Spotlight: Pentax MX - Special Tom Foley Edition

Tom

At first glance, this camera appears to be a normal Pentax MX, but upon looking closer, one will discover it is factory engraved with the name "T. Foley." Tom Foley is a good friend and mentor that I first met during my senior year at Monmouth College. I participated in an internship with Tom at his studio in Galesburg, where I learned a lot about what it means to be a photographer. The most important piece of wisdom he passed down to me is that a true photographer does not take photographs. A true photographer makes photographs. Since finishing my undergraduate degree five years ago, Tom and I have remained pals. I always enjoy visiting him in Galesburg, where we usually shoot the shit at his neighborhood bar, "Duffy's." In the past few years, Tom showed in juried exhibitions with me, photographed my wedding, and wrote around a dozen recommendation letters to help get me into graduate school. I'm very grateful for his continued friendship and support. 

A few months ago, Tom sold me his personal Pentax MX, and I am honored to look after it for him. Here are some photographs I made with it a little while ago:

Plate: Untitled

His memory dies with me.

But without a photograph his features start to melt away with time.

Soon he'll be but a formless ghost in my mind.










Pentax Q10 with 5-15mm zoom.

Woe is a broken camera

Last week, my Nikon Df DSLR broke down. The aperture control lever randomly ceased functioning, meaning no matter which lens I put on the camera, the aperture does not stop down. Therefore, just about every shot is drastically overexposed and soft. I recently sent it in to Nikon, and they say it's going to cost $273.22 (exactly) to fix.

F*ck.

This puts a damper on some projects I'm working on (and projects I've been meaning to work on). Right now I only have access to my mom's old Pentax Q10, which, while a fun little camera, doesn't cut the mustard in terms of image quality for me. Also, since my Df + macro lens combo is how I scan film, I haven't been able to digitize some 35mm negatives I recently made. I desperately tried my flatbed scanner this morning, but the quality is just too shit. So... until my Df comes back from Nikon (hopefully in a week or so), there probably wont be any posts, unless I manage to get into my school's digital lab, but given UNO's strange summer hours, that seems unlikely.

Boo.