Regret, Kind Of.......

  Six years ago I began getting rid of my Ricoh GRD cameras that I loved so much and used for 12 years. I felt it was time to move on mostly because I felt the city didn't deserve them any more as wave after wave of gentrification and whitewashing began. After decades of the loft life my wife and I decided to move to one of Philadelphia's most North West neighborhoods where things are more suburban than urban. At one point I owned 8 original Ricoh GRD cameras and one GRD3 camera, many which were given to me by other photographers. Yes I said given ! The other cameras were purchased for reasonable prices between $50 and $75. Today that's impossible due to profiteers on Ebay and social media hype. When I decided to let the cameras go I returned the favor by giving half the cameras away and selling the rest for under $75. I wanted other photographers to have the same opportunity that I had with these cameras and more photographers should consider doing this.

  My only regret is that I should have kept two of the cameras just in case I found a use for them again, which I now have. The problem today is that there are none or maybe one available for sale in America so you're stuck ordering from Japan which I did two years ago with a terrible result, a broken camera in just over a month. Today if I wanted 2 original GRD cameras it would cost close to $600 with shipping. To me that's ridiculous for a 19 year old fragile camera. But do I really need two of them? The answer is yes! None of my GRD1 cameras broke but now all I'm hearing is stories of quick camera failures and when you're in a middle of a project the last thing you need is a broken camera, so two cameras is a must.

  At this point I'm disappointed because my chances on returning to the GRD are almost zilch.

 Last year I gave away two Canon Powershot cameras to a photographer in Sweden because I was finished with them and he was currently using the same model but was having issues with his.