Same here too. Reminds me of my first lessons in photography back in 2008
FAOS
This looks great
I have an old Zenit in the draw, and it’s only marginally lighter than that one — it’s like hanging a breeze block around your neck! I accidentally dropped it on a friend’s patio a few years back — the camera was fine, but it broke one of the concrete paving slabs in half! If I take it out and about without the strap, I always wear steel toe-capped boots — just in case!
@martbetz How about this gem, then? Zenit Photosniper - Camera-wiki.org - The free camera encyclopedia
Yeah, I’ve seen those. I think Matthew Stern did a video on them some time back.
Haha. Try taking that through airport security
Especially if you’re wearing one of these t-shirts:
https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/1041892633/i-shoot-people-tshirt-photographer
The odd thing is that I once saw one of those,
fully equipped, at a local flea market. Asking price
was about USD 300, which I thought was way too
much to spend on a thing that I really did not “need”.
My first 35mm camera was a Zenith 3M, though.
It came with a 50mm Helios lens, and a 135mm Jupiter lens.
Both great lenses. Sady, my Zenit no longer works (it’s used as a prop these days), but you can find loads of them for sale, often in good working order and very cheap prices (hence why I haven’t — as of yet — invested the time in repairing it).
Zenits are really tough cameras — they’re built like tanks. I’d take the Zenit places I wouldn’t dare take any other camera, and wouldn’t have to worry about it getting broken or damaged.
When can we go back to space themed(or at least named) camera gear?
In 35mm land it’s impossible to go past the Nikon F series, particularly the first three: F, F2 and F3. Absolutely timeless, and won’t smash your bank account like Leica gear… of which the M3 is undoubtedly iconic. Part of what makes the Nikon F cameras so great is the fact that mount has been around since 1959 and is still in use. I lens collection is predominantly F mount and I use them on my F2, my D700, and my Fuji X-T3 - and have even hired them out to a friend for use on an Arri Alexa.
Honourable mentions to my Dad’s Pentax Spotmatic F, a bulletproof m42 mount camera, and the Hasselblad Xpan which shoots nearly double-wide panoramic photos. Any of the mainline SLRs from Canon, Olympus and Minolta are well worth shooting too though. The Nikon FM2 is a great, fully mechanical pro-sumer camera they put out in 1982 as well.
In medium format I think its hard to argue against the Hasselblad 500C as the most iconic camera out there. The square format has been a mainstay in professional studios for decades and it also went to the moon. On the more affordable side the Pentax 67 is a cult classic, as is the Fuji GW690iii, the Texas Leica.
As for iconic films to run through these cameras, hard to go past Tri-X and HP5+ for black and white, and Kodak Portra or Ektar for colour.