Collecting Minolta
Around the time the fifth camera arrived, it dawned on me that I had become a Minolta collector—that certainly wasn’t my goal initially. My first purchase, the Maxxum 7000i, was solely for the purpose of solving the bokeh problem. Awareness of the 7000i had been with me for years asContinue Reading
Buying Manure by the Bag
After ripping out the liriope, a new problem arose— the yard was even with the sidewalk, so there was no way to prevent mulch from spilling from the beds. The two obvious choices for solving the problem were digging around the perimeter of the bed to lower it below theContinue Reading
Finding a Good Book…
After realizing I needed much more help with understanding my cameras and how to compose images, I went looking for a good book. Not a lot of blog posts contain book recommendations. Having looked at all the film photography blogs I could find in the weeks after I got myContinue Reading
Of Chili Dogs and Childhood Memories
I spent my early childhood in rural southwest Virginia. Fifteen-cent chili dogs are one of the fondest memories of my childhood. There were two places to get good ones (as far as I knew at age six). The first was the “Friendly Inn,” run by a friend of the familyContinue Reading
Plotting Out the Front Yard
When plotting the yard, I had two goals in mind. The first was figuring out where the sun would hit between March 21 and September 21. The second was trying to figure out what plants could coexist in terms of water needs, sunlight, colors, and textures. The yard is small,Continue Reading
Why Film?
My first grownup camera was a Minolta SR-T 101 bought in a pawn shop with money saved doing college work-study jobs. That was 40 plus years ago. I loved that camera, and my affinity and affection for Minolta have never waned. So, when I decided to buy a camera, IContinue Reading
Seasons of the Garden
As I write this, it’s late winter, mid-March. The garden is half green, half brown. The coneflowers and daylilies are up much sooner than is good. Already I’ve had to cover them from frost three times, and more times seem likely. Even the fern buds are up. Over the pastContinue Reading
Bingeing Minolta History: Really—This Should Be on Netflix
On learning that Minolta no longer existed, naturally, I wanted to find out what happened. After having read every website I could find about the history of Minolta, I reflected on what the company accomplished. What I found was a history of risk-taking, notable firsts, unfortunate missteps, and a fewContinue Reading
Of Gardening Books and Flower Daydreams
The idea of having a front-yard garden hit me around the time I realized that periwinkle would not likely work any better than ivy. Periwinkle had been my safety choice. When that fell through, desperation set in, and the idea of having a garden slowly took hold, despite the lackContinue Reading
The Shape of My Art
Looking through a viewfinder somehow changed my perspective. It’s difficult to explain how or why. In fact, I don’t think I can. What gives a situation or a scene or a thing significance? Why does a collection of objects or a location caught at a specific point in time haveContinue Reading
