Woman have shoe stores...

Ya I know, it does sound sexually biased but I speak from experience. Some woman can spend hours going in and out of shops looking for the perfect shoe or dress or whatever. That just doesn't happen for me. In fact, large sections of my brain go inert when dragged along on such an adventure.

But then there's equipment crack!

No surprise that men have stuff too. This is usually related to either high-tech gear that makes noise and pictures (stereos, HD screens, etc.) or more noise and gears (power tools, cars, etc.). Some guys (like myself) are slaves to camera sh%@. It's like crack. Don't do well without a hit every week or so. Can't really afford to indulge but love to dream.


Yesterday was my day to go walkabout and chill. Like a free-electron following a random path, there's always a capture potential out there. In fact, there's such a highly positive-charged gravity well located inside places like The Camera Trading Company (368 Bank St, Ottawa, Ontario). There's an event boundary close to the front door. Once past that, there's no escape... nothing comes back out.

Inside is a dazzling assortment of camera gear that baffoozel's the camera geek mind. Just look at this stuff!




There to help you in your journey of equipment addiction is Tom Steiner. He's an enthusiastic curator of this museum-like collection. There's a story and education behind every piece. He explained the history and practice of each piece I showed interest in and some I didn't. One in particular was an old large-format camera he had in the window. With painting your own emulsion onto the glass plate you could achieve an equivalent ISO of 3 to 5! Can't imagine the exposure levels you'd need to get a decent picture.

It was hard to leave but what an enjoyable hour.