Charity shop finds..

Alastair

Alastair

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Once in a while I do a lap around town and see what's sitting on the shelves of the charity shops. I've done it often enough a couple of people will take me to one side and say there's "something in the back".

Spotted today, very nice (immaculate) Yashica D tlr in a mint brown leather ever-ready case. A fair price at £50 I think. Viewfinder was bright, no obvious nicks or dings to the body or lens that I could see. Untested.

However I already have far too many cameras that swmbo may or may not already be aware of, and the RB67 is plenty enough MF to keep me busy for a while. These finds never turn up until just after you've bought something..

If anyone in the area (King's Lynn and West Norfolk) is interested I can PM a contact number for the shop ('tis for charity..).
 
Do you know I've been trawling round the 'charidy' shops for a couple of years and I haven't seen any, not a single, solitary even half-decent camera. Not a sausage and this areas renowned for its sausages.

Andy
 
Andy, this is the only decent camera I've ever spotted in a charity shop, and I've been doing the rounds in town for about 2 years.. the closest to this I've seen was a rather battered Voigtlander Brilliant with a badly oxidised mirror.

I'm trying not to talk myself into going back next week and getting it..
 
Charity shops seem to be pretty expensive for camera stuff sometimes, the last time I saw any decent old stuff was in an Oxfam shop in Liverpool and the prices were roughly four times what you'd pay on Ebay. Decent for books though.
 
Have to say its not the first time you have seen me perusing round the local car boot on a Sunday looking for the photographic bargain of the century knowing some people just don't know the true value of old camera stuff.
 
The pricing on cameras and accessories in the charity shops here in southeast Florida is impossible to understand. I've seen "throwaway" 35mm cameras that are supposed to look like a good slr and with a piece of steel plate in the base to give it some heft (free with a magazine subscription) displayed in a glass showroom case - and- a good camera left out for everyone to destroy. I was fortunate several years ago to pickup a Nikon FE black body, 50mm series E lens, a Nikon manual zoom lens in a hard leather camera case, and finally a Sunpack Pro 66 flash for $30.00 U.S. No one had a chance to ruin anything yet as it was left out on a shelf with appliances. The temperature and humidity here plays havoc with foam rubber products and rubber bands. I had to replace the light gasket on the camera which was easy enough. There are 2 shops that I regularly visit and once in a while I'm rewarded with a lens or accessory (or even camera).
 
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SparkUK said:
Charity shops seem to be pretty expensive for camera stuff sometimes, the last time I saw any decent old stuff was in an Oxfam shop in Liverpool and the prices were roughly four times what you'd pay on Ebay. Decent for books though.
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It seems to vary from one shop to the next. Very few charity shops have access to anyone that can really value specialist items. Most seem to price based on looks, so something plastic, or small, or rather simple looking might get priced at £10 or less regardless of make, whilst something hefty and expensive looking might get priced at £30 or more. So you wind-up with an abundance of over-priced Zenits.

You get lucky if there's a former enthusiast volunteering in the shop who has a bit of knowledge and knows where to go for a bit more, and is then realistic about getting a sale.
 
stupar said:
Have to say its not the first time you have seen me perusing round the local car boot on a Sunday looking for the photographic bargain of the century knowing some people just don't know the true value of old camera stuff.
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yeah I agree!

I went to a car boot last year and walked away with a Canon EOS 650, 35-70mm, 50mm, and the 240ez flash for £10:eek:

I sold it all for roughly £140! I'm doing it more often because it's great to earn an extra bit of cash.
 
Sounds like a good score. But I hear you on having too many cameras. It's hard to get around to shooting them all. I wouldn't mind replacing my old Rolleicord IV with that Yashica D. Mine needs a CLA and the view finder is really dull.
 
The people who run the local charity shops, and sell at the car boot sale - summer only - seem to have some very odd ideas about value and pricing. Old Instamatics for £40, and pedestrian, consumer, 35mm cameras for £75.

I don't really have a problem with this, the seller can ask for whatever price they want, and it's up to the buyer; but I'm sure some people have picked up the idea that all old cameras are worth a packet. Glory days of buying manual SLRs and MF lenses for a song seem to have gone too, but that's probably because of enthusiast interest.
 
MartynK said:
Glory days of buying manual SLRs and MF lenses for a song seem to have gone too, but that's probably because of enthusiast interest.
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Well forums like this and google could be part of the blame....most people have computers now and have even heard of ebay, so if they have some photography gear it's easy to find what it is roughly worth.
ermm if only I had bought that Nikon AIS 24mm f2.8 for £40 last year at the boot sale, the guy I used to see regularly finally said he wasn't coming again because he couldn't sell anything as most people want things for peanuts.
 
I did manage to pick up a mint Oly OM10 with 3 lenses a flash and a nice bag last year at a car boot. 2 of the lenses were Zuiko and one tokina but they were like new. The guy said that no-one wanted old film stuff anymore and said he'd let them go for £15, I agreed with him and offered £8 which he accepted. Mwah ha ha.

Andy
 
When I was volunteering in a charity shop, at one point a guy dropped off a hugh great box of camera stuff that I had a look through. The stuff varied from some cheap compacts, to a fairly nice Canon APS SLR, a Zenit with a cracked mirror, various lenses in differing condition, a few accessories, a seriously professional looking massive video camera with about every option going and best of all, a black (rarer) Pentax ME Super in mint condition with tons of original Pentax accessories in a camera bag. It even had a roll of film in it that I rewound and am intending to get developed one day to see whats on it.

I inventoried a lot of it for them and they sent most of it off to their regional depot to be valued and put on ebay. Not sure how much any of it made but I was able to procure a few items from that for only £10 before they sent it off! (An M42 80 - 200mm zoom and set of M42 2x/3x teleconverters!)
 
I'm pleased to report the Yashica D has found a new home..
 
Jealous doesn't even come close - I really want to try out 120 film for a while but I can't find a way to get into it for less than hundreds of pounds, and being a student means that just doesn't cut it... the charity shops I've tried don't even have terrible plasticky point and shoots, let alone anything else!
 
There really are some cheap options for 120 film... look through this part of the forum, there are a few threads about it, cheap TLR's, cheap folding cameras etc.
 
I've had a look - I should've clarified that I want to try a TLR, but I'm reasonably sure I can't get anything like that minty Yashica for that sorta money :(
 
TLR's can be had quite cheaply, granted not as mint as that one usually.
 
I've seen Minolta Autocords on the bay for decent prices, people seem to speak highly of those too.
 
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