Your first camera

A Kodak Box Brownie then later a Kodak instermatic 33 and my first 35mm a Helina without rangefinder or exposure meter, my first 35mm SLR ... A black bodied Pentax S1A with 55mm f2 lens.

Interesting that no-one seems to have used/had the magnificent Pentax auto 110 system as their first camera - I know my uncle had one and loved taking shots with it as he travelled around Peru.I still have one of the lenses ( 24mm F/2.8 ) the rest of the system was stolen whilst he was dying in hospital.The size is staggeringly small compared with the lenses of the usual SLR and it must have been a perfect "pocket camera".

Got one of those freebie cameras that took 110 film (I think). It was a red plastic jobbie, with a fold-up plastic "viewfinder".

My mum got it for developing her photos at SupaSnaps/SuperSnaps.

FWIW, here's my two penn'orth:

1) Plastic camera, blue top, black body, 127 roll-film, make unknown, aged 5. Purchased at a toy shop in Keswick. Still remember the smell and the little red aperture in the back for the exposure number.

2) Bakelite Kodak Brownie, 127 roll-film, given by a friend of parents when I was 10 - this is what first got me interested and I used to rattle off all eight(!) shots then dash down to the chemists to get them developed. Could never load colour film properly (not dark enough under bed)! I still have some negs and prints from this camera somewhere...

3) Was also given an Ensign (Ilford?) with a look-down 90 degree viewfinder at similar time.

Would list other cameras but getting a little OT here!

Your not the only one, but certainly the first to respond.
I started with with a (gasp) Practika Nova 1b, by far the noisiest camera I have ever owned. That was was followed by a Fujica ST701 which was really good and then a procession of Pentax K-mounts culminating in the K10D and K7.

Cheers from Oz

A good camera!
Andy

Yes it was. I bought it in preference to the Spotmatic which a friend had and liked. During the time I owned it there was quite a buzz about "open-aperture metering". I never knew what it was about until I had a good play with that Spotmatic. It had a sliding switch on the side of the mount/pentaprism while the Fujica had a spring loaded DOF/meter button beside the lens like todays bayonet release. You just pressed the button, took the meter reading, released the button and there you were with open aperture to focus/compose. Too easy.

Cheers from Oz

I have one of these, they are truly tiny! Not too expensive to buy if you fancy getting hold of one as an interesting addition to a collection, I paid about £20 for a good example with 24mm lens and the smaller of the two matching flashes.


I had another one with the 18mm wide angle lens a few years ago, it's somewhere in the house (I hope) although I haven't seen it for ages.

Did anyone else have one of the really cheap 110 cameras where the whole thing was barely larger than the film (with a fold-up viewfinder on the top)?