Cameras Past and Present: Pentax Point and Shoot

In this series I'm going to think out loud about cameras I've owned in the past and cameras that I have now. In each entry, I'll discuss how or why I acquired the camera, what I used it for, its good and bad points, and anything else I can remember. A discussion of a camera needs photos taken by the camera, so a few will be included in each post.

The first camera I owned was a Pentax point-and-shoot, the name of which I can't remember. According to the photographs in my collection, I used this camera from about 1989 at university until the mid to late 90s. It was also likely the camera used by myself and my parents when I was in high school. I was its last owner but I doubt I was the purchaser and first user. I most likely liberated it from a drawer in my parents' home. Thanks, Mom and Dad.

My friend and I at high school graduation in 1988. Note the matching colours of my bowtie and her dress. Classy. Not sure why I'm holding her purse. Photo by Mom or Dad.

Jack Mumberly, home from the Canadas! Me playing Jack Mumberly in a production of The Mumberly Inheritance put on by a group of students and a couple of professors in my first year at university. I don't remember the name of the student who played my one true love Polly the maid. Again, photo by Mom or Dad. 

I wasn't interested in photography during the time I had this camera except as a way to remember things. It preserved memories very well with its single focal-length lens (28mm? 35?), built-in flash, autofocus, and auto-exposure. I do remember the autofocus sometimes being off. Possibly my fault for not turning on the flash in low light? These days I pixel-peep to make sure focus is perfect in my photos, but in those days I didn't really care as long as I could reasonably make out who was in the picture. Out of focus photos were just one of those perils of photography I accepted. I had no urge (or money) to go out and buy something better.

Memorial University, 1991. Some student festival. She told us she had gotten a tattoo in a private place and we asked her for proof! The woman in the grey hoodie got a better photo than I did. Paton College where I lived for a year or so is in the background.

Speaking of Paton College, this was my first room at Rothermere House. I used the camera to record the way I decorated the walls around my bed. My roomate had posters of his baseball and American football heroes up on the walls. People would come in the room, look from one side to the other, shake their heads, and walk back out. Although we had big differences in decorating tastes, we both loved Alfredo's Pizza and ordered often at night.

At the wrap party for the production of Caligula by Albert Camus put on by my philosophy class. Here you can see the autofocus problem. Hmm, the flash appears to have gone off, so I don't know why it wouldn't focus.

A church in Fredericton New Brunswick, where I studied for a year after graduating from Memorial University in Newfoundland. A decent picture for someone who knew nothing about photography.

Obviously influenced by the nice church in town, I dressed up as the Pope in my room and a flatmate made this picture of me.

Another of my flatmates. Lester is from Barbados and was such an easy-going guy. Lots of fun walks to the doughnut shop and the mall.

I took the camera with me to Korea when I came here in 1995. This was one of the classes I taught at an English academy in Daegu.

I took pictures of things I wouldn't see in downtown Fredericton. This pavilion was (is?) in a park near the apartment where I lived in Daegu. 

The camera also captured some mad moments. A couple of guys and I went to Busan for a couple of days and when we visited the harbour we asked some random fisherman to bring us out on his boat for a harbour tour. We gave him some money and he ran off to buy raw fish and soju. And he brought his wife to come out with us. We stopped in the middle of the harbour for a sashimi picnic and some heavy drinking by the happy couple. And then some song and dance on the way back to the docks.

I don't know what happened to the Pentax. I seem to remember it dying around 2001 or 2002. From leaking batteries because I had neglected it?  I had a replacement by that point so I wasn't upset.

Writing about this point-and-shoot, I feel some nostalgia for having just one simple camera that did everything automatically. It would save me a lot of analysis paralysis (What's the best camera for me?! Which one should I bring today?! Film or digital?! Ahhhhh!) and probably a lot of money. I know my iPhone does a good job of producing photos without any input from me, but I still can't think of a phone as a 'real' camera. I'm just old, I guess.