The Minolta Hi-Matic E is an advanced consumer, fixed lens rangefinder camera from the early 1970s. When it was  introduced in 1971 it featured, what was then, some fairly high end technology. While being a fixed lens rangefinder, a form factor that was common to the period, it features a rather good 40mm f/1.7 lens constructed of six elements in four groups that offers reasonably good quality though it is somewhat subject to flare and chromatic aberration. It has a Seiko leaf shutter with speeds from 2 – 1/1000 seconds and manually set ASA/ISO from 25-500. The aforementioned 40mm f/1.7 lens has has a focal range of 2.6’ to infinity. The camera has a coupled rangefinder with parallax correction and frame lines to match the lens’s 40mm focal length. The rangefinder patch in my example is somewhat age faded and I am certain it was easier to see when new. 

My HI-Matic E. – all dressed up and no place to go.

It was not a budget camera when introduced which, was reflected in its price at the time of about $900.00 USD in today’s money. Today you can find these cameras used for anywhere from $40.00 USD to around $100.00 USD dependent on condition. 

I paid around $50.00, including shipping, for mine about two years ago.

The competition in its time would have been cameras like the Canon QL17 and Yashica Electro 35 GSN, just to give you an idea of its position in the market.

Realistically, however, in retrospect, this camera, like the others mentioned above, is really an early point and shoot that offers none of the simplicity or convenience of point and shoot cameras from the 1980s and 1990s and none of the creative control of more advanced cameras from its time. 

Then there’s the batteries. This is one of those cameras that was designed to work with the now banned PX640, 1.35 volt mercury cells. Which makes powering the camera a little bit of a hassle, and since there are no manual functions, the camera is completely bricked without power, the film advance lever wont even work. Battery options include using 640 alkaline equivalents or buying an adapter online to use LR44 type alkaline batteries. There are also some things online to show you how can “jury rig” a couple of LR44/A76 type batteries to work which is what I did (and breaking a tiny nub off of the plastic battery compartment door in the process – which is now held in place with electrical tape). Yes these are all slightly higher voltage options, but don’t worry it really doesn’t effect things enough to worry about considering the exposure latitude of both color a and B&W film. Trust me.

I don’t know if I missed focus or had some camera shake in this one.

For some reason, I developed an interest, or more accurately, curiosity about this general type of camera a couple of years ago which for me is odd because I am an SLR person through and through. I purchased this camera from an online auction site and received it in the condition it’s in (minus the lens hood and red soft release) and have just given it nothing more than a general surface cleaning. After shooting it I am pleased that it has no light leaks and the exposure seems accurate so far, but then I’ve only run two rolls through it.

This back yard shot is more indicative of the lens’s quality and the cameras abilities.

This is a difficult review to write. I understand completely where it fit into the market when released, but today this camera serves no purpose in my collection other than a typical example of a higher end consumer camera from the era.

Ergonomics weren’t much of a consideration when this camera was designed so, its shape is basic with little thought to fit. Haptics are so-so, and the overall shooting experience is kind of boring. Battery issues can be frustrating.

While this general type of camera has experienced quite a bit of popularity in the last few years, I honestly don’t get it. On the other hand, if you are interested in these older fixed lens rangefinders, I suppose this is as good as most. Maybe a little better in some respects (like the lens).

So that, of course begs the question; Who is this camera for? Well, for me that’s difficult to answer. One area that I can see that it would be useful is for street photography. There are some things that would be advantageous to a street photographer. Being a manual focus camera, you can set it for zone focus and combined with its very quiet shutter it would, indeed, make a very stealthy camera that could be “shot from the hip” so to speak, and with practice, I would imagine you would have quite a high ratio of keepers.

Then there is the idea that working with a single camera and lens combo will, over time, make you a better photographer. It might be useful to that end as well.

Lastly, it could just be a curiosity that’s fun to run a roll through from time to time. Which is what it is for me and, ultimately, why I haven’t sold it on to someone else or tossed it in the bin.

Stay safe and see the world your own way.

Thanks for reading.

As Photographers, we put ourselves under a lot of internal pressure. This applies if you use the term Photographer in any way to describe yourself, even only in your own mind, and is not dependent on whatever word you put in front of it, beginner, amateur, semi-professional, serious amateur, hobbyist, whatever. You still identify on some level as being a Photographer, or put another way, someone engaged in the serious pursuit of making good (or better) photographs. Unlike the average person with a point and shoot camera (increasingly rare these days), or shooting on their phone. They do not identify as a photographer. They see themselves as “just taking pictures”. Whereas we as “Photographers” strive to make the best possible image. In fact, most average phone shooters would never refer to their pictures as “images”. when those folks get a “good one” they are happy, when the don’t, it’s “no big deal” for the Photographers among us it’s a blow to our psyche.

As Photographers, we have been conditioned to abhor the snapshot. We use every technique we know, from lighting and composition to exposure control to create a picture that cannot be called a snapshot. To this end we invest in the best equipment we can afford and try to find the time to pursue the “craft” of photography. Indeed often we refer to what we are doing as “a personal project” or “personal work” as if this verbal talisman somehow lends a sense of importance to our picture making. We avoid, at all costs, making snapshots, and are severely disappointed when our “images” end up being snapshots. We view snapshots as what they are, photos made in a hurry with little regard for proper technique. To eschew them as inferior though, is the ultimate disservice.

Some of my better snapshots … or so I think.

My first encounter, as a Photogapher, with the unintended snapshot was in the early nineties. There was an area at the southern end of California’s Eastern Sierras that I passed through two or three times a year. I eventually noticed a meadow with an old barn and a range of low mountains in the background. A very bucolic, though cliche scene. The first few times I drove past it I did not have my camera. The next time through however, I made sure to take a camera.

I do not remember exactly which camera I took, I know it was one of my Canon EOS models, I just don’t remember if it was a Rebel, or my EOS 630. I don’t remember which lens either, but it was probably a 35-80 kit lens. I was just a beginner.

When I arrived at the scene, I parked on the shoulder of the highway. The barn was quite far away, and I couldn’t get closer due to a barbed wire fence at the highway, but the barn was meant to be the focal point of the shot. It was nearly noon and the light was extremely flat and there were no clouds or anything to add interest to the sky. I was loaded with color print film (likely Kodak Gold 100) and I remember bracketing three exposures. I was so focused on the barn that I though I had a great image, a real “banger” so, on with the rest of my day.

After getting back home I hurriedly dropped the film off for processing. I picked it up the next day and couldn’t wait to see my “incredible” landscape image. After looking through the prints, I couldn’t find it. Sure, there were some crappy snapshots of the barn in question, but no wonderful image to ooh and ahh over. Well, that was disappointing. The disappointment was that the photo was not representative of what I saw- though it was an absolutely objective representation of the scene that was before me that day.

So what happened? Simple, I was so enamored of the scene that I didn’t take anything else into account. I didn’t think about the lousy light, I didn’t think that my lens was wrong, I didn’t stop to think that the composition was off. I didn’t think about the complexity of shooting a brown subject against a darker brown background. In short, I didn’t think. I just shot like any other non-photographer. I turned the image in my mind into a snapshot.

I don’t know whatever happened to that photo, I kept it for several years though, and I can still see it with clarity in my “mind’s eye” with no problem whatsoever. That photo, more than any other drove me to try and improve my photography, and I am sure a similar experience has happened to every serious photographer ever. I wish I still had that photo, not because it represents a failure, but rather because it represents an evolution in my photography,

So I, like many other Photographers, have had a built in prejudice toward any image that can be called a snapshot. Likely because we want to differentiate ourselves from the common “picture taker”. Though it has recently occurred to me that the snapshot might just be one of the most valid forms of photography and is due as much respect as more serious “images”, regardless of who made it.

Snapshots are the backbone of our personal history. The inevitable box or album of old family photos is, almost always, full of snapshots taken by someone in the family with a camera. Taken at every family event, vacation or occasion imaginable, they are our individual historical record.

In fact, historians have learned more about the daily lives of past generations through casual snapshot photography than they ever have with formal images. Snapshots are, most often, made as remembrances not as a form of art. They are the penultimate document of our lives, and, when viewed, usually a cause for nostalgia and reminiscence. In short, by and large, they are a big part of our humanity, as individuals, and as a society.

As Photographers, we should celebrate the snapshot instead of making it the object of our derision. That doesn’t mean we should not use whatever acquired skills we have to make better snapshots, quite the contrary, but we need to remember, that not every photograph should be art. Some (if not most) should be allowed to just be photos.

I’ve been on a break of undetermined length due to a confluence of events, like self inflicted unemployment starting last August (2020). Really, quitting your job in the middle of a pandemic and a crashing economy is not a good idea. However staying in a position with a toxic management team is not really a viable option for the long term.

After finding a position that was in my field and, career-wise, a lateral move, it turned out that the company was a complete administrative mess and after about a month and a half we agreed that the relationship was not a good fit for either of us so I moved on. I moved on into a ridiculous position that was in a completely different industry and completely beneath my skillset and abilities – I made it about three weeks before throwing in the towel after taking a long look at myself and wondering what exactly was I doing.

Then, after a few more applications, a recruiter reached out to me and I finally landed in a position in my industry at a slight increase in compensation over my last position, with what, so far, appears to be a good company with some pretty good perks and benefits too. So, hopefully I am over that hump.

While I was unemployed, I tried to make a little side money with photography, which I have done before. It didn’t work this time and I have to say the “pandemic economy” probably played a large part in that situation. 

I threw myself into that venture with intensity and with no reward, in the situation I was in, I quickly reached the burn out point with photography. Which led me to sell off my entire Sony kit. I did so with the intention of using the money to help out with expenses, even though my wonderful wife assured me that it wasn’t necessary. Ultimately though, without photography, I was able to concentrate on my job search and it did pay off so, there’s that.

So, now that I am appropriately employed again it’s time to delve back into photography. Of course, this also means picking up where I left off in the blog because suddenly, I. Have an brain full of topics that I want to write about and share.

First and foremost is assembling another kit. This time it will be all about the micro four thirds format, for very specific reasons both objective and subjective. Ive already purchased a (new) camera and lens. So there will be a user review coming soon. Also despite my dire predictions for film photography, I am gong to use and talk about some older and interesting film cameras. I have a goal in mind for that medium too.

I’m also thinking about some educational posts too, regarding the technical side of photography, and we’ll taking a deep dive into home printing, which is something I do quite a bit.

I will be continuing a series I started based on the idea “photographers you should know” and have a few in mind, but those posts require a huge amount of research, especially if you are writing about a living person. So, that will probably be awhile before I can get back to that.

So I guess for those of you who read and comment on my blog, stay tuned, I think you are going to like the new direction.

Let me know if there’s anything you would like to discuss or read.

As always, stay safe, and see the world your own way.

Thanks for reading

This is the first post in what will be an occasional series titled;

Photographers You Should Know.

Featuring brief overviews of photographers from the past or present that have had a profound impact on photography and have either influenced or informed my own development as a photographer. 

What brings this first photographer to the forefront in my mind is the recent attention on former Obama administration photographer Pete Souza. Heralded for his intimate access to the Obama administration and also for his nearly unrestricted access to the President himself and to the First Family. Now, Souza is an amazing photographer and photojournalist, but he wasn’t the first. So let’s meet:

David Hume Kennerly

I originally discovered Kennerly around 1983 through his first book Shooter essentially a career retrospective that I read (for the first time) in the early 1980s having been first published in 1979. The book had a pretty profound effect on me at the time and defined, for me, what a photojournalist was and should be. Despite the lack of concrete proof, I have often though that the photographer portrayed in Mel Gibson’s We Were Soldiers was a lightly veiled Kennerly. Maybe, or maybe not.

David Hume Kennerly is an extraordinary photographer who, in 1965, after working as a photographer on his high school newspaper, got his professional start as a staff photographer with a relatively small daily newspaper – The Oregon Journal. Then after a stint in the National Guard, he was hired as a staffer at The Oregonian in Portland. It was probably symptomatic of the times, or maybe just f/8 and be there, but during his time at The Oregonian, he was fortunate enough to photograph Robert F. Kennedy, Miles Davis, and Igor Stravinsky among others. On his Wikipedia page it’s mentioned that his photography of Robert Kennedy is what first ignited his interest in photographing the political scene.

By 1967 he had moved to Los Angeles where he became a staffer for UPI (United Press International). While in Los Angeles he photographed RFK on that fated evening at the Ambassador Hotel shortly before he was assassinated by Sirhan Sirhan. Kennerly got the photo of Ethel Kennedy that night in the back of an ambulance on the way to the hospital with her husband.

The next stop for Kennerly was in 1970 at the Washington DC bureau of UPI, where he eventually became a member of the traveling presidential press pool assigned to Richard Nixon. He was 23 years old.

In 1971 he was assigned to UPI’s Saigon (currently known as Ho Chi Minh City) Bureau in Vietnam Nam where he eventually became Bureau Chief. In 1972 Kennerly won the Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography based on a portfolio of work from Vietnam Nam and Cambodia as well as other images including shots from the Ali-Frazier prize fight in Madison Square Garden and photos of Pakistani refugees in Calcutta. After his time with UPI, he became a contract photographer for Life Magazine in Saigon. Unfortunately, shortly after taking the position, Life Magazine folded. His contract was picked up by Time Magazine (the parent company of Life) and, for the time being, he continued his work in Southeast Asia.

He returned to the States in 1973 where, for Time magazine, he walked right into the middle of the Watergate scandal. He photographed the resignation of then Vice President Spiro Agnew, and the selection of Senate Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford as the new Vice President. Ford’s first appearance on the cover of Time was also Kennerly’s first cover for Time (he would go on to shoot over 35 covers for Time and Newsweek). Thus began a long personal relationship between Ford and Kennerly. Kennerly became Chief Official White House Photographer after Mr. Ford ascended to the Presidency (at that point, only the third civilian to ever hold that position), he was specifically requested for the position by President Ford. During his tenure, Kennerly and Ford, along with the First Lady, and the rest of the First Family, became exceedingly close and Kennerly enjoyed unprecedented and unlimited access to The White House, both officially and unofficially. He photographed the President during formal occasions and during more personal moments and he developed a very close relationship with First Lady Betty Ford and photographed her in very quiet and personal situations that normally were not seen by the public. Ultimately these photos gave a very human feel to the Office of the  Presidency, and, I think, acted as somewhat of a salve for the wounds suffered by  American people during the Watergate scandal. His photos and negatives from this time are now in the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library in Ann Arbor Michigan.

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Interestingly, Kennerly had a long relationship with Ansel Adams and invited him to the Whitehouse to meet President Ford in 1975. Kennerly later photographed Adams for a Time Magazine cover that ran on the September 3, 1979 issue – the only instance that Time ever ran a cover photo of a photographer. 

Kennerly went back to Time Magazine where he covered some of the most important stories of the time. The following are just a few of the things he covered, in and of itself it’s an impressive list, but they are just some highlights.

• Egyptian President Anwar Sadat’s trip to Israel
• The People’s Temple suicide in Jonestown Guyana
• Reagan and Gorbachev’s first meeting in Geneva

In 1996 he became a contributing editor to Newsweek where he photographed president Clinton, Senator Bob Dole, the 2000 elections, and the 9/11 attacks on the Pentagon.

In 2016 Kennerly provided election coverage for CNN and photographed President-Elect Donald Trump for their book Unprecedented.

His life is probably best summed up in a quote from James Earl Jones -“David Hume Kennerly is like Forrest Gump, except he was really there”. 

In the mean time he had also entered private professional life and worked for years as a corporate photographer for Bank of America covering their Social Responsibility programs and The Girl Scouts where he created new photos for the cookie boxes (sweet job!). These are but just two on a long list of corporate clients.

He has been associated with various universities especially the University of Arizona where he was named the university’s first Presidential Scholar. 

Currently his archive of over one million images and other memorabilia are in the custody of the Center for Creative Photography.

At this point he has been exhibited extensively, has several film credits and has written several books after Shooter, including Photo Op detailing his time with the Ford administration and recently On the iPhone a volume dedicated to mobile photography (really showing what a smart phone camera can do in the right hands), as well as others, some outside of the realm of photography and politics.

Writing a piece about a living person is dangerous territory. I have made every effort possible to ensure complete accuracy in this post. As this is not a comprehensive biography and is meant to be an introductory piece to incite the reader to further investigate Kennerly and his work for themselves, I have not covered every detail of his amazing work and life.

A note on sources: All information in this article has been sourced from Wikipedia, Kennerly’s web site, or the three books mentioned; Shooter, PhotoOP, and On the iPhone. 

A note on photos: All photos used in this post are used under Fair Use guidelines for editorial and educational content, or are in the Public Domain,

 and are credited to David Hume Kennerly unless otherwise noted.

References;

Shooter by David Hume Kennerly ISBN 0-88225-265-8

PhotoOP by David Hume Kennerly ISBN 0-292-74323-8

On the iPhone by David Hume Kennerly ISBN 978-1-939621-13-9

Wikipedia – David Hume Kennerly

Website –  kennerly.com

Stay safe and see the world your own way

Thanks for reading