Let's face it: we photographers are gun nuts in disguise. We might
as well admit that we are SHOOTING, not "making an image."
Today my partner and his son were examining a family heirloom: the
grandfather's World War II pistol, a .45. I was in the other room,
listening. They were taking it apart, firing the "shutter" so to
speak, and speculating about whether it could be cleaned, lubed, and
adjusted so that it would be useful again (what with all the
hurricanes and the need to defend one's water and gasoline in
interminable evacuation traffic jams, etc.) I realized that this is
the exact kind of thing I do with old cameras from about the same
era. I just HAVE to get them up and running again, no matter how
impractical and silly and sometimes expensive it is.
The Rollei may be a chick camera, but it is a chick camera for chicks
who are crypto-gun nuts. It may be less phallic looking than, say, a
Hassie, and it may be true that you hold it over your belly and shoot
from the womb, but it is still a gun in disguise.
It's a weapon of mass communication.
--shannon --- Rollei List
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