Some readers may already know that I am not only a writer from Oranghongkong.com but also a photographer. I actually worked in IT for more than 20 years, as I told you in the first article in the About Authors column, and only started to get serious about photography in 2017. But I actually fell in love with photography when I was in elementary school in Yuen Long, and the main reason was because of my grandfather's workspace.

Quietly entering my grandfather's workspace

When I was in elementary school, I didn't know for sure how old I was, and I started to sneak into my grandfather's office because I was so curious about the bookshelves that contained hundreds of books and magazines. Most of them were photography books and magazines, and I was very impressed with the photos that were in them. Then the question arose in me, the person who took these photos use?

My grandfather also had a lot of professional cameras and lenses, but for books and magazines alone, he didn't mind me touching them, let alone showing me his photography tools. That's why at that time photography was a hobby that I could not channel.

One of the cameras that my grandfather used to use, the Rolleicord Twin Lens Reflex. [Photo: Rolleiclub]

One of the photos from my grandfather.

One of the photos is from my grandparents as the model.

Try photos with my dad's camera

One day, when I saw my father take out his camera, I realized that my father also had a semi-professional camera, so I remembered the drawer he used to store the camera. One day while my father was still working, I secretly opened the drawer and took out my father's camera to study it. It wasn't long before my father found out I had played with his camera because I had opened the back of the camera and caused the film inside to be exposed to light, and most of the photos in it were lost. After that, of course, I got a pretty severe punishment.

When I was about 9 or 10 years old, my father allowed me to try his camera for the first time.

The first time I had my own camera and was serious about learning photography techniques was when I was 16 years old when I bought a used camera in Tsim Sha Tsui with my income from part-time work when I was still in Secondary (SMA) in Hong Kong. The story will be told in another article according to the storyline in the About Author column.

Some of my photos are on https://www.instagram.com/harristsam or https://www.instagram.com/fotocatchphotography. Thank you.

The camera that my father once owned was the Minolta HI-MATIC F. [Photo: Wikipedia]