I got into photography following after I inherited all of my Grandad's cameras, lenses, flashes, filters, tripods, kit bags, and most importantly undeveloped and expired film. Starting in the 1950s and seemingly never selling anything, he latched onto the Canon EOS ecosystem as soon as it landed on the scene with the 650 in 1987, and stayed with it the rest of his life. Following some research, experimentation, and a lot of new batteries I selected some pieces from that massive collection to become my personal kit, along with my 70D and some later era EF and EF-S lenses.
Besides photography I'm into films, anime, cooking, music, bioscience, real ale, history especially the English Civil War, and cats.
Canon EOS 300 - Plastic Fantastic consumer grade camera, one of the last film models from Canon and one of the most successful. Lightweight and easy to use, the AF and metering hold up ok by modern standards, all in all a pretty fun camera. Gets paired with...
EF40mm f/2.8 STM - Prime Pancake, fast enough for government work, and gives the 300 a really slim profile so I can take it anywhere. No slouch on digital bodies either.
EF28-90mm f/4-5.6 USM - Era appropriate standard zoom. Prefer the prime for walking around, but sometimes you just need the extra range. The AF still works on this one unlike a lot of Grandads other lenses, plus it's silver which matches the 300.
Canon EOS 5D MkIII - Fondly remembered beast of a full-frame DSLR. Somewhat unwieldy but there's really nothing she can't do. Gets paired with...
EF24-70mm f/4L IS USM - Nice and versatile, the IS helps more than I probably realise, and surprisingly light. I do wish it went a little faster than f/4, OOTH it was entirely free so...
Canon EOS 70D - My first DSLR, bought in Book Off Super Bazaar in Osaka. Still useful despite inheriting the 5D MkIII, largely due to the amount of cheap EF-S glass on the market. Such as...
EF-S10-18mm f/4.5-5.6 IS STM - Good for getting weird and distorted super close up shots, or wide angles of whole rooms. Inspires a lot of creativity.
EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 - Standard zoom for the APS-C range. Kind of boring and not the nicest to use, but it helps to have around as an alternative to the 10-18mm if needed. May well be upgraded to a EF-S17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM in months to come.
Affinity - Not a camera nor a lens, but I do use this for processing RAWs and resizing JPGs, mainly because it's free and somewhat intuitive.
Canon Epoca 135 - Early 90's point and shoot that looks more like a camcorder. Funky little number, basically use this for brain off fun shooting.
Pentax K1000 and 50mm f/1.7 lens - Bought cheap on eBay as I wanted to try out fully manual film shooting, and a nifty-fifty to go with it. Haven't gotten deep into it yet as I need to replace the light seals (it was cheap!) and it's a wee bit intimidating. But watch this space!
SIGMA 55-200mm f/4-5.6 - Honorable mention to this specimen purchased in the junk section of Hard Off for ¥550 some 20 minutes after buying my 70D. Caveat emptor. Worked well enough to actually get some decent shots while I was in Japan, however it had an annoying habit of breaking all communication with the body whenever over or under exposed, or too zoomed in, or not enough, or if the wind was blowing the wrong way, you get the idea, requiring constant restarts and a lot of missed shots. I'm sure this is a fine lens when in new working order, unfortunately, mine was not. Should I have cut my miniscule losses and bought an actually working EF/EF-S lens for slightly more money and quit my complaining? Definitely, nonetheless this particular paperweight will always have a special place in my heart, and far away from my cameras.