Yes.. I've sold my Z7ii. I know, this may not come as a surprise to you all, considering my last post.. but I have to admit I am more than saddend by it's departure. I... miss it! I know I've harped on about all the Z7ii's failings and short-comings, whilst tempering my excitement for it's positives.. It's a dainty camera built to D750 levels with a D850 sensor.. It's mirrorless, and that's new so it's great. What was even greater, and perhaps rather unsung, was it's ability to take lenses from other marques and.. autofocus them.. in may cases better than on the original cameras. And with the focus zoom function, you can really nail focus on the eye. So out I went and purchased every single Canon L lens I'd ever wanted.. and away I went. By most indications I did shoot quite a bit with it.. A total of 10,000 shots. In 23 months, so just under 2 years. That may not seem like a lot, but I'm not a big shooter, and though more recently I'm doing more sports shooting, I prefer portraits and landscapes, where spraying and praying is not really required. Only one other camera averaged the same volume in my stable, and that was the D810. So notwithstanding all the shortcomings I alluded to in my previous post, this, in fact, was quite a successful camera for me. Maybe the lack of bulk and weight made me want to take it along more often? Maybe the added joy of using different lenses from different makers made me want to experiement more with it? Who knows. I simply have to conclude that it was a great little camera, and more than suited to my requirements. Who knows.. I may hunt for a used one as a back-up camera :-)
Saturday, September 23, 2023
Why I sold the Z7ii.. or how relaxed and learned to love film.. again
Monday, March 28, 2022
Why I don't like the Nikon Z7ii
I have been an avid photographer (subtext - amateur) with some forays into professionalism (event photography, product photography) for the better part of 39 years. Wow.. Thats a long time. I've managed to transition from manual focus to autofocus, and then from film to digital slr's, and now the latest transition, from DSLR's to Mirrorless. While waiting for Nikon to get it's act together, I experimented with the Sony A7RIII full frame Mirrorless camera, and then just as promptly dumped it, as it wasn't for me. The philospohy of the two camera makers couldn't be any more different, and my acquired muscle memory of Nikon controls meant that I was constantly fighting with a camera that would simply not co-operate. Plus the colours looked terrible.
Nikon then did the inevitable and caught up with everyone else and released their Z6/Z7 duo, and I was invited by Nikon to one of their launch events in Australia. I was mightily impressed, although like many I was also perplexed at the glaring omissions to the camera's functionality, like dual card slots. I voiced my concerns with Nikon, and strangely for once, they seem to have listened, and barely 2 years later released an update, the Z6ii/Z7ii duo. Or maybe they listened to the tens of thousands of other photographers clamouring for the same things.. I can't be sure.
Aaaanyway, in the mean time I'd sold off the Sony, and was back to using my Nikon D3s, and really felt the need for a higher megapixel camera capable of using all my plethora of lenses from various mounts. I finally took the plunge (again!) into mirrorless and bought a Nikon Z7ii. The camera felt reassuringly similar, yet also strangely different, and this was immediately apparent when I tried to control the camera. Pro level controls were not present - more "prosumer" controls รก la D600 or D750 were in their place. Strange omissions still continued, like the two-button format option present on just about every Nikon DSLR since time immemorial.. Gone.. I discovered much to my dislike, that they had removed the manual DX lens selection option. And the final cherry on the cake (not!) was the fact that they'd removed the Picture control option for scanning negatives.
Now don't get me wrong.. I undestand all about marketing tiers and creating levels of products for customers to oogle at. That's all fine. And as Mirrorless stands today, it is clearly positioned by Nikon to be inferior to their pro DSLR offerings (D6, D850 and D500). Those cameras have a totally different design philosophy and their differentiated controls echo that. However right now the Nikon Z7ii is MORE expensive than the "equivalent" D850, with which it shares an important attribute, the sensor. So different controls, different viewfinder, but same image quality, and comparable in price, though with a clear pecking order. The "cheaper" camera.. is the better camera. Yes, I know, the D850 is near the end of it's life and hence price is lower, and the Z7ii is at the beginning of it's 2 year product life. The two cameras have very different Autofocus capabilities, with one sharing the AF of the flagship D6 and the other a newer though (currently) less capable AF technology, Mirrorless. Nikon WANT you to buy into Mirrorless, however it is still not as good as DSLR in that important category. Instead of sweetening the deal though, they have arbitrarily taken out features much the same way Canon or Sony have done for centuries. Well, ok, years.. Once upon a time this would have been anathema for the more engineering oriented Nikon... Well, I guess we all have to grow up and stop playing with our meccano sets and start selling houses in Monopoly.
You see, to put this all into context, Nikon was the bastion of pro photographers for many many decades, and though Canon and Pentax and Leica and Minolta (now Sony) and many others tried to compete, it was the accepted wisdom that Nikon was the best. They made camera bodies that were tough as nails, and lenses that could be used through successive generations of bodies. But times change, and technology changes, and small advantages turn into big differences down the line. And essentially two big changes destroyed Nikon's dominance in the imaging business.. AutoFocus and Full-Frame digital sensors. Their delay in adopting and offering viable options in both those areas meant that they went from Nr 1 in the 1970/80's to Nr 3 in the 2020's.. Yes, even consumer electronic giant Sony sells more cameras than them.
(Arguably a third technology, communications, has dealt all camera makers a blow, as in reality the Nr 1 spot is not Canon, but Apple with it's iPhone... But let's not muddy the waters and keep it Camera body centric discussion).
Out of all this comes a newer more modern Nikon, finally releasing full frame (FF) Mirrorless cameras to an awaiting public, and trying to recapture some of their past successes. In so doing though, they have adopted many of the consumer electronic tricks that the older Nikon, the engineering Nikon, the Nikon with a thousand and one accessories for the Pro shooter, would never EVER have considered. And in so doing, Nikon has become what we hoped it wouldn't.. a Canon or Sony! Before any fanboys from either brand make any comments about my impartiality, I do have to mention that I have used Canon SLR's and DSLR's EXTENSIVELY before finally moving to Nikon, and I much admired Minolta SLR's and later Sony mirrorless cameras (though disappointed with their A7RIII). I know my stuff with them. Seriously. Don't try me!
So whereas the "old" Nikon gave us hit's like the Nikon D3 and D700, the D810 and D500.. and lately the D850.. all great pro-level cameras (not to mention D4, D5 and D6), they are treating Mirrorless like the consumer animal it is.. whilst still charging "full price" for them.. Notwithstanding their "firmware updates" that are improving the sorely lacking AF of Mirrorless, they are not really increasing the usefullness of these cameras as they had implied they would. And they are really just getting us used to the endless treadmill of two steps forwards one step back upgrade path that Canon and Sony have been practicing for 20 years, and have gotten down to a fine art.
So to summarise this rant.. I am REALLY UNHAPPY with my Nikon Z7ii. Notwithstanding the fact that it produces truly spectacular images, the fact that it's framerate is superior to my D3s, the buffer is amazingly deep, there are two card slots making it easy to get images off it, and surprisingly compact and well made. How could Nikon improve this? Give us back what you took away!!!! Give us the negative scanning profile, make DX imaging area user controlable and not automatic, give us the quick format option that EVERY Nikon before had. And this will become a truly great (prosumer) mirrorless camera!
Come on Nikon. Please! It's just firmware!!!!
Footnotes:
1) The format card option via button press is a unique feature to Nikon DSLR's! For everyone else it's a menu-dive.
2) The Negative image profile is a feature unique to Nikon DSLR (singular, only the D850 has this option)!
3) The manually selected DX/FX area is NOT unique to Nikon (Sony also allows it), however Nikon DX lenses (unlike Canon, for example) mount on all Nikon F mount cameras and adapters (FTZ) and some DX lenses have imaging circles that cover the FX sensor in some or most situations. I was on safari some years back and had just ruined a 80-400 lens, and my ONLY option was a loaner 18-200 DX lens on my D700 full frame camera. I was able to manually select FX image area and used the lens at infinity and actually created a competition-winning image. There IS a usefulness to having that sort of manual control of your camera. WHY did you remove it Nikon.. Why?!
4) MF lenses are supported with a 20 bank memory that are user controlable EXCEPT for the focal length, which are pre-fixed to Nikon specific focal lengths.. You cannot manually select 90mm for example (eg. using a Leica M mount lens).. it either goes to 85mm or 105mm! How idiotic!!!
And an afterwards... after checking with an Internet Luminary who shall remain nameless (Hi Thom).. apparently all the above items are well known and have been discussed ad infinitum amongst Nikonians/Nikonistas/Nikophiles... So I am just late to the party is all...
Thursday, November 26, 2020
GAS
Gear
Acquisition
Syndrome
Most comonly suffered by the male of the homo sapiens sapiens species, although the females have their own version (shop therapy, shoe acquisition syndrome etc). Oh, and before my female readers get their knickers in a knot.. SATIRE ALERT!
GAS normally relates to technological items of a complicated and convoluted sort, something that takes us males ages to understand and make work properly, and once we've mastered how they work.. we turn to the next item on our G.A.S. list.. GAS items normally include cars, cameras and lenses, complicated pocket-knives, watches (normally of the expensive swiss kind) and, strangely, bags. Something in common with our female folk.
Now GAS can range from the relatively harmless to divorce level material, insofar as it interferes with one's ability to connect with one's better half (again generic gender stereotype, as how could one half be better than the other?!). However it does allow man's desire for infidelity to find a relatively innocuous release, especially when viewed by our spouses. Think for a moment which your wife or partner would prefer.. you going out with the latest model blond bombshell... or swapping the merc for a bmw?!
GAS also allows for the male mind's desire for total and complete control of something rather complicated. Seeing as we are unable to manage to control our spouses in any discernable way, or indeed to understand them, we concentrate our attentions on an inanimate object that must follow the immutable laws of physics as well as the less clearly defined rules of logic.. depending on who's logic was used to create the item in question. This has brought the western male mind into contact with ZEN thinking that is the basis of Japanese design, as well as the art of the needless complication as exemplified by Swiss watch manufacturers.
And how has GAS affected me? Well I suffer from multiple manifestations of GAS driven in part by the fall of film camera prices, the almost instant availability via platforms like EBAY and the ability to dispose of some of my income indiscriminately. My kids are still young so planning for university fees hasn't quite hit me yet. Or that's what I'll tell then when they come asking for money and I peer above my mountain of used cameras and lenses...
GAS can get out of control, and in this day and age of the internet where access is but a click away you can lose a lot of time window-shopping and selecting bid or buy. Back in the day you'd have to search out your favourite camera store, the monthly nic-nack market, or wait for the weekly autotrader mag to see what vintage model soft-tops there were.. or whatever forum there was for your GAS item of desire... But today the acceleration of GAS is given by the almost always on internet shopping possibilities, as well as being able to go to far-flung corners of the world to find stuff. I mean I got a bit of camera stuff from LATVIA the other day.. posted to Australia.. and now on it's way to Mozambique. The power of online shopping, fast shipping and willing mules has made my GAS explode exponentially. But now my wife is starting to wonder if I am wed to her, or to a camera store.
My GAS takes other forms as well.. sadly of the even more expensive kind.. Watches. Although here there is a practical aspect limiting my purchasing, and that is that I have only 2 arms on which to wear my watches. And because they are all mecchanical, it takes a lot of time every day to keep them all ticking along. One could make the same argument about my cameras, i.e. only having two eyes, but I find that putting 2 cameras to my face slightly (note I said only slightly) ridiculous, and in fact the different cameas I have serve different purposes and indeed take different film formats which changes their characters completely. At least that's what I tell myself. My wife can't tell the difference between a photo taken with one camera or another...or with my smartphone for that matter. And.. neither can most photographers.
With lenses the equation changes substantially. There I can go wild. I'm told the average photographer owns 2.2 lenses. The poor bugger with the .2 of a lens must be really be pissed off! However the reality is that most people buy an SLR with one consumer zoom lens and live happily ever after. Then there are the GAS guys (invariably guys!) who have to absolutely cover every focal length from here to infinity and struggle with bags of 8 or 9 lenses. I make sure the average stays up!
And where will this take us, this GAS? Well, have you ever heard of an estate sale?! Rarely does one's offspring take as much care or interest in the things that we took so long and worked so hard to amass. In fact they probably have an aversion to those things, seeing them as useless baubles, or things that took their parent's time away from them.. And so many end up on the auctioneer's block. Or worse Cash Crusaders. Guess where I'm headed next?!
Monday, November 16, 2020
Xefina Revisited (Again)
Some of you may (or may not!) know that in 2008 I published a photobook via Blurb called "Xefina Island". That book was made using photos shot over a two year period, from 2007 and 2008. I had been visiting this small sandbank of an island for much longer than that, and have managed a few trips back since my book, although the last was in early 2017... What could more that 3 years do to an island already ravaged by the forces of nature? A lot, as I learned this past weekend!
However the island continues to live in an eerie calm, just perched at almost walking distance from the Costa do Sol beaches of Maputo. Although it maintains it's mystery for most Maputans, except for a few intrepid kiteboarders, it is a habitual haunt for a significant number of fishermen that use it's beach as a launching point for their expeditions. A small village is home to some of the poorest people in Mozambique, though rich in pride and humility. I was fortunate to have had had a nice interaction with some of them while taking these photographs.
I have to confess that the impetus for this trip were a photographer friend, Nii Obadia, as well as my wife. Through the former's insistance and latter's organisation, we were able to make it onto the island. Here are some pictures from yesterday's trip. Hope you enjoy.
For the technically minded these photographs were taken with a Canon 1Ds mark III, which was released about the time I started photographing this island (2007!). Coupled with this camera were two Nikon (!) lenses, a 17-35 f2.8 and an 85mm f2.8 Tilt and Shift lens. Other photographs (not shown yet) were taken with a Hasselblad 500CM with a 50mm f4 Zeiss lens on Kodak Plus X 125 asa film. Oh, and for the record, I used the Gitzo tripod I saved from oblivion as reported in this blog page.
Friday, April 3, 2020
Fixing a Gitzo GT1541OT
So today's post is about one of my pet likes.. fixing things. I was browsing Facebook's marketplace when I chanced upon an advert for a Gitzo tripod for $80! Intrigued, I read on, although the pictures explained exactly why the tripod was going for so little. A tripod that in it's day (+/- 2009) retailed for 800 POUNDS! The guy who I eventually bought it from said he paid over AUD 1000.. still a big chunk of change. As I am living away from my trusty Giotto tripod (Chinese clone of Gitzos), and still waiting for my Peak Design travel tripod, I was in need of some stability.. so to speak. So I met up with the seller and after a bit of haggling bought the tripod and head for a measely AUD60.. However the scars were deep and they were many. The centre column has completely crushed in the middle and was disintegrating at every attempt to raise or lower it into a position, where it could be tightened and put to good use. The leg joints were completely loose and 2 legs had lost their original bolts and were held together by your bog standard galvanised bolts, all rusty and not really doing the job. Still, could be worse...
And indeed, when I got home, on looking closely at one of the legs, it too had been wacked, although thankfully the scar seemed mostly superficial.
Note to self, bring my reading glasses when examining photo equipment!
The most pressing problem was the centre column, which in it's present state was totally unusable, as the legs did in fact work, though in a wobbly fashion. So I immediately set about dismantling the legs.. Priorities! What I found both disheartened and delighted me. At some point this tripod had sat in the back of a car driving across Australia.. Only that could explain how everything had gotten loose and in some cases lost. Washers were missing, bolts replaced.. Anything that was a screw had some issue with it! Someone though had tried putting the legs back together at some point, and where there was once brass, we now had either a galvanised washer or none. Eventually I managed to get everything off, cleaned and then re-assembled the legs using the original parts to complete 2 of them, with all the "spare parts" used to complete the third leg - two perfectly working with all the right parts.. and one.. sadly a frankenstein. A quick visit to the "net" revealed that Gitzo, 10 years after releasing this tripod, still stocked spares!! I was totally amazed. Not only that, they had an exploded diagram of my tripod with all the spares marked.. You could practically build a new tripod out of parts!!!
However Gitzo is not cheap, and the centre column and leg bolt set would set me back US165.. Not a huge amount in the grand scheme of things, but I thought I could do better. Also, I wanted to use this tripod NOW, not wait for the vagueries of Christmas time shipping! So I started searching for suppliers of bolts and washers in Brisbane, Australia (I'm here now) and found a few, one just 10 minutes away. So at 2pm on a Friday afternoon I shot off down the road to try my luck..
Items required:
2 stainless steel button hex bolts M8 15mm long
2 brass washers 6.7x15x1.5mm
2 stainless washers
After 10 minutes the pregnant storekeeper handed me a little bag with part that approximated my need, but weren't exactly the right size. Note to self.. next time bring along a caliper. Total spend AUD 1.18. Well at least I wasn't too too out of pocket!
So as that hadn't gone quite as I hoped, with the hex bolt heads being a bit too small for the tripod, I headed to Bunnings Warehouse, where low prices are just the beginning..
While there I found larger philips head bolts.. not the most elegant solution nor as easy to tighten, however a much better fit for the tripod leg connection.. more brass washers just in case the first lot weren't perfect and then.. well, what about the tripod column?! Yes, I'd need to deal with that, so some glue, sandpaper and gaffer tape.. You'll find out just after the break..
Before we continue with the rebuild though, I thought I'd talk a little about this tripod, which doesn't have much in the way of literature about it. A long and almost fruitless Google search did however provide a few pointers.. I finally found one video with barely 15 likes that talks about how this tripod is built, which at only 4:44 is definitely worth a watch. If you don't have time, let me summarise.. Stainless steel parts so tripod can be used in the sea with salt water.. aptly called Ocean Traveller (the OT part of the GT1541OT model number). So this is a Gitzo traveller tripod, one of the first with reverse storage legs to make it smaller when packed, but almost as large as normal tripods when opened up and extended. I'm not a fan of tripods with big centre columns as they tend to sway in anything but a whisper of wind. Not this tripod aparently. The load rating is low at 4kg, but I believe that to be conservative.. Maybe not for large format, but medium format should definitely balance on top.
So back to the rebuild of this Ocean traveller.. The centre column.. Well, in it's present state it was all but useless..however I'd read somewhere about shortening broken carbon fibre tubes, and so set about doing just that. After a tap test (tapping the tube to hear changes in sound) I worked out that roughly half of the tube was damaged. I then proceded to wrap the gaffer tape around the tube along where I wanted to cut, and just next to that with scotchtape, leaving just a thin sliver where I would cut along. This would help prevent spintering as I cut through the fibres. I did a test cut into the broken tube first to understand how my handsaw would react with the carbon, and proceded to make a huge amount of dust as I cut into the tube. So if you're doing this at home, then make sure you wear a dust mask, have a cloth or piece of paper underneath. The cut was almost perfect, with very little splintering. The tapes were doing their job. I then cut into the channel I'd left uncovered between the 2 tapes and with bated breath proceded to make another almost perfect cut. Now I had little less than half a perfect carbon tube.. However the open end would be at risk and would need to be stoppered, so I took the off-cut end and removed the metal stopper, and then glued that with epoxy glue into the open end of the good part of the tube.. Perfect connection! And you can hardly see any glue. Wow, I must be getting good at this after years of model planes :-)
So we are done! Perfectly working tripod with a shorter centre column, ready and waiting for my camera to go take some pictures. But wait.. there's more..
Because I'm a bit particular about these things, the AUD1.18 bolts were not doing it for me, and so I decided to splurge on the Gitzo bolts and washers, which in actual fact were a bit wider and held the leg more securely, so off I went to their website, ordered the parts, and 2 weeks later they arrived, right in the middle of the Christmas rush! Well, Christmas came early for me, as the parts were spot on, and now I have a perfectly working, perfectly looking (short) Gitzo tripod.
With Gitzo spare parts, and the other consumables I ended up spending $60, and with the tripod at $60, a total of AUD120, or for those inclined to use greenbacks, around USD80.. Not bad for one of the highest quality tripods I've ever seen in my life.
And one last word about this ST version. The stainless steel used in this tripod is a special cast type which is non-porous and therefore even more rust resistant than ordinary stainless steel, and therefore weathers the elements perfectly. This tripod is 10 years old and not a spot of rust on it! Obviously this process must have been very expensive because Gitzo (now made by Manfrotto in Italy, after it's UK holding company closed the French factory down) no longer manufacture this type of steel. All their tripods have their standard greyish laquer paint, which is nowhere near as resistant to chips and bangs and marks, and eventually rust. Sad. You will not see a more beautiful tripod around than this one..
Monday, November 18, 2019
I'm in love with old lenses
So how does one reconcile 1 good shooting eye and 27 bodies and 50 odd lenses? Well, quite simply I can't. I just like collecting them, shooting them, playing with them. More importantly each camera had it's own specific lenses, and each brand made some spectacular optics.. And it's really the optics I enjoy. Which is why I own so many different brands. To the uninitiated amongst you, this is all known as GAS.. or Gear Acquisition Syndrome. As the name states, this is a disorder and I am afflicted with it. As afflictions go though, it is fairly innocuous, as long as you don't let it ruin your bank account! As there are some pretty expensive pieces of glass and bodies out there. Thankfully though the modicum of scotish and neopolitan blood I have coursing through my veins mean that I'm not attracted by the impossibly rare and ludicrously expensive items out there.. at least not enough to spend money on them! No, all my objects of desire are relatively attainable.. However that I have spent a sizeable chunk of money on them is true. Please oh please don't let me die and my wife sell my camera and lens collection for what I told her I spent for it! A similar line exists for cyclists by the way, who are also afflicted with Gas.. and another maxim as well.. the correct number of bikes one should own is N+1, with N being the current number of bikes owned. Again, the same thing applies to cameras and camera collecting.. So my search continues for the very perfect camera body and lens..
Except there is no such thing. Perfection is a state always strived for, but never attained. The Japanese are infuriating because for every new camera they build, they almost always put in some flaw. Canon does this by taking out a random feature that was in the previous model.. Wabi Sabi anyone? They are though in the business of selling consumer products, and they need our patronage in a year or two's time when their new batch of products is out. I however have jumped off that bandwagon, and prefer to buy their older models. Except for mirrorless. Yes, that new buzzword mirrorless..
Why? Well, quite simply because I can then use ONE body with all of my lenses.. And remember, the only reason I have all those bodies is to mount all those wonderful lenses! And again, as I said before, no single manufacturer gets is right all the time.. Each one designs a spectacular product once in a while, so there are many great lenses out there from different manufacturers. All you have to do is look.
Now in my search for lenses, I tend more towards portrait focal lengths, and seem to have a preponderance of lenses in the 50 to 135mm length (for 35mm film).. Obviously there are lenses that go beyond this range, but for some reason I seem to gravitate to that central bit of focal range. So here goes, a partial list:
- Canon 50mm f0.95 rangefinder lens.. This lens, built 20 years before Leica got around to building their Noctilux, was a technical marvel made to surpass the limitations of the film of the day, which couldn't go past 400asa and was grainy as hell. It was released in the early 60's and my copy was purchased by my father while working in Japan. If you wanted to take pictures at night, without using a flash bulb, then this lens made it possible. Today it is know as the dream lens. Later in EF (electro-focus) territory Canon again tried to replicate their earlier feat by releasing a f 1.0, still today the fastest autofocus lens on the block, though sadly discontinued. Nikon has gotten on the bandwagon in mirrorless territory with their Noct 58mm f0.95.. but.. always a but.. MANUAL focus.. Remember what I said about holding something back in their designs? Truly infuriating!
- Nikon 85mm f1.4 AF-D The portrait monster that sucks up light and looks oh so good on my Nikon D3s. It's a hard lens to use though, as focus is paper thin and more often than not an eyebrow will be in focus, and the eye not! So frustrating, but when it does nail focus, it can render some amazing images. Got to know what you want to achieve with it, as not every shot needs total fade to background! Sadly harder to use on Mirrorless because there is no internal AF motor, but with focus peaking it is still doable.. Supposedly surpassed by more modern designs that achieve greater sharpness at the expense of a cheaper and less durable housing. Anyway.. sharpness is overrated! This is another lens that will make it into the next century. Sadly we'll all have personao AI bots taking perfect pictures with their built-in eye-imagers..
- Nikon 70-200 f2.8E lens. Only one of 2 zooms that I revere. A truly spectacular lens with amazing sharpness. Satisflying sharpness. Does not miss a beat, perform badly, totally well behaved. Only annoyance.. can only use wide open on my film bodies. Then again.. WHY exactly do I buy fast lenses?! To stop them down while shooting!? Noooooo.. So actually, this lens does NOT have any flaws, even the previously mentioned one. But does it belong in this listing? Released in November 2016.. it is only 3 years old. So though not technically old, this is a lens that I will want to own in 20 years time (if it's still working). Thankfully it is built like a tank, weather sealed and a joy to use and notwithstanding it's heft, is manageable in the weight department. Obviously Nikon will release another in 6 years which will be better than this one.. but this one is so good I may not care!
whewwwwwww..... Need to take a breath.. this is getting into a long post.. But.. What was the whole point I started with?! Oh, the afflction of GAS, and the first step in solving a problem was recognising it. However as I've gotten this far, I might as well admit that I DON'T recognise a problem here. AT ALL. I mean, what's wrong with collecting old lenses? It's not like I'm massively impacting the planet? If anything I'm sometimes saving lenses from going to the tip. Maybe those lenses though didn't quite make the grade in my list of "Best of".. In any event I'm not fuelling useless consumerism! Although the accessibility of these old (and optically quite fine) lenses is in part due to the consumer nature of our modern western societies. Which is sad. We humans are on a relentless persuit for newness and perfection, but sometimes we leave it behind. And that's why I search out for these old lenses, because perfection, or the striving of it, can be found in older things. Interlude over, back to the lenses..
- Leica 90mm f2.8 Elmarit-M lens.. Released in 1980 and according to Ken Rockwell one of the best Leica lenses. He later goes on to state that it's the easiest focal length to design.. Bought this on a whim, and though it's small it is NOT light.. Very dense glass in there. At 2.8 subject separation requires work and correct shooting distance.. The lens is exquisitly designed and built, with integral lens hood, a nice leather pouch, and a very smooth focusing ring. The M bayonet mount is possibly the best lens mount ever, although Hasselblad comes a very very close second. Why the M mount? Because it has a very short throw to click the lens into place. Hassy gets second place because you have to contend with the shutter mecchanism which needs to be aligned with the lens (i.e. in the same state as in cocked). So good on you Leica for in 1954, before the F mount (1959) had worked out how easy it should be to mount a lens securely!
- Leica 90mm f4 Elmar-C lens released in 1973. What? 2 Leica lenses the same focal length and one stop apart. Are you crazy? Well, I do appreciate fast glass, hence the first Leica. But then I couldn't pass up a (relative) bargain, hence the second lens. At less than a quarter of the price of it's one stop faster brother, it is quite cheap, possibly Leica's cheapest M lens, although officially never meant for an M body, but rather the CL body made for Leica by Minolta. But of course it's an M mount so you can use it pretty much anywhere you want. It's chief attribute is it's lightness and it's compactness, and image quality is surprisingly good and surprisingly close to the f2.8. So why do I own both? I'll eventually sell one.. I just can't decide which one I'm keeping is all!
- Hasselblad 120mm f4 modified Petzar lens. Now this is a strange lens, and not the best optically. In fact it tries to recreate the wierd whirly effect of early Petzval portrait lenses, which were the first large aperture lenses evailable for large format cameas back in 1840. So a slavic engineer decided to convert old C Hasselblad lenses using modern optics that try to recreate an ancient optical design. The effect, when it works, is quite mesmerising. When it doesn't it just looks boring and out of focus. Just have to keep on experimenting though. Sadly no sample images, as the last roll I shot came out blank.. Maybe I loaded it backwards :-)
- Hasselblad 80mm f2.8 CF lens - probably my favourite of this brand, or rather my most used Hassy lens. Like the Mamiya above it is a "normal" focal length and mimics a 50mm for medium format, although comparisons with Hasselblad's 6x6 negative and 35mm film tend to understate the differences. We're talking about a square format, which until relatively recently Hasselblad touted as the "Perfect" format (until they started making digital backs with 2:3 aspect ratio). It certainly forces you to look at your image making in a different way (maybe the eye level viewfinder also helps in that regards!). I find I have to slow down and search for the perfect composition that will fit in a square box. Which makes the V bodies slower, but also more satisfying to work with. Although I called this a Hasseblad lens, the name inscribed on the lens itself is Carl Zeiss, a german optics maker. Hasselblad simply made the box and farmed out the rather more difficult task of making lenses to the Germans.
- Pentax 135mm f2.8 K mount manual lens. I've probably owned this lens the longest.. and since I started shooting Pentax in 1992, that really is a long time. I don't use it much today, but at the time it was my favourite portrait lens. All the advantages of a small lens, long focal reach, wideish aperture mean you can really make your subject stand out. Not particularly rare, but a gem of a lens that brings back some memories, and supremely competent at what I like doing best, taking portraits. the above image is a roll of Lomo 200ASA - wierd film - processed badly in Mozambique and converted to B&W. Still you can see the nice effect in the out of focus areas.
- Nikon 17-35mm f2.8 AF-S lens - A workhorse lens for me. The large aperture means that even though it is wide angle you can achieve nice subject separation with a bit of work and planning. It's optical design has probably been surpassed by newer lenses, and at 35mm the older O Nikkor lens for me does a better, or at least more interesting job. However I did say I'd mention 2 zooms in this list, and this is the second one. For autofocus work with digital it ticks the boxes, and it's an old lens to boot. The front element has a wierd aspherical nature which is truly bizzare to the touch, with a dimple in the middle. It is satisfyingly made of metal and wouldn't feel out of place in a war zone, and crucially takes 77mm filters, which means it works very well with my other zoom, the 70-200 f2.8. It too will be around well into the next century. Probably only as manual focus, as the motor will have given up the ghost by then, but everything else will work perfectly. Superceeded by newer designs, that won't last as long. Such is consumerism today.
- Nikon 24mm f2 AI-S lens - Almost forgot about this manual focus wonder... An old design, with heaps of distortion, although no moustache distortion like the 20mm Nikon that I couldn't stand.. Bokeh is average, but the wide aperture does allow for some fairly good subject separation.. It's really small, the focus throw is very short meaning focusing is fast. I really struggle between this lens and the 35mm O when I want wide angle.. In the end this does more landscapes and the 35 ends up working more with people.
So when and how do I use all these lenses? Well as you've seen there's a mish-mash of older and newer lenses, manual focus and AF.. Basically whatever I'm trying to achieve photographically will have me reaching into different parts of my photography cabinet, grabbing different bodies and lens combinations. For street work in film I tend to have 2 kits - the F3 with the manual focus trio 35mm, 50mm and 135mm (or sometimes the35 + 105mm). If I want some autofocus then the F6 will come out with the 17-35 and 70-200. If I'm walking a lot though the F3 will get the nod as the manual lenses are lighter and a lot smaller.
If I'm shooting a wedding or an event then I'll bring along both the Nikon and Canon bodies (D3s and 1DsIII) and the primes (50 and 135) will go on the Canon and the 17-35 and 70-200 on the Nikon. That's quite a weighty combo, but with fast action covered by the Nikon, the more formal portraits will be done by the Canon. Although the stellar 70-200 will do some of those as well, especially as we reach the end of the day and the VR and higher ISO advantages of the D3s come into play. Events are fast action and so I'll probably just take the Nikon setup. Portrait sessions are a completely different story, because I'll throw just about every portrait lens I have at the subject, and see what looks best later.. When I need more compression the trusty 70-200 will be front and centre, although the two 135mm's, from Nikon and Canon also help in this regard. If I'm outdoors and can swing a nice leafy background then the Petvar Hasselbad will come out to play, and even the old Canon 50 0.95, as it too has a distinctive bokeh that works with distant foliage in the background. For clinically sharp headshots the 105 f2.5 manual focus Nikon still can't be beat. For more dreamy images wide open, the 85 f1.4 Nikon is the one I'll use, and if I need a bit wider the Canon 50 f1.2 will come out, especially if I need to nail focus and need to work faster than manual focus allows me. For situations that aren't repeatable (i.e. weddings!) you need to trust your equipment to get it right, and you need your equipment to be fast. It's unusual that I use two different camera brands, but they each have particular lenses that work for me. I could mount my Nikon lenses on the Canon (not the other way around), but the ergonomics of the Nikon bodies is just that little bit easier on the hand, whereas the Canon L lenses are superb, especially their primes.
Lens collecting is fun for me. The chase. Finally finding something. The negotiation.. When I, with bated breath, finally open the package... There's a certain thrill in the hunt. There's definitely a tactile connection between me and something that I feel has been made well, that has a certain heft, a certain volume, a certain feel. However I'm not just an idle collector, and these lenses all have work to do, and so ultimately they're here because they help me make some amazing images, or at the very least, give me pleasure while I TRY to make an amazing image.. lately it's more the latter. At least I'm still using them though..
Thanks to my boys who served as models for many of the images here. As you can see one son doesn't mind being photographed, whereas the other runs away every time I pull out the camera...
I'll add images for the remaining lenses as time goes on.
Monday, July 16, 2018
Mirrorless vs DSLRs, or how I stopped worrying and learned to love the bomb
Single Lens Reflex. Reflex because the image is reflected from the image plane up through a viewfinder, so you see what the film will see. Single lens because unlike dual lens systems like the TLR's (TWIN.. get it?) SLR's only use one lens, so you're seeing exactly what will end up as the final image, in terms of framing. And now add a D for Digital and you get a DSLR, which is what I'm currently shooting. But lately the buzz-word has been Mirrorless. What is mirrorless you say?! Well, effectively it's taking out the Reflex out of Single Lens.. The imaging sensor "sees" the image before you take it and a copy of that is projected onto an electronic viewfinder. So you're still effectively looking through the single lens, just in a different way. For a long time SLR's and DSLR's could claim a better viewfinder, especially the higher end cameras which offered 100% viewfinder coverage (WYSIWYG for the computer programmers out there) and long eye-relief (meaning you could see the whole viewfinder comfortably, withought having to push your eyeball into the camera!
Time though marches on, and what initially seemed like a lacklustre solution.. looking at a mini TV-screen approximating the scene in front of you, soon matured and became a surreal experience.. being able to see IN THE DARK as if in daylight, easily focusing on your subject, while DSLR's started to struggle. Not only that but mirrorless cameras could do away with the whole mirror-box assembly making the cameras slimmer, and as a side benefit the shorter flange to sensor distance meant that all of a sudden you could mount all your competitor's lenses on your own camera.. A massive advantage indeed, which meant that all those vintage manual focus lenses languishing in op-shops and thrift stores and under layers of dust in old camera stores suddenly came into vogue.. an adapter away from photographic heaven. And indeed the ability to use different lenses from different manufacturers all on one body is a most liberating feeling. No longer "locked into" a camera system, you are free to choose the best lens, no matter the manufacturer. Think of Canon's legendary 50mm f0.95, which only worked on ONE rangefinder model, the Canon 7. Or Nikon's 200mm f2 VR lens.. a monster of a lens with bokeh in spades.. Smoething more esoteric? An Apo Lanthar macro lens from Voightlander, a modern gem of a lens that outresolves just about anything out there. A tilt and shift from Canon? Or a Hasselblad lens? You can use (almost) all of them on this humble Mirrorless..
So what did I do? I went out and bought one. Stay tuned to find out more...