A camera is just a tool? [Archive] - Rangefinderforum.com

rbsinto

02-06-2008, 03:29

Whether or not a camera is just a tool depends of course on your motivation for having it.
Me? My cameras are for taking photos, so in my world they are just tools.
To others, cameras are an investment. Things to be bought, sold or traded as their value changes.
And to still others, they are object of affection, to be collected and cherished.
And then there are the posers. Those individuals who play at being photographers by having all the trappings, minus the motivation or talent to produce images. For them cameras are props.
So no, cameras are not just tools. They represent many things to many people.

sepiareverb

02-06-2008, 03:31

...So no, cameras are not just tools...

Blasphemy!:angel:

Sparrow

02-06-2008, 03:46

Sparrow! I´m glad you brought this up, but it´s darn difficult to decide!

leif e
Yep forty years in and I’m still stumped, when ma granddaddy bought that old Bessa I’m sure it was a tool then one day, what’ya know just upped and changed into an ornament

:D

Keith

02-06-2008, 04:15

Yes they are just tools ... but a dedicated craftsman can still love and cherish his equipment! :)

marke

02-06-2008, 06:17

It’s not got a soul silly, it’s just a camera; although the lens sometimes has an out of body experience.

:rolleyes:

But never an out of camera experience. Now that just wouldn't be right.

landsknechte

02-06-2008, 08:29

Put soul back in bowl.

bsdunek

02-06-2008, 08:40

Yes they are just tools ... but a dedicated craftsman can still love and cherish his equipment! :)
Probably the best explaination of how I feel about my equipment. :cool:

shadowfox

02-06-2008, 10:02

luketrash

02-06-2008, 10:03

For me, the unpaid hobbyist, they're fetish items. If owning one camera is good, owning 200 must certainly be better, right?

I like using them and I like looking at them, analyzing the differences and realizing that I still haven't found any one camera that does everything I want it to do.

By definition, I don't use all of my cameras and none of them make me any money, so I guess they aren't tools.

nikon_sam

02-06-2008, 10:11

I have a problem with the word "Just"...
Is it just a tool??? No, not just a tool...it can be used as a tool but it can also be a work of art...and the same camera can be seen as either one by two different persons...and it doesn't have to be in perfect condition to qualify as either...
Calling a camera a "Tool" is not a bad thing...I use tools everyday and when you need a certain tool for the job and you have that tool the job becomes alot easier and you come across to the customer as more of a professional than if you just bang things together...
I have a Ball Pein hammer that's been in my tool box for the last 21 years...it still works and I like the way it feels but it's showing it's age...I've been looking for a replacement for sometime now...I'll wait until I do find the right one for me...It sounds silly but that's the way some folks see their tools...

kevin m

02-06-2008, 10:32

I have a problem with the word "Just"...

I was thinking the same thing. It seems that most of us here own cameras that are more than "just" tools, they also happen to be well-made artifacts of a bygone age that are beautiful to hold and look at. It can be a distraction.

thomasw_

02-06-2008, 10:56

Yes and no. Yes it is does perform a designed function, as a tool. But it has characteristics which are attached to it. For some the way it functions, how it looks, how it feels, how costly it is; these things can make it a status symbol, a workhorse, or a cherished memorial of a friend or family member. So it seems a camera is a tool but can be more, too.

Kent

02-06-2008, 11:19

Just a tool?

No way! Too much fun to be "just a tool". ;)

luketrash

02-06-2008, 11:35

If the camera is a tool, my photos are the equivalent of all those nuts I rounded off with an old pair of pliers.

chris000

02-06-2008, 11:38

Roger Hicks

02-06-2008, 11:48

Anyone who can use the word 'just' to create the phrase 'just a tool' is unlikely ever to learn how to get the best from any tool more complex than a crowbar (American: pry bar).

To get the best from any tool, you need to learn how to use it. Good tools are easier and nicer to use. If you don't believe me, try comparing a decent Snap-On or Craftsman socket set with a Chinese set made of pot metal and putty. Or a forged Solingen kitchen knife with thin, wobbly stainless steel.

edit: I have to modify this in the light of Chris and his Land Rover. But stand that next to an Austin Gypsy...? They're both 'just' tools.

Cheers,

R.

luketrash

02-06-2008, 11:58

Caneras are sometimes "... beautiful to hold and look at ..." or " ... a work of art ..." ???

I'm sorry guys, they are pieces of engineering designed for a purpose, and if they are not being used for that purpose then they are just so much waste metal/plastic/whatever - they are just a tool, yes some are better tools than others, but still just a tool.

hahaha:

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1327/563926677_af8e239027.jpg

When people use the word 'just' or 'only' when stating their opinion as if it were a universal truth it's amusing.

I can think of all sorts of cameras that were produced that were never really intended to be used for anything.

chris000

02-06-2008, 12:11

Anyone who can use the word 'just' to create the phrase 'just a tool' is unlikely ever to learn how to get the best from any tool more complex than a crowbar (American: pry bar).

I can't agree Roger. I need a camera (or perhaps more than one) to make photographic images (which is what I enjoy doing) and I have no other reason to own cameras but for that purpose.

Whilst I accept that some 'tools' are better than others, and I prefer to use good quality tools when I can afford / find them, I don't 'fondle' them or place them on display, in fact I don't even take them out of the bag unless I am going to use them or for periodic maintenance.

The word 'just' in this context means 'no more than' and does not refer to the quality of the instrument.

To be honest, I have never understood camera collecting - but I suspect that to some on these forums that will be regarded as a serious inadequacy on my part! :D

chris000

02-06-2008, 12:21

hahaha:

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1327/563926677_af8e239027.jpg

When people use the word 'just' or 'only' when stating their opinion as if it were a universal truth it's amusing.

I'm sorry you interpreted it that way, it was meant as my opinion not a 'universal truth'.

I can think of all sorts of cameras that were produced that were never really intended to be used for anything.

So can I. But, in my opinion, owning any of them would be pointless.

luketrash

02-06-2008, 12:28

I think it's fun to own all sorts of nickknack conversation pieces. But I'm also the crazy cat lady of camera hoarding.

Unlike some of the crazy people that do this, I do actually shoot film in all of them at some point and my rule is they do have to work.

Philisophically, how would we classify a broken camera sitting on someone's mantle as a decoration or family heirloom? Sure, it was designed as a photographic tool, but what has it become presently?

Chris101

02-06-2008, 13:00

This is bad. First I checked the simple "no". Then I decided "Oh yes it is" but came back with "Oh no is's not."

Now if there had been an "Is too." response, I would have chosen that one next.

Roger Hicks

02-06-2008, 13:22

The word 'just' in this context means 'no more than' and does not refer to the quality of the instrument.

Dear Chris,

We do not disagree on this; but my dispute is with those who use 'just' dismissively. Some do -- I am sure you have met them too -- and those who use 'just' in this way are normally overprivileged twerps seeking to look clever, tough or 'professional' by abusing their tools (if you will forgive the image thus created). A craftsman looks after his tools and is not dismissive of them.

You will note that I have enough regard for your opinions that I modified my post as soon as I read yours. I fully accept that these are two different readings of the word 'just' and I do not think that either of us would deny the validity of the point made by the other.

As for collecting; well, in about 1969-70 my girlfriend wanted a good, basic camera and (on my advice) bought Leica II conversion no. 23010, for twenty quid. After a few weeks she wanted to use it so I had to buy my own IIIa, no. 229589, for thirty quid. (These are the only two Leicas I have ever used where I remember the serial numbers, I hasten to add).

We then bought various things together to use, such as a fat-barrel coupled 9cm f/4 with a serial number ending with both a (attrape, dummy) and * (re-used serial number) -- the only lens ever to sport this combination, as far as I know. I knew none of this at the time: as far as I was concerned, at eleven pounds ten, it was a cheap lens to use. By the early-to-mid 70s I had quite a collection, all bought to try it out, but realized that it was a lot of money tied up, and sold it. Since then I have bought equipment primarily to use; sometimes to trade (my 90/2 Summicron cost me 90 pounds new, as a swap for a tri-lens turret, and my M4-P, as far as I recall, 120 new, swapped for a good black M3); and sometimes just to write about...

In the process, especially in the early days when Leicas were just old cameras, not investments, I met some major and very knowledgeable collectors. These included Paul-Henry van Hasbroeck and the late Colin Glanfield (who did a lot of Paul-Henry's photography), as well as others who would prefer to remain nameless. I also met an awful lot of people who wasted an awful lot of money on rubbish withoit really understanding what they had or indeed what they were doing. But I haven't collected cameras myself for over 30 years. Like you, I can't see the point.

Cheers,

R.

moonwrack

02-06-2008, 13:51

Is gadget-freakery an exclusively male characteristic?

arbib

02-06-2008, 14:02

A tool?.. YES... :)

An ego thing?.. Sometimes..Especially when it is NEW and used for the 1st time...May be a proud thing too sometimes :D

A weapon?..If nothing else is available to stabilize the situation....:eek:

Tuolumne

02-06-2008, 14:04

Take a common garden tool - say a sp@de (shovel in English). Is it just a tool? I suppose people would say Yes. Now take an English garden sp@de bought 15 years ago from Smith and Hawken. Is it just a tool? I suppose people would say Yes. Now compare the two side by side; pick one up and use it one afther the other. Now is each just a tool? I suppose yes, but the English garden sp@de is jsut soooo much more a tool than the shovel. If you see what I mean, you understand what it is for a camera to be just a tool. They are all just tools, but some are soooo much much more tools than the others.

/T
PS: Had to edit sp@de to overcome RFF software censor.

Paulbe

02-06-2008, 14:09

Shouldn't the poll be:

---Yes
---No
---All of the above

:-)

dee

02-06-2008, 14:24

If a camera is just a tool - why do so many of us buy dodgy tools from ex USSR ?

I guess it is a tool .. but there are tools and tools - I still have one of my great grandfather's wooden planes , I have no use for it , it's just wonderfull !

Creagerj

02-06-2008, 23:53

A screw driver is just a tool. A camera is a source of inspiration.

rxmd

02-07-2008, 00:01

A screw driver is just a tool. A camera is a source of inspiration.
Maybe you just haven't thought hard enough what you can do with a screw driver. ;)

In addition, I don't think that way. Firstly, anything can be a source of inspiration, so that's nothing special. Secondly, I don't take a camera and feel a surge of inspiration. I feel a surge of inspiration and use the camera to express something with it. So the camera isn't the source of inspiration here, no more than the artist is inspired by the brush rather than by whatever he wants to paint.

I like some cameras as quaint objects. I also use some to do something more or less creative with them. (Mostly these are not the same cameras.) Definitely tools. Even the quaint objects are quaint in the way that my grandfather's tools are.

Philipp

rxmd

02-07-2008, 00:02

Is gadget-freakery an exclusively male characteristic?
No.

Philipp

Sparrow

02-07-2008, 00:03

Simply,

a camera is a tool ...

that can make two or more decent, even-keeled grown-up men to bicker (online or otherwise) until their faces are blue.

... what a tool.

Btw, Stewart, how many of us do you think vote both Yes and No ?? ;)

I didn’t have any view at the start, what has surprised me is how few have voted for both 1 and 3, or 2 and 4

Sparrow

02-07-2008, 00:09

Or Dr. Timothy Leary?

Or Widow Twankey :D :D

LINK (http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre/features/panto-oh-yes-it-is-an-art-form-429476.html) For the rest of the world

Roger Hicks

02-07-2008, 00:28

IMHO there's a big difference between "looking after your tools" and fondling them.

Cheers,

P.
Dear P.

Certainly true. But there is an even bigger difference between using them (including using them hard) and abusing them to show how clever, tough and professional you think you are.

Cheers,

R.

rxmd

02-07-2008, 00:53

But there is an even bigger difference between using them (including using them hard) and abusing them to show how clever, tough and professional you think you are.
You mean like the motorcycle guys who take a grinder to their knee protectors?

Haven't seen anyone do that to a camera lately though.

Philipp

Brian Sweeney

02-07-2008, 01:17

You mean like the motorcycle guys who take a grinder to their knee protectors?

Haven't seen anyone do that to a camera lately though.

Philipp

I have. I broke three dremel cutting disks repairing a Canon 50/1.2. Had to get the rear module out of a junker lens that was completely locked up to use it in another lens. You cannot believe how much metal you have to cut through to get to it, or how bad a stuck retaining ring can be. Or that someone would solder a focus helical into place, remove the front element of a lens, lock the aperture at F16, and use the lens for who-knows-what. But it's feeling much better now.

Came out pretty good in the end, total spent was $90 for a Canon 50/1.2 RF lens.

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=52943&d=1197163961

I also make shims to collimate lenses. Lots of grinding. Converted an Industar-69 28/2.8 lens to focus on the Leica; had to file an internal stop off of the lens-mount. Had a 9cm F4 Elmar with a big front-focus problem. Had to grind down the lens mount to position the lens-module in closer to the film. Can't figure out how anyone used that lens in the past 60 years. Moved the rear-module in closer to the front optics on a Helios-103 to change the focal length to use on my Nikon. That required grinding the secondary shim down by 0.4mm. Dremel polishing tools are not very good for optics- had to polish down the front element of the opaque Summicron by hand. Took a couple of hours. Just sat in front of the TV watching Wallace and Gromit. And J-8's and J-3's, that could be a thread by itself.

Those are a few examples for the "stuff" in my collection. Just have to spend money on it, you know.

It's probably more exact to label the camera as an "Instrument". Maybe I'll start a Poll on the Camera being an "Instrument" or whoever started this entire discussion as being a "Tool".

amateriat

02-07-2008, 01:26

Well, collectively, my cameras are a "tool of the state" (of my mind, more or less). But, just as my bikes are tools, there can be beauty and craft in their utility, and vice versa.

There's a Bucky Fuller quote to this end, but it's way past my bedtime here...

- Barrett

varjag

02-07-2008, 01:28

Secondly, I don't take a camera and feel a surge of inspiration.
See, that's the thing about M5 Philipp :)

Jokes aside, do you have your preferences in camera equipment? Given a choice of equally well-performing cameras, some of them you gonna like more than the others, not necessarily because of ergonomics. So yes they are tools, but they are also more than that :)

varjag

02-07-2008, 01:33

I broke three dremel cutting disks repairing a Canon 50/1.2. Had to get the rear module out of a junker lens that was completely locked up to use it in another lens.
Hear hear. When taking apart postwar Sonnar from massive TV-mount I actually cut two axles. The discs were reinforced so they just worn.

BTW Brian, did you find a LTM mount that could fit a Helios-103 yet?

Brian Sweeney

02-07-2008, 01:47

I bought a Contax to LTM adapter from "Amadeus" on Ebay. It works well with my Canon 7 and Canon P, but WILL NOT fot the Zorki 3M. The threads are very thin, and required a "cut-Out" for the focus stops. This gets hung up on the FSU RF coupling. The coupling wheels of the German and Japanese cameras work with it. I use the modified Helios-103 mostly with a Nikon S2, but it also works well with the LTM adapter.

rxmd

02-07-2008, 02:00

I have. I broke three dremel cutting disks repairing a Canon 50/1.2. Had to get the rear module out of a junker lens that was completely locked up...
Er, the quote I replied to was about people "abusing them to show how clever, tough and professional you think you are." I have my doubt that this is what you're identifying with or that this is what you want to tell the world :)

Philipp

rxmd

02-07-2008, 02:01

See, that's the thing about M5 Philipp :)
Ah and I thought it was just me being a bad photographer. Reassuring to know that it's really the camera. That means I can make my pictures better by buying another camera. Now I know why that GAS thing is all about! ;)

Brian Sweeney

02-07-2008, 11:19

Er, the quote I replied to was about people "abusing them to show how clever, tough and professional you think you are." I have my doubt that this is what you're identifying with or that this is what you want to tell the world :)

Philipp

I was just responding to the "take a grinder to knee pads". I thought you meant they were modifying them for performance. My younger brother used to go through a lot of trouble to reduce weight to make cars and motorcycles faster.

rxmd

02-07-2008, 11:24

I was just responding to the "take a grinder to knee pads". I thought you meant they were modifying them for performance.
I see! No, I meant they were modifying them so as to look as if the rider went lower in curves than they actually dared to do.

Philipp

Brian Sweeney

02-07-2008, 11:28

My brother will get a big laugh out of that. At his first wedding, the bride rode in on a Harley. In her wedding dress. Most of the wedding party rode Harleys.

Roger Hicks

02-07-2008, 11:49

You mean like the motorcycle guys who take a grinder to their knee protectors?

Haven't seen anyone do that to a camera lately though.

Philipp
Dear Philipp,

I have heard of people who massage black paint with toothpaste (the mildest abrasive readily available) but this may be an urban legend.

I have met photographers from small-town newspapers who throw all their kit indo a holdall with no lens, back or body caps in order to appear 'professional'.

Yes, there are times you stuff an uncapped lens into a pocket, in the interests of speed, with the silent prayer, "I hope it doesn't get too dusty/damaged" Doing this when there is no time pressure is the action of a true prat.

I also ride motorcycles. When I first tried a Hesketh, Mick Broom (sp?) said, "How did you find the handling?"

I replied, "Can't say. It handles better than I can ride,"

He stuck out his hand to shake. "You're the only journalist who has ever admitted that. Last month there was a piece about how the back end had stepped out at 100 mph. First, it doesn't, and second, if it did, you'd be dead. I'm not sure I could handle it, and I'm damn' sure he couldn't"

This from a man who rode a Water Buffalo (aka Kettle) around the Island so fast that the manufacturers offered him a team place -- which he turned down on the grounds that "When I overtook _________, he thought I'd fallen off. I thought I'd fallen off..."

And a good few years back, I was talking to someone at Luftmeister who told me how he had once followed one of his racer wannabee customers with scarred knee protectors and all that stuff, after following him for a few miles on the freeway and in the canyons. When they stopped, he said to the customer, "How the f*** do you manage all that drama when you're riding that slowly?"

Cheers,

R.

kshapero

02-17-2008, 03:39

Roger Hicks

02-17-2008, 04:04

Roger, I sure am glad you are seen frequently in our midst again. You are a great read. Now back to the subject at hand: Hell no my camera is not a JUST a tool. Why else do I pull it out of my bag just to look at it? Cause it is also ART!! or at least a love object.
The Gibran tripod (no longer available) was (still is?) in the New York Museum of Modern Art, and I believe they have featured some cars too. By that token, I'd certainly back some cameras (especially Leicas) as Art as well.

And thanks for the kind words.

Cheers,

R.

aad

03-27-2008, 14:17

Hi, Roger,

I enjoyed your Hesketh story. I've ridden with a few moto-journalists, and they all seem to be very nice guys-but the articles sometimes make me wonder if they're the same guy.

dan denmark

03-27-2008, 23:07

if it isn't a tool then how do you build a photograph?

dd

ernstk

03-28-2008, 02:29

Some cameras are just tools (disposable cameras?) others are much more than that (insert preferred brand here).

Some cars are just basic transport, others are works of great beauty (Ferrari 250GTO, Bugatti Atlantique, Jaguar E Type, Fiat 500... the list is endless).

Part of the pleasure of photography for me, is using a finely engineered instrument that is tactile, ergonomic and one that used the highest quality materials available.

It's like a nicely engineered wristwatch, a wonderfully machined fly reel, a great pen, a lugged steel bicycle frame. These are all things that transcend their purpose and go beyond being tools.

Anything that shows great design and craftsmanship is worthy of admiration beyond it's basic function. I have a very old Porsche 911 which gives me a great deal of pleasure to work on, or to just look at, or to hear the air cooled engine tick vocally after it's switched off, as the different metals cool and contract. All of these things add to the pleasure of use and ownership and for me, it's the same with some cameras.

To say that they're just tools utterly misses the point.

Regards
Ernst

dan denmark

03-29-2008, 20:29

in Queensland, Australia (up north where it is warm, the Florida of Oz), high school kids finishing year 12 go to the Queensland coast for a week to unwind and party hard, called Schoolies Week. the older men who pray on young slightly inebriated high school girls are called Toolies. all they make is trouble.

back to cameras. by design, tools are for making things, ie cameras for photogrpahs, but very often if you visit an historical museum you will see old beautifully preserved tools hanging in display cabinets and even rare and certainly distinguised new ones archived as remarkable examples of a technology or era, side by side for comparison.

they are both.

-dd

benedictjames

04-11-2008, 12:04

Is your heart only a tool?

The shutter is the camera's eyelid, but also your own, for it opens up to the world in front of it in a meaningful way only when we do.

We invest cameras with our energies, so they become part of us. They take on meaning, as do lots of 'things' or 'tools' - like beautiful cars and buildings. Transport; shelter; a mere means to a picture? Of course! Something more? More than a good chance.

Cameras are creations - just like the pictures they help make. Then when in our hands, they compel us to create with them and through them. They become our guide, and our companion - even our friend. Giving them our love is effortless.

I ran out of film at an event last year. The only available THING nearby was a disposable. It quickly became my friend, losing its mere 'thing-ness', in an instant! Its value beyond plastic and paper became very apparent, and with me, and me through it, created priceless memories - including the memory of the camera itself doing just that! That camera was much more than 'a camera'. Any camera - any THING - can be the same in that regard.

Why are many man hours also put into creating meaningful and worthwhile things AROUND cameras if mere tools they are? Is RFF then a meaningless tool too - just a functional means to impart functional information? Do we who participate do so because cameras are just tools, or because they are much more besides? 'The camera' - as part of 'the person' - makes it, and makes it so. There is no detachment there. RFF is about 'cameras and us' in that way. Because the latter has soul, the former is never divested of it.

Our material is never immaterial. The whole visible universe IS material, including our visible selves. Light itself is material. We connect with ALL material beyond just touch and other physical senses, and therefore everything - including the camera - becomes something more than just connected with our bodies when looked at, picked up, and used.

Like the camera, any part of the material realm becomes a soulless tool only when we do.