I learned on a Kodak rangefinder that I believe was made somewhere in the
early 50s. That and a twin-lens reflex of un-remembered lineage. In the late
60s/early 70s sometime I was given a Sears SLR (that I believe was some sort
of Pentax clone. Screw-mount, anyway...) as a christmas gift, along with a
lens or two.
That Sears served well in many overseas trips while I did a tour in the
Navy, even surviving a swim in Lake Timsah, mid-way down the Suez Canal in
1974.
By 1978, however, I was definitely in the market for something better. As a
new dad living on Navy enlisted pay, the budget was very limited, so I was
pretty obsessive about making the "right" choice. Lots of reading,
questioning and browsing of the camera shops and shows pretty rapidly
convinced me that I couldn't go wrong with the Olympus Om-1n. Small, light
and part of a huge system and, as far as I could determine, a much more
cost-effective investment than the Nikons (the only other seriously
considered choice when all the other research was done).
It served very well (and still does) along with a Winder2 Bounce Grip 2 and
only a 135/3.5 to complement the basic 50/1.8, but early this year, after
about a year of shooting a digital wonderbrick, I had a Zuiko relapse. The
list of great glass and cool bodies is now too long to reproduce here.
There's really nothing new out there to out-perform what Olympus pioneered
in the 70s, IMO. So why not make the most of it? :-)
---
Scott Gomez
-----Original Message-----
From: Mike [mailto:watershed@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Subject: [OM] Competition for OM in the 70s
I bought my first "real" camera around 1973?, a Pentax SP500 with a 28mm
and 135mm as a lightweight travel kit. <snip> After carrying that
little SP500 around while others struggled with big lunkers no way was I
going for a Nikon (or Canon or Minolta) the "real" camera of the time.
Mike
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