The Best Thing About Rental Is When You Take The Stuff Back

What?

What kind of a statement is that for an shop blog? What sort of advertisement does that make? Are you insane?

Nope. Sane and sober and closely shaved. Even smell good. And the thought is also a good one. Follow me along....

I used to take pictures of glamour girls and dancers. A lot of the pictures were taken on the Flapoflex camera with the deadly sharp Flaponar lenses. They showed all the wrinkles on the girls and they complained. I was losing business - so I bought a Mugugaipan Portrait lens with the variable fluffy aperture and the autojiggler circuit - and used it for about a year while the fashion for soft dancer photos was current. It was eye-wateringly expensive at the time but I figured I would eventually make the money back.

Then the fashion changed. An international superstar iconic legend photographer got a big feature in Australian Photo Wannabee magazine and everything had to be razor sharp, high-def, and with the contrast turned up to 87. My Mugugaipan lens was worthless as a money-maker. I tried to sell it at the shop, on eBay, and on Gumtree and the best offer I got was to go and do something rude with it.

I reflected that I had made a business error - putting my real money into something that was unreal - the fashionable image. What I really should have done was to be realistic - I could have come into Camera Electronic on the occasions when I had booked a wrinkled dancer and rented their Mugugaipan for the weekend.

I would have gotten all the pictures I needed in about four rentals in that year, and had none of the capital investment vanish. Each time I could have taken the Mugugaipan back with a clear conscience and the chance that it would be the last time it was needed. I did not need to own the Mugu - just use it four times.

The change in fashion is a factor that we cannot control - neither can we sometimes control our own tastes or the way in which our vision develops. It is no good having a closet full of gear that we have outgrown, or never grew into. Will ye or nil ye with the new lens or camera - curb your desires sensibly - rent it for enough times to find out if it is useful to you, and try not to hold onto it one minute longer than it pays you to.