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July 8, 2006 - Following yesterday’s comments, I’d like to comment on the “it’s the carpenter, not the hammer” line. It’s true enough a good photographer can probably create a silk purse from just about any sow’s ear of a camera and lens he/she uses, but to be most effective, one still has to choose the right horse for the particular course (to butcher another oft used line). A photographer wanting to capture a grand scenic vista isn’t likely to use a compact digicam as the best tool for the job. Similarly, a photojournalist in the thick of action is most often going to want to use a heavy duty SLR that can take bullets – there was an incident reported in Pop Photo some years back about a Nikon F3 using PJ whose camera did in fact take a bullet for him. There
are always exceptions to the rules, such as Galen Rowell continuing
to use 35mm cameras throughout his creative life to capture the grand
scenic vista and printing them as large as 50-inches wide. There’s also
the PJ in
I’ve been wanting to go digital for weddings for a little while now, but until I bought some new D-SLRs, I had only done some limited shooting with my first D-SLR, the Nikon D100. Why? Well, work with me on my meandering thought process… I don’t really care for labeling myself as such and such style of photographer, because weddings usually require all the genres, from formal/posed, to PJ/candid styles. If I called myself a PJ-style photographer that would be a lie, because a "true" PJ offers no direction, being essentially a fly on the wall to capture the moments as they occurred naturally. A formal/posed photographer sets up the subjects, directs the scene to capture the perfect photo, from facial expressions, to strands of hair misplaced, etc. I offer some minor direction to the subjects and I’ll arrange large groups for the photo, as well as taking candid shots when they present themselves, but I try not to classify myself in either of the main camps. Even pros that helped to define the so-called PJ-style, such as Gary Fong, are actually offering direction at some portions of the wedding coverage. If I had to orient myself into a particular camp though, I’d be leaning towards the PJ side, but without being so pretentious as to call it PJ-style or myself as a PJ. I'm there to do the job that the couple hired me for, which at times call for being that fly on the wall and not intruding into the moment, and other times to offer them hints and suggestions about what to do, or what comes next. With that non-style in mind, the equipment requirements are usually for a very responsive camera that will release the shutter the moment that I want it to. It also generally calls for fast lenses, because I can’t always use flash in some venues. Cameras and lenses that meet these requirements are most often the high-end offerings from Nikon and Canon, and unfortunately, are the most expensive. Speed and responsiveness are not the D100’s strong points, which only makes sense when you scrutinize the D100 critically and objectively and understand that though it may have cost over CAN $3000 way back in 2002, it was really a consumer-grade $400 Nikon F80 film camera with a digital chip inside. For wedding work, I was using Nikon F100 cameras. Not top-grade like the F5 or F6, but more than capable in being fast and responsive with a much friendlier price than the F series cameras. If I wanted to do digital weddings, I needed the digital F100 and the D100 is nowhere close. Now that I have the D2X and D200, I’m very confident in having the tools that can work with me to take the photos the way I want to. The new D-SLRs are the right tools in my hands to do the photography that I wish to do, rather than have the equipment dictate the style or manner in which I take the photos. And for those wanting a sense of what my subjective and objective opinion is of the two cameras, if I had bought two D200's instead, I'd still be a very satisfied photographer - and, I may yet buy myself a second D200 when all is said and done, but, I will have more to say on that later on (when I don't exactly know). The carpenter still bangs away at the nails to build the house, but having the right hammer sure makes the job easier J July 7, 2006 - Back in the good old days (whenever that was), when people asked me about the idea of switching brands (Nikon to Canon, or gasp, vice versa) I questioned why they would want to do so. My thinking was that you would sell off the old gear at a loss only to have to spend more money buying new gear (or, at best, break even by buying used gear of the new brand, but that points more to a lateral sort of move instead of an upgrade). The economics never made sense to me and if that was true back in the film days with long life cycles for cameras, imagine how much worse it is in the digital era with short camera life spans and much higher pricing for the digital chip. Also in my thinking process is that if you were to switch, it had better be for something that really did improve upon what the old kit was or couldn’t do for you. If you were to switch from say, the Nikon D70s to the Canon Rebel XT with whatever consumer lenses are flogged with these cameras, I would have to question what exactly the point of switching brands was for. If on the other hand you were to go from the Nikon D70s to a Canon 5D along with commensurate (and expensive) Canon L series lenses, then I would say that you will have upgraded significantly enough to warrant the brand switching. My attitude back then was that switching brands may indeed resolve some issues that you face in your type of photography (e.g., wildlife photographers may benefit from Canon’s big L series IS super telephoto lenses compared to Nikon users still waiting for similar VR lenses), but if you were going to switch, you had better make it as big a deal as possible. These days my attitude is to go with the flow and if someone were to ask me about switching brands, I’d say, do whatever makes you happy. And I don’t mean that to be as flippant as it sounds. What I’m getting at is that for some people, switching brands and spending money will make them happier photographers and happier photographers may go out and take more photos with their new gear. Hopefully, they will also be better photos than what they got pre-switch. Does it matter that most equipment is better than the photographers that use them and that no matter which brand, a good photographer is still that, a good photographer – the old it’s the carpenter, not the hammer line. No, it doesn’t matter anymore as I get older and more curmudgeonly and if it did, companies like Nikon and Canon would be hurting for sales if people were fully and completely satisfied with their cameras and lenses. Sometimes FUD “can” be good for business. Just don't tell me that you've sold your Nikon D70 to buy a Rebel XT 8^) June 17, 2006 - I think I’ve hit my curmudgeonly stage of development as a photographer. I say this after reflecting on how my printing habits have changed since I bought my first printer back in 2000 or 2001. Back then with digital imaging being so new and refreshing, I was printing quite a lot, much of which was considered crap and thrown out by me in my last round of cleanup late last year. I’m a more discriminating printer these days when I print images for myself. It’s a different story when printing for review purposes wherein it seems my printers exist only to satisfy my curiosity about how good this or that paper is, or how well various color management suites fare in comparison. But, to satisfy no one else but me, I don’t find myself printing a whole lot these days. You would think that having some very capable and excellent Epson K3 printers would compel me to print everything I shoot, just as I did years ago when the Epson 1270 was new and heralded. But, it’s the experience of knowing so much of what I printed is destined for the landfill that I try and ensure that there’s a reason or purpose for today’s personal printing. Related to this is how much actual photography I do these days for myself, as opposed to shooting for reviews or bookings: not much unfortunately. Home life takes up much of my time and while I can certainly and purposely set aside some time to do some shooting when I’m really motivated, I find myself pretty gassed out by the time the weekend rolls around. When I do shoot though, I’m more inclined to consider the subject a bit and then look through the viewfinder seeking the right framing, whereas in the past, when I first started out, I’d shoot first then consider later. I’m not talented enough to get too many keepers, but I try 8^) What I think I need to do is discipline myself to shoot no matter what the weather or conditions and no matter how tired or useless I feel. Henri Cartier-Bresson was noted for shooting two rolls of film everyday before breakfast and on a different track, the late and much heralded Canadian author, Mordecai Richler, would go upstairs to his office in his house and type from about 9 am to 5 pm every weekday. It didn't matter whether Richler was on and wrote with motivation, or whether he was uninspired, but he still wrote because that was what he did. Now, I certainly do not claim even 1-percent of the talent of these two giants, but how they went about their art is instructive in what's needed to keep a wanna-be photographer going and understand that if one claims to be a photographer, then one must go out and photograph even when they're gassed by the weekend. June 2, 2006 - I believe I’ve written about the following theme before in a Vignette, but it bears reminding every now and then. Why do we photograph? What compels us to take up a camera and take pictures, whether they be little snapshots of our daily lives, or a grand scenic vista, or as an attempt to create art? A couple of things made me ponder this recently. A regular reader asked me an opinion on a wedding photographer’s portfolio that really struck him as being special, which made me think about the notion of being a “photographer.” Then, a recent posting on Michael Johnston’s The Online Photographer, in which he posted images of Dorothea Lange’s Immigrant Mother and W. Eugene Smith’s Tomoko Uemura in her Bath, really hit it home for me. Lange’s
Immigrant Mother is now an iconic photograph showing the desperation
of the Dirty 30’s Great Depression. Smith’s Tomoko Uemura in her
Bath is a new photo to me, but holy smokes, what a photograph! I
thought it was a death scene at first glance, but then it becomes apparent
that it’s a mother bathing her disfigured daughter (okay, I cheated
and had to read
These photographs are examples of the power of photography for me and that what gets me going are the photographs that reveal the human condition. What is the human condition? I don’t know, but I know it when I see it. In response to my reader about the power of photography, I used a photograph in one of my National Geographic books as an example. The photograph was taken by William Albert Allard in 1981 and in the right foreground it shows a Peruvian boy in tears. The crying boy shows tremendous anguish on his face. His clothes are worn and ragged; revealing that the boy and his family live a subsistence lifestyle. As your eyes move from the boy to the slightly out of focus background you see a man walking in the middle of the scene, but further left and down, we see dead sheep, victims of a hit and run by a taxi. Now you realize why the boy is in such anguish, those were his sheep that were killed and probably represented the family’s meager wealth. The human condition revealed with a photograph that showed tragedy (the boy and his sheep) and cruelty and injustice (the driver of the taxi that hit and killed the sheep then drove off). The emotions provoked are raw about the injustice that the boy had to live through that day. When the photograph was originally printed, the response from National Geographic’s readers were donations totalling $7,000 that allowed the boy and his family to get back on their feet. I can fret and sweat all I want about taking yet another landscape or urban photo that nobody wants to see, but this is just in pursuit of what I consider the intellectual process of photography. What camera should I use; which lens will give me the view that I want; should I wait for better lighting; should I filter it; how will I edit and print the photo, etc, etc. All of it just superficial eye candy compared to what Lange, Smith, and Allard have documented about the human condition, which is about the emotional aspects of photography. Would I love to have an original print of Ansel Adams’ Moonrise, Hernandez? Of course, it would inspire me to be a better photographer, but a print of Smith’s Tomoko Uemura in her Bath would inspire me to be a better photographer, and more importantly, a better human being. May
16, 2006 - Wedding Photography Worflow As I wrote recently, I was able to use the D200 for a short bit of wedding photography when my wife and I were guests at one of her friend’s wedding dinner. I wasn’t sure how the night would go, because I was a guest and I didn’t know if anyone else would be photographing; I was basically working for my wife, who asked me to bring some gear along. If someone else was working, courtesy requires that I be in the background and grab a shot here and there, but as it turned out, if there was going to be someone working, it was going to be the groom using his Canon Rebel XT whenever he had a moment to snap some shots. So, I had no problem going around taking shots whenever I wished. A Chinese dinner is usually a four-hour event from the time you arrive to the time that you leave. It’s noisy and boisterous and for wedding dinners, there are usually little games held at the couple’s expense that reveal that Chinese aren’t quite as fuddy-duddy as you might think with most games having obvious sexual overtones and innuendo. There’s plenty of action going on and oftentimes, the action is in cramped quarters with tables packed closely together. Having the 12-24 zoom lens was killer for having to work in such tight quarters and still being able to show some context to what was going on around the couple. The wide-angle zoom also worked very well for the usual walk around toasting that happens midway through Chinese dinners when the head table gets up and walks to every table to toast the guests. This is the domain of the Hail Mary style of photography when short guys like me will often hold the camera up and pointing downwards in the general vicinity of the couple and say a prayer for some good shots. Framing is hit and miss with some shots showing too much ceiling, but there are always some great expressions that the camera captures. Chinese also love having group shots taken at the end of the dinner and this one was no exception. Being very minimally equipped, there were no light stands, monolights and umbrellas, just me with a handheld camera and single on-camera flash bouncing off the near-white ceiling. At the end of the night, I had well over 300 shots taken, but a number of them, like the groups, were dupes or triplicates (always take extra to cover closed eyes, or people not paying attention to you). Workflow My desktop is relatively unchanged since I first wrote about it here. A change in optical drives here, an addition of more RAM there, running dual monitors, but the overall computer is still largely the same. I only have two hard drives inside the box, dual 10k RPM Western Digital Raptors. One as my C drive with all the applications and the second one is my short-term storage, temp file drive, and Photoshop scratch disk. I use to have another 300 GB storage drive, but for safety and security and to keep things more simple with less heat inside the computer, I moved that drive out and into an external case. I have four external drives, all at 300 GB capacity, for long-term storage and backup purposes. While four drives at 1.2 TB of capacity sounds like a lot, it isn’t because of the way I use the drives, it’s only 600 GB of capacity, as I mirror the data. As I complete a project, I move the whole she-bang from the short-term storage drive to the appropriate external drive, and then to the second, mirrored external drive. No RAIDs, because I don’t need anymore complexity in my computing life – I’m not dissing RAIDs, I’m just saying I don’t need it at this stage. Eventually, I’ll get an NAS – no, not Nikon Acquisition Syndrome, as I’m already afflicted, but a network attached storage drive (Nikon Acquisition Syndrome is like a STD that flares up every so often and gives you the most horrible itch to spend money on things Nikon – often described like a drug addiction too.) I have
my eye on one of the Buffalo TeraStation units that connects to the
computer via a network RJ45 cable, but also has four USB 2 ports of
its own. Getting the 1 TB version with four
250 GB drives would be quite fine to use the
Anyway, back to workflow… After backing up my RAW files, I start round one of the editing to get rid of all the clunkers in the folder and move the dupes and triplicates out of the working folder. Out of 350 shots, this takes me down to around 250 files, but this will be pared even more further down the editing road. Next is the RAW conversion to 16-bit TIFF files through Bibble Pro. I have Nikon Capture and I use it often for the tedious and boring testing of cameras and lenses because people would expect a Nikon user/reviewer to utilize what is considered the best RAW converter for Nikon files. However, when real work is required, I use Bibble Pro, because it’s fast, efficient and its layout is much nicer than the bloated Nikon Capture. Bibble Pro also caters to my laziness. The recently added Perfectly Clear plug-in is awesome for being exactly what it advertises to be, a one-click solution for editing RAW files into good looking proof images. The Perfectly Clear plug-in brightens up the image, improves the contrast and provides a round of sharpening. It works great for probably 80 to 90 percent of my files, but for those remaining 10-20 percent of the files, Perfectly Clear can be too much of a good thing. For images that are already high key or close to blow out, you won’t want to use Perfectly Clear, because it will exacerbate the blow out. Because it brightens the image and improves the contrast, digital noise may become more apparent depending on your ISO setting. For files that are very dark, Perfectly Clear may not be enough and you’ll have to either do some plus exposure compensation and/or do some fill/shadow enhancement. For the noise issue, Bibble Pro delivers again with the built-in Noise Ninja plug-in. I found that the default setting was just fine for my D200 files taken at ISO 400, but of course, you’ll want to season for your own tastes in noise reduction. Lastly, I apply some sharpening with Bibble again, which allows me to dispense with any additional sharpening in Photoshop, except for enlargements, but more on that later - again, sharpening is seasoning to personal tastes. I know that sharpening during RAW conversion isn’t the “approved” way to sharpen files, because no sharpening “should” be done in-camera, or RAW conversion, and that all of us should use Photokit sharpening and do three rounds of sharpening, etc, etc ad naseum. Look, do what works and looks good for you and your workflow and again, digital workflow is in a state of flux and this particular workflow may change as quickly as my next job. For me, the RAW conversion sharpening is essentially my capture round of sharpening in Photokit. There’s no one correct way to do something, except the one that gets you the results you desire – just make sure you know how to repeat those results J After batch
processing all the RAW selects through Bibble Pro, I fire up
You don’t
necessarily have to use
Whichever image browser I use, for this stage of editing, if I know I’m printing proofs, I like to adjust the browser to show four large thumbnails in a row to represent the typical four images per page. This allows me to see how the photos relate to one another in context and the flow of the storytelling of the photos (yah, I know, calling it storytelling is so trite and so 20th Century). It also gives me a sense of how portrait and landscape photos work. Ideally, one sheet should be either all landscape or all portrait orientation for best viewing. I try and avoid odd number placement and if I have to mix the two orientations, I try and go with 2x2. After doing whatever edits are required (minimal at this stage because we’re still working with what are essentially proof files), I use a simple Photoshop action to convert the 16-bit TIFF files to full-sized 8-bit JPEG files saved at maximum quality and tagged with the sRGB color space. I’ll use another Photoshop action to covert the TIFF files to much smaller 800 pixel wide JPEG files, saved at medium resolution and also tagged with the sRGB color space. The full sized JPEG files are used for creating a ProShow Gold slideshow, as well as being the client’s copy for their own printing needs or desires (burned to the same slideshow disc.) The smaller 800 pixel JPEGs are for use in creating a digital proof album via FlipAlbum Pro. Both sets of JPEGs are tagged with sRGB because if the client takes the files out to a lab, most likely, the files will be printed through a Fuji Frontier or Noritsu printing system and these machines are sRGB devices. Most clients are not likely to be viewing images on a calibrated monitor and sRGB plays nicely with those monitors too. If I’m
printing any of the proofs (in color), I’m using the TIFF files tagged
with Adobe 1998 RGB color space and printed with custom profiles through
my Epson 4800 printer. I generally use Epson Premium Luster for most
of my printing needs. Before printing proofs or creating the FlipAlbum
CD, I go through a second round of editing to make sure no “iffy” quality
images remain. Then if any files have been tossed and the order number
restructured, I’ll use
This helps to keep FlipAlbum Pro in line for the image order, because it’s otherwise stupidly old school when dealing with alpha numeric naming conventions, as in 1, 10, 11, 12, 13…2, 20, 21, 23…, 3, 30, 31, 32, instead of 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11, etc. Adobe Bridge is pretty good with batch renaming, but I do find its use of ( ) around the numbers to be annoying with certain types of naming conventions, as in CameraHobby (1), CameraHobby (2), etc. I'd much prefer CameraHobby1, Camerahobby2, or better yet, CameraHobby001, CameraHobby002, etc. The FlipAlbum Pro CD is burned with a custom image and label via a LightScribe burner. Same goes for the ProShow Gold slide show disc. Lightscribe helps to give the discs a personal touch, but you might prefer printing on discs with an inkjet printer for full color. Lightscribe images have a monochrome finish like oxidized copper. Given how many printers I have in-house already, buying another inkjet unit for CD/DVD printing was not something I desired (and also having to worry about another set of ink cartridges.) After getting the slideshow DVD and proof CD ready and delivered to the client then it’s waiting for confirmation of which images the client wants enlarged for their portfolio album (assuming that they ordered such a package). Or, if a client ordered just the basic services then my work is done - actually, I'd likely do a more touchup editing if this were the case before delivering the discs. For enlargement print orders, it’s time to edit more critically and carefully and do what I can for touchups. This may or may not require another round of RAW conversion. For my wife’s friend, we decided to give them a letter size portfolio album of proofs (40 sheets), the proof CD and DVD slidehow, as well as an 11x14 inch enlargement, as a wedding gift (I would have actually given them a 16x20 print, but unfortunately, my 17x22 inch paper order is nowhere to be found by my supplier at this time.) The proofs were printed via Qimage, which is mostly a fine printing application, but I’m a little perturbed by some limitations with centering the templates and maximum printing area available for letter-sized sheets. For example, I can fit four 3.5x5 inch images per sheet if I don’t have the template layout centered, which doesn’t look good to me, because one edge will have more white space than the other. However, if I center the template, then I lose the ability to print four images per sheet in Qimage, because of an apparent limitation of the Epson 4800 printer driver. I may have to go back to ACD FotoSlate if I find myself doing a lot of proof printing down the road, or maybe buck up for the ImagePrint RIP J For the 11x14 print, I just took the TIFF file from the original conversion and did some minor touchups of skin blemishes, followed by an output sharpening round via Photokit for a glossy inkjet print at 240 dpi print resolution. The resulting print is quite sharp, maybe too sharp if viewed closely, because I generally use a very light hand for touchups. I may go back and re-edit with a duplicate layer and Gaussian blur with a blending mode to soften the image a touch and add in a diffused glow to the couple. So, to wrap up, I started with somewhere in the range of 350 photos taken and edited down to just over 200 images from a 4-hour shoot. Those 200 files are placed into a FlipAlbum Pro proof CD. About 160 of those photos were used in a 6-minute DVD slideshow. Just over 150 of those photos were printed four per letter sized sheet for the portfolio-style album (two 8x10 sized images thrown in the mix) and one 11x14 enlargement. The entire editing and printing process was about one full weekend of work (mixed in with other tasks at hand) and took up about 32 GB of hard drive space. And to reiterate, what I did for this job may change for the next one, all based on whether a new application or process comes along that does a job or task better. April 26, 2006 - Baby did a bad, bad thing - Chris Isaac Hubris:
exaggerated pride or self-confidence For a while now, I’ve been musing quite aloud that the D200 was in my plans for upgrading the elderly, but still reliable and working just fine D100. My budgeting plans were coming along nicely for a late spring or early summer purchase with the greater consideration being when the hot-ticket D200 would become available for purchase. But, it’s funny how things change and how plans go awry or become wholly revised based on things happening beyond your control. I had fully expected that 2006 would be my last year for shooting weddings with film and that 2007 would be the big purchasing year to offer digital-only wedding photography (not that I’m "that" busy shooting weddings). Even my other website offering wedding photography services used to only mention film-based packages, so what happened to those plans? Long time
readers that have a memory like an elephant may recall that I’ve been
shooting with two F100 film cameras for several years. However, only
one of those F100 cameras actually belonged to me with the other loaned
to me by a great and kind soul for some six-years. It was a great thing
for me to be able to shoot with two highly capable film cameras for
so long (although it had its rather expensive repercussions, as you’ll
read about later on in this little ditty). I also received a request to do a wedding shoot in June from within the extended family, a full day (non-money) event apparently and with that kind of consideration (or lack of) it would be as good a time as any to experiment with a digital workflow and process without the severe pressure to perform and deliver like a real money shoot would have. Hey, when you’re not being paid anything you have every right to experiment J There are also additional shoots coming up where digital would be a better process and allow me to provide a better overall package based on a planned significant printer upgrade. With everything
that I’m committed to do in 2006 being open to digital coverage the
next step before actually committing to digital coverage was to secure
financing. Long time readers will also know that I have claimed poverty
many a time in the past and I continue to claim poverty. Living in one
of the most expensive cities in
Attitudes and outlook had to change though. If I want to offer wedding photography as a serious business then I would have change over from amateur hobbyist to professional photographer, even if it’s only on a part time basis. Equipment should never be the basis of how good a person is as a photographer, but equipment is and always will be a factor for how well we can do the job asked of us and unfortunately, good equipment requires some fairly major cash to invest in. But, as I attempted feebly to explain to my doubting wife, I'm investing in myself. My significant other, she that hath fury unmatched by Hell, was mentioning to me that I already owned a digital SLR and why did I have to consider blowing a big wad of dough on more D-SLRs? As fine as the D100 has been to me over the four-year relationship, it is unsuited for the style of wedding photography that I want to offer. It’s primary weaknesses are that it’s too slow in frame rate for the sudden bursts that I need every so often and the miniscule buffer that fills up very quickly if shooting in RAW mode (and JPEG too actually). It’s a huge difference to go from a F100 to a D100 and at minimum I wanted the digital equivalent of the F100. When the D200 was rolled out to the public, it finally appeared that Nikon had listened and responded and given us the digital F100. I thought I was all set until it happened, FUD. Fear, Uncertainly, Doubt FUD goes hand in hand with second-guessing and I worked my mind over about the D200 purchase. Not one, but two, for the cardinal rule of wedding photography is always backup your gear. Now a true backup does not really have to be the exact same as the primary pieces, so a D200 primary camera could be backed up with a much cheaper D70s, but recall that in my world there’s no such thing as a backup camera. If I have two cameras I use them at the same time and thus having two identical cameras is the ideal situation so that your mind doesn’t have to wonder about which button is where and what I have do to adjust this setting on such and such camera. The D200 is a fine camera even if it had some teething pains with the banding issue, and I’m sure it will produce many a fine picture in its users’ hands, but figuring that my large capital outlay has to last me for quite some time, I began to wonder about the D200. Did I really want to be using it for say the next five-years, which is the time that I figure my D-SLRs would have to be good for. If my duration was shorter, the D200 makes more sense because it’s not as much capital outlay as the D2X and it leaves more money available to see what the next generation of upgrades brings forward. However, the longer the duration then the immediate next upgrade from D2 to D3 series is of no consequence because I wouldn’t be looking to buy. It may even be the case that I would skip the D4 generation before spending another big outlay in cash for capital acquisitions – remember, Hell hath no fury like my wife that has so far tolerated my photographic excesses from day one, but talk of more future purchases is a life-threatening endeavor. With such a long timeframe in mind, the D200 was starting to lose its appeal and the more expensive D2X was starting to make more sense as the appropriate long-term solution. Throw in the better build quality, longer lasting shutter, better battery life, faster and superior AF quality and the big difference in price for the D2X was becoming easier to bear. FUD also made me consider Canon. When you’re contemplating blowing this much cash you gotta look at all the options available, including the competition and despite my being a Nikon user for nearly a decade, I’ve admired what Canon has done and is capable of doing in the digital market (even if I do poke some fun here and there). Their cameras and lenses are impressive tools and I don’t doubt that they would produce some fantastic results once I learned how to operate them as quickly and as efficiently as my Nikons. However, no matter how much I tried to configure something for a big switcheroo, it still came down to blowing a lot more dough to get me back to the kind of gear I currently have. Plus, I’m still not convinced of Canon’s flash quality and ease of use for outdoor fill conditions. So, I’m committed to the Nikon brand…this time around J All of this is just so much verbosity for me to say that while I did end up buying the D200, I also bought a D2X J I seriously considered going with two D2X cameras, but that was getting to be a bit too much outlay in cash for me to stomach all at once for just two cameras. It’s not to say that I’m not going to spend that full amount, as the difference in price for a second D2X may be put towards a major printer upgrade J Hubris:
D2X PS - I used one of my Eight Rules for Making that Big Ticket Purchase for this major outlay. The D2X purchase also marks the first time in my photographic history that I have owned a first-rate, no holds barred professional SLR, film or digital. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to use all the Nikon boxes I've accumulated over the years and build myself a doghouse..
The Nexto is utilitarian in look and functionality. It’s bare bones basic in only having a compact flash card slot available, although a multi-card adapter is available for pretty cheap. It has a built-in battery, which I normally don’t care for because batteries have a tendency to die in the field when you most need a device, but an external rechargeable battery is available that prolongs the life significantly and beats having to make your own battery pack. A car charger adapter is also available for added functionality. The basic case and external battery cost me CAN $235 after conversion from Australian dollars and S&H by courier (I bought from a vendor that I’ve purchased from in the past, Power In Numbers). I went for the Nexto instead of waiting for the even faster Giga Vu PRO because I don’t generally chimp in the field and shoot almost like I was shooting film. When I’m not sure about an exposure or more likely, when I want to cover the bases for a high dynamic range image, I’ll bracket extensively. When I do view the image on the LCD, I’m mostly checking to see how the histogram looks and not really the image itself, thus a more feature-packed device like the Giga Vu PRO isn’t warranted. I’m also of the opinion that given the price the Giga Vu PRO and competing Epson 4500 devices go for, I’d rather have a cheap 12-inch notebook that offers a much larger screen and much more functionality even if it sacrifices some weight and size.
The drive has to be formatted for FAT 32 and if the drive isn't, the Nexto can format it properly for you very quickly. Upload times for the Nexto are suppose to be very fast with gigabytes uploaded in a scant few minutes. Since I only have 512 MB cards, I could only test with them, but for comparison, the X-Drive takes about 10 minutes to upload the 50 Nikon RAW files that each card can hold. Don’t worry, when I finally do upgrade my D-SLR, I plan on buying a few high capacity compact flash cards to handle the larger files. Uploading 50 RAW files to the Nexto took 2 minutes using a Ridata flash card that's almost 4-years old. I'd expect much faster times using one of the current generation Lexar Pro or Sandisk Extreme or Ultra series of cards. The one button found at the top right corner does all the work and accesses the various options in the very basic menu system. Fast clicks scrolls through different menu options followed by either another quick or long button click to choose more sub options. The leather cover is very snug and after you've installed the hard drive, you'll likely never take it out again unless you need to replace the drive. Connections are at the bottom for USB 2, Firewire, AC, and external battery pack (all cables included) - I would have liked some additional integral flaps or other protection for these connections. The external battery looks like a pen light and fits in snugly in a stretchy holder on the side of the case. The top has the compact flash insert that also has no integral cover of its own, thus another reason to always keep the Nexto in its leather case, as it has a top flap to cover up the insert. It's obviously too early to discuss reliability, but I'll be putting it through its paces as my backup device for a couple of shoots coming up.
Writing about the Nexto reminds me of a conversation I had with a reader over coffee two weekends ago. The reader had mentioned how at times he feels like a policeman or handyman with a big utility belt because of the number of high tech gadgets he carries around with him. Cell phone, PDA’s, digicam, MP3 player and other accessories to keep those devices going on the go. He was looking for a device that could converge as many of the accessories as possible into one device that could do it all. I suggested the Giga Vu PRO could be of interest to provide him with large storage capacity and enable video and music playback, but to be honest, the Jobo device looks pretty big and hefty all by itself, so you may not really gain anything. It’s also of no use as a daily planner and calendar and based on all the things the reader does in life, a planner is must for him compared to my relaxed and sedentary lifestyle. But I did wonder if a Jobo that married all of its fine features along with a daily planner a la the PDAs wouldn’t work? But if you really needed all that then a sub-notebook is probably still the best device that could handle all of those tasks, albeit for a hefty premium given how expensive sub-notebooks are. It did make me wonder about the Palm TX, a device that a relative bought and showed off to me a little while ago. I was quite impressed with how good and sensitive its Wi-Fi capabilities are, completely undresses and spanks my old Toshiba Pocket PC. With Adobe Acrobat Reader for the Palm I could load up some e-books and instruction manuals for reading on the go. However, it still comes back down to the fact that my life is not so hectic that I need another Palm or Pocket PC and I’d rather put the money towards the camera upgrade. March 17, 2006 - If you follow world politics you'll know that the situation in the Middle East is controversial and fraught with politics that inflame both sides of the debate. I deliberately avoid discussing politics at CameraHobby because this website is about the process and technique of photography, not about the politics of photography.
Daylight Magazine is a documentary magazine and according to the introductory editorial comment, this particular issue took one-year to develop and produce photographic and written essays showing the lives of people in the middle of the conflict. The photography is documentary-style that seemed familiar when I looked over the photo essays. Reading the included bios of the contributors made sense of that familiarity as some of the photographers have worked for Magnum, the famous French agency that includes Robert Capa and Henri Cartier-Bresson as founders. Some of the notable photographer within Magnum's current ranks are Steve McCurry and Alexandra Boulet, both contributors to National Geographic Magazine over the years and both photographers of compelling images. Contributors to the Spring issue of Daylight Magazine include insiders and outsiders to the conflict and each provided a snapshot of time from a particular perspective or particular segment of the population. Segments that do not come immediately to mind or have never been discussed in the mainstream news. These include:
Most of the photography and writing is not overly political, but there are some elements that are a little stronger in their commentary, where the writer’s words rises a little further away from objectivity, but this is a region with centuries old conflicts and it's hard to keep emotion in check. Since the photographic process was invented, photography has been used to editorialize and reveal what goes on around the world. There’s no doubt that photography has been used to marvel as well as to shock its viewers and that it is one of the more powerful ways of revealing the human condition. Even in the earliest days, photography stirred controversy and photographic historians probably still debate the merits of a US Civil War era photographer moving the bodies of dead soldiers to get a “better” shot. But the end result is still shock and horror in seeing war dead. It’s one thing to read about war or conflict, another to actually see the results of war and conflict. There are never any easy answers, but with good documentary photography, it not only makes you aware of what’s happening, it also provokes thought and reflection on the subject no matter which side you stand on a particular issue.
My first foray into purchasing "art" was a photo of old drills by Brooks Jensen. Brooks Jensen hardly needs an introduction as the editor of Lenswork Magazine, a small digest sized bi-monthly that specializes in fine art B&W photography. I wrote about Lenswork Magazine some years ago and out of all the magazines that I subscribe to, the Pop Photos and Shutterbugs get recycled within a month after reading whereas Lenswork has a permanent place on my bookshelf.
Brooks Jensen also believes in egalitarianism when he sells his prints. He does not sell his prints for $1000 or even $100, but for a mere US $20 plus S&H. The image size itself is about 8x8 printed on 11x14 size paper with some text below the image to detail the image and photographer. It's pretty classy looking and certainly I feel that it's $20 well spent to buy a piece of art. When the print arrived yesterday I was surprised to see the box sitting on my desk because I completely forgot I ordered the print when I renewed my subscription to Lenswork the week before. When I opened it up, boy was I impressed with the way the print was sleeved, not once, but twice with a cardboard backing, then bubble wrapped and taped down to the inside of the box. No rolled up print, but flat shipping and all this for less than $6 S&H.
As for the image itself, most of Brooks Jensen's prints are printed on thick Hahnemuhle Photo Rag paper. No thin, saggy, curly matte paper, but a very high quality paper that I'll be trying out myself once another order of paper arrives (I also have some beta samples of Crane's new Silver Rag paper and have also ordered Moab Entrada too). The image itself is striking and I like it for its simplicity, but I'm not sure I like the image on matte paper. It's not the image quality, but just my own personal aesthetics of liking pearl/luster finish papers the best over matte and glossy types. I'd love to see this image printed on Epson Premium Luster 8^) In case you're wondering why I, a declared luster paper kind of guy, am buying more matte paper, well, I'm curious about these highly regarded papers and I'm searching for the one matte paper to rule them all, which I'll write about in a future article. If all of this praise seems overly effusive it's because Brooks Jensen has definitely influenced the way I would sell my own photographs from a down to earth process at a real world price. February 5, 2006 - (this update is not photography-related) After an absence of about 10-years, it’s only been recently that I’ve gotten back into the audiophile scene and made myself familiar with all that’s current and hot in the sometimes ludicrous world of high fidelity. I started subscribing again to the two leading American magazines, Stereophile and the Absolute Sound, and yikes, what a difference a decade makes. First, I had to get myself up to speed on the changes to digital playback with up-sampling and up-res’ing of regular CD players. Then there were the SACD and DVD-A offerings that seemed to offer much, but I found it ridiculous that there would be format war of sorts between these two offerings with yet another war being prepared for in the Blu-Ray and HD-DVD offerings. Easy excuse to keep my wallet in my pocket and wait for the winner before venturing forth into high resolution digital playback. However, the biggest shock to the system was in seeing how dramatically prices have increased over the past ten-years. Back in the early to mid 1990s, reviewers use to talk about building a darn good hi-fi for about US $10,000. These days that’s the price paid for a single component in an “average” system. Mega priced components were certainly around back in my not so glory days, but you didn’t see that many reviews in the mags. Wilson WAMMs and Krell Audio Standard amps were talked about in almost reverential terms because few had ever seen them let alone listened to them due to their incredible costs. Today, these kinds of mega-buck products are a dime a dozen in the magazines and internet review sites. One trend that was just as apparent a decade ago as it is today, is the oft-repeated complaint that high-end audio is dying as the baby-boomers that can afford the gear are slowly retiring and off pursuing other leisure time activities. Older audiophiles complain that young folks have no appreciation for high fidelity playback thanks to the ubiquity of portable devices like the iPod and its ilk marketing the notion that thousands of music files can be uploaded to such devices. Of course, in order to upload thousands of music files, they have to be compressed fairly heavily with MP3 being the most popular compressed format. I can bare a grin and laugh at such complaints because every generation has had those kinds of complaints. It’s always some new fangled technology that’s going to destroy the fidelity of what the old timers know best. In my days as a youth, oh so many years ago in the 1980s, the cassette tape and the Sony Walkman were my generation’s iPod and the 33 rpm LP was the high fidelity medium. And we all know how much fidelity was available in a medium that deteriorated over time played back in cheap little tape decks. While pre-recorded tapes were sold by the millions, often times, the kids recorded off of radio broadcasts or even off of the TV’s crappy speaker during music video shows. High fidelity it wasn’t! Take those low fidelity sources and compare them to today’s MP3s and we’re talking about a world of difference in clean sounding music not to mention the speed and convenience the digital age has brought forth. But, go back further in time and before the age of cassettes didn’t we have reel-to-reel tape players? Before the long play 33 rpm record, didn’t we have the 78 rpm record? The world does not stand still and what was good in one generation’s time does not mean it must be good and static for the next generation. However, even in this digital age, many are still playing back their old (and new) records. Vinyl replay has never been better and there are still many small companies producing new players; choices are plentiful for those that prefer their records over CDs. BUT, what’s going to happen to vinyl when the generation that grew up with records as their music mainstay have departed to the great sweet spot in the sky? While there may be some interest in the younger generations about vinyl, will there be enough interest to continue supporting all the niche companies? And most of those niche companies are run by baby boomers. To steal a line from Wes Philips, I’ve made my peace with digital and while vinyl interests me every now and then, I really don’t desire to go back to the days when I wet cleaned and vacuumed, preserved, and then sleeved before playing back a record on an old, but still okay turntable that would have required many thousands to upgrade – the Oracle deck was very nice to look at though. While we can fret about Blu-Ray versus HD-DVD and all that, I don’t see this as the long-term trend for music sales. Everything points to downloading as the way almost all music will be sold in the future, from low resolution, compressed files, to high resolution, uncompressed files. Apple’s iTunes is already moving up in the rankings as one of the biggest music retailers in the world. Consumers like compressed music files and they like a la carte shopping. Consumers also like CD quality. They think it’s just peachy as it is now and have no desire to re-purchase their whole collection over again in Blu-Ray or HD-DVD. They already did that with vinyl, so there’s no mass consumer market for high resolution music on Blu-Ray or HD-DVD. It’s not these high res formats won’t see the light of day, they will, but it will be for computer data storage and movies. You’d think that downloadable DVD quality movies will soon be commonplace, but HDTV will provide the home theatre industry with a big boost as consumers upgrade and move up to high definition TV. Those consumers will want better movie playback quality to match their new TVs and thus high fidelity music playback will continue to be an afterthought in the mass consumer market. It seems the big music companies are still stuck in a mode of selling consumers a piece of something physical in the hands whether it be a record, a CD, or a DVD. Now those same music companies want to impose ever more restrictions on how those physical mediums can be used and played back. Fair usage is a dirty term to them and it seems that the way they want it, if you buy a CD, they want to prevent you from copying or ripping the contents of the CD for your legitimate use in other devices. Downloadable songs from the legitimate services like iTunes or PureTracks involve their own security hassles and workarounds if you want to be able to playback those songs on different devices. Because of the way digital has revolutionized the music medium, the old school record companies want to impose more restrictions as a way to compensate for their inability to understand the new way to do business. There is also another oft-repeated complaint that the old record companies aren’t giving us the music we want to hear, persisting in selling “safe” music that will sell by the millions to the teeney-bopper market but to no other demographic. Back to the fear of today’s young not wanting high fidelity music playback; I don’t have much fear in today’s young not being able to appreciate good music reproduction. We all have to start somewhere in our music appreciation and Lordie, those old days of lying in bed listening to my crappy cassette tapes may be ear-offending hiss and noise today, but back then, it was about the music not about equipment. If anything the young are more pure music lovers than a middle-aged boomer with thousands spent on just cables alone. Those young will eventually move on and upgrade their playback systems. Most will probably go to a big box outlet and buy a cheesy home theatre system, but some will want to really improve upon music playback and will gravitate to the high-end stores. It’s up to the high-end stores to nurture these brass ears into golden ones instead of just catering to the moneyed crowd, because eventually, the young will become the moneyed crowd. Before
moving to
I just hope that the next scruffy looking twenty-something that walks in off the street, eager to hear something better than the compressed MP3s on his iPod will be welcomed as I was so many years ago. February 3, 2006 - The term “pixel peeping” has popped up with some regularity ever since Michael Reichmann gave birth to it some time ago on his Luminous Landscape website. If I recall correctly, Reichmann coined the term in exasperation over the nit pickiness of various DPReview posters about some of his reviews, in particular the slew of 8 MP digicams starting with the Sony F828. Pixel peeping is now used in a derogatory manner, an insult leveled at those that seem to review sample photos only at 100-percent magnification, or pixel resolution hence the term. Pixel peepers are regarded as only caring about quality as seen at these huge magnified views and ignore other aspects of the camera such as operability and ergonomics. For example, taking a 6 MP file that is 3000x2000 pixels in dimension and viewed on a typical 72 dpi monitor at 100-percent is the equivalent of viewing a 42x28 inch poster - divide each dimension by 72 dpi to get the number of inches. In one
review, Reichmann indicated that while the
So, it’s a bit of a "can’t see the forest for the trees" thing when we’re talking about pixel peepers in that people are overly concerned with what a file looks like at high magnification and may ignore other important factors about the overall usage of the camera. There is also the point about whether or not artifacts seen at pixel resolution would even show up on a print. Take that 6 MP file and print it at 42x28 inches and you may well see those artifacts when your nose is up against the print, but at an appropriate viewing distance, you may never notice them. I would also take issue with anyone that would actually desire to print a 6 MP file to those dimensions because I’m not one for pushing a 6 MP file beyond 12x18 inches at best and only if my photographic technique is good. But have we gone too far in condemning pixel peeping? First off, to a certain degree I’m a pixel peeper and sharpness (as in detail) nut. I’ll quickly scan over a photo at pixel resolution to make sure there isn’t anything untoward and would require some editing. But I wouldn’t suggest at all that images live and die by what I see at 100-percent. When working with my D100 files, my normal viewing for a landscape oriented photo is at 50-percent because it fits perfectly on my 21-inch CRT running at a resolution of 1600x1200. All the palettes are on the second monitor, so my primary is clear to show a good sized view that generally tells me all that I need to know about whether I can use it or not. It’s only if I notice something that I zoom in to 100-percent or more to see what kind of editing might be needed. If the image looks good at 50-percent then I know I’ve got something to work with for printing. Basically, I don’t go looking for trouble, i.e. pixel peeping unless I have to. Case in point, when I started using the 17-35 f2.8 lens, there were enough images that didn’t look good at 50-percent that I needed to investigate further. Viewing at 100-percent confirmed that a few too many of my shots didn’t look good at certain settings. Several hundred test shots later and I was able to determine which settings were the weakest for my sample of the lens and now know to avoid them if I want to maximize my image quality. Pixel peeping had its use here and allowed me to see what was up with my lens. Similarly, pixel peeping revealed to me that my sample of the 28-70 f2.8 lens is consistently good throughout its range and at most aperture settings. So much so that the 35-70 f2.8 lens is being retired from my camera bag. As usual, the truth lies in the middle and pixel peeping has its appropriate use and place for all digital photographers. I would also note that as much as some people decry pixel peeping, they continue to post sample crops at pixel resolution in their articles J Febraury 1, 2006 - Read an article comparing scanned medium format to a Canon 1Ds (original model) and found it quite interesting and timely given my own indecision about where I might be headed for future investment in film or digital photography. The article was great for me because the writer used equipment that is near and dear to me. He uses a Bronica SQ system and bought a Nikon Coolscan 9000 to scan his film. I also use the Bronica SQ system and I’ve been eyeing the Coolscan 9000 from afar ever since it came out. What’s stopping me from giving into the lust is the CAN $3500 after-tax price tag for the scanner and glass film holder. $3500 can buy me the Nikon D200 kit and some large capacity flash cards, or an Epson 4800 printer with a full supply of 220 ml ink cartridges and plenty of paper for printing. Being very middle class, I don’t have the means to do all that I want to do and not end up in the morgue as a victim of an angry wife taking her frustrations out on me blowing the kids' college fund. So, I have to figure out which product will give me the best bang for the buck and will also fit in with my long-term goals as a photographer. Right now I’d say that the choice is going back and forth between the scanner and the D200, so the article’s other protagonist in the Canon 1Ds was also timely in comparing the scanned film with an 11 MP camera (the D200 is 10 MP and 1 MP is of no consequence at this level). I’ll also hint that the D200 is winning out over the scanner at this point. To cut to the chase, the scanned film produced a better overall result. I’d even say the scanned film spanked the 1Ds output. The 1Ds files were cleaner (of no real consequence actually thanks to Noise Ninja being able to clean film grain), but at the largish print size the writer used for comparisons, the 1Ds files did not hold up as well as the scanned medium format film. I expected this, so there weren’t any surprises to me about the results. I also appreciated the comparison for scanning film with and without the glass holder, and also in using a wet mount kit. All very illuminating and very real-world testing with samples to show the evidence of the conclusions. The surprise to me was not the article or the conclusion, but the comments posted by some of the other readers. Generally they were along the lines of:
I was taken aback by the comments stating that the 1Ds is so much yesterday’s news that it’s almost useless in today’s digital world. If I paid CAN $10,000 for this camera, I don’t think I’d appreciate such comments, but true enough, one would expect that the half-priced 5D should surpass the original 1Ds given how rapidly digital technology develops (the 1Ds is still a better built camera though and goes for about US $3200 at KEH). If the 1Ds is now so much chopped liver that must make my D100 the “end” result of eating that chopped liver. It wasn’t so long ago that many people were trumpeting the 1Ds as the breakthrough camera that could match scanned medium format. Up to a particular smallish print size, that may be possible, but at the larger sizes that most medium format users would expect to be able to print to, I don't believe the 1Ds has enough resolution to keep up. One article that’s since become infamous was by Luminous Landscape claiming that the original 1Ds matched the quality of Pentax 645 chromes scanned with an Imacon. The nonchalant manner that such an expensive camera can be tossed aside for the latest and greatest was somewhat disturbing, but that just shows my own inability to be a spendthrift J Does it seem like those that once called the 1Ds the greatest thing since sliced bread would just as soon not be reminded about the fleeting nature of digital, and especially how the 1Ds did not match scanned medium format film in overall quality, a shown in this article? Some other comments about the quality of the Coolscan 9000 were also surprising as some claimed that the CS 9000 is no better than an Epson flatbed scanner, so why pay so much more money for it? Now, I don’t claim to own a pair of golden eyes that can pick out details like an eagle can pick out a brown rabbit on a prairie field from 200 feet up in the sky, but neither am I blind to the abysmal quality that flatbed scanners produce when trying to scan film (see this article). Or maybe my idea of quality is much higher than others, but I wouldn’t think so. Once upon a time I was excited by the prospects of scanning my 6x6 chromes with the very lowly Epson 1200 Photo scanner, but I like to think I’ve grown up a little since those early days of my foray into the digital darkroom J To suggest that only a drum scan or Imacon would do for large prints is one thing, but to trash the Coolscan 9000 in favor of a flatbed? Yeesh, what a bunch of (blind) snobs! There are enough reviews, articles, postings etc. (as well as my own experience) that show that flatbed scanners are not up to snuff for anything more than small prints, or web use. The only somewhat affordable flatbed unit that appears to offer some real scanning quality for film is the Microtek 1000XL Pro, but this big beast retails for pre-tax CAN $3500, just as much as the CS 9000 and glass holder after taxes have already been factored in. Beyond this level and you’re getting into the massive and massively expensive Creo scanners and neither of these big flatbeds offer ICE for film scanning. The math also strikes me as being suspect too, because why would I need to spend CAN $7000 or more on an Imacon when a $3000 scanner spanks what use to be a CAN $10,000 camera? I’ve seen samples of the Imacon and I’ve read enough comments to believe that the Imacon is a superior scanner, but three times better, and without ICE technology? I don't think so! If you’ve ever scanned negative films without ICE you will know what I speak of when I say I get quite distressed to see all the scratch marks and chemical gunk left on the film by the lab. I’m still going back and forth on the whole film versus digital thing and about the only certainty I have is that if I choose digital I won’t be spending big money on any top line D-SLR like the D2X and will settle for whatever happens to be the second tier camera, like the D200. It’s just getting way too much for me deal with contemplating blowing CAN $6000 every few years just to remain current – not that one needs to buy a new camera every 2-3 years, as my “obsolete” D100 is nearing its 4th year of use. But neither am I under any illusion that the D200 will match, let alone exceed the quality of scanned medium format film, so that CS 9000 still remains an intriguing option. However, the D200 offers other benefits that are quite alluring to me. January 25, 2006 - From my last postings about KM leaving the photography business and selling their assets to Sony, as well as the Nikon DX versus full frame situation, I received some good comments and questions from readers. One of which asked why I thought Sony would become a key player in the D-SLR segment when Sony has a recent history of royally screwing things up in various other segments. One example is with the flat panel TV market where Sony was a leader at first, but did not catch the trend fast enough and is now trailing Samsung – Samsung is the Korean company that wants to become the next Sony for the 21st Century. I didn’t flesh out my thoughts about Sony, so here goes: Sony is already dominant in the digicam sector. They use to be number one for several years running before Kodak took over by virtue of low prices and volume sales in big box stores like Wal-Mart. Canon’s hard on their heels in its pursuit of becoming the number one photography company in the world – period! However, Sony is still in command of a big chunk of the market and this will help Sony to parlay that into higher-end cameras based on the KM legacy. There’s a ready market of thousands if not millions of Sony digicam users that Sony can tap into for future upgrades. Sony is
also no stranger to producing fairly well-regarded higher-end digicams
such as the F-828 and the R1. Being first to market with the latest
and greatest is a good thing in this tech-savvy world. Remember that
the F-828 was the first of the 8 MP digicams and had a number of good features compared to the Johnny-come-lately
products from Nikon, Canon, and
Taking over KM’s technologies gives Sony exclusive access to the Anti-Shake technology built around the CCD instead of all the other variants being built into lenses. Sony already has image stabilization technology available in some of their digicams, so it was a surprise that they did not implement it in the R1. I came across a tidbit of info (might have been the last Pop Photo mag) that indicates that there are issues with image stabilization when trying to work with wide-angle focal lengths and as the R1 goes wide to 24mm equivalent, it may have been a technological limitation that prevented the R1 from having some IS. But a sensor based on the Anti-Shake system should allow Sony to workaround the problem and I would definitely count on the successor to the R1 having AS built in. Samsung is a relative newcomer to the digicam world. While it’s trying to make a big splash with an 8 MP camera offering a big lens range, a 3-inch screen, and a Schneider lens, is it enough to entice consumers away from the established leaders? Samsung has also just released their first D-SLR, which by all accounts is nothing more than a re-badged Pentax camera. Pentax has not produced anything of relevance since the original *st. All subsequent cameras have been variations on the same *st theme and that’s just not good enough in this MP-crazy world. I have no doubt that the *st and its ilk are fine little cameras and Pentax has some great lenses, but there isn’t a whole lot to differentiate it from the crowd, whereas Sony now has AS. AS is a brilliant idea that instantly provides past and future KM mount users with image stabilization without having to replace or upgrade any lenses. So, while Sony has had some recent problems with TVs and flop movies, they’re still a dominant force within the digital photography world and in a better situation to parlay their marketing reach and power for the future KM mount cameras and lenses. The other question received is why worry about full frame when DX already provides stellar image quality? Short answer: I’m a greedy SOB and I want more, more, more! Long answer: FF is the natural evolution of the digital camera based on the 35mm film system. For me, FF is not about having the same angle of view for my lenses as with the film cameras, that’s just silly and neurotic to quibble about, especially since I’ve already been doing lens conversion factors since 1999 when I bought a medium format system. For me FF is about resolution and the ability to produce a large enough file size filled with real details at good print sizes. I know, I know, resolution isn’t everything. If you can give me truly clean files with great color accuracy and fidelity along with fantastic dynamic range, I’ll take all that and a bag of chips in a (relatively) lower resolution camera. German pro, Michael Weber can buy whatever he wants to get the images he needs for his livelihood, but in recent times, the camera that he seems to be reaching for most is the Nikon D2Hs because of its improvements over the original D2H. Weber cites great image quality at high ISO settings, great colors, and image files of enough quality to satisfy some quite demanding end uses, such as calendars, posters and billboards. He also appreciates the pure speed of the D2Hs for his sports photography. So, high MP isn’t the end all, be all, even in the demanding professional world (except maybe for those having to deal with Getty for stock photo sales). I digress though, back to FF and DX. The D2X has by most accounts provided stellar image quality despite being a DX format camera offering 12 MP of resolution compared to the over 16 MP available in the FF Canon 1Ds Mk II. It can be argued that the D2X provides all that most photographers would need in a small format system, but time does not stand still in this digital age and as improvements are made in digital capture, so too will resolution. Some are predicting an eventual end-game to the MP race because we’ve already reached the level where the relatively affordable 10 MP Nikon D200 surpasses the image quality of 35mm film, but we’re in a paradigm shift away from the leisurely pace of the film world. Photography now moves at the speed of the computer industry, meaning many more products in a much shorter time frame and I don’t count on the end-game happening until we’ve reached at least 24 MP, which would seem to be the realistic end-game based on current technology. The D2X could already be pushing the limits of the quality available by packing so many pixels onto a finite amount of silicon (the pixel pitch is apparently the equivalent of a 27 MP FF sensor). Trying to pack even more pixels will lead to problems for controlling noise, especially at the higher ISOs that more and more photographers are demanding as being part and parcel of the digital experience. Once the practical limits have been reached for resolution, speed, noise, and dynamic range of the chips will be worked and improved upon. Meanwhile, best to save big bucks for those desktop super-computers we’ll need to handle all those 24 MP FF files. The only way around pushing the qualitative and quantitative boundaries of the APS-C sized sensors is to get bigger and the most logical size in getting bigger is 35mm sized at 24x36 mm. I agree that there’s no magic in 24x36, it’s just another size, but one that has a long history and acceptance and again, it’s just logical. I’m also of the opinion that when we finally see 24 MP cameras on the market that lenses will have to be improved upon in order to keep up with the demands imposed by digital capture. And we can’t all be buying high-priced Zeiss lenses to use with our D-SLRs, so Nikon and Canon have to get a bit Teutonic in their lens design philosophy and pilfer the best of the German designs, just like they did in the past while keeping the prices affordable. For me personally, I don’t need a FF camera, it’s just a wet dream and I think I could be very happy with the D200, or the successor to the D2Hs, which won’t likely be a FF camera but should provide the right mix of resolution, speed, and image quality that I desire. I’m just commenting on where I think the industry is headed based on what we already have and am just making some inferences from my observations. And I’ll probably be wrong most of the time J January 22, 2006 - Over the last few days I’ve been mulling over the impact of Konica Minolta deciding to leave the photography business. Most of the comments posted have been of the, “what a shame, it’s too bad to see such a longtime historic brand disappear.” But is it really? What’s really changed in KM departing the scene? Not much, other than a change in name brand to Sony. Sony will continue to develop KM lens mount cameras and as of April 2006, will take on the servicing obligations of KM products. There’s perhaps some confusion as to whether or not KM will still be involved indirectly. For example, some reports indicate that KM will continue to produce the cameras and re-badge them as Sony, as well as KM will continue to produce lenses, but no word on whether those lenses would KM or Sony branded. This could just be a temporary arrangement until Sony gets up to speed in producing their own line of cameras and lenses, but there’s no doubt that KM users won’t be left in the lurch. The KM event might have some Pentax users worried though, but as Pentax is allied with Samsung, and Samsung has just released their first D-SLR (a re-badged Pentax camera). There’s no reason to fear that Pentax mount cameras will go to that great stop-bath in the sky…at least not yet. The more interesting angle to ponder out of the KM transfer of technology to Sony is what will this mean for Nikon. Nikon for the most part uses Sony chips in every one of their cameras except for the D2H that uses Nikon’s own LBCAST sensor, but then who fabricates the LBCAST sensor for Nikon? I’m only speculating, but I’d be surprised if it wasn’t Sony too, as Nikon does not fabricate chips in-house. Will Nikon move to in-house chip production like Canon, or will they simply move to a new supplier such as Kodak, Fuji, or Foveon (not likely, just wishful thinking)? As Sony gets stronger and gains market share in the D-SLR market with the KM mount, would they really want to continue supplying a competitor – actually, why not, since they already supply the chips for most of the digicams on the market while still selling their own Sony-brand digicams. You sell your own products while getting a tiny piece of every other sale made using your chips. Put another way, would Nikon really want to continue buying chips from a direct competitor in the profitable D-SLR market? In the consumer world of photography, there use to be about a half-dozen camera brands competing in the film world. There’s still only about a half dozen major brands competing in the digital world, but some of those brands like Sony, Panasonic, and Samsung have replaced or will replace the weaker film brands like KM, Pentax, and Olympus. But can those new brands even with all their financial muscle and marketing know how be able to dent the market share dominated by Nikon and Canon? I don’t see that happening given how established Nikon and Canon are for the professional market as well as the consumer market that feeds off the professional prestige given to these two brands. While a few percentage points might be gained here and there, the real fight will be for third place by the big three consumer electronics companies and my money’s on Sony. I still think they should have bought Nikon instead 8^) With Zeiss producing lenses in Nikon F mount (and 42mm screw mount) one wonders about Leica and if they might follow suit. Leica’s R series lenses are highly regarded like Zeiss and most know that Leica is in pretty precarious financial difficulty if their corporate masters decide to cut their losses and let the camera division fend for itself. With R camera sales being nothing more than an afterthought (and no, the new digital back won’t make a difference at the price it sells for) in the overall market, it would seem to make good business sense to market R lenses in different mounts. At first I was thinking Canon would be the logical first choice because Zeiss has already targeted Nikon, but then wouldn’t that mean a fair bit of modification to the lenses to make them fully compatible with the electronic EF mount? Far easier and cheaper to just select Nikon F mount again. Some speculated that Zeiss would produce lenses in more mounts, but that does not appear to be the case with Zeiss choosing to offer only M42 screw mount as their offering for everyone else not using Nikon. Leica disappearing would be pretty significant, certainly far more than KM’s departure and while there’s good buzz going around about the pending digital M rangefinder, to me it just seems to be another case of too little too late. The days of M cameras lasting for many decades and being handed down from generation to generation will not be carried over to the digital M because of the manner in which digital cameras are more regarded as computers that just happen to take pictures. A digital M camera that comes out in 2007 offering 10 MP will already be somewhat behind in the megapixel race and no matter how good the camera will be initially, it will be a product frozen in time with no hope of providing improved image quality as the years pass. With film, each decade brought new advances and improvements so that while the camera and lenses may not have changed too much over those same years, the medium provided very meaningful improvements in image quality. Now that silicon is the medium, you can’t just swap out one old chip for another and continue to improve the image quality; you have to buy a whole new camera. The R system would actually seem to address the swapping out issue to an extent, but at US $5000 a pop for a back, I’d rather just buy a whole new Nikon D series camera that will always up the ante in state of the art metering, focusing and other features not available in a R camera. It’s not to say that a digital camera can’t continue to produce fine image quality years after it’s been released, but the cachet that the film equivalent had won’t be the same. Right now a mint condition 40-year old Leica M3 and lens can fetch near US $2000; what are the chances that a digital Leica M Mk I and lens will command the same kind of money in 2046? Why do some Canon users persist in hanging out on Nikon forums and proceed to virtually piss on Nikon users? Yes, I know about trolling and all that and these people are definitely trolling, but sheesh, don't they have anything better to do, like take pictures with their expensive, super-duper, full frame 1Dz Mk 666? Yah, I'm a Nikon user, so my commentary is biased, but at least I admit it 8^) On the topic of full frame, one sometimes wonders about DX lenses. I fully expect Nikon to produce a full frame D-SLR, as do many other users, but I seem to read a wee bit too much optimism about the cost of the future Nikon full frame camera by those users. They post comments along the lines of I won’t buy a DX lens because I want all of my lenses to be ready for full frame. Um…great, got US $8000 or so for that future Nikon D3 FF? Too much, okay, how US $5000 instead, based on Nikon’s past pricing policy for their top line D-SLR? What, still too much for you? So many people complain about the price of the D2X yet still seem to delude themselves that a future full frame camera will be priced like their last film camera purchase. Sorry, ain’t gonna happen for a few more years to come. By the time that the prices on FF cameras have finally come down so that mere consumer mortals can afford them, don’t you think you would have gotten your money’s worth from whatever DX lens you bought? And it’s not like you have to buy a whole slew of DX lenses, the only real need for DX lenses is in the wide angle focal lengths. For me the most obvious lens that I could use to round out my coverage is the 12-24 f4 DX lens. If I were going to do digital weddings in a serious fashion then the 17-55 f2.8 DX lens would also be a good lens to have and since I like doing the occasional fisheye shot, the 10.5 f2.8 DX lens would also be nice to have. However, neither of the latter two are strictly required because having a 17-55 is more for convenience than an absolute necessity to replace, say a 17-35 lens and the 10.5 lens is more of a novelty, but those that have it seem to love it. |
Edwin's
Vignettes -
Selected Musings from 2006
April
3, 2006 - I’ve
just received my latest tool to throw in the old camera bag, the Korean
made 
I
slapped in the old 40 GB 5400 RPM drive from the old X-Drive and popped
it into the Nexto. No software is required to install on the drive,
so the OS must be in the firmware, which makes life easy for swapping
in drives. I don’t see any easy access to the internal battery though,
whereas the X-Drive did allow you to change batteries when the old one
finally gives up the ghost.
However,
I was provided with an opportunity to review the current Spring issue
of Daylight Magazine, which took on as its major subject, the conflict
between Palestinians and Israelis. 
February
11, 2006 - In all the years I've been involved in photography (as if I'm a grizzled
veteran with less than a decade of experience) I've never purchased
any photos except for some wedding portraits that my wife wanted. I've
always been on the taking and selling side of photography, which explains
why there are so few photos of me in my family albums (someone had to
take all those photos), but recently I decided to buy a photo just to
see what the fine art scene is about (not that one photo makes one an
expert and qualified to talk about art).
I've
followed 
The
man is not only an egalitarian, but an honest man when it comes to charging
for S&H, whereas too many other vendors pad the S&H horribly,
making a larcenous profit from it.