A few weeks ago, I was helping John hinge and hang a new door. Which meant I was propping up the door so he could do all the work, twirling my hair, humming, looking around the room for shiny objects or equally shiny secrets, and asking pointless, useless, and/or nosy questions. On his fabulously old I-want-that-too blue dresser, a frayed brown leather case caught my eye. I opened the case to reveal a Minolta Autocord camera, looking excessively and deliciously old and dusty. Also, the strap disolved on me, for added antique effect. I asked John if I could be a steward of the camera for a while and figure out how to use it. He easily agreed, so I tried my chances at the old blue dresser, too, to far less success.
Without further ado, my new object of stewardship:
This weekend, I took it into George's camera in North Park, held it at arms length like a kid and asked, "what's this and how do i use it and what film does it take and does it even work?" Actually, I just suavely brought the camera up to the counter and just asked what film it used and if they sell it, and I got answers to the above questions. It was cute, though; the nice man gave it a full check-up and heartily encouraged me to be excited to be experimenting with it.
I've currently loaded it with color film and taken about 5 pictures. God knows how many are on a roll. Also, god knows if I'm actually taking pictures. My friend David's dad explained every knob and feature while we were over at his house the other day, but most of it is a blur. I'm following the sunny-16 rule, even if I'm not entirely sure what that means or if I even have the rule right. Good times.
I feel completely legit taking pictures with this, moreso than even my Eighties Nikon. Sweet Grace saw me unpeeling the camera from it's disolve-y leather case, and, having presumably never before seen a twin-lens reflex camera before, quickly identified it as a camera because she's a GENIUS, pointed right at (on) the lens where she's always told not to touch, proclaimed "camera!" and smiled - ready for her close-up. However, she moves too quickly and the whole backwards mirror reflection thing wasn't quite working out for the sports/toddler photography.
I mean, I can't wait to show you my artistic blur shots when they're developed. Most of all, I hope John doesn't read this and want the camera back.
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