Luminous Landscape Forum
Equipment & Techniques => Medium Format / Film / Digital Backs – and Large Sensor Photography => Topic started by: julienlanoo on December 05, 2013, 09:06:28 am
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There is some thing great to know if its for you or not.
Its called : renting
The concept of this is that some one else or some company buys it, and loans it on a regular basis for shorter periods in extchange for a much "smaller" amount of money than buying one.
The advantage of this is that you dont have to spent an enormous amount of money to use some thing, and then see you don t like it.
If you concequentally like it you can buy the thing for real, being shure..
You re welcome..
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And with many specialized shops, including ours, your rental can count towards purchase. Making it a very low risk proposition. Either you love it and didn't spend any extra money to buy it, or you don't like it and you save a huge sum from not buying.
But you also have to understand that not everyone lives in a high-population area where MF rental is common/easy. Also not everyone has the appropriate insurance to rent e.g. 30k of equipment and getting one-time coverage is very cost prohibitive.
This is where we get a lot of people that fly to NYC to try the equipment out in person (I'd imagine the same is true for cities like Moscow or Berlin, but I can't speak to that). Usually when we have such a person we try to make accommodations to go "out and about" in the city with them, or set up a mini shoot at our office studio, so they can get some idea of real world shooting without having to rent or deal with insurance.
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But you also have to understand that not everyone lives in a high-population area where MF rental is common/easy.
Even then...I live in Sheffield, one of the biggest cities in the UK and the there's no photography or film rental facilities to be seen. Of any kind, let along MF.
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Even then...I live in Sheffield, one of the biggest cities in the UK and the there's no photography or film rental facilities to be seen. Of any kind, let along MF.
Europeans and Americans have such different concepts of "close" and "far" when it comes to travel. That's neither good nor bad I suppose (except the larger environmental impact), just different. You're only 3 hours from London no? I have two friends that commute 2 hours each way to work - 5 days a week. One by train and one by car.
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Europeans and Americans have such different concepts of "close" and "far" when it comes to travel. That's neither good nor bad I suppose (except the larger environmental impact), just different. You're only 3 hours from London no? I have two friends that commute 2 hours each way to work - 5 days a week. One by train and one by car.
Close is within easy cycling distance. :P Actually most commuting in town is faster by bike, even somewhere as hilly as Sheffield.
My girlfriend has a stupid commute, 50-60 mins in morning. Plus she starts early with no overtime because she leaves before traffic gets bad and then a minimum 90mins return. Utter waste of time/one's life and a serious drain on one's wallet as fuel is very much more expensive than in the US. Not to mention, she's worn out from 12 hour days - if she leaves on time.
A return to London on the train tomorrow would cost around $300 - you can do it cheaper with more notice, but you don't always get that. So it's not just about geographical distance, but financial distance. Bizarrely we can often fly to other countries for less than the cost of getting to a relatively close airport.
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how far away is Leeds from Sheffield? you have the flash centre and dale photographic if you want to get your hands on MFD
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Most of the people starting these topics about buying DMF live far away from rental studios and dealers.
For me, it wasn't a problem to drive six hours to a dealer, but the problem was that, in my opinion, you need at least a month of extensive shooting in all kinds of shooting scenarios that you come across in your job on daily basis to really test it. Few hours of playing around with the equipment is just not enough.
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i am not talking about a few hours,
every thing i bought i first rented for a week, when i had a bussy week..
works fine!
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And an other remark what's a 300 pound train ticket on a 50 000 euros investment ? ..
make a WE in and around Londen :p
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It wasn't possible. There is no dealer in my country. There is no dealer in any non EU country in Europe, I think, at least not one close enough. I don't think any dealer would let me take the camera outside EU for a week or more.
This and other forums were my only option.
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I'd take it a step further with other options to get kit in hand. Such as:
- Phase One Certified Pro - the cost includes a full license for Capture One and it gives you a bit of an idea of what you'd me using. Take it a step further and setup a shoot / walk about with the supporting company (Digital Transition, Capture Intergration, Bear Images, in the USA).
- PODAS - http://www.phaseone.com/en/Workshops/PODAS/Workshops.aspx - Go on vacation, shoot with gear you'll love, and just have fun.
Hasselblad has an owners club, http://www.hasselblad.com/hasselblad-owners-club.aspx so reach out to a local shooter and see if you can get some time with them.
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I once got an offer to test a Hasselblad H4 system from a dealer.
He simply sent me the Pelicase with the stuff by mail.
Unfortunately it arrived too late and I had to send it back untested.
But that wasn't his fault.
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Even then...I live in Sheffield, one of the biggest cities in the UK and the there's no photography or film rental facilities to be seen. Of any kind, let along MF.
All the MF dealers in the UK who do rental and/ or demos can either visit you in person or use a courier to send the kit to you.
If you need any help with speaking to someone about Mamiya Leaf let me know and I will sort it out for you. My contact details are in my signature below.
BR
Yair
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Hmm, may take you up on that offer when I have the time to test properly. :)
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And an other remark what's a 300 pound train ticket on a 50 000 euros investment ? ..
make a WE in and around Londen :p
I wasn't talking about the cost relative to the kit being bought, but about the relative distances of near/far that Doug mentioned with regard to Europe and the US sometimes being a financial distance.
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There is some thing great to know if its for you or not.
Its called : renting
The concept of this is that some one else or some company buys it, and loans it on a regular basis for shorter periods in extchange for a much "smaller" amount of money than buying one.
The advantage of this is that you dont have to spent an enormous amount of money to use some thing, and then see you don t like it.
If you concequentally like it you can buy the thing for real, being shure..
You re welcome..
Why, thank you for that amazing insight. If you could find a rental shop within 200kms of Singapore,t hat would be extremely swell!
(I did manage to get a demo, but this generalization that everybody interested in MFD has access to a rental facility is laughable. Tunnel vision much?).
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Why, thank you for that amazing insight. If you could find a rental shop within 200kms of Singapore,t hat would be extremely swell!
(I did manage to get a demo, but this generalization that everybody interested in MFD has access to a rental facility is laughable. Tunnel vision much?).
Not having access to a good dealer sets you on the road to a bad MF experience.
If you don't have some sort of decent arrangement with a dealer who knows his stuff AND who you trust, do yourself a favor and don't get a digital back.
Edmund
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Not having access to a good dealer sets you on the road to a bad MF experience.
If you don't have some sort of decent arrangement with a dealer who knows his stuff AND who you trust, do yourself a favor and don't get a digital back.
Edmund
I have a good, knowledgeable dealer. I got a demo from him. I just don't have access to a rental facility for MFDB here; which is what the OP was suggesting.
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Medium format has a bit of a learning curve - depending on which system you use. I did several tests with Hasselblad versus Nikon, and I was underwhelmed with the differences because the MF was more natural and the Nikon (and Canon) more hyped and contrasty. So it takes a while to learn and to appreciate what you are getting.
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a whole new perspective on the word "poundering".... ;D
The other thing to consider is bought equipment depreciates in value. This can be good for your tax and bad for the wallet if you were to sell it.
IMO with whatever limited time I have used MF, someone making a decision of going MF is going to do a hell of a lot of research.
I've often seen people disappointed even with the best of camera and lens combinations: say a M9 + 50lux or D800e + 14-24, or 1Dx + 600f4 etc... and I wonder if its really the gear that they are disappointed with.
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Not having access to a good dealer sets you on the road to a bad MF experience.
If you don't have some sort of decent arrangement with a dealer who knows his stuff AND who you trust, do yourself a favor and don't get a digital back.
Edmund
Well I'm glad I never received this advice nor followed it when purchasing my IQ180.
Kind regards,
Gerald.
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Jjj , as Mr Smith says, The Flash Centre and Dale are both options, I deal with both of them a lot and they're both very good operations to deal with.
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This is where the new Sony A7 (r) makes huge sense.
In the UK to rent an A7 is 63 pounds a day. With VAT and shipping in slightly more than three weeks if you bought it.
Heck you could buy one, use it for work and tests, if you hated it sell it for half price and still come out way ahead.
If you needed it for a month, you could actually buy two and stay even to the cost of rental.
IMO
BC
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Jjj , as Mr Smith says, The Flash Centre and Dale are both options, I deal with both of them a lot and they're both very good operations to deal with.
They may well be, but I prefer local shops. If I ever need an urgent purchase, have an issue or problem with my current kit I can just pop into Harrison Cameras which a mere 15 min bike ride/car trip [used to be a 3 min walk]. 3-4 hours round trip in car to do the same in a Leeds shop is not so attractive.
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They may well be, but I prefer local shops. If I ever need an urgent purchase, have an issue or problem with my current kit I can just pop into Harrison Cameras which a mere 15 min bike ride/car trip [used to be a 3 min walk]. 3-4 hours round trip in car to do the same in a Leeds shop is not so attractive.
That was how I viewed it too, when I was working in the UK. It's how I still view it, except that my local outlet has retrenched back to Barcelona - la crisis, you understand: nobody has any money, and I awaited three hospital visits back in September. There is still no word. My neigbour upstairs has just been bumped for the second time in over six months for a hip-replacement... it's not all in the sub-prime world.
When I think this all stemmed from greed within the usury fraternity, I could envisage the beauty of being a vigilante stalking various capitals... Bah! a pox on them all.
Rob C
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When I think this all stemmed from greed within the usury fraternity, I could envisage the beauty of being a vigilante stalking various capitals... Bah! a pox on them all.
I have toyed for a while with a script about something similarish.
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Most voters wanted the banks bailed out and the bankers to continue getting paid; they were more afraid of the risk involved in change than of 20 years of misery for themselves and their kids . In other words voters preferred to live as cold shorn sheep rather than let the wolves starve. Look at RBS where the bank was bailed out, taken over by the state, and kept paying the bonuses. Let's not complain about the way we are treated in our democracies if we have not first at least tried to make our voices heard through political process. Although, it is starting to look as if total impunity for fraud in the financial system might be a fatal flaw that might bring down the democracies themselves.
The same things is true in the NSA story. European democracies have citizen's rights to privacy, and guarantees against illegal search, written into their constitutions. Now it appears that all major security agencies in Europe have signed agreements whereby they waived all their citizen's rights in favor of the US demand for surveillance - and in return benefitted with an echo-back of the surveillance data on their citizens. This is a political issue for the voters to address; if the voters do not demand their constitutional rights then they do not deserve these rights, and in fact it appears they have permanently lost them. I see no reason to protest this fact - as the current state of affairs could be changed by political process if there were a will.
Edmund
That was how I viewed it too, when I was working in the UK. It's how I still view it, except that my local outlet has retrenched back to Barcelona - la crisis, you understand: nobody has any money, and I awaited three hospital visits back in September. There is still no word. My neigbour upstairs has just been bumped for the second time in over six months for a hip-replacement... it's not all in the sub-prime world.
When I think this all stemmed from greed within the usury fraternity, I could envisage the beauty of being a vigilante stalking various capitals... Bah! a pox on them all.
Rob C
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Most voters wanted the banks bailed out and the bankers to continue getting paid; they were more afraid of the risk involved in change than of 20 years of misery for themselves and their kids.
Sorry, I do not recall any referendum on this topic in any country.
Besides if the question was something like being asked if you want to continue with current regime where dodgy practices result in some people becoming extremely rich or try another one where your kids may end up begging for food isn't likely to result in regime change via the polls. Forgetting of course that the current system has led to many people losing their homes and large US cities turning into ghost towns.
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I wasn't aware that the UK had a written constitution... thought that was a US thing.
As for bailing out banks, it isn't that simple - it's not just about 'bankers' getting burned at all, which nobody other than they would have minded. Had RBS and HBOS not had intervention applied (and Northern Rock well before 2008), there would have been many thousands - if not millions - of normal depositors on the street, everything lost. You can't let that happen if there's a way out.
The problem isn't bail-outs: the problem is the poor fiscal controls that were, apparently, in place but were not applied because in some cases its the very same people who do both the gambling and the controlling. I repeat again: you should try to get to see the DVD Inside Job, which names names etc. and is an eye-opener as to the enormity of what and why, and also about who the people are in the universities, holding powerful positions relating to fiscal education, yet in their extra-campus rôles as consultants and advisers to government, were often the same dodos pulling everything down... the concept of perpetuation rings alarm bells. And those same players are still in place.
Regarding rights to privacy, the same thing applies to banking offshore. It was never illegal, and there are/were clear(ish) rules about who, where and when one could. Hosts of international law companies and accountants existed to advise. Then, the US leaned on Switzerland and she gave in. That was a mistake. It was the domino effect writ large, with the majority of the rest caving in. Many of those offshore bank branches are now pretty much pointless, and I suppose that it won't be long before most close and the islands turn to deserted ones, just like in the olde tales of the Spanish Main. Except that it'll spread far wider than that geographic zone.
There's a lot of misunderstanding around about offshore. It was never meant as a tax-free banking device: the obligation to post returns/interest etc. to some country or the other was always there, and it's almost impossible not to be either resident or domiciled somewhere.
So well done, Big Bro'; you blow it at home then seek to make amends by screwing everyone else.
Rob C
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As I recall it, the banks were bailed out, and all those hardworking bankers kept their jobs despite managing their companies into the ground because their banks were "too big to fail"; however, it was decided not to forgive the loans on these actually valueless houses. Forgiving the loans would have been feasible -it could have been a not very expensive addition to the bailouts - and it would have kept millions of men women and children in their homes, and prevented the predictable domino effect which you describe, but "would have been unfair to the many hardworking Americans who did not default on their mortgages."
:)
Edmund
Besides if the question was something like being asked if you want to continue with current regime where dodgy practices result in some people becoming extremely rich or try another one where your kids may end up begging for food isn't likely to result in regime change via the polls. Forgetting of course that the current system has led to many people losing their homes and large US cities turning into ghost towns.
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As I recall it, the banks were bailed out, and all those hardworking bankers kept their jobs despite managing their companies into the ground because their banks were "too big to fail"; however, it was decided not to forgive the loans on these actually valueless houses. Forgiving the loans would have been feasible -it could have been a not very expensive addition to the bailouts - and it would have kept millions of men women and children in their homes, and prevented the predictable domino effect which you describe, but "would have been unfair to the many hardworking Americans who did not default on their mortgages."
Much better to let the guilty off and punish the innocent I guess.