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Camera case question

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NutmegCT

NutmegCT

Great Pumpkin
Bronze
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Things just don't last as long as they used to!

The leather case of my Voigtlander Bessamatic is now shedding "leather dust", which ends up on the camera exterior.

Is there any way to stop the deterioration of the leather? It's not the exterior finished surface of the case - it's the rough interior surface. Also the reverse side of the leather straps, which are just beginning to dry and crack.

Thanks.
Tom M.
 
Neatsfoot oil?
 
Success. Used mink oil and beeswax. Seems much better.

The Bessamatic was my first real camera; bought it back around 1965. Used it when I made my six week "starving student" trip around Europe in '67.

IMG_0648.jpg
 
And an Agfa-Gevaert meter! That pic brings back a ton of memories.

My first was a Mamiya-Sekor fixed lens SLR. Long gone now. '64 or '65. Made enough money with it to trade up to a Yashica SLR with a Pentax screw-mount lens, used that to progress into Miranda SLR's, Soligor optics. Miranda SLR's were the closest system cameras to Nikons I could afford. By '68 I was working as a "stringer" for local rags and part-time in a family photo shop. Made enough money by '69 with those Mirandas to afford my first MGB, freshman year of college. Couldn't afford to pay a mechanic, so began the journey...

Thanks for that, Tom!
 
memories, memories

IMG_0650[1].jpg

Just found a photo of my first girlfriend - met her on that 1967 trip. Took the picture with the Bessamatic!

memories, memories
 
DrEntropy said:
Miranda SLR's, Soligor optics. Miranda SLR's were the closest system cameras to Nikons I could afford.
Click to expand...

I put a roll of film in my fathers Miranda recently.
He bought it for the same reason one of the few affordable systems available at the time with all sorts of accessories for close ups, changeable eyepieces.
Still works but maybe I should order a replacement battery for the light meter.
 
My first camera was a birthday present that I got in the late 1950s. I still have some prints I took with it. They were contact prints and I think you gor 12 shots per roll. You had to make them count.
Camera 1 s.jpg
My first SLR. Clunky and heavy but it still works some 45 years later. At least I think it works but I have not put ant film through it in a long time. I do have slides I took with it.
Camera 2 s.jpg
David
 
Hello Tom

I went to boarding school in 1958 and I had it when I was there.

The Zenit-B was a popular cheap SLR camera in the UK. It did take good photos but was completely manual so a meter was a necessary accessory.

David
 
I still have my Canon FT QL with 3 lenses, filters, etc. Put in a new battery but haven't used it yet. Also still have a complete B & W darkroom outfit in the cellar.
 
Zenit! Sold a few of those in the late '60's along with Prakticas. Cheap! In both price and build, felt "tinny" to handle. Lots of Pentax Spotmatics and Minolta SRT's as well.

I still have a lot of the Miranda system's pieces here; Extension tubes, bellows, fixed-length lenses from 21MM out to 400MM. Favorite lens for head shots and medium distance work was a 105MM āˆ±2.0 Soligor.

There's a fish-eye attachment in this shot, too. Mounted it by screwing it into the 50MM front.

cameras2.jpg
 
Doc - what's the award plaque?
 
1969, one of the awards for a local Pittsburgh PP of A contest. Mostly useless. it just put my name in a pile of others, but got me a job after service in USAF with a local studio. Long story, hardly worth mentioning.
 
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