How I met Lomography

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(Update: I added more pics to the post.)

So here I am for some time now, proud owner of a Diana F+ Deluxe kit and a Holga. Having analog cameras to take photos feels like being home again: During my childhood and teenage years I used my fathers camera to take photos. Scanning them is still on my Todo List.
Sadly enough the Fujis film transport failed and the camera was never repaired. This was the end of my photography hobby for the time being. I observed the first Lomography hype and badly wanted to be part of it. But being a pupil I could not afford the camera.

Analog media suddenly was outdated, people (including me, sadly enough) dropped their vinyl collections and switched to CDs or MP3s. I started to use mobile camera phones (K750i, N95….), but never was satisfied with the results. It just wasn’t the same.

Then, it must’ve been the 24th of december in 2009 I received a tweet from some of my tweeps, something like “My sister got a big package for x-mas. #lomography”. A pic was included and I saw a nice camera with lots of lenses. I was interested, this surely looked good. I soon found Lomography.com , and I found out that the item displayed in said photo was Diana F+ Deluxe kit, as you already might have guessed.
I was hooked. Analog photography, without programs and automatic settings. Just a plain piece of plastic, film, and a few settings. I needed one. I wanted one. This seemed to good to be true.
And yet seeing the price I had to wait. I am a father after all and have to care for my family.
I regularly stopped by the Lomography website, visitted the shop and admired both the cameras and the photos. Oh yes, the photos. Lovely vignettes, pinhole shots, crazy colors. What do I need to tell you, you know it all yourself, don’t you?

A few month later, it must’ve been sometime in April I noticed that the price of the Deluxe kit on the website went up to 200 Euro. But I found a new kit on Ebay. It was the 3, 2, 1 mine story.
The day the kit arrived was a special one. I celebrated unboxing the kit, and I couldn’t wait to make some use of it.

Some of my first Diana shots, taken with different lenses and pinhole (I really love pinholes, it’s like reliving some part of history):

Credits: cptsalek

Lomography soon became an adiction: I fell in love with the Diana because it looks so fragile, with the knobs and dials, and the lenses. I love it because of the endless possibilities the Deluxe kit offers.
But I felt that I couldn’t take the Diana with me all the time. I became owner of the Holga.
Well, signing up for lomography.com was the last, natural step:

Credits: cptsalek

So here I am. :)

Life took a different road from there on. I got a used stereo system from a colleague, started to collect vinyl records again and even created a new Mixtape a few days ago. It feels good to live a analog lifestyle again.

written by cptsalek on 2010-12-02

2 Comments

  1. erinwoodgatesphotography
    erinwoodgatesphotography ·

    I wonder how many people got the love of photography from their fathers! I did!

  2. mountainmomma
    mountainmomma ·

    I did too...and my father from his father :)