Welcome to The Marston Messenger, a periodic newsletter from the hamlet of Marston on Dove in Derbyshire, England, edited and mainly written by Nick Spurrier. This site is mainly concerned with photography, not only in what comes from the photographic process but also the art and science of visual reproduction and the tools by which it is achieved.
I got my first camera, an Ensign FulVue, in 1949 when I was nine and since then have been fascinated with all aspects of photography. In my 'teens I was developing and printing black-and-white with very humble equipment and developing colour slide film. My first "proper" camera was a Leica IIIc with a 5cm Summicron lens which I was given in 1960 in exchange for some unpaid work for a photographer. Neither worked very well; the film transport was dodgy and the lens had a scratch on the front element but I had a great time with it. From there I progressed to a secondhand Rolleiflex and got paid for doing portraits. A second Rolleiflex had me feeling like a pro photographer but sadly as the 1960s became the 1970s the requirement to make more money than my talent would produce reduced the time available. The Rolleis were exchanged for Pentax and Nikon SLRs and the darkroom was used less and less. But fifteen years later a change to a new and exciting career in the IT business rekindled my passion and if became obvious that if I could write computer programs when it was dark I could take photographs when it wasn't. From that time onwards I have been collecting photographic equipment. I've just counted 169 cameras in the collection (all but five of them working) nearly all 35mm but with a sprinkling of miniature and medium format cameras and a large amount of lenses.
I've noticed that it's a symptom of the addictive personality that all real photographers have to read about it, write about it, argue about it, force opinions on other people and generally make a nuisance of themselves about photography and photographic gear. Some of them get paid for it too. So I don't feel bad about joining the tribe. A site like this is very self-indulgent but I can, and will in due course, point you at far more egotistical sites than this will be.