Whilst sitting in a cafe last weekend, an older man in an adjacent booth, called out to me to inquire about my camera. He wanted to know if it was a manual Nikon as he had suspected. “No, it’s a Yashica.”, I replied, “My Nikon is at home.” He then launched into a conversation about old film cameras and we speculated over my camera’s age. I realised that I actually didn’t know how old my camera was (which made me feel silly) but he assured me that it must have been from the ’70s. I had thought it was more likely a later model from the ’80s. He seemed quite delighted that I was using something he remembered from his past. Conversation about cameras continued on with my new friend until my lunch arrived and he proclaimed, “Yes, I told my wife that that lady really knows her photography. She is using film.”
That sweet man was not the first to strike up conversation about my cameras. I have been stopped many times by strangers and never have they posed me questions of why. They’ve all greeted me with smiles and discussions of once owning similar cameras. Most of them walk away with a happy memory in their head. Experiencing these little interactions with strangers is just another reason why being a film camera user is so heart warming. Have you ever had these kinds of conversations with strangers?
p.s. I’ve since learned that my Yashica is from the mid 1980s.
