Or Sell Off The Unused Stuff
Although a lot of us started with just a
camera and a lens, we eventually seem to gather up many
more photography items over the course of time. As for me my first
35mm SLR was a Chinon CM3 with a
50mm normal lens.
It wasn't very long afterwards that I had saved some money and went to the camera store and bought the matching 28mm and 135mm Chinon lens. Then of course I need a bag to carry it all in. Then slowly I started adding items to the gear bag such as polarizing and other specialty filters, cable release and on it goes from there. Before you realize it, you have a tripod, lights and other gadgets to go along with the camera bag.
About ten years ago I realized I had 4 or 5 working film bodies and 3 digital bodies. Of course along with that, I had 7 lens's to go along with them. An untold amount of assorted filters that may have been used and some probably never used. Along with cables for lights and camera sync, remote triggers and much more had ended up in my gear bag which happened to be a different gear bag than the original purchase since my collection of gear and gadgets had grown many times over the years.
At some point I decided to sell off all the film bodies except for one that I may use and one older camera to go along with a collection of several other vintage roll film cameras. I also wanted to sell off any lens I no longer shoot with so it didn't just end up getting ruined by fungus and dust.
The Madness Never Ends
It seems that about every 2 or 3 years, I feel the desire for a lens I don't have already. I then sell off the glass I haven't been using and use the proceeds to buy the lens I now want. I also decided to sell off all camera bodies and get a new one. over the years - sold the D2x to get a D600 eventually selling it and getting a D810.
One day I got the idea I wanted to downsize even more and sold all five lens that I had and the D810 in a effort to "have a smaller rig" and also wanted to switch to Nikon Mirrorless and Z mount lens system.
I bought a Nikon Z7 with a 24-70mm Z mount lens and that was the total components in the gear bag. This sparked the need for a much smaller gear bag. It wasn't long before I acquired the 50mm Micro lens and shortly after that the 24-200mm and felt the gear bag was complete as it ever needed to be. I found that those few lens would suit most all of any shooting I may do. But it didn't stop there, as last June rolls around ad I sell the Z7 and buy the Zf to satisfy that desire I had for the retro look and build. and eventually I sold two lens and bought three other ones.
Have I Learned Anything Over The Years?
Yes... of course. I can see where a lot of the reason we gather gear we no longer use due to the much lower resale value and the process of actually selling the old gear. The big problem with just holding gear such as lens's would be growing fungus. which thrives in dark, damp, and unventilated spaces by feeding on moisture and organic elements on optical coatings. Although you could store the lens with no caps on them out in the light. You might not grow fungus but there will certainly be dust that eventually works its way in.
In camera bodies, motor drives, electronic flash and items that hold batteries in them, you definitely want to pull the batteries. They will start corroding even sooner than dust or fungus can do any damage. Battery corrosion can ruin a piece of gear if not caught in time.
I shot with the Nikon FTn about 10 years ago in a Project in Issue 2, but it has some features I like better on other film cameras I still have. I pulled the battery to keep it from leaking out eventually but this camera and the Leica iiig that I have will also probably never be sold off. I did draw the line somewhere and decided to keep some gear like in my own photography museum.
I think for a lot of us that it's just about having stuff related to using the camera and the feeling of thinking it has expanded your capabilities. Actually, most all of those photo gadgets do help increase our capabilities in one way or another.
As I look back to the times I had a large gear bag with 2 bodies and half dozen lens. ooodles of assorted filters, flash triggers and much more. compared to todays gear bag that will only hold one body and three lens. I wouldn't say I have any less image making capabilities, the major difference would be lens options. Even though with a few zooms I still can cover as much focal length as with twice as many lens.
Digital Cameras = Less Gadgets?
There could be a few things like certain filters that the digital camera wouldn't need to achieve the same effect the computers image editing software can produce. There is still plenty of lens options for digital photographers to acquire and all the lighting gadgets you had will sill be useful in digital photography.
Other than lens, the rest of the small gadgets we acquired have no resale value worth the efforts to sell and ship them out. while personally will continue the lens sell off and buy back about every 2-3 years but the other gadgets will just collect in a box of their own to gather dust.
As for a collection of bodies... if they are more than four years old then they most likely will not yield as much back as you hoped. But if you are in the market for a used body, then you can get a great price on a camera compared to the latest and greatest brand new body. As for old film camera bodies, I would just as soon keep them as moments of days past.
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