This Old Blog

Happy New Year. Just a very quick entry to prove to myself that the one and only post for 2014 (and the last post chronologically) wasn't a fluke. It's also the briefest of outlines for what might be in store for 2015 and beyond. I've been collecting Olympus gear, specifically OM-D cameras and prime lenses. The one you see above is my last lens acquisition, the M.Zuiko 1.8/17mm. Since that time I've picked up two new camera bodies, a second E-M5 and an E-M10. The photo above was taken with the Panasonic GX1 and the Olympus 45mm. With the three OM-Ds I have enough bodies to mount all my favorite lenses, and to just roam about taking photos without changing lenses. Sometimes I'll just take one of the bodies with a specific lens and just use it exclusively. This coming year I intend to start another photo project using just the OM-D bodies (the GX1 was given away, along with the Panasonic 20mm). I want to do something along the lines of Matthew Robertson's...

E-PL3, Lumix 14mm, and FL-FM1 Some men pass the time by chasing women. I did that and wound up married, and we all know how expensive that gets, especially when you add in some children. Some men pass the time with hobbies like fishing or golf, and wind up spending considerable sums on expensive boats, expensive fishing gear, or expensive golf equipment (some very expensive). Some men even have photography as a hobby, and we all know how expensive that can get. I, on the other hand, with my limited budget, have a hobby collecting and using older cameras that have passed their prime (no pun intended). So I wait, usually several years, until all those former new hotness cameras become old and busted in the eyes of the market and they go on considerable markdown. The Olympus E-PL3 is one of those cameras. Introduced the latter half of 2011, it was the last of the 12MP µ4:3rds cameras (the other two being the E-P3 and E-PM1). The next cameras to come out of the Olympus camera chute...

Top view: Nikon Df vs. Nikon FM3a (via TheOnlinePhotographer ) I came across this scale comparison on the Internet's today. In one simple picture it summed up why the Nikon Df isn't the digital FM3a so many want it to be. It also illustrates in part why (outside of the price) I won't purchase the Df. If you look at the top plates of both cameras, you can see the top plate outline of the FM3a literally sticking up from the Df body. The Nikon Df is much deeper than the FM3a from the front (the lens mount) to back (the LCD). What we have here is an odd-ball digital camera design that appears to have bits and pieces of the FM3a stuck on it like a collection of spare parts someone had lying around at the time. When old people like me say they want a digital Nikon FM3a (or in my particular case, a digital Olympus OM-1), we want the film sized body with a same-sized digital sensor replacing 35mm film. And as the Nikon Df illustrates so eloquently, that won't happen...

Playing in an open box... Oh dear, I've been spotted! I want to be alone... So I'm sitting at my computer, when I start to notice a racket in back. I ignore it for a while until I hear a load "thump!", as if something had been dropped on the floor, followed by a lot of loud rattling. I turn around and see Lucy in the box just having a grand old time, rolling around and rattling that box a good one. I grab the GX1 and snap a few shots before she notices me and the camera, then leaps out and back into her chair (which used to be my chair before she decided it was her chair). Just like caring for Katie my black Lab taught me about dogs, caring for Lucy is teaching me about cats. She finds me fascinating, as I do her. And she expresses great affection and love toward me without coaxing. I try to return the affection and love, but she is a cat, and she takes a bat at me on occasion, although I think that's just her being playful. She always has her claws...

The affordable, discrete, rugged, and always-ready Panasonic GX1 with 14mm pancake. I have experienced a barrage of new camera announcements for the last few months and today I reached a point of saturation. I realized just how well past tired I was of it all when the final official reveal of the new Nikon Df (which must stand for "Dumb fools", as that's the marketing niche it's aimed at) occurred today. When I read faux-tography sites such as Forbes gushing about how wonderful the Df was, then read the reactions of real photographers such as Tom Hogan ( The Df very well may be the first camera marketed and sold to the AARP crowd ) and Mike Johnston ( Omigod, be careful what you wish for ), I knew for certain that Nikon had finally jumped the shark . And a $3,000 dollar shark at that. Me, I just wait at the trailing edge of photography, where everybody drops their  old and busted gear for the new hotness , and then I just pick up perfectly good equipment for pe...

You're looking at a test shot taken where my wife and I went out for taco Tuesday (Lime Fresh Mexico Grill near my local Whole Foods, if you must know). On the way into the place, while I was carrying my GX1, I somehow fumbled it, and dropped it. Onto the hard asphalt of the parking lot. I had the Panasonic 14mm mounted on the body. When the whole assembly hit the pavement the battery cover popped open and the lens cover got knocked off. It picked up a series of little nicks on various corners and part of the metal frame was bent right at the back corner where the flash sits flush with the body. I've carried this camera all over, including up to Seattle. In all that time I've never had an accident like this until tonight. Before I took it out with me this evening I swapped the 14mm for the 20mm I normally keep on the body. I don't know what I would have done if the 20mm had taken any kind of damage. Maybe use the drop as an excuse to get the new all-metal, all-b...

Sony α7R I'm a died-in-the-wool technologist, even when it comes to photography. I have always been fascinated with the technology that goes into manufacturing any camera, from the lenses (optics) through the mechanical construction, the electronics involved, and especially the chemistry of the film and the sophistication of the digital sensor. It's amazing that the camera can do all it's asked of it, regardless of manufacturer. Of all the types of cameras that I've really taken an interest in, contemporary mirrorless (again, regardless of manufacturer) are the most interesting because of the challenging problems the scientists and engineers have had to solve in order to build a compact but highly functional camera. In particular I've followed the sensor advances over the years and watched image quality climb (especially with μ4:3rds) to exceed film and rival one another such that there's very little difference any more as you move from the smaller sensors...

Four photographs, two from the Olympus E-M5 with Panasonic Leica 25 mm and two from the Sony NEX-5N with Sigma 19 mm. Both sensors with 16 MP resolution. Does knowing the difference really matter anymore if you can't see it? Group 2 All photographs taken in Key West Florida, post processed in Lightroom 5.2 and Color Efex Pro 4.

This post and the following posts are a confluence of odd events. Let me explain a bit. Before this post I had written Matthew that I wouldn't tweet or photography or blog throughout the upcoming week because I was going on vacation and I was pretty much burned out, and I needed a "recharge." But as life would have it, my resolve died rather quickly. Matthew had just written a review of his new Ricoh GR , which I re-read after I wrote Matthew and it triggered a memory of my Sony NEX-5N with its pair of Sigma E-mount lenses , and so, inspired (or jealous, your call), I went back to where I had it all stored and pulled it all out and started to drive around with it. I always carry a camera with me in the Prius, specifically the Olympus E-M5, but I hadn't been getting much use out of it except for the Cloud Lab blimp . I figured what the hell, change up the gear and see what happens. And then I ran across Lee Reamsnyder's " Your Eye Is Not A Camera "...

excited It's tough being a visiting parent. You want to treat your children like small children instead of adult children, to reach out and protect them still. The hardest part is acting with restraint. You offer praise without being asked, and carefully nuanced advice when asked and only when asked. It's a different form of parenting. It goes to underscore that you never stop being a parent. Your parenting continues in small and surprising ways as long as you live and breath. This is by no means everyone. This is a small fraction. And it's extending, slowly, as my daughters build their lives. The things I have, especially my cameras, are far more important as instruments to capture moments of what is really important to me than as things to own unto themselves. wary annoyed I have begun to shift (or perhaps the word is "pivot") in my photographic technique. Here's a surprising personal revelation. I find I don't quite like the added expo...

You're looking at a photograph taken by English wedding photographer Kevin Mullens while he was in Tokyo trying out the new Fujifilm XF23mm F1.4 lens . Mr. Mullens is, according to his site, is an award-winning photographer who uses the Fujifilm X-Pro1 as one of his tools. Kevin Mullens is a globe-spanning photographer; according to his basic review of the lens he traveled from Rome to Tokyo to review the lens before heading back home to London. I found out about this excellent review from a link via The Online Photographer . What got me started writing this piece was this sentence written by Mike Johnston in the post: Some samples here ( all the blown highlights appear to be the photographer's style, not evidence of some technical problem ). emphasis mine When I read that sentence, it was as if a switch toggled in my mind. I'd read one off-handed criticism too many, and I decided to do something about it: criticise the critic, in this case Mike Johnston. You...

I can tell when I'm in the middle of a tipping point when I get three major indicators within a 24 hour period. The first was last night with Giulio Scorio at Glazer's Camera. It was, for me, eye opening. The second and third came later today via the web. I don't normally visit Luminous Landscape all that much, preferring to hit the place about once a week to scan the headlines, and then move on. But today Michael Reichmann published " The Ten Commandments of Cinematography For Still Photographers " which I will copy the core of below. I've seen bits and pieces of these commandments over the last few years (with a few going back decades to when I was attempting to shoot with Super 8, then 16mm). Here are the core commandments from the article: Don't zoom. Zooming simply looks amateurish. Yes, there may be times when it's useful or even necessary, but avoid doing it if you can. Turn off autofocus and focus manually. Even the best AF systems ...

It's been a long three weeks here in Dupont and JBLM. Tonight, on the day of my work's conclusion, I drove north to Glazer's Camera in downtown Seattle to participate in Giulio Sciorio's presentation o n Hybrid Motion Street Photography. Among the many hats that Giulio wears, one of them is the founder and chief driver of SmallCameraBigPicture.com . His primary interest is what he refers to as the hybrid aspect of contemporary digital photography, the blending of still and motion into the final visual product. His jam-packed two-hour talk tonight was an attempt to convey some of the techniques and tools he has discovered and developed, along with many examples. The group was small and intimate, allowing Giulio to interact directly with every member of the audience. I'm not about to go over every detail of his talk,  partly because I don't understand it completely to accurately convey what he said, and partly because you should go to one of his presentat...

Sony α3000 with E-mount 18-55mm kit zoom ( via 1001 noisy cameras ) So Sony finally went and did it. They took the basic components of the NEX line (the E mount, the sensor, the mirrorless box, and the EVF), added them to a DSLR-alike body, and bundled it with an existing E-mount 18-55mm kit lens for the shockingly low, low price of $400. A price you don't normally see on a mirrorless camera unless its been out for 6-12 months and then put on a fire sale. This is Sony's way of telling Canon's Rebel and Nikon's D3x00 class entry level DSLR cameras to go and take a hike. I have heard all the critics harp about how the E-mount lenses were too large for the NEX bodies, how using their APS-C sensor somehow doomed the highly innovative NEX cameras to a lingering death. And all those reports reporting how mirrorless was doomed in general. I guess Sony decided if you can't beat them, join them. They took their box of NEX parts, mixed in a DSLR design body, and voilà...

OM-D E-M1 with MZuiko 12-40mm f/2.8 PRO zoom lens About a month ago I wrote a long soppy post about how I was tired of buying cameras and I wasn't gonna buy no more new cameras, no way, no how. I managed to keep that promise through the Olympus E-P5 and the Panasonic GX7. While the E-P5 was pretty, the design of the GX7 left me cold. And then Olympus leaked (yes, they did) the video of the E-M1 with the Zuiko Digital 12-35mm f/2 mounted on it. I looked at the blurry video and found I could resist the siren's call. And then, over on 43rumors , there appeared these two, much much clearer, more professionally produced photos of the E-M1 with the equally rumored 12-40mm f/2.8 constant aperture zoom. You're probably thinking "Here it comes. Here's where he falls off the wagon and makes wild claims about buying the rumored E-M1 no matter what." Maybe. I certainly like the design of the E-M1. It has an incredibly attractive chiseled look that spe...

red wheels In an age of ever accelerating camera releases, we can't keep a camera long enough before the next iteration is released and the world at large starts calling what we currently have as old and busted, while the latest releases are the new hotness. I went out tonight for my walk around Dupont, but this time, instead of taking the merely old Olympus E-M5 I took the very old Panasonic GX1 with the hoary old Panasonic 1.7/20mm mounted on it. I took them because together they're a quite unpresupposing combination. They just blend in . They're a compact powerful photographic pair that with the right kind of light and careful attention to exposure can produce some excellent images with that je ne sais pas ce image quality. The 20mm, matched with the absolutely ancient Panasonic 16MP sensor, produces some quite detailed images that match the E-M5 in sharpness and detail. The E-M5 and the GX1 represent a kind of µ4:3rds yin-and-yang camera pair for me. Depending ...

Good shoes are more important than a good camera. It's better to have the same brand of camera as the people around you in your life than to have whatever is momentarily latest and greatest. "More Zoom" is never the correct answer to any question. If you're an aspiring Canon camera owner, it's important to know that "2.8L" is not a measure of volume. Spending money on new gear means getting less use from what you've already paid for. One lens will do most of the work. A second lens will do most of the rest. A third lens will do very little at all. Start simply and add complexity as necessary. Extra batteries and memory cards are cheap. Flip-out screens work. Ken Rockwell is a troll. Never associate with a photographer who doesn't realize this. Factor in the price of a small fast prime when budgeting for a superzoom lens. A 50mm prime is the original all-purpose lens. Leave the bandolier camera s...