Opposite of GAS - gear disposal choices

[Austerby]

Over the past few years I have acquired a substantial amount of RF cameras and lenses and now it’s time to reduce my collection to the core elements that I actually use rather than the ones I was curious about but find don’t appeal so much to me any more.

I have decided that I specifically want to use my RF gear for manual monochrome photography – i.e. no electronic metering or battery dependency in the camera. I shall use Sunny 16 or an external meter. This is because I want to concentrate on building my photographic skills in this area. I shall look to reduce the film types and developers I have been experimenting with too.

Colour photography will be digital and electronic using a compact or dSLR. I also have my old Hasselblad kit for further manual monochrome analogue photography.

As I don’t want to carry two RF bodies this leads me to one camera with a selection of lenses that all work specifically well in monochrome imagery. These are not necessarily the absolute best lenses of those that I have, but ones that can bring specific benefits to my black and white photography. I want to have the full range from wide to long.

From my existing kit that would mean keeping my Leica M3 – my first and still my favourite M.

The lenses I would keep are:
a) 15/4.5 VC Heliar – for it’s extraordinary perspective
b) 25/2.8 CZ Biogon – it’s sharp, wide and delivers stunning tonality, works well with external viewfinder on M3.
c) 50/1.5 CZ Sonnar – charismatic drawing
d) 90/2.8 Tele-Elmarit – useful, small and handy
e) 135/4 Tele-Elmar – has proven surprisingly useful on an M to me

I would therefore sell:

1) Leica IIIa – great little camera but experiments completed
2) Leica M2 – great but there’s just something about the M3…
3) Leica MP 0.58 – great but I don’t need the metering
4) Leica M7 (0.72) – great but I don’t need the AE or metering
5) Voigtlander R3A – great but I don’t need the AE or metering

a) 25/4 VC Skopar – a great lens but duplicates focal length of CZ 25mm, smaller but slower
b) 28/2.8 Elmarit-Asph – lost out compared to CZ 25mm
c) 35/2.5 VC Skopar – not a fan of 35mm focal length
d) 50/1 Noctilux – interesting to use but experiments completed.
e) 50/1.4 Summilux Asph – prefer b&w look of CZ Sonnar for my photos
f) 50/2 Summicron – lovely look from it but I don’t need this as well as CZ Sonnar
g) 50/3.5 Elmar – interesting to use, great results but limited handling.
h) 50/2 Summar – interesting to use but experiments completed
i) 50/2 Summitar – interesting to use but experiments completed
j) 75/2 Summicron – a great lens but no framelines on the M3 and the 90 will do its job for me.

The lenses I’m not sure about keeping or letting go:
a) 35/2 Summicron v4 – I’m not a natural with the 35mm lenses and the M3 doesn’t have the right framelines but it is a lovely, relatively fast, small & useful lens.
b) 40/1.4 VC Nokton SC – as above – but a useful fast and small lens
c) 50/1.5 Summarit – interesting to use and fits well with the M3 but prone to flare and results can be unpredictable.

I’m aware that many regret selling lenses and cameras they once owned so I’m interested in people’s responses to my selection before I start trying to sell the unwanted items. I’m in no particular hurry to sell, so observations about the state of the market and timing of the selling welcome too.

(Please note that I'm not advertising this equipment for sale at the moment so please no offers or PMs about individual items - I will use the RFF Classifieds and other outlets when my disposal decisions have been finalised )

[john neal]

....
The lenses I’m not sure about keeping or letting go:
a) 35/2 Summicron v4 – I’m not a natural with the 35mm lenses and the M3 doesn’t have the right framelines but it is a lovely, relatively fast, small & useful lens.

Definitely a keeper - just put some black tape over the frameline window and use full the full VF frame for composition. You will really regret selling this one. Apply some practice and learn to love it :)

[kshapero]

Some tough decisions. We will be watching the RFF classifieds.

[Dave Wilkinson]

I have recently taken similar steps, but if we are not advertising equipment for sale, it seems pointless listing cameras and lenses - and asking opinions on decisions that have allready been made.
Dave.
P.S. it's good that you have completed so many 'experiments' and are just going to take pictures.

[tom.w.bn]

Why keep the M3 and sell the MP? Your reason for selling is the metering and not the viewfinder magnification. Why can't you use the MP without battery just like the M3? Shouldn't you experience less frameline issues with the MP?

[nikonhswebmaster]

Austerby

YOUR POST IS ALL BLANK FOR THOSE OF US WHO ARE LOOKING AT THE RFF IN BLACK ON WHITE. NOTHING IS VISIBLE

DO NOT CHOOSE A FONT COLOR.

[CLE-RF]

Austerby

YOUR POST IS ALL BLANK FOR THOSE OF US WHO ARE LOOKING AT THE RFF IN BLACK ON WHITE. NOTHING IS VISIBLE

DO NOT CHOOSE A FONT COLOR.

Fred,

until Austerby adjusts his font color, just push Ctrl-A on your keyboard, all items on the page will be highlighted for copying and you can read the text.

[peter_n]

I have no comment on the lenses as I think these choices are personal and we are all so different. I do think you should keep the MP, especially since it's a 0.58x mag body and those are extremely difficult to come by. You can always take the battery out...

[hunghang]

Wow... I thought I spent a lot of money trying out gear :)

From your selection of lenses, it's obvious that you know what's good for you based on experience rather than the perceived qualities/mystiques/legends (i.e. you seem to be letting go of all those famous/reputable Leica glass and opt for the bang-for-buck options).

Good luck in your culling... I'm in a similar process (but the job is not as large as yours).

[Bill58]

My take or gut feeling on the current mkt. is there are still some collectors out there who have some bucks to pounce a bargain, but the majority of us have ceased buying for awhile. Makes a lot of sense to me.

[nikonhswebmaster]

Fred,

until Austerby adjusts his font color, just push Ctrl-A on your keyboard, all items on the page will be highlighted for copying and you can read the text.

Sure but then I have to go to my preferences and change to a dark highlight color from the light orange I use now, to something like black, just to read the post.

It is a bug in vB, there should be no choice of font color outside of the CSS skin you have chosen.

But vB is PHP, what can you expect? :p

[notturtle]

Are you selling to simplify or raise money?

The MP 0.58 is wonderful but it seems you shoot mainly longer lenses with the 25 thrown in as your first short under 50mm, so keeping the M3 makes sense. Personally I would freak out if a 0.91 mag body was my only one! I would hate not being able to work with the internal finder at all for 35mm and 28. I would be seriously tempted to hang onto the MP to compliment the M3.

[thinkfloyd]

I too had undergone a similar decision, selling all extraneous stuff to focus on the ones I use most. Though my reasons were purely financial, cause if I could afford it, I would have kept all my stuff to pass down to my daughter. I wish you well.

[Al Kaplan]

Just keep the 15mm Heliar. Learn to handhold 1/4 second exposures. Keep things simple.

[Dave Wilkinson]

Just keep the 15mm Heliar. Learn to handhold 1/4 second exposures. Keep things simple. Yes...that would be great - if he fancied doing some portraits! :rolleyes:

[Austerby]

(Apologies for the font colour error - corrected now)

Thanks for your comments - I hope I didn't come across as dilettantish in my post...

I am tempted to keep the MP as the combination of a 0.58 with a 0.91 finder is an appealing combination. It'd make sense with the 35/2 too.

Any more thoughts?

[BillBingham2]

Austerby,

I went through a simular process more to recapture cash but at the end I have to say I'm very happy. Other than a few cameras pass down from my father, I now only have one RF and four lenses. I'd love a fifth but I have not found an adapter for it. My one camera does everything I need it to and is reliable enought I feel it will die many years after I do even if I used it every day. Three of my four lenses are Nikkor, the other CV.

I'd stick with the set you have listed as your keep for sure. The only reason I moved from a 25/50/105 system to add a 35 was because the S3 that I switched to from an S2 has a built in 35mm frame line. It is nice to have a 35, but not a requirement. I'd say sell everything out side of your first list.

B2 (;->

[JohnTF]

I have purchased some oddities, and great stuff, when I began I had a poor choice of equpment, and today I decided to return two to the wild, so handed a Fuji 6x9 and an evil Pentax 6x7 over to someone who will hopefully find a new home with someone who will give them some exercise.

It is painful, but perhaps some sign of sanity. ;-)

Regards, John

[maddoc]

I am not a huge fan of to much equipment either, just recently replaced three Ms (M2, M5, M6) with an M7, also kept my M4-P, and use it with my four (now 5) lenses. :)

Having two M Leica cameras is quite useful, at least as a back-up. If I were in your boat, I would keep the MP 0.58x and the M3 and maybe 4 to 5 lenses, the ones you like best and use most.

[januaryman]

It's hard to let go of hard won gear. Even though I don't use cameras as much as I should, I like just looking at them, sometimes. The enjoyment I get from that out weighs the small amount of cash I'd get for all but 1 or 2 items.

This may change, but for now, even with this break in photography I'm going through, I feel it is better to hold on to something I once lusted after and loved. Maybe my personality makes my title part collector, part camera user. I wish I had the nerve to tackle GDS. Just not right now. But I completely understand.

[nikonhswebmaster]

It's hard to let go of hard won gear. Even though I don't use cameras as much as I should, I like just looking at them, sometimes. The enjoyment I get from that out weighs the small amount of cash I'd get for all but 1 or 2 items.

I once had a list like the OP, only much "worse," and it was agony to think of letting it all go, it was indeed "hard won." I spent a lot of time and energy buying, searching, learning, repairing old gear.

But I also had to worry about it, insure it, protect it, and finally I sold most of it. I still have some equipment of course, but now just a few cameras which I really like, and strangely the value of these cameras is higher to me. Even now I am getting ready to sell more, I want to own just want I really "need."

Every once and awhile I wish I had some of the equipment I sold, but I get over it, and make images with what I currently have.

I am looking forward to getting the new Olympus Pen, it helps to buy a little from time to time.

[januaryman]

I am looking forward to getting the new Olympus Pen, it helps to buy a little from time to time.

I hear that! We've all been there.

As for the value of my equipment, I have 10 rangefinders (which include 3 fixed lens cameras ) that have cost me a total of $2,143.99, according to my spreadsheet. Not a fortune. Doubt I could even get what I paid for any of them, except maybe my 2 Leicas.

Leica M2, M4
Fed 2b, 2d
Kiev 4AM
Canon P
Canonet GIII QL17
Bessa R
Yashica Minister D
Yashica GT
(all working, although the Minister D remains untested; bought for the sake of getting back the very first make/model camera I ever paid money for - I lost my original one)

[nikonhswebmaster]

As for the value of my equipment, I have 10 rangefinders (which include 3 fixed lens cameras ) that have cost me a total of $2,143.99, according to my spreadsheet. Not a fortune. Doubt I could even get what I paid for any of them, except maybe my 2 Leicas.


When I got ready to sell my stuff, the value of trading really hit me, I had very little invested in my cameras, they had all bought themselves.

[historicist]

I've never regretted selling anything to be honest, at least in terms of not having the item any more rather than that I could have got a better price for it (I still shudder when I think how little I sold my Merlin ti with mint original 7 speed XTR for in the days before ebay).

It's great having a million cameras and lenses, but there's only so many hours in the day and in those hours you can only use so many.

[Austerby]

It's great having a million cameras and lenses, but there's only so many hours in the day and in those hours you can only use so many.

Exactly, you should see the agonies I go through before going away on a trip :bang:- I need to de-clutter and dispose of items in more than one area of my life

Thanks for your comments so far, I did think there'd be some defendents of the lenses I'm proposing to let go but those adherents haven't surfaced yet.

[chris00nj]

I think each piece of equipment should have a purpose in my set. I try to complete the sentence "I will use this camera/lens when I want to ..... "

I see a lot of overlap in your portfolio. The only one I think you may want to keep is the Elmar due to it's compactness. I might keep a 2nd body though. They come in handy. You might want some frameline diversity too, so I'd lose the R3A. I'd probably keep the MP. You're only keeping one LTM lens so the IIIa becomes irrelevant.

I did find the cure for GAS though.... crappy sellers. I recent string of disappointing purchases makes me uninterested in buying something new.

[peter_n]

I am tempted to keep the MP as the combination of a 0.58 with a 0.91 finder is an appealing combination. It'd make sense with the 35/2 too.I think that's a good decision, and you may also find that you can use your 25mm on it without the external VF too. Then you could have a two body kit with 25 and 50 on the cams and your little 15 or 90 as a third lens depending on what you might shoot.

[Sonny Boy Havidson]

Great topic! I tend to sell regulary what I do not use to try to reduce my gear to one RF, one TLR and one SLR. I do the same for lenses and use 3 lengths: 35 mm, 50 mm and 85 mm (on SLR and 135 mm for RF).

[Austerby]

My decision has been made and my collection has now reduced: what I decided in the end was, for now at least, to keep the following:

Bodies: M3, R3A, IIIa
Lenses: VC 15, 25, 40; CZ Sonnar 50, Summarit 50/1.5; Summar, Summitar; Elmar 3.5; Tele-elmarit 90 and Tele-Elmar 135.

I'll probably reduce my vintage LTM kit but at the moment they're fun.

So, much against most people's advice I have sold my M2, MP and M7, and my CZ 25/2.8, my 35 Summicron v4, the Noctilux, the Summilux 50 ASPH and the 75/2 APO and others - all brilliant items which I'm sure the new owners will enjoy using.

I'm pleased, if slightly surprised at my decision and it's been long enough now that I don't have any regrets.

The best thing is that I got back approximately what I paid for the kit in the first place - OK some items were down but others went up and overall I came out having had effectively free use of a lot of very nice kit for two or three years.

I am now looking forward to the simpler life, concentrating on photography and not gear.

[john neal]

Interesting how we all feel slightly differently about kit, isn't it?

I would never part with my MP / 35 'cron (v4), but was happy to sell my M3, a non-stamped IIIcK, IIIf converted from a 1942 IIIc and three of my beloved mint black LTM cameras from the 1930's.

I agree with your sentiment about taking pictures, I too hope to avoid GAS and generate prints :D