As you´ve gathered, my love affair with the Epson R-D1 digital rangefinder brought me to the Rangefinderforum. This is a fun place to be. A rather large niche of photographers who understand the niceties of a direct optical viewfinder, manual controls, fast and superior optics in a compact package. Digital camera users are however not the norm, they are tolerated but to a certain degree frowned upon, unless Leica SLR users of course. So, over the last year or two my prejudices towards film have been successively worn down. I grew up on film, but like many had been led down the wrong garden path in thinking that digital was in every way better, and had discarded my film cameras a long time ago. How wrong can you be? This is not a digital vs film rant, because I use and enjoy both. But I´ve come to like taking pictures in the traditional manner more. For me its a more sedate and nerve-calming process. I´ve not yet a darkroom, so post-processing is still a digital affair.
When choosing to start shooting film again. I never considered getting just another rangefinder, 35mm format, camera. There are some very beautiful rangefinders out there. However I thought whilst we are at it, why not go for larger expanses of film? Secondly, me being in no small part stingy (must be my Scottish heritage), I thought I´d build my own camera, and this would be much easier with leaf shuttered lenses, negating the 35mm format altogether. Exactly why I´d like to build my own camera, what type and how will be the subject of another post.
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