Photography has long been a hobby of mine. Pics of family, pets, vacation. Photography class was among my favorites, shooting in a studio setting with ancient double lens reflex cameras, playing in the dark room.
However, I found it prohibitively expensive to pursue as a true hobby in the days of film. Sure I had a nice Pentax camera handed down to me, and along with it some decent lenses, but the cost of film and development of film held me back.
In 2006 I managed to get an obsolete ist DL so I could start taking pics of my stuff.
It was wonderful…
 |
| From Halloween 07 |
But struggled mightily at night, washing things out in a haze.
 |
| From Halloween 07 |
A science experiment ended up frying pieces of it in 2009, and I couldn’t get it to work with older lenses. Thus, in 2010, we acquired Bertha. My trusty pentax K100D. Ancient by DSLR standards, even at time of purchase. It was a relatively minor upgrade to the ist, but was rated among the best at low light photography.
I LOVED Bertha instantly.
 |
| From The Harvest 2011 |
And when I found the setting to let her use old manual lenses, that adoration grew.
 |
| From 2013 buildup |
I systematically bought used kits off local classifieds and grew my collection of old lenses for Bertha over the years. However, as my interest moved to macro photography last year, I noticed Bertha having some challenges in this arena. I just couldn’t get very clear focusing, it was always “just” off.
 |
| From Buildup 14 |
a
Research told me a lot of that had to do with the fact that though the old manual lenses work fine, some of the guts in Bertha were made for autofocus lenses. My plan, thus, going into the year was to retrofit Bertha with old technology. Selling off a bunch of the old film cameras I’d collected while acquiring lenses, I went shopping…
And come across a camera, already retrofitted for fully manual operation, and 2 generations newer than Bertha at a price cheaper than I could redo Bertha, so I was able to swing a new lens more suited to working closeups as well. New toys in hand, but no bugs outside in January, I went down to Music Village to play around, and compare the new camera to Bertha. While Bertha held her own fine in the picture quality, it was so much quicker and easier to use the new camera retrofitted for manual work I’ve decided to part with Bertha as is, and embrace this retrofit.
Sure, it’s a 2006 camera, big, heavy, and ancient by most electronic standards. There’s no live view, no video, no wifi instant posting or GPS or any of that stuff you get in today’s cameras. Shooting with lenses from the 50’s-70’s, there’s not even autofocus, and pure manual operation is mandatory. That, however, is somehow part of the appeal, as for me, it recaptures some of that magic that was working with film long ago.
 |
| From Pentax |
 |
| From Pentax |
 |
| From Pentax |
