I Bought A New (To Me) Camera

Right after publishing my recent blog post on psychologically justifying my ownership of several cameras and even more lenses through 'rationalization,' I bought another camera and lens.  I didn't plan it that way, it just turned out the timing was right and a nice copy of the camera and lens I had been looking for was available.  Also, I paid $67 US for both so my decision to buy was relatively easy.  You can read my justification for owning multiple cameras and lenses using 'rationalization' here.

Looking at the image at the top of this post you can see which camera I purchased.  Why would I buy a 50-something year-old all manual film camera with a 50mm f/1.4 lens?  Well, this camera and lens combination holds a special place in my photographic past and in my development as a photographer.  Hold that thought.  I intend to add the Spotmatic to my  photographic display cabinet which holds other significant cameras I’ve owned and used.

(Courtesy Wikipedia)

First a bit of background about this camera.  For those of you who began photographing after 1980 or so, you probably never had the necessity of using a camera such as this one.  

The Pentax Spotmatic was manufactured between 1964 and 1976.  Even though the name of the manufacturer was Asahi Pentax, this camera is branded as the "Honeywell" Pentax Spotmatic.  Honeywell was the official distributor of Pentax cameras in the United States at that time.  Any officially imported Pentax camera was branded with the Honeywell logo.

This camera is manual everything.  It has shutter speeds from 1 second to 1/1000th second.  That was blazingly fast in the late 1960s and early to mid 1970s.  Not so much today with the shutter in the Fujifilm X-T5 having a speed up to 1/180,000th second!  It also has a Bulb mode, which most digital cameras still have today.  If you aren't familiar with "Bulb" mode, it allows the shutter to remain open as long as the shutter button is fully depressed or a cable release has the shutter locked open.  Notice there is no hotshoe for a flash and only a manual film wind.  There is no motor drive.  Motor drive is how fast you can work your thumb to advance the film after each exposure.  The dial on the left is for rewinding the film into its cartridge once you exposed the entire roll.  Many people opened the camera back forgetting to rewind their film first.  Ruined.  Luckily, I cannot ever remember doing that.

The camera was named "Spotmatic" as it was supposed to have a spot meter built-in.  Pentax, just before release, decided a spot meter was too cumbersome so instead they used a center-weighted meter.  But they kept the name.  Go figure?

Like the Fujifilm X-Pro3 camera, the film speed, ASA but now referred to as ISO, control is located within the shutter speed dial.  You lifted the outer ring and rotated it to adjust it to the correct ASA of your film stock, then allowed it to lock in by returning to its resting position.  I could go on about this cameras controls but you get my meaning.  

The lens is a Super Multi-Coated Takumar 50mm f/1.4.  This lens was and is considered optically excellent and many still use it with adapters today.  Multi coating made a difference and was relatively new at the time.

These all manual cameras only worked well if you were a thinking photographer.  If you didn’t pay constant attention to what you were doing, you probably were going to have issues.  If the film didn't catch securely on the take-up spool and it failed to advance, that was your fault.  If you didn't focus accurately, that was your fault.  If the exposure was off, that was your fault.  If you failed to rewind the film before opening the back, that was your fault.  With cameras like this, there were many more ways to fail than to succeed.  But succeed we all did!

Now, how does all this pertain to me and my photographic background?  After graduating from University with a degree in geology, I "accidentally" became a police officer.  True.  I had never even thought about a law enforcement prior.  It is a long story for another time.

After going through extensive basic training and spending some time as a patrol officer, my photographic knowledge and scientific educational background became known and I was transferred as a detective to the forensic unit.  There I would be responsible for going to the scenes of crimes, photographing them, identifying and collecting evidence, attending autopsies, dusting for fingerprints, later analyzing some of the collected evidence, developing my film and printing my photographs (black and white 8" X 10" for court), and all the other scientific things we did back then.  I also became an acknowledged fingerprint expert in both state and federal courts.  Of course, the technology we had then pales by what law enforcement has today.  But we did fine.  We cared about what we did, the victims, their families and tried our best to help solve crimes using science.

Because of my knowledge of photography, I ended up being in charge of the darkroom which was a blessing to me.  My colleagues and I got to shoot as much film as we wanted and experiment as much as we wanted.  My supervisor was of the opinion that practice, practice, practice was the best method for not messing up when at a homicide or other serious crime scene.  If you screwed up, there was no going back.  Having no crime scene photographs could open up the door to defense attorney questions as to what nefarious reasons there may be for not having photographs available!  Luckily, in the over 100 death investigations I worked as well as the hundreds and hundreds of burglaries, larcenies, robberies, rapes, auto accidents, etc., I never made any mistakes and lost the images.  Lucky or just scared to death of failure?  (As my career progressed I worked my up to chief of police, retired from that department after 25 years and was appointed chief of police in another, larger city.  After retiring from that department, I worked for the United States Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) for a number of years and then became president of a consulting company.  All because of my 'chance' decision to become a police officer instead of a geologist!  Funny how things sometimes workout.)

The Pentax Spotmatic was the camera I used for several years until we bought Nikon FM cameras.  We used the Spotmatic with only one lens, the 50mm f/1.4, as focal lengths longer or shorter could visually distort the perspectives and relationships of one subject to another in photographs and confuse jurors.  In other words, a wide angle lens could make two pieces of evidence appear to be far apart and a telephoto lens could make them look like they are right next to each other.  One camera, one lens.  Oh!  As for film—Kodak Tri-X only.  No color film until the mid-1980s as it was considered “too inflammatory” for jurors to see.  All that red blood and such, we were told.  When we needed more light, we supplemented the camera with a huge, hulking Honeywell Stobonar flash and carried a large, heavy 510 volt battery on our belt attached to the flash with a coiled cord and all that attached to the camera with a PC cord.  As I mentioned, no hot shoe.  Wow!  Have times changed and for the better.

They are all good memories.  I was able to learn photography at little cost to myself, experiment extensively with infrared and ultraviolet photography, eventually learn color processing (C-41), process control using a densitometer and felt as though I was doing something worthwhile and important.  I spent eight of my 36 years in law enforcement as a forensic detective.

So that is why this camera and lens combination is near and dear to my heart?  I shot hundreds of crime scenes and other events, festivals, portraits, city events and a few family events with it as well.  These cameras are built like tanks and, as the saying goes, 'you could pound nails with them.'  I hadn't had one since I turned in my old one for the Nikon FM around 1980 and I thought that, for a price of $67.00 US, I could afford to buy one, even without any psychological rationalization.  Lol  The camera and lens will make a nice addition to my collection of cameras that I used along my 52 year photographic journey.

Just a thought that came to mind.  With all of the computers with lenses we call digital cameras and all of their features, automation and amazing abilities, I think a good case could be made that using a fully manual camera like the Spotmatic, may provide many of us with a better and more satisfying photographic experience.  Your thoughts?

Is there an old camera and/or lens lurking in your memory that provides meaning and context to your photographic history?  If so, leave a comment and let us know.  These kinds of stories are of interest to many of us.

Join me over at my website, https://www.dennismook.com.  

Thanks for looking. Enjoy!  

Dennis A. Mook  

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