March 29, 2005

• Went to a new camera store today. New to me, anyway. It was crammed full of old treasure, too. The kind of place you should think of when you hear 'used camera store.'

  Utterly lined from wall to wall, floor to ceiling, with cameras and accessories and other assorted gee-whizzery. Rollei next to Polaroid, Contax next to Argus. All organized, of course, but according to its own logic. The kind of organizational system you feel certain exists, and could be reverse-engineered given the inclination, but which is still baffling to you.

  I used to never be able to understand car buffs. People who know which make and model have how many cylinders and displacement and gear ratios, all the way back to 1924. Since my brother's a bit of a car buff and was a greasemonkey gearhead as a youth (and makes his living by fixing really big machines as an adult), I used to want to be able to play along with him and his greasemonkey friends. I had the genetic inclination, too, given that my dad has an intimate relationship to the various geological stratum and their life cycles, and can tell you the differences between about a zillion species of finch. But I never really liked cars all that much, since I was young enough that I could never imagine owning one. So why get excited?

  Well, you can own cameras. They're small, too. You don't need to add on to your garage. Though you might end up opening a used camera store, like Jim's Used Cameras on 43rd in the U District.

  I went there and bought an M42 to K-mount adaptor ring, finally. And his is literally the only place in town that will even carry it. I called all the places, and they said, "Have you tried Jim's in the U?" It's official Pentax, too. Jim's story is that Pentax just upped the price of this little silver ring, and won't even cut retailers a break on it. So even though it's not a high-dollar item, it's also not as absurdly cheap as it should be. Makes me want to open a machine shop just to make the things and let Pentax be the loss leader. Or something. This is why I don't head a giant corporation, by the way.

  You might ask: Well, Homer, that's all fine and dandy, but what's the thing do? And I appreciate the fact that there's no hint of irony in your voice when you say 'fine and dandy,' by the way. Well, you put the ring in the camera mount like this:

  

  And then you put an ancient M42 lens on your newfangled digital camera like this:

  

  You might well ask again: But, what's the point of doing that? And I'll reiterate:

  

  

  • 3:38 am
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