Amateur Photographer Magazine

The Final Frame - Roger Hicks

Thursday 17th December 2009

Roger Hicks

None of us lives wholly in the present: it's impossible. We live partly in the past, and partly in the future. The past is made up of all kinds of things: possessions; education; relationships; commitments (they are not the same thing); memories, fond and unfond. There are of course plenty of other things that tie us to the past. Likewise, there are many aspects to the future, partaking of various degrees of certainty. I am reasonably certain that I know what I am going to eat for dinner tonight. On Tuesdays, my wife usually goes to the sewing circle. We have plans for next summer, depending on which friends come to stay. And so forth.

The interesting part comes when we look hard at our balance of past, present and future. We can sometimes do this best by looking at the way others balance things, and by looking at our own attitudes and how they have changed, are changing and may yet change with time.

In particular, we need to ask ourselves whether our ambitions are appropriate to our circumstances. That camera, watch or car you've 'always wanted': is it the you of today that wants it, or is it still the you of yesterday? And may not the you of tomorrow want something else?

For me, digital cameras afford an especially fine example. Ever since I got my first Nikon DSLR, I have known that I couldn't really live without a reasonably high-quality digital camera, simply because it's the quickest, easiest, cheapest way to illustrate magazine articles.

On the other hand, I regard DSLRs in much the same light as I regard washing machines and refrigerators. I don't want to live without them, and I want the best I can afford, but I can't get excited about them. They are superb tools, but not objects of desire. Unlike, for example, rangefinder cameras (which I also find vastly superior for travel photography) or, for that matter, wooden large-format cameras. Or Alpas. Note, too, that 'object of desire' does not preclude 'professional-quality tool, used as part of earning a living'.

I don't think my opinions about the best cameras for me are likely to change much in the near future: I've been thinking about them so hard, and using them so much for so many years that I'm pretty happy with what I've got. Currently, this means digital for colour, and film for black & white. It also means minimal automation, though I admit to a weakness for coupled film wind and shutter cocking. But am I living in the past?

Well, sort of. But I'm also living within the boundaries of what I like and what I can afford. The most pressing example for me at the moment is not from photography at all, but from motorcars. I'd be quite happy if I could find a desirable, affordable second car that is as simple as my Land Rover, as easy to maintain, and for which parts are as cheap. Fuel economy is secondary, because this is a car for Frances, simply because she finds the Land Rover too big and heavy: it has no power steering and no power brakes.

There is no such car. Intriguingly, the few cars that come close, such as the old Morris Minor, Renault 4, Peugeot 504 or the Citroën 2CV 'tin snail' now command prices that would have been unthinkable a decade ago, so it appears I am not the only one who is looking for such things.

Then I look at the 1995 Twingo that some friends of mine run as a second car. They paid £800 for it six years ago, and apart from a new battery and the yearly Contrôle Technique (MoT) they have spent virtually nothing on maintenance. If it died tomorrow, they'd only have spent about £200 a year since they bought it, including depreciation but excluding insurance and petrol: something of a bargain. Of course, they've been lucky. It could have gone bang after a year. But I can't help wondering whether I'm living too much in the past. Even if I'm not that keen on moving a great deal of my life (except digital cameras) into the 21st century, maybe I could at least move into the mid-1990s and start looking for a second car, even if it is not an object of desire.

Roger and Frances website

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