My Cameras

A picture is worth a thousand words

Attributed to Arthur Brisbane, Confucius, Frederick Barnard, and Napoleon Bonaparte among others.

Zeiss Ikon Nettar

The earliest photos I have that I took myself are from when I was about ten. My memory of the camera I used is now lost.

I must have shown an interest in photography, though, because when I was about twelve or thirteen, my father gave me the camera he had had since he was a teenager. It is a Zeiss Ikon Nettar 517/16 made in Stuttgart, West Germany in 1954 or 1955 (according to the serial number) and uses 120 film. I managed to take quite a few photos with it, although I never really understood how it worked. I just left it on the two red dots on the controls and it seemed to do mostly ok. I also wasn’t very picky.

My first try at still-life photography

I ended up storing it in the bottom of my sewing box, because I would be unlikely to lose it and it would be unlikely to be stolen. It has stayed there only coming out occasionally for probably the last 25 or 30 years. I got it out recently because I thought it would make a good still-life model for one of my online photography classes. The paint is flaking off, but it still looks as though it is in working order. Now that I know more about photography in general, I might see if I can find some film for it.

I was going for dark and moody in this photo

When he was about 17, my father was out sailing on the Norfolk Broads with my grandparents and his Uncle Bill (my Great Uncle Bill). He decided to try and take a photo of the sailboat under sail so he got in the dinghy that was being towed behind the boat with this camera, and someone - I’m guessing Uncle Bill - let line out so he was was far enough back to get the boat in the frame. He was standing up about to take the photo when Grandpa (probably not on purpose) suddenly tacked and jerked the dinghy out from under him. He ended up treading water holding the camera up over his head and slowly being swept downstream - watching the boat get smaller and smaller - while Grandpa and Uncle Bill hove-to, hauled the dingy in, unloaded all the things they had been storing in the dinghy, and Uncle Bill got in and rowed back for my father who by this time was a tiny dot in the distance. Apparently there was some delay and discussion as Grandpa expected him to swim back to the boat against the current while holding the camera over his head, but apparently common sense - probably Uncle Bill’s and Grandma’s - eventually prevailed.

Photos I know I took with the Zeiss Ikon when I was about 12 or 13 and the captions I wrote on the backs. I didn't correct capitalizations or spelling:

• “Different kinds of century plantsBrownsvilleTX”

• “Tall palm treesTx”

• “a tiny crow Brownsville TX”

• “Swimming pool at the motel in Brownsville Tx”

• “A statuett TX”

I remember stalking that poor crow for ages trying to get a photo of him. The following photos were taken around the same time, but I don’t know for sure what camera I was using. Again, I used the captions I wrote on the backs at the time:

• “Daddy and Whiskey (Daddys the one with the cap on)”

• “Mink and Tigger one picture taken over another (turned out quite well I think)”

• “Alamo San Antonio Tx”

• “Jane, Mummy & Philip at the Alamo Tx”

• “a broken bridge Tx near the rodeo”

Philip was pointing at a bullet hole at the Alamo, I did accidentally double expose the photo with Mink and Tigger, and yes, Daddy is the one in the cap. I looked at the photo of the fallen railroad bridge, and thought, “I remember that that was near a rodeo.” Then I flipped it over and saw that it indeed was taken near a rodeo. What rodeo, I have no idea. I have no photos of the rodeo.

I had other fairly nice point and shoot cameras over the years - the more recent ones even automatically wound the film on so I didn’t have to expend my own energy or accidentally double expose film. The modern benefits of point and shoot are that they are generally small, some are waterproof, and now, of course, they are digital.

Then came phones. Who needs a camera now, right? We carry one with us at all times! Also small, often waterproof, and some of them take amazing photos. I took the following photo of Mount Rainier (Puyallup Tribe name Tahoma or Tacoma) the other day from the top of Crystal Mountain Ski Resort with my phone. I wasn’t about to ski with my good camera.

Nikon Coolpix B500

This camera led a hard life.

In early 2019, Bob and I invested in a Nikon Coolpix B500. We were traveling down to Southern California to meet up with our friends David and Pete in Joshua Tree National Park, and a desert super bloom was forecast. That camera is technically a point-and-shoot with optical and digital zoom. It is considered a “bridge” camera between point-and-shoot with only digital zoom, and Digital Single-Lens Reflex (DSLR) and Mirrorless cameras which have interchangeable lenses. It has a lot of pre-programmed settings, for instance: Landscape, Beach, Snow, Sunset, Night portrait, Macro, and quite a few others. I didn’t use many of them. Its autofocus was very good at figuring out what I was trying to focus on. I really liked that camera. It took really good photos, had GREAT optical zoom capability, AND it was shiny red!

A few photos I took with the B500:

• Desert dandelion (Malacothrix glabrata) and distant phacelia (Phacelia distans) in Joshua Tree National Park. March, 2019

• Joshua tree (Yucca brevifolia) flower, Joshua Tree National Park. March, 2019

• Joshua tree flower (Yucca brevifolia), Joshua Tree National Park. March, 2019

• Desert paintbrush (Castilleja angustifolia), Joshua Tree National Park. March 2019

• Bob and my Jeep. Road to Darwin, Death Valley National Park. March, 2019

• Delicate Arch, Arches National Park. November, 2021

• Hot air balloon over Lake Havasu City. December, 2021

• Yellow-headed blackbird (Xanthocephalus xanthocephalus), Crystal Crane Hot Springs, Oregon. May, 2021

• American Bison (Bison bison), Wind Caves National Park. November, 2021

• Transient (meat-eating) orca pod hunting seals in South Puget Sound near McNeal Island. Female and calf. Taken from Scat. June 2, 2022

• Male transient orca (Orcinus orca) and in the South Puget Sound - note the much larger dorsal fin than the female in the previous photo. June 2, 2022

That camera lasted a few years. It mostly survived me being suddenly squirted in the leg by clam which startled me into leaping sideways, slipping on a sea anemone, and falling on it against a jagged rock while we were exploring the shore of Eagle Island here in the South Sound. I was bleeding a bit and ended up with an interesting camera-shaped bruise - Bob was pretty sure he could make out the word Nikon written backwards in it. This wasn’t the first time I fell with the camera - the first time was on an hike in Joshua Tree right after we bought it. That time I ended up landing with my hand on an cholla cactus and having to have Bob and our friend Pete remove the needles. Hundreds of tiny needles. That was fun. Unfortunately, during our boat trip to Canada last year I dropped this poor, abused camera and bent the lens housing. I was sad, but not really surprised.

Sony Alpha 7C

I think I was concentrating, but I actually just look a bit surprised.

Shortly after we returned from Canada we were planning a trip across the country to visit my parents. We were going to take our time and visit as many National Parks as we could spending a couple of days in each, and we would want a working camera. One day Bob said, “You should look at the Nikon Coolpix P1000.” I looked and I was pretty much hooked. Wow! Twice as expensive as the B500, but it looked AMAZING! Then Bob said, “Or…for not much more we could invest in something a bit better. You really seem to like photography. Maybe we should look into DSLR cameras” Hmmm.

I wanted a Nikon, since I had liked the Coolpix so much, so I dived into online research and came up with a camera I thought I would like - a Nikon D750. I wanted to actually hold one and see what it was like, so we got up our nerve, donned our KN95 masks, and walked into the local camera shop. Of course we were the only ones wearing masks. The salesperson handed me a D750 and said it is nice, but for only a bit more you could order a Sony ɑ7C that is smaller, much much lighter, much newer technology, and mirrorless. A customer in the store who was shopping for lenses and had apparently been listening, turned around, walked over, and handed me her ɑ7C to look at (which was a bit startling, since I’m not used to being so close to strangers anymore) and said it was the best camera she has ever had.

We left, did some more research, decided we liked what we saw, and and went back and ordered one a few days later. The Sony ɑ7C comes in two body styles - black with a silver top and all black. I really like the look of the one that is black with a silver top, reminiscent of Daddy’s old camera. I ordered that style, but due to supply chain issues, it never came. I waited for almost a month and a half and finally settled on an all black one about three days before we left on our trip.

Some of the hundreds of photos I took over the month we were traveling:

Glacier National Park, Montana

Not many glaciers left…

• These mountains were not visible when we arrived in the rain the previous day

• We slept with the van pop-top closed…

• The aspens had all turned

• Tiny glaciers are all that are left

• The largest of the glaciers that we saw

Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota

• Bison (Bison bison) Maybe a slightly better photo than the similar bison one taken with the Coolpix in Wind Caves NP

• Little Missouri River and Theodore Roosevelt badlands

• I think we woke him up

• Curious, but wary prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus)

• Badlands formations in Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

• Close-up! Actually we were in the car at all times bison were nearby… All bison photos were taken out the window.

• Lounging next to the road.

• There were prairie dogs everywhere!

Voyageurs National Park, Minnesota and Various Places in Northern Wisconsin

Most of Voyageurs is boat-in, so we only saw the very outskirts of the park.

• A sign letting boats know where the bathrooms are. If you look closely, you can see that it was snowing.

• Voyageurs Kabetogama Lake

• October in Voyageurs. The two benefits are that the leaves are turning and there were NO mosquitos.

• We saw these black bears (Ursus americanus) about 150 yards from our campsite in Big Bay State Park, WI. We were in the van, and Bob had his foot on the gas pedal in case mama bear got irritated. She actually had three cubs.

• Bayfield, Wisconsin from the Ferry out to Madeline Island.

• American Red Squirrel (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus) in Big Bay State Park, Wisconsin

• White-tailed does (Odocoileus Virginianus) having a chat near the equipment shed in Copper Falls State Park, Wisconsin

• Curious white-tailed yearling buck, Copper Falls State Park, Wisconsin. One of those does in the previous photo was his mother.

Badlands National Park

This was our second time here and we are already planning on going back. We haven’t gotten enough of prairie dogs and bison, apparently.

• Badlands at dusk from the Big Badlands Overlook.

• This bighorn ram (Ovis canadensis) walked across the street in front of us at dusk as we were driving into the park.

• Prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus) in our campground. He wasn’t even bothering to keep an eye on me.

• Itchy bison vigorously scratching his belly on a parking bollard

• Desert cottontail (Sylvilagus Audubonii) in our campground

• Flat prairie dog

• The first bison looked like he was having such a great time scratching himself, another one came hurrying over to scratch also. Tired of bison yet?

• Daydreaming bison. We came across him on our way out of the park and he’s actually, believe it or not, scratching himself on a parking bollard. Apparently bison are VERY ITCHY. And those bollards are super strong!