Today’s Post by Joe Farace
It’s Love Week here on my photography how-to Blog and I’m trying to keep the theme of “love” going to see how long it might last…
Given the steep deprecation of used camera values and the rapidly rising prices of new ones, upgrading for incremental improvements doesn’t seem attractive.—David Thorpe
One of the things that I’ve been trying to do with new blog posts during 2022 is to provide as much information as possible about how I made a specific image. I put this information in a section of the post labeled How I Made This Photo. When writing these snippets it sometimes prompts e-mail from readers, asking the same question that I want to address in today’s post: “Why are you using such old equipment?” OK, here goes:
- The first reason I’m using cameras such as my Canon EOS 60D, instead of the newer EOS 90D, for example, is that I can’t afford it. I do, however own an EOS M6 Mark II that I’ve used for some videos on my YouTube channel. Part of the reason is because I’m not employed, sponsored or part of any camera company’s ambassador programs. Consequently I have to pay for my cameras just like you do. Nobody gives me free equipment so I will write nice things about their cameras.
- Secondly, I don’t think purchasing a new camera will make much difference in the kind of photography that I do. Maybe I’m wrong but there are exceptions, of course, for film cameras.
- Thirdly, it seems that more people ask this question when I mention Canon gear. For the record I have been selling off some of my Canon gear to focus more on shooting with Micro Four-thirds and film-based cameras.
Long before I wrote this post, there was news that Olympus (now OM Systems) discontinued my beloved Pen F. This announcement comes hot on the heels that the Olympus refurb page, where I purchased my Pen F, was selling these cameras for $100 more than what I paid for mine from the same website. As I write this there are no Pen F bargains on that page but it is periodically updated.
How I made this Photo: I don’t care if the Pen F was discontinued for the same reason that I don’t care that any of my film cameras are no longer being manufactured either. I love shooting and owning those cameras too. I wish I could say the same about my Canon EOS DSLR’s but the truth is that they no longer “spark joy” for me.
More and more as I write the “How I made this photo” sections of these blog posts I find myself mentioning images made with Canon EOS equipment, I find myself saying “this discontinued blah-blah lens.” Yet these lenses continue to work just fine for me. I keep thinking about getting an adapter that lets me to mount Canon EF and EF-S lenses onto the M6 Mark II but every time I get ready to reach for my credit card, a little voice in my head says, “don’t do it.” Even I don’t know what the heck that means.
Today’s featured photo is of a Lotus Formula 1 car driven by Emerson Fittipaldi at Watkins Glen International raceway during the 1972 US Grand Prix. Fittipaldi retired on lap 17 because of suspension failure. The camera I used was a Minolta SR-1 (not an SRT-101) with a MD Tele Rokkor 135mm f/2.8 lens, the longest focal length lens I owned at the time. Film was Kodak Ektachrome, exposure was unrecorded. Scan by Scan My Photos. Image was cropped slightly in Photoshop.
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