Feeling somewhat acquisitive after surgery (and, admittedly, before surgery too), I decided that I would mark my successful shuffle down the hallway between the surgical clinic and the convalescent home with a new camera in a sort of (re-)birthday girl marker and a little bit of emotional succour for a hobby I’d have to set aside to heal properly.

(Charlotte waves from bed 👋🏻)

As these things normally go, without any particular criteria for what I was looking for, my eBay saved search list quickly ballooned. It quickly occurred to me that there was no real rhyme or reason for my choices outside of “oh neat!” and “people seem to like it!” Neither of those are especially substantial reasons to open a purse.

In an attempt to narrow things down, I tried to find what this motley collection of searches had in common, and ir was:

1. Pre-mid-80s. I prefer the results I get from lenses before modern coatings were developed. I tend to prefer medium (or even low-ish) contrast, less vivid colours, and some of the other imperfections that may present from a time that the state-of-the-art was not yet what it is today.
2. Lighter. I’m a bit of a weakling and find some of the cameras from my preferred era to be a little burdensome around my neck. While I have a very light and dainty camera to carry, it’s rather new (the body manufactured in or after 2003, the lens I pair it with, 2012).
3. Smaller. Many of my favourite cameras are a bit beefy. Much of the time, I’m okay with it, but not always.

All things considered, this brought me to the Olympus OM system, or even to the very Nikon EM that I already own. There was just one problem: lenses. For the former, I would be buying into an entirely different lens system (so a $300 purchase would soon snowball), and for the latter, Nikon’s Ai (post-1977) lenses often demand prices that I am unwilling to pay. Especially when you get away from the basic kit lenses.

Then it occurred to me: I have a number of Pentax K-mount lenses and, as much as I like my K2, it’s a heavy brassy lump and thanks to a design choice they made (and never repeated), changing film speed on it is a frustrating, stiff, – and, for a manicured girlie like me -, nail-breaking experience. Eventually Pentax would engineer a response to Olympus’s proof that the market wanted a smaller, lighter, but featured SLR, and I decided that the ME Super was right for me.

A quick test of the ME Super shows that it's doing exactly what I want it to!

[image or embed]

— Charlotte ♥ (@lottiejoy.ca) July 16, 2026 at 6:34 AM

After a dog’s age in transit from a seller in the US, it finally arrived last week and I gave it a very quick six-frame roll to test it out. Immediate success! Then the following day, I loaded a full roll to give it a more substantial test.

With that, unless I have a very good reason, I’m not buying any more 35mm cameras.

No more 120 either. Well, except for one, which I am saving up for.

Especially now that the rangefinder is out of alignment, the heroic five pounds that the Fuji G690BL weighs is just too much. I still want those gorgeous 6×9 negatives, however, so I am looking to replace it with a more modern GW690iii.

And then I’m finished. With cameras. Unless I have a very good reason.

Scanners though? Well, that’s another opportunity to save up.

---