Who remembers RFF when it started ?

Ha, I guess I was *relatively* early but I felt like I arrived late! Hqd been reading off and on, joined when I got my RF645 iirc. I think I was on LUG occasionally prior.
 
Leica M4 Black (1975?)

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I've loved seeing familiar names and am enjoying the memories of great threads and sadly departed photographers. I joined in 2005, coming across from CVUG.
My first RFF lens was a CV15mm 4.5 but I didn't have a body for a few months. Got a Bessa L and an M2 for $500 Aust. And then GAS hit....

Grateful to Jorge and Stephen, the hard working Admins and Mentors, and the incredible treasure trove of wisdom an encouragement that continues. Thank you all for the richness you bring to the community.

Remember this first publication, and the follow up? You can still get them at Lulu... Pictured here with the Travelling Bessa III that went around Australia forwarded on between RFF members, thanks to Mainline Photography.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2oyj7yy]RFF memories by john m, on Flickr[/URL]
 
I came about a month and a day after RFF started from the old Popular Photography forums. I hop on every few months, but I don't really use a rangefinder very often. I always go back to my SLRs.
 
I come and go as life has its seasons. I began here in 2007. I've enjoyed this forum for quite some time and still think back to the print swaps organized here. It's been a while since I've visited, so I'll have to see if that's still going on.
 
When a website has been around as long as RFF, there will be valued members who pass on… I would like to acknowledge and remember some of the RFF’ers who contributed to the culture of this site but who are no longer with us:

Tom A.
charjohncarter
Sparrow
Colton Allen

I’m sure I’ve forgotten some … I learned a huge amount from each of these gentlemen and am (maybe) a better photographer for what they taught me by comment or example.
 
According to my profile (which remembers things better than I do :unsure:) I joined in September 2006.

I’d been using Canon DSLRs, on a very steep learning curve, and posting mostly on a UK forum, digital-darkroom (sadly gone, along with its founder) and a bit on P.O.T.N.

Then (I think via Luminous Landscape) I read Sean Reid’s views on “seeing differently” with viewfinder-window (especially RF) cameras vs reflex cameras and became intrigued. I looked hard at Stephen Gandy’s site, read Karen Nakamura’s (sp?), lurked on RFF - then joined when I bought a Hexar RF (then soon after, a DS M3).

This was in that all-too-brief period when 1hr film development with decent scanning was readily cheap and available, so film didn’t seem a problem. I couldn’t afford an RD-1, and Leica (which I could even less afford, new) was saying a “full frame” 35mm RF camera wasn’t possible.

How things have changed!

Hectic work-schedules knocked me off participating in (or even reading) RFF from 2017 until this year, and most photography as well. But my interest has been rekindled, and time has become more available in my semi-retirement.

I was very glad to find RFF still here, and still as good, on my return. Thanks to all who helped with that.

…Mike
 
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Bingley said:
When a website has been around as long as RFF, there will be valued members who pass on… I would like to acknowledge and remember some of the RFF’ers who contributed to the culture of this site but who are no longer with us:

Tom A.
charjohncarter
Sparrow
Colton Allen

I’m sure I’ve forgotten some … I learned a huge amount from each of these gentlemen and am (maybe) a better photographer for what they taught me by comment or example.
Click to expand...

Thank you for sharing honor for our RFF friends.
 
My memory isn't what it used to be - sadly, to be brutally honest I have to admit it never has been, ha! - but I think I turned up in 2004 or 2005. I know my profile claims 2008, but I distinctly recall posting in 2006, maybe even before. I Didn't post all that much until after 2007 when I returned to The Real World after one of my periodic retirements from everything usual in my life. Off and on as usual for me, since my last (and current) retirement in 2012. Now back again after a two-year sabbatical. That's me in one paragraph.

Like some (even many) here I was an early member of photo.net, but left after I fell foul of one of their Nazi moderators who during his too-long tenure there did untold damage to the site. Now long gone. Both of us. I never went back. Far happier here.

I have a lifelong reputation for coming and going in all things, web site participation being one. Left and returned here several times but one salient fact has always drawn me back, the kindness and above all else the intelligence of many RFF members I have dealt with over the years.

More so than any other site, the amount of good and accurate information I've had from RFF posters, has uncooked my goose many times, especially with darkroom difficulties.

Am still a rangefinder 'shooter' but nowadays due to age and a dislike of carrying heavy camera gear, more into digital rangefinders than film. Also the high cost of film in Australia, a brick of anything by Kodak or Fuji involves selling a kidney and I doubt anybody would buy either of mine...

Back in the day I had Leicas (1980s), then Contax G1s (1990s). The Leica M2 and M3 kits are long gone (and still missed), sold of necessity when my architectural practice ran into cash flow problems and we needed money to cover the basics. I kept the Nikkormats and the Rollei TLRs and now the digital Nikons, so I'm more a 'fringe' lurker than a rangefinderholic. Like so many of us, my film days are mostly past history. I still have a G1 and a 28-45-90 kit, but I seldom use it. My Fuji XE2 and four Fujinons do everything it all for me. I can put them in a backpack and go out all day without risking back pains. I would love a Leica M6 and a 28 Elmarit or even a Voitlander as my last ever minimalist kit, but for me that ship has sailed, financially and physically.

Nobody or nothing has ever cured me of writing too-long posts. It's how my brain works. The words flow and the fingers tick away. Ditto the memories. From my Kodak Brownie snapshot days (1950s) to my first "real" camera, a Yashida D TLR, in 1962. And them Leicas...

Many posts here so accurately reflect my thoughts. I too have learned much from RFF members and writers over the years, and I remain to this day, profoundly grateful and thankful for my time here. Long may we all go on.
 
Keith said:
One of the highlights here for me was Al Kaplan's presence while we had it. I can't believe it's been just under fourteen years since he passed away suddenly!
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I visited Al and pleaded with him to quit smoking. He was an aggressive pro-‘choice’/pro-smoker: Do you smoke? He fed me a lot of BS about his doctor being ‘confused’ about how healthy he was and a lot of other arguments. I explained lifetime risk, irrespective of obvious markers like blood pressure. Al also overlooked that his cannabis habit had probably caused his epilepsy rather than ‘kept it under control’. He smoked a lot of cannabis too. Then a few months after I visited he had a heart attack and died.

Look after yourselves people. With every death a library burns down.
 
Another interesting RFF memory is the time the singer Seal appeared here and started posting anonomously under the user name Ascender and started telling us about the new digital Leica rangefinder he had when the M8 hadn't actually been released. It started an absolute bun fight here among the skeptics and eventually he fessed up and told us who he was which a lot of people didn't seem keen to believe either! :ROFLMAO:

Of course Seal has a German partner and is is pretty palsy with Leica and had been given the camera well before it was officially dropped on the market. Exciting times ... it was a great thread! :)
 
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