Day 15/365

I was thinking about doing a product-type shoot yesterday, so I did that today.

This is the first camera I remember messing with. It was my dad’s camera. And yes, it’s a film camera.

After using homemade pinhole cameras to take pictures that we developped ourselves in the school’s development lab for art class, we were assigned to shoot pictures with a “real” camera.

Below was the camera I used. The Pentax ME Super.

Now, let’s get the obvious out of the way: it’s a goofy name. No way around that. Super? Yeah. Goofy. But it’s not just Super. It’s ME Super! Sure, it was probably meant as “M.E. Super”, but to my ears it sounds like “Me so Super, Me take pictures all night long!”

Then, the not-so-obvious: it was released in the same year I was born; 1979. No great reason I mention this other than the fact that it adds to the sentimental value of the camera for me.

Finally, the (hopefully) really-not-obvious: I sucked at taking pictures with it. I really just didn’t get how to operate the camera (ASA? Shutter Speed? Aperture? Exposure Compensation? Huh?) and worst of all, I didn’t understand why I couldn’t get crisp shots in low-light without a tripod. I remember going out with this thing after dark to a local school located right by the woods. The few street lights I had to illuminate my shots weren’t nearly enough light. All of my shots were blurry.

Fortunately, since then I’ve gotten a lot better. And although I can’t say that I shoot with it with as much frequency as I’d like, I do still pick it up from time to time and take a few shots. Funny though, after shooting digital for so long, when I do shoot with the Pentax, I often find myself taking a shot, looking at the back of the camera and going “Hey! Where’s my picture?!”

Digital cameras have spoiled us all.