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Author Topic: where does it fit?  (Read 14122 times)

fredjeang

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where does it fit?
« on: April 24, 2010, 02:54:15 am »

Finaly an article about the GRX system!
I've been surprised why nothing has been writen here so far in the sense that this path is probably one of the most exiting in term of design.
I wish there is a future here, and that others will join the train.

First: this little body has exactly the controls I'd like to see in any camera. Ricoh obviously is thinking more photography and less marketing.
Please Canon, Pentax and Co: ask your designers to watch how Ricoh resolve the interface! Only Leica can compeat in this terrain.
second: IQ is on par with the X1, better than MFT specially in low light. I'd trust more the files in PP from this gear to be honest and that is peace of mind.
third: Ricoh has made a "stupid decision" not allowing lens mount, but with such a system that can be solve any time in the future.

A question: Why Leica has not taken this path with the S2 ? I really do not understand it, and mentionned it at least a 100 times,  because sure than the S2 would have been a game changer: a dslr body with MF sensor AND MF modularity...Again, it seems that Leica has taken a train in late.

Cheers.

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Rob C

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« Reply #1 on: April 24, 2010, 04:10:12 am »

I read the 'review' because of your interest in it, Fred, but I have to admit that the product of the reading was boredom: I'm afraid that, to me, all these changes to format etc. are nothing but desperate attempts at catching new market share, just as the TV 'beauty contests' of the three main political parties in the UK election battle. Battle, yes... more like a confidence tricksters' convention.

My feeling is simply that we already have far too many types and systems of camera with which to play. What we need are a couple of really good ones that take us back to the relative certainties of the 'blad and Nik (okay, allow Canon in too) film era. Maybe I was just lucky, but the systems never let me down, only some small failures due to insufficient servicing ruffled my feathers; the rest of the time I forgot about them and just used them.

Competition is sometimes said to be an essential part of progress, and perhaps it does help in pushing various expensive testings, but I do believe that we have probably already reached the point where the needs of photographers are pretty well understood, and the requirement/failure is in reaching those expectations, not in introducing alternative forms of oven in which to cook turkeys. That isn't an answer to anything - just an attempt to grab sales through a trick or two.

Maybe the market will resolve itself if those who need MF eventually settle on a single brand that meets the greatest number of photographers' dreams - much as the 500 Series did, with alternative brands simply providing cheaper, very similar means to the same end. It was very nice to live in an era where the Nikon F, the Hasselblad 500C and the Leica M3 were as good as it got, (and photograhers knew that!) with Sinar and Linhof providing for those with a different agenda. I like that sort of security, comfort blanket, almost; there are fights enough in the photographic workplace without added ones with the equipment makers. It's going to end up like cars: they are all very similar within price bands; there are too many price bands, none is particularly attractive to own and only the exotica can raise a suggestion of desire. Cool.

Rob C
« Last Edit: April 24, 2010, 04:11:12 am by Rob C »
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fredjeang

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where does it fit?
« Reply #2 on: April 24, 2010, 04:49:25 am »

Hi Rob,
Precisely, what makes the GRX unique is that it goes in the points you just mentionned. On the other side, I'm not sure that the needs of photographers are covered enough. In fact, what we mostly see is just a digital adaptation of old systems made for films. Digital allows less conservatism and I think Ricoh did it well but they unfortunatly did half way (no mount).
In search of "stability", if you have a great camera, with this system all you'd have to do is upgrade the module sensor when new technology is available instead of having to buy a totally new body and read the 400 pages instructions. It's clean, no marketing, no hassle, just working with the same camera that you are familiar with. That's the strenght of MF-LF and that should be implemented in smaller formats IMO.

The implications are enormous. Imagine a 1D MARK 4 with modular sensors and what does it mean in terms of workflow,  flexibility etc...
You could have a dedicated module for video, a dedicated infrared module or whatever. You shoot in action with the same gear and just change the module in a second. If you need a bigger sensor size module, a smaller with more speed and more DOF etc...
And this is digital potential, not simply adapting old designs to new technology.

Hey Rob, spring is back. Hope you turn off the calefación and start to smell the sand and sea.

Cheers.

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Rob C

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« Reply #3 on: April 24, 2010, 09:41:39 am »

Hi Fred

Spring is indeed back, and I hope that it stays this time! I am thinking of venturing out for a café au lait in a moment, but, no doubt, by then it will have turned cold again. I have finished all the wood I bought for the winter - so considering the GESA prices, I shall just wear more clothes!

But getting to the camera topic once more - what you are suggesting with the interchangeable modules is really something I see as added expense, a further opportunity for manufacturers to produce all sorts of 'dedicated' backs (or fronts!) to suit different applications, when all you really need is a good sensor that only needs a good lens in front of it, not entirely new bits of camera. That's the problem: film allowed that but digital, in its superiority (?) does not right now, because it seems you can only choose to have good high or low ISO performance but seldom both in a single sensor. I think - though mabe I have misunderstood it all - wouldn't surprise me at all.

If you do go down the road of interchangeable modules, then I suspect that the weight of the kit will be even greater than it is already, not exactly much to do with the pocketable concept.

That Euro Milliones had defeated me yet again; no supercar this week, then.

Rob C
« Last Edit: April 24, 2010, 09:42:58 am by Rob C »
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fredjeang

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where does it fit?
« Reply #4 on: April 24, 2010, 10:52:02 am »

Ricoh, a very small company, is alone in this design for the moment. Sure that if the big boys smell that there is a way to make the people buy more gear they will do it right now...but I think they won't. They need to sale cameras, not just sensors units.

Now, Ricoh will be very kind to do a Leica R unit sensor for example. (just kiding)

If you think about it, what we have now is an inmature digital interpretation of old technology. When you bought your F3, 35mm was 35mm. Fuji or whatever film maker could release a new film technology, all you had to do was putting the film in your F3, not upgrading the entire camera. If you were happy with your camera and accessories then you could work with the same basic tool for decades. You want infrared? you want Pan film? well, just put it in the F3 or whatever Pentax. Now I hear people talking about dedicated infrared camera etc...is not that absurd?  Current average design is perfect  to make us spend more money than we should and that is why I doubt the big boys will join that train.

Now what they gave us is like one type of film with unlimited frames call sensor. When "digi-film" is obsolete (and they are fast), you are obliged to buy a new camera. Imagine that 20 years ago someone would have told you that you'll have one film in your camera that can not be replaced so when they decide this film is obsolete, you'll have to buy a brand new gear with another fixed film, so every 4 years it is time to replace your entire camera, and they are kind enough that some accessories are even not compatible...you would have think this guy is crazy. Oh, and that there are a lot of different resolution according to the price one can afford in a same format. But that is what we have except in MF-LF land because here they can not play this silly game...although some recent products...
« Last Edit: April 24, 2010, 12:14:17 pm by fredjeang »
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Ray

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« Reply #5 on: April 25, 2010, 01:29:52 am »

Quote from: fredjeang
Now what they gave us is like one type of film with unlimited frames call sensor. When "digi-film" is obsolete (and they are fast), you are obliged to buy a new camera. Imagine that 20 years ago someone would have told you that you'll have one film in your camera that can not be replaced so when they decide this film is obsolete, you'll have to buy a brand new gear with another fixed film, so every 4 years it is time to replace your entire camera, and they are kind enough that some accessories are even not compatible...you would have think this guy is crazy. Oh, and that there are a lot of different resolution according to the price one can afford in a same format. But that is what we have except in MF-LF land because here they can not play this silly game...although some recent products...

Fred,
This idea of replacing the whole camera instead of the film is not crazy at all. Just the opposite, in fact.

Consider the following example. About 5 years a go I bought a Canon 5D for about A$5,000. I've used that camera more than any other camera in my entire life, having shot approximately 100,000 frames.

Let's consider how much it would have cost me to shoot 100,000 frames of color negative film. A 36-exposure roll costs on average A$10. It costs another $10 to develop the film plus another $10 to scan to CD ROM at the rather low resolution of 3000x2000 pixels.

To shoot 100,000 frames I'd need 2,778 rolls, each 36 exposures. Total cost, including developing and scanning would be 2778x30= A$83,340.

Okay! Let's economise. I buy my film in bulk, say $5 per roll, and I do my own scanning of just a small proportion of the shots taken. I'll also take into consideration the fact that I probably wouldn't take nearly as many shots as 100,000 during a 5 year period if each time I press the shutter it costs me money. Let's say I take only 25,000 shots during the 4 or 5 year period.

The calculation then becomes: 25,000/36=695 rolls. At $5 for the film and $10 for the development, 695x$15=$10,425

Now that's more reasonable isn't it? Except, a replacement for the 5D in the form of a 5D Mk II will cost me only A$3,000, will produce results far superior to the best 35mm film, and shoots very respectable video also.

I think I'd definitely prefer to replace the entire camera body every 4 or 5 years   .
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fredjeang

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where does it fit?
« Reply #6 on: April 25, 2010, 04:11:34 am »

I totally agree with Ray's points (at least considering the calculations for the amateur, for pro it is another story because you generate incomes with investment/cost whatever this might be) . The thing is that we have the technology right now to get the best of both current digital systems and film age. They've been doing it in MFD and I think it's a great design for smaller formats also. In fact, greater than the designs we have now IMHO.
« Last Edit: April 25, 2010, 05:12:40 am by fredjeang »
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Rob C

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« Reply #7 on: April 25, 2010, 04:38:45 am »

Ray, your argument seems, to me at least, to be nothing other than a plea for the machine gun school of photography; finger exercise yoga.

Let's look at your four or five year period in some detail. You speculate on 25,000 shots or 695 rolls of film. On your maths, I would expect you to have garnered 695 wonderful images. Have you? In a lifetime of pro work, which saw me do relatively well, I would laugh out loud were you to ask me to make an exhibition of more than fifty to seventy images on which I'd stake my reputation, whatever that might have been. Of those 695 films I would certainly expect to have come up with a shot that fulfills the brief in each roll, but great is something else. And that's one of the problems amateur photography inevitably faces: what's the standard going to be? Remove the commercial imperative that virtually defines subject and execution, and what judgement can you appeal to regarding your work?

Either pro or am, if one's vision and thought is focussed, one hardly faces problems defined by cost of film. Such problems arise from indecision and no clear sense of purpose. I would submit that blasting one's way through photographic life is no route to success, but more likely one that leads to disappointment.

Racking up big click scores may indeed be part of some commercial techniques - fashion, for example, where you are not only encouraging the model and building her and yourself up to getting something approaching a visible climactic reaction, but you are also attempting to bring all that together with the background, the breeze or the wind machine and what it does to the cloth and where it throws the hair. A hit in thirty-six ain't bad! But were one to apply those maths norms to landscape, architecture or product, I'd say one is in the wrong business.

So yep, the old, reliable 'blad and Nikon were certainly not second-class citizens in my world. The single, huge benefit I see with digital is that it shortens the time between shot and available image. And that really only means much where a client expects or needs the turnaround to be so fast.

If I look at my own shooting, I can't say that I do much more with two digital cameras than I would have with film; it is just more convenient for me now since Kodachrome has vanished and E6, at least on the island, is pretty well a lost possibility too. Thanks, sensor. Today's ideal, for me, would have been the 500 series and Ektachrome with a dedicated 120 scanner: rapid editing and a great route to the kind of b/w image I love to print (yes, Virginia, I know Ektachrome is colour transparency film). So even here, now an amateur on a rock, I have come to realise that removed from the needs of the fashion or glamour shoot, the slow ways of the medium format are far more likely to lead to considered work that will mean something even after the shooting.

Rob C
« Last Edit: April 25, 2010, 06:11:23 am by Rob C »
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fredjeang

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where does it fit?
« Reply #8 on: April 25, 2010, 05:34:54 am »

I'm sure that if the Leica beast S had been modular it would have been another story.

The body is perfectly designed, no hassle menus and wired ergonomics in the line of the Contax 645 and no need to change any basic interface.

Example of applications: you need video? Put a smaller sensor unit to solve the D.O.F problem, specially dedicated for that task.
And that could fit with the R lenses that Leica abandoned to the E.bay collectors market.

You need resolution? put a unit that fits that purpose.

You need fast shooting? put the dedicated unit.

etc...

But your body stays the same.

Modularity should be a basic feature in camera design. That's also the reason why MFD is exciting, not only resolution IMHO.
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John R Smith

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« Reply #9 on: April 25, 2010, 06:16:45 am »

The snag is, that digital photography in 2010 is probably (or almost certainly) still in its infancy. Perhaps where chemical photography was in the 1850s, say. No-one can predict with any certainty where it is going or where we will be in 10 or 20 years time, either. And because digital imaging is, by its nature, totally bound up with the development of IT hardware and software, the volatile nature of that business feeds back into camera design too.

You only have to read the reviews here on LL from ten years ago to appreciate the huge gulf in price and performance which has arisen in just those ten short years. There is no real stability in digital camera design, and can't be until we have reached the practical limits of sensor photosite density, DR, low-light sensitivity, on-board memory capacity and read speed. And we are not there yet. The only relatively long-lived digital camera designs so far seem to be the Canon 5D and 1DS, probably because they set the bar very high in the first place. I have the feeling that the Ricoh is actually an evolutionary dead-end, good though it probably is.

You might eventually see the digital successors to the Hass 500, Nikon F and Leica M, but I think that is a long way off yet.

John
« Last Edit: April 25, 2010, 06:39:23 am by John R Smith »
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Rob C

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« Reply #10 on: April 25, 2010, 10:32:41 am »

Quote from: John R Smith
You might eventually see the digital successors to the Hass 500, Nikon F and Leica M, but I think that is a long way off yet.

John



Hi John

You have just defined my dream list, all of which I have owned, barring the Leica. Today, the dream would be the 500 with a full-frame sensor. There would then be the opportunity for the perfect factory mating of body and back (no interchangeabilty required!) and the perfect body shape would be back in business.

If they looked at it this way, perhaps not too far off in the future...?

No, I haven't won that darn lottery yet, though I do try: since I use birthdays etc. I can't afford to give up, even for a week, because I would instantly recognize the numbers and could never forgive myself for having missed making the family futures and fortunes.

Rob C

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« Reply #11 on: April 25, 2010, 11:01:49 am »

Quote from: Rob C
Hi John

You have just defined my dream list, all of which I have owned, barring the Leica. Today, the dream would be the 500 with a full-frame sensor. There would then be the opportunity for the perfect factory mating of body and back (no interchangeabilty required!) and the perfect body shape would be back in business.

If they looked at it this way, perhaps not too far off in the future...?

No, I haven't won that darn lottery yet, though I do try: since I use birthdays etc. I can't afford to give up, even for a week, because I would instantly recognize the numbers and could never forgive myself for having missed making the family futures and fortunes.

Rob C


Rob, do you have a link to your website?

fredjeang

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« Reply #12 on: April 25, 2010, 11:11:37 am »

John, that's exactly why I think that modular design solve the problem because it allows volatility but at the same time, stability on an entire system.
The Ricoh path is probably a dead end path because they did not allow lens mount, but if the units where independant from lenses this could be a real winner design?

Coming back to the S2, among the pros it would have been much more impacting if they allowed in their S2 an independant sensor unit. I'm sure that Leica would have sold them all in a month, even expensive priced. Because then when you have this sort of stability you are ready to spend the money or not in whatever extravagant feature they will put tomorrow on the market. And you invest in a gear that can be used when they release new sensor. Big difference.

Who's pro going to make the trip in Japan for the Pentax because that's exactly what you want and nothing else? Hey, it's cheap but we are still talking about 9000 euros...I got a brand new 1DMK4 (4000 euros here) with superb video and top IQ and a 5D or a 1DS second-hand with top lenses in e-bay for that price...not sure the 40MP is a solid argument in itself. No tethered option, slow and no lenses...but it is so cheap compared to the scandalous prices of high end mfd that it is a revolution just for that reason.

If this Pentax had been modular and care about connexions etc...there will be right now special charters from all over the world to go to Tokyo.
But that's not what will happen. Hassy and Phase can thank Pentax that doing the things halth way they saved them from a big disaster.

And wait...if Ricoh suddenly decide to release a sensor unit with Leica M mount with a last generation of EVF that could change the all game in this kind of cameras niche. But politically correct, they will not do it.
This little Ricoh could have combined both M9-MFT worlds in a MFD design but I'm afraid it is indeed another well-thought-design-badly-implemented (WTDBI) I just invented it now.

When not a long time ago, Michael was complaining against MLU on Canon's gear over and over again, I thought it was pretty fun and part of the all theater, but what's behind the scene indeed is a very poor concern for the real needs of photographers (like video with fixed lcd). That is why IMHO the Contax 645 is still highly regarded despite it is not in production.
Following the advices of many experienced pros here, I've been trying the Contax not a long time ago and there is no such design elsewhere (that I know), it just feels perfect. 1200 euros with Zeiss 80 and you find a great back in the second-hand market and you have a far better system ( and all the lenses availables right now) for the same money. Oh, and when I'll need 150MP when they will do it and convinced me that I need them to keep the race, I won't have to through away the Contax, like it will happen with the Pentax. Stupidly, an out-of-production product is capable of longer life service than a just brand released model...because it's modular.

I'll use a sentence of Apolo mission control: No modularity is not an option.
« Last Edit: April 25, 2010, 11:36:38 am by fredjeang »
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John R Smith

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« Reply #13 on: April 25, 2010, 01:37:13 pm »

Quote from: Rob C
Hi John

You have just defined my dream list, all of which I have owned, barring the Leica. Today, the dream would be the 500 with a full-frame sensor. There would then be the opportunity for the perfect factory mating of body and back (no interchangeabilty required!) and the perfect body shape would be back in business.

If they looked at it this way, perhaps not too far off in the future...?

Rob C

Rob

I have just been out for the afternoon shooting with my old 500 C/M, 60mm and 150mm lenses and the CFV-39 back. I wouldn't swap this setup for anything I see in the marketplace today, whatever the technology or cost advantage. I just love the feel, the look and the sound of this camera system. It's a bit like driving a 1930s Alvis, really. But then I just do this for fun - if I had to make my living at it, i'm sure I'd be first in line for a Canon or Nikon whatever. Or an H-system. As for a full-frame square sensor, I think we can forget it. I had a discussion with the Hasselblad rep when he visited me, and basically no such sensor exists as a standard Kodak or Dalsa product. The only backs which make commercial sense to produce for the V system have to use a readily available sensor which is available (relatively) cheaply in quantity, hence the use of the Kodak KAV 39000 in the CFV.

John
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Rob C

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« Reply #14 on: April 25, 2010, 02:54:37 pm »

Quote from: gdwhalen
Rob, do you have a link to your website?



A vey delicate subject with me: I began one with the help of a chap I know on the island, but in the event, it didn't work out because the pics that he put up for me were all soft. I have no idea how that can happen, but Fred and another guy have made suggestions indicating incorrect procedures...

http://www.robcphotos.com

Enjoy  some white noise.

I shall try again later, it seems such a dumb situation for me to be in.

Rob C
« Last Edit: April 25, 2010, 02:55:26 pm by Rob C »
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Rob C

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« Reply #15 on: April 25, 2010, 03:27:05 pm »

Fred, or anybody else who knows: where can I see some sample websites done via weebly?

Rob C

fredjeang

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where does it fit?
« Reply #16 on: April 25, 2010, 04:00:37 pm »

Quote from: Rob C
Fred, or anybody else who knows: where can I see some sample websites done via weebly?

Rob C
Rob,
I know at least in my memory one photographer who uses weebly platform.
He works big prints, I particulary like his "Toros" serie: http://ricardobsanchez.weebly.com/toros---bulls.html
, that he did for a book.

I discovered weebly by pure accident one day and for curiosity I checked inside and to be honest it's pretty impressive. It's not gona be as powerfull as other systems like photoshelter and certainly not as a "sur mesure" programation-design, but indeed by far much user friendly than most cms like wordpress, drupal or whatever.
The good think about weebly is that it is highly customizable, but also totally intuitive and easy for the people who do not want or not have technical knowledge to spend in a more complex CMS. Everything is just drag-and-drop.
Features are really extended and you can even sell prints via paypal. It uses friendly html but you can also integrate flash (AS2) if you wish.
Video is totally integrable and you got control about the way you displays your pics etc...

You can open a free account and in a question of hours you will be able to manage your control panel and start to upload pics.
It is that easy because they use Ajax as a base. For small websites, photographers, videographers etc...it is a very interesting alternative when you want to have full and easy control of your website for free.

The dowside: Their designs are basics and really not fancy at all, and you need to know css to make something visualy decent but if you have any issue with that part just send me a mail and I'll rewrite the css for you in an hour. no problem.

----

The other alternative is the Russ system: lightroom galleries in your domain.

----


Cheers.
« Last Edit: April 25, 2010, 04:10:52 pm by fredjeang »
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Ray

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« Reply #17 on: April 25, 2010, 11:52:42 pm »

Quote from: Rob C
Ray, your argument seems, to me at least, to be nothing other than a plea for the machine gun school of photography; finger exercise yoga.

Let's look at your four or five year period in some detail. You speculate on 25,000 shots or 695 rolls of film. On your maths, I would expect you to have garnered 695 wonderful images. Have you? In a lifetime of pro work, which saw me do relatively well, I would laugh out loud were you to ask me to make an exhibition of more than fifty to seventy images on which I'd stake my reputation, whatever that might have been. Of those 695 films I would certainly expect to have come up with a shot that fulfills the brief in each roll, but great is something else. And that's one of the problems amateur photography inevitably faces: what's the standard going to be? Remove the commercial imperative that virtually defines subject and execution, and what judgement can you appeal to regarding your work?

Either pro or am, if one's vision and thought is focussed, one hardly faces problems defined by cost of film. Such problems arise from indecision and no clear sense of purpose. I would submit that blasting one's way through photographic life is no route to success, but more likely one that leads to disappointment.

Racking up big click scores may indeed be part of some commercial techniques - fashion, for example, where you are not only encouraging the model and building her and yourself up to getting something approaching a visible climactic reaction, but you are also attempting to bring all that together with the background, the breeze or the wind machine and what it does to the cloth and where it throws the hair. A hit in thirty-six ain't bad! But were one to apply those maths norms to landscape, architecture or product, I'd say one is in the wrong business.

So yep, the old, reliable 'blad and Nikon were certainly not second-class citizens in my world. The single, huge benefit I see with digital is that it shortens the time between shot and available image. And that really only means much where a client expects or needs the turnaround to be so fast.

If I look at my own shooting, I can't say that I do much more with two digital cameras than I would have with film; it is just more convenient for me now since Kodachrome has vanished and E6, at least on the island, is pretty well a lost possibility too. Thanks, sensor. Today's ideal, for me, would have been the 500 series and Ektachrome with a dedicated 120 scanner: rapid editing and a great route to the kind of b/w image I love to print (yes, Virginia, I know Ektachrome is colour transparency film). So even here, now an amateur on a rock, I have come to realise that removed from the needs of the fashion or glamour shoot, the slow ways of the medium format are far more likely to lead to considered work that will mean something even after the shooting.

Rob C

No! no! no! Rob. You do seem to be very much set in the old ways. Modern photographic technology and editing software allow for much expanded creative opportunities that were simply not feasible in your days, at least not without great expense and difficulty; and these expanded opportunities often require multiple shots of the same scene.

The first photographic print I sold, after my renewed interest in photography about 15 years ago, was an 8ftx1ft panorama of the city of Brisbane printed on my A3+ Epson 1200 using roll paper. Sold it to the then Mayor of Brisbane for $400. I believe the photo was mounted and framed, then auctioned to provide funds for the Mayor's re-election.

This panorama consisted of 13 frames of 35mm film, shot with a 300mm lens, scanned with my Nikon 35mm scanner at 2000 dpi then carefully and time-consumingly stitched on my computer with software that (in those days) required a number of pairs of flags to be very carefully positioned at each overlap.

As a result of haze problems and pollution rising from the city centre I had to visit the site on a number of occasions before I got a result with which I was reasonably satisfied. I would have shot several rolls of different types of film in the process. Eventually, the film from which the print was made, which provided the most pleasing colors and happened to be the film in my camera on that clear and sunny day when the haze seemed to have been carried away by a propitious breeze, was Ektachrome 200.

Another example: Right at the moment I have a 6ftx2ft print of the Himalayas clipped to a mounting board leaning against the wall on which it will eventually be hung after I've finished the decorations and fittings in my new house (my tiling venture was interrupted by a fall which caused a fractured wrist, so I'm very much behind schedule).

This print was made from just 5 stitched frames taken with my Canon 5D. However, each frame was exposure-bracketed to increase dynamic range, making a total of 15 shots for this one picture. At this size, the whole print is sharp, even from close up. Every blade of grass in the foreground is eye-catchingly sharp, and, if there'd been a climber on any on the snow-capped peaks at the time, waving an Aussie flag, he'd probably be visible on this print.

However, I'm still not satisfied with this print. It's too small. I'd like it to be 12ftx4ft. Unfortunately, my printer (the Epson 7600) is only 2ft wide. In order to make a 12ftx4ft print I'd have to divide the image (after interpolation) into 6 vertical strips each 2ftx4ft, then position the individual prints next to each other on the mounting board. This is not really satisfactory. How does one make a join in a sky invisible?

I've got it!  I'll photograph the window frames in my house, and with the help of Photoshop, create a 12ftx4ft window with 2ft wide vertical dividers. Each vertical divider will cover a join in the Himalayan landscape. The total window frame will be the frame of the picture. I'll be creating an imaginary view out of an imaginary window. This is going to be magnificent!

However, I'm a bit concerned that the 12mp of the 5D may not be sufficient for a 4ft long print (vertically). On close inspection, the resolution may not be impressive. I may have to revisit that scene in Nepal with a 5D MK II and reshoot. We amateurs can be very dedicated, Rob.  

There are other applications that may require multiple shots of the same scene in order to take advantage of the marvels of modern software. For example, places like Angkor Wat are crawling with tourists. They're everywhere, from dawn till dusk. So Rob C with his old Nikon or Blad has found a sublime spot with perfect composition and lighting. He knows what he's doing and he's selected the scene carefully. He's got his exposure right and all he needs is one shot.... except, there are tourists wandering in front of his camera all the time. If they're not directly in front of his camera, they're in the background taking a photo of their spouse or kids, with their P&S.

Now I suppose Rob could could hire a few minders who could block every entrance to the site, "Excuse me. We have a professional photographer at work. Could you wait just a few minutes until the site is cleared. Thank you." But, I'm not sure that would be legal.

However, there's a hi-tech solution. If you have Photoshop CS3 or CS4 Extended, you can simply take one shot of the same scene every couple of seconds (or every 5 or 10 seconds) until you are certain that every tourist in the scene has moved at least once. You then stack the images in Photoshop Extended (whether 5, 10 or 20 frames), and the software will choose the parts from each frame that are  identical in all frames, to produce one composite image with no tourists.

Have I made my point well?  
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Ray

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« Reply #18 on: April 26, 2010, 12:28:43 am »

Quote from: fredjeang
Coming back to the S2, among the pros it would have been much more impacting if they allowed in their S2 an independant sensor unit. I'm sure that Leica would have sold them all in a month, even expensive priced. Because then when you have this sort of stability you are ready to spend the money or not in whatever extravagant feature they will put tomorrow on the market. And you invest in a gear that can be used when they release new sensor. Big difference.

I can't see it, Fred. The sensor is just one part of the camera. It's obviously a vital part, but it's not the only part that evolves and continues to get better. I'll name just a few improvements that we've seen in the past few years in various camera models, that could not be provided by merely changing the sensor.
(1) Faster frame rate.
(2) LiveView LCD screen.
(3) High resolution LiveView LCD screen (920,000 dpi).
(4) Autobracketing of ISO in manual mode.
(5) Improved autofocussing
(6) Wider range of exposure autobracketing (Nikon can autoexposure bracket up to 9 continuous frames)
(7) Better high-ISO performance due to off-sensor processing.
(8) Dedicated MLU button.

There's no substitue for the integrated package designed as a whole, each component being the latest in technological development, and each designed with the other in mind.

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Rob C

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« Reply #19 on: April 26, 2010, 04:09:45 am »

Fred

Thank you for your link and offer of help - I shall look at the Sanchez site later today; I have to visit the gestoria about my residencia renewal which, now, seems to be far different a procedure to what it was during the past twenty-something years!

Ray

You have made your point well, as always, but you have missed the greater one: I have absolutely no interest in that kind of image-making. My photography has been centred, focussed(?) on the single telling shot of a person, usually female. You have no idea the lengths to which I would go in order to avoid the scenarios you paint: I would hate to spend time at a computer stitching and messing about like that; it is so contrary to my nature that I would rather just stop photography altogether than do it; it represents my photo nightmare!

Age factor, resistance to progress? Perhaps, but then I would rather believe that it has little to do with numbers and a lot to do with where lie my interests. John R Smith, a couple of posts ago, states his position as amateur and explains his pleasure in the 500 system; he shares my position. I am no longer in pro practice and what I do now is, mainly, something that allows me distraction from personal disaster, that fills my time with more than bitter-sweet memories of lost love. But, what has not changed, is my total lack of interest in technical matters per se: I learn as much as I have to in order to make my camera work - the rest is soul or lack of it. The 500 system was my perfect match and I do think that had Hass been able to come up with a fixed sensor, FF digital evolution of the existing 500 body, then they would have cleaned up - end of MF makers' battle stories. Ironic that they depend on somebody else for such huge proportions of the product, that their progress is limited by what a chip maker can, cannot or will not do.

Am I the only photographer who still believes in the single, great shot?

Rob C
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