A New Old 645 Completes my Collection
Foto.Feola.Friday for March 21, 2025
Because they don't have the Eiffel Tower in
Taiwan all they have is pagodas and he
Had many bagodas too he had
Twenty-eight bagodas
Which he shrunk with water and
Kept them all in a
Big trunk which he dug out from the sea
From a huge wreck of this old
Galleon, and he kept galleons too, many
Many galleons with skeletons and
Lots of treasure
And he collected them he collected
All the treasure in
All the world
Foto.Feola.Friday
I am not a collector; it just doesn’t interest me. I have no problem with people who have every single variation of the Omega Speedmaster Pro Moon Watch — apparently there are zillions — or every last Labubu. Or go crazy for MoonSwatches. But as always my life is ruled by Things I Did While Planning To Do Completely Different Things, and over the years I’d somehow accumulated cameras and lenses of every Pentax system from the diminutive Auto 110 Super to the ginormous 67.
Except one: The boxy 645 never interested me, mostly because I’ve always shot like a photojournalist and box cameras seemed like studio equipment to me. But when I mentioned this on Pentax Forums several Pentaxians extolled what I was missing. And when I saw that the original film Pentax 645 could be had for a couple of hundred bucks, I thought Why not complete the collection?
And so I did!
I found a great deal on the 645 with a SMC Pentax-A 645 45mm F2.8, which is the equivalent of 30mm on 35mm camera lenses. I was lucky to find it; most 645s come with the 75mm “normal” lens. And normal lenses just never seem to fit my eye. I also grabbed an SMC Pentax-A 645 80-160mm F4.5 short tele zoom because it was crazy cheap — under $100. So far so fun!
Next on Perfecting Equilibrium
Editor’s Note: There were so many comments and questions on Starship Troopers Revolutionize Warfighting that I’ve decided to do a followup immediately. Clerks and Jerks died because they didn’t know how to handle a rifle: Late night talks with a drill sergeant about why every soldier is a rifleman first, which is about what it was like to serve in the Rapid Deployment Force, will appear at a later date.
Sunday, March 23rd — Starship Troopers 2: 21st Century Doolittle’s Raiders. The best defense is a good offense, always. That’s why the ability of Starships to deliver 300,000 pounds of soldiers and equipment anywhere in the world in an hour changes the geometry of 21st Century Warfare.