The Best Camera In The World

The Best Camera In The World

This is one of the easiest questions to answer, but one of the most difficult to answer for anybody else apart from ourselves. Just imagine though that we are walking in some remote part of the world and suddenly a momentous moment arrives - we actually see that UFO, parked just beyond that rise in the ground. The best camera in the world is the one we have with us and its quality matters a lot less than our ability to stop shaking with excitement and press the shutter button. Or our ability to delay fleeing in fear long enough to make the shot, depending on our constitution. But that's the answer - the best camera in the world is the one we have with us, even if that's a phone.

There is a point to this though, because all my photographic life I waited for such a camera that was compact enough to carry everywhere, in every situation, and yet had enough quality to make great images when required. In the 1960s and 1970s "compact" film cameras were generally huge and hardly suitable at every event. My first would have been the Konica Auto S2 with its 45mm f/1.8 lens that was just soft wide open and nowhere near SLR lens quality. Other cameras suggested themselves, such as the Rollei 35 series, very tiny but with no rangefinder to help focus that 40mm lens. Sub-miniatures using various formats on 16mm film stock had insufficient resolution, apart from the Minox beloved of spy fims, which apparently produced impeccable 10" x 8" prints every time.....

And then there was digital. At last, tiny cameras that really do fit the pocket and actually offer the ability to shoot sharp images. I've had a few, including waterproof models and in the end I find that the current model that is always in my jacket pocket, explaining why my suits always look a bit lumpy, is my lovely black Pentax MX-1. It shoots everything from macro to a fairly reasonable telephoto and at the wide end has a usefullu fast f/1.8 aperture. A3 print? No problem, and a few shots have been competition winners.

So, in celebration of photography coming of age and in anticipation of the arrival of that UFO, here are a few compact camera shots.

Cafe Candid



Project Decay



Street Photography Blues



Organist at St Ann's Church, Manchester



Photographers at Work



Colourful Architecture, Royal Exchange, Manchester



RHS Bridgewater, before restoration began



RHS Bridgewater, internal shot before restoration



Rose



Chetham's Library, Manchester



Two Bengali Cats



At The Ballet



Rick Keller