Boggled...

[ffutures]

I've been selling off some of my old photographic kit on eBay. Today I thought I'd put up one of the SLRs, a Canon AE1 with an F 1.4 lens, data back, and winder. None of it particularly remarkable kit, all reasonably nice condition but nothing truly special.

So I set the minimum bid low and the "buy-it-now" price to the maximum I thought I was likely to get, sixty pounds plus postage.

It sold in twelve minutes, and the buyer paid before I even had time to send an invoice. So either I got that one seriously wrong or the buyer did, and knowing my luck it was probably me.

Never mind - it's sixty pounds in my pocket, and I really wasn't using it. But it'd be nice to know why that went so fast, when there's plenty of (to my eye) comparable kit that's just sitting there, including at least a dozen other AE-1s. Here's the description, for those in the know does anything look rare or unusual? The lens is probably the nicest part.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=7519766407&ssPageName=STRK:MESO:IT

Comments

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

I'm not a Canon expert but a f1.4 lens is fantastic with any camera.
The kit is in good condition, there are no missing parts so that might have been what they were looking for.
Or, they searched for an AE-1, found yours as the first match, liked what they saw and didn't want to bother with going through an auction.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm sure that the f1.4 was the main selling point - needless to say I also have one on my F1 or there's no way I would have parted with it. But there are other F 1.4s there and fifteen other AE-1s, nobody else was selling the data back but it's pretty common (also pretty crap), and the flashgun is a basic automatic job that doesn't even tilt.

[heliograph.livejournal.com]

Take a look at his other transactions. He buys and sells cameras so he picked yours up as stock and clearly thinks he can resell it for more. That's eBay for ya. He also seems to always use the "Buy it now" price if one is available.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

That makes sense - he probably wants to mix and match bodies and lenses to make up the best possible sets for resale. That lens would push up the value of something like a Canon F1 considerably, if it was replacing one of the cheaper lenses. I did consider selling it separately, but I decided that I'd get more money overall if sold it all as a package. Maybe I was wrong.

Oddly enough I feel better about this than I would if it was a private buyer snapping up a bargain. For one thing it probably means that there is less chance of the guy deciding he doesn't like it...

[dsample.livejournal.com]

Gee, I wouldn't have parted with my AE-1 for that price. I don't use it much, anymore, but it's still a perfectly servicable camera.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I was led to believe that the going rate for them was fairly low - as you can see I may have guessed too low. While it would have been nice to keep it, my main use for 35mm is scientific photography, and the F1 (especially with the jumbo "sports finder" prism that does eye level and waist level photos and doesn't mirror-image either view) is simply a much better camera for that.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Oh, sorry about the camera porn there... the F1 sports finder is a wonderful piece of kit, and I would LOVE to have equivalent facilities in an interchangeable-lens digital SLR. Maybe one of these days the Digital Film guys will get their act together, but I doubt it...

[dsample.livejournal.com]

I took a look at eBay to see what other AE-1s were going for, and it looks like you got a pretty good price for yours.