecstatic.

 

After one day of use I noticed something weird. The images from the 1Ds MkII had more depth and realism than what I had previously shot, and the lens behaved as I expected a 24mm lens to behave. Surely this couldn’t be all down to more pixels? Whatever the reason it was a revelation, and epiphany, a re-kindling of passion.

 

So I did some research, and learnt all about sensor size and how the differences affects the resultant image, and came to a new conclusion; whatever camera I buy it has to be full-frame. As the only DSLR with a full frame sensor at that time was the Canon EOS 1Ds MkII, I had found my ideal digital replacement for the T90.

 

But my wallet still wasn’t deep enough for that £5K body, and so in early 2005, with the birth of my son only weeks away, I took the plunge - and went back to analogue!

 

I bought a pre-loved EOS 1n with Power Drive Booster E1, Speedlight 540EZ and a Canon 20-35mm f/2.8L from York Cameras in London - all for a mere £800.

 

Why did I do this? Friends thought I was mad buying old technology when the digital revolution was in full swing! Try as I might to explain the merits of shooting full frame 35mm it fell on deaf ears. However when the results from my EOS 1n came back in glossy prints I knew I had made the right choice. Finally all the colour and depth of photography that had eluded me since my T90 had returned. And to make the transition less painful I could order a CD with every roll of processed film. My passion was once again in full swing,

 

I was having a ball. But the cost of stock, processing, printing, and the interminable wait for results meant I still wanted to go digital.

 

I knew my choice of DSLR was going to be Canon, so I began re-building my lens collection. A Canon 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM was first, followed by the Canon 85mm f/1.8 USM then the Canon 50mm f/1.4 USM – all destined to mount onto an EOS 1Ds MkII full frame DSLR. If only I could afford it…

 

Thankfully in October 2005 Canon came to my rescue (and my bank balances!) with the launch of the full frame sensor EOS 5D. This time it was my opportunity to personally contribute to the retail economy of Singapore. So in late December, en route to a Christmas break in Australia, I found myself in Sim Lim Square (technology heaven!) buying my first DSLR.

 

Overall I’m quite pleased with the way my photographic history has panned out. Of course I wish some situations had worked out differently; I wish I’d made more use of Darkie’s Olympus OM10 to take more embarrassing shots in the 80s, I wish I’d shot more transparencies whilst backpacking in Europe, I wish that criminal hadn’t stolen my T90 and instead had lost both hands in freak meat cleaver accident, I wish that I’d bought my EOS1n earlier so I could have practised more, but I’m so glad Canon made the 5D. Yep things have worked out pretty well, now all I have to do is find the time to shoot more!

 

Present photographic artillery

 

2 x Canon EOS 5D "Classic" DSLRs both with BG-E4 Battery Grip

Canon EOS 1N 35mm SLR inc PDB-E1 Power Drive Booster

Canon Powershot S80

 

Canon EF 70-300mm f/4.5 - 5.6 DO IS USM

Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM

Canon EF 85mm f/1.8 USM

Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM

Canon EF 16 - 35 f/2.8L USM

Canon EF 20 - 35 f/2.8L

Sigma EX 15mm f/2.8 180° fisheye

Sigma 600mm f/8 reflex

Lensbaby 2.0

 

Canon Speedlite 580EXII with Sto-fen Omni-Bounce diffuser

Canon Speedlite 430EX with Sto-fen Omni-Bounce diffuser

Canon Speedlite 550EX with Sto-fen Omni-Bounce diffuser

Canon Speedlite 540EZ with Sto-fen Omni-Bounce diffuser

 

Manfrotto MN055CXPRO4 Carbon Fibre Tripod with MN460 Mg 3-D Magnesium Head

Manfrotto 276 monopod

Manfrotto 484RC head on 055 clamp

 

Tamrac 5265 CyberPack Express - Rolling Photo/Computer Backpack

Lowepro SlingShot 200 AW sling bag

 

I only use Flickr to share photos with family and friends. None of my paid, professional or experimental/artistic images are posted here.

 

I am a television director.

  

Countries I would like to visit!