1986

New Camera

My Canon AE-1 Camera
I still have it in 2023 but have not used it in years

We spent my birthday at our house in Melbourne and Julie surprised me by giving me a Canon AE-1 PROGRAM 35mm camera which I had been looking into for several months.  The “Program” feature had been out for a couple years in cameras being made possible by putting a computer chip into the camera.  Prior 35mm cameras were fully manual meaning you had to set both the shutter speed and the aperture, something only for the more serious photographers.  While the AE-1 had a full manual mode, it also had a shutter speed-priority mode which you only have to set the shutter speed and the camera would automatically set the aperture making it much simpler to use.  There also was a full “program” mode which basically made the camera a point and shoot camera. The camera came with a 50mm f1.4 lens lens which was good for general photos, but I soon went out an bought a 28-85mm zoom lens which from then on was all I used.  

ThThe AE-1 is a Single-Lens-Reflex or SLR camera which is considerably more sophisticated than my Polaroid SX-70 camera, but with that sophistication came flexibility, so I studied the manual, and I bought a couple of books on SLR and started taking pictures.  It took some time and effort to learn how to use the camera going through quite a few rolls of film with minimal success. While my Polaroid was nice in that it gave instant pictures, the Polaroid film pack only had ten pictures and was fairly expensive.  The AE-1, takes 35mm fil which came in rolls of 18 or 36 pictures and were considerably less expensive.  Well, the film itself was less expensive, you then had to have the film developed and pictures printed which probably ended up about the same cost in the end. 

Eckerd Film Envelope

I’m not sure how many rolls of film I shot before my pictures started turning out at least halfway decent.  I would buy the smaller 18 picture rolls at first as I didn’t want to waste a dozen or more pictures when I didn’t get some setting on the camera right before seeing the results a week or two later when I got the film developed.  I could of course just put the camera in Program mode and let it make all the decisions, but what was the fun in that, why have a fancy camera if I was going to use it as a point-and-shoot.  I read about shutter speed, aperture, focus, when to use each but reading and actually doing it with the camera took practice, and a lot of film.  Fortunately, about this time the drugstore chain Eckerds started developing film and when you went to pick them up you could choose and pay for only the ones that you liked and didn’t have to pay for the rest.  There were times I took an 18-picture roll of film and would only keep one or two.  In time I got better and at least half the pictures, though maybe not all that good, were at least good enough to keep.

My box of film cans

One thing I always liked about 35mm film is it came in little canisters the perfect size for storing small things in.  I liked the early canisters the best because they were made of metal and had tight fitting screw lids so you could store small things in them which would be safe and dry.  I once saw how to make a small first aid kit that would fit in one.  At this time the film industry, was switching from the metal film cans to plastic ones of which I saved many in a shoe box.  The only metal film can that I saved happened to be in my old stash box from the 70’s which still contained marijuana seeds. Humm… I wonder if they would still grow.

The Canon AE-1 was a good, sturdy camera that I would use until the digital age of cameras came many years later.

Christmas