My god! Things have really changed...

15 years ago I closed up a camera and photo finishing store due to lack of sales, thanks to K-mart. I then moved from an island community on the US western coast to Sacramento California. It was a terrble transition for me. The beautiful coastal area made selling my photographs a snap. But when I moved from there to the Sacramento valley I saw no beauty through my Pentax view finder. I did a few weddings but really just lost my desire to take pictures within a year of the move.
So I sold a reletive all my gear. All of it including a few loose double A's.
15 years later I see my son just sitting on his ass playing with his electric guitar and video games. So I think to myself this kid needs a real hobby. And photography is just the thing a lazy kid needs to get outside and see the real world.
And by a stroke of luck after the idea fadded a few days later I find myself at a thrift store and what do see in a glass case? A pentax ME Super with with a generic case! And only for 25 US bucks. And it worked!
So I brought it home and fired it off a few times and the old slap of the mirror and shutter brought tears to my eyes. "I miss that sound" I said to myself. "I miss my old ME Super Program. My 24-50mm zoom lens. The motor drive, the filters. The teeny batteries. I want my camera back"!
So I emailed the Relitive and asked if the camera was still around and as luck would have have it it was. And as luck would still have it, Reletive only used it to take pictures of paintings she did. And as luck would still rather have it, Relitive is going to send me the entire works along with a YashicaMat (that I just totally forgotten about) all for nothing!
So I joined a Pentax users forum in hopes of discussing Pentax cameras and maybe getting into a local photography club but as luck would have it it turns out to be a British forum. "oh well" I think to myself. "Whats the worst thing that could happen on a British based forum?" Sure thier gonna take jabs at my improper use of the English language and tearible spelling... But on the other hand they have a great sence of humor those Brits.
So anyway.....Hi.

For a Pentax addict, that's one very touching story. Welcome to the board
If you're out of luck in Yuck for scenery, there's always macro land for images
Matt

Fantastic to hear from you, hope you enjoy your "new" hobby!

Welcome, and we'll forgive the spilling mistokes . . . for now.

But do tell, is your son still playing guitar and video games, or does he have a life now ?

Chances are, if he's like many a brit teenager, if dad's enthusiastic about anything, he won't be 'cause it ain't cool to like what dad likes.

Happy shooting, and get your hands on a Pentax digital SLR as soon as you can.

Welcome, from another newbie.

How can anywhere in California be called Yuck? and you think we have a sense of humour!

I think helping your son create some cool Rock Album Cover photos might be an easier way to lure your son into the photo addiction thing....who knows where it might lead...good luck.
And the great thing about these Britts is they're polite.
They've been too polite to tell tell me to shut up and go away for months...so I'll forgive them for speaking English so funny.
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Thanks for the "welcome" guys and gals. I assume some of you are gals. I so use to the metal detecting forum. I don't think any women hang out there.
You know, thats a good idea about the album cover. I will make sure he has the camera when he leaves for band practice.
I already have a digital camera I bought about 5 yreas ago for about a thousand bucks. Its a Fujifilm 4900 and I think I saw one go for about 10 bucks on ebay. The images turn out okay but the lag time sucks and I dont care where I set that f-stop I can't see any difference in the depth of field. Unless I have it set on Macro.
But it is a SLR and I like the fact that I can use a external flash. Smartmedia, but I bought plenty of cards for it and I still see them on ebay.
Speaking of digital, and excuse me for my ignorance, but what does "Raw" mean in digital terms? Does it have something to do with that terrible time and ink consuming TIF format?

RAW format means . . . just that. The image that is saved to the memory card essentially comes straight from the cameras image sensor. No post processing (EG: Sharpening or compression etc) is performed by the camera. These 'finishing' functions are then performed on your computer.

yes and both tiff and jpeg are file formats that are used after the camera or computer processes the RAW data.
Always wash your hands after handling RAW files...or was that meat?...I get confused...

Slofts:

As an expatriate Californian living in Bisbee, Arizona along with a gaggle of other ex-Californians, we have a tendency to say things like, "California is over with," meaning that the charm and breathtaking beauty of the state has largely been ruined by massive overpopulation and rape of the land (logging, agriculture and its attendant herbicides, pesticides that have poisoned the land and ruined the streams, to say nothing of air pollution).

Especially so is this view held by those of us who grew up in what in our view then was that it was, in fact, the promised land. And L.A. was indeed the City of the Angeles. Its original name given by the Spaniards was Nuestra Senora, La Reina de Los Angeles. Our Lady, the Queen of the Angeles. What a sweet name...

As for Brit humour, or the lack thereof, I once lived in London for four months and for the first month was continually blindsided by the sublety of it.

Ted

I thing we are generally more reserved, we don't usually stand up, waving our right fist in the air and making whooping sounds, everytime someone says something that we agree with!
To us, many things American seem bigger, louder, more 'in your face' and overly exaggerated - great for a 30 minute comedy show but you dont all live like that.........do you?

I suppose it's understandable, I mean we've got Cheddar Gorge and you've gone a tad bigger with the Grand Canyon

Ted,

All sounds so familiar. Being a Sussex man and not being 'druv' your words ring true for my home county. However things are starting to improve slowly but the loss of agriculture and the demands to develop land for housing will probably be a disbenefit.

Maybe we have more in common than you think!

steve

Thank you both for your observations.

Apropos of your humour, the day after I arrived in London to stay in my friend's house on Cato Street (off Edgeware Road), I went to the pub on the corner. It was recommended by my friend, Robert Cummings who said, in effect, to just mention his name. So I went, and I did. The bartender, an enormous hulk wearing a white dress shirt and a bow tie (looked as if he'd once been an enforcer of some sort) quietly served me my scotch and listened patiently - and silently - to some inane tale of mine. When I finished, he walked to the other end of the bar, polished a glass or two, returned and said, in a remarkably small voice for a huge man who looked like a thug, "I would have thought it might have been the other way round."

Back to cameras. It seems my M42 to K mount adapter is not the genuine Pentax article. Although made in Japan, and although Pentax is written upon it, it is rather difficult to remove. Goes on OK. Doesn't want to come off.

ON the US Yahoo Spotmatic sight folks who have the genuine article say it goes on and off smoothly. I believe I'll chuck it and buy the 'genuine article."

Anyone else have problems with non-Pentax adapters? Or is it just me...

Ted

I think I have a similar adapter and it took me some time to realise that the 'spanner' extends too deeply into the mount. It springs the clips OK and turns the adapter a small amount, then I have to withdraw the spanner slightly in order to actually turn the mount to the position where it can be removed. Other than that it works fine. I think the adapter is OK, in my case, it's the spanner that is badly made.

For those of you who really actually care Reletive has sent my Pentax along with most everthing I can recall that was with it when I sold it to her.
Heres a list of what arrived....
*The Super Program.
*Pentax 50mm 1:1.4 lens
*Pentax 24-50mm 1:4 Auto lens.
*Tamron 35-80mm 1:2.8~3.5 w/macro. (this macro is unbelievable!)
*Sigma 75-200mm 1:2.8-3.5 Auto also with macro.
*Motor Drive "A". But Damaged. Has tape wrapped around the top portion of the handle just under the shutter button. I don't remember selling it that way. But hell! Im getting it all back for nothing! And it works just fine!
*Pentax AF200S flash. I don't remember this flash. I thought I had a 100% dedicated vivitar zoom bounceable multi-position flash.
*Tons of assorted filters
*Yashica 124mat G twin lens camera.
*And a roll of Kodak 120 film thats best if processed before June of 1995.