Photography in the fifties and sixties

One of the huge differences between now and then is that, in the 50s and 60s, it cost each time you took a photo. You had to buy film – which was likely to be a roll of 127 or 120 size film on which you had sufficient to take, I think, 12 photographs; if you were rich enough to afford a 35 mm camera, then the choice was between a 20 or 36 cassette. Having used all your film, you then had to get it developed – which cost money – and then decide which of the pictures (which you had a negative of) was worth printing – and that cost money too. The result of all this was that each shot was carefully taken as it cost as much to take a bad photo as a good one. All the above relates to black and white photography. Somewhere along the line came the option to have, with 35 mm, colour slide or colour negative film – the slide, which gave a transparency, was viewed by setting up a projector and screen and boring friends and neighbours with your slides; the colour negative gave a colour print (more money).