Countering the rising costs of photography ~ On Being A BottomFeeder

Thom Hogan has written an excellent article that observes and comments on the rising costs of photography and the sources of those costs.

Being the contrarian penny pincher that I am, I thought I'd give a few examples of how I no longer "play that game."  In fact, I've not "played that game" for decades.

When I had a job and could afford such things I would buy new pieces of camera equipment from time to time. The last new camera I bought was a Sony A6000, and that was well over ten years ago.  Though, thinking about it a moment, maybe the last new camera I bought was a Sony A5000.  The memory fades.

Most of my efforts however, even when I worked, were buying/using/selling used gear.  Hundreds and hundreds (more likely thousands) of lenses and cameras have passed through my hands over the years.  The habit carries forward into the present.

On the image processing side of things I leveraged my knowledge of and contacts with the Open Source community, and experiences of deploying large scale Linux systems.

So, my costs have been traditionally low.  I see no reason why someone truly interested in photography either as a hobby, artist, or working professional can't do something similar.

Sony A7RII, Sony FE 35mm f/2.8 ZA
RawTherapee, Digital Zone System
Pt/Pd tinted

Here are a few things I do.

Buy Used -

It seems like an obvious place to start. 

If I worried about reliability the thing I note is that most of my used cameras these days are very "low mileage."  One Sony A7 I bought had around 800 clicks on the shutter, looked well cared for, and set me back 450Euro five years ago.  Another had less than 2,000 clicks for a slightly lower price, again, five years ago.

On the other end of the spectrum, I recently picked up a Sony A7RII with 72,000 clicks for a nice low low price.  This, even though the camera remains in excellent condition and the shutter is rated for 500,000 clicks.

Similarly, used lenses can be attractively priced.  For less than the price of a new Sony A7III body (even on sale) I've been able to build an A7 kit with three fixed focal length lenses.  Two lenses are usually expensive Zeiss labeled and one is like new latest generation Sigma.  All are auto-focus, modern optics.

Thinking again about reliability, of all the used gear that's passed through my hands, there's not one single "bad deal" that I can recall. I take that back.  I bought a Fuji 240mm A f/9 large format lens many years ago that arrived with difficult to see sand-impacted front element.  It was returned for a full refund and the seller apologized.  He remembered he'd recently taken the lens to Death Valley where it had been windy.

Image Processing -

I tend not to spend too much on computers and stick to using a laptop.  Any decent quality device will do.  HP, Dell, and, hmmm... that's about it, actually.  For security reasons I assiduously avoid anything designed/manufactured/marketed by the Chinese.

Once an inexpensive computer is at hand, I wipe the disk and install a decent distribution of Linux.  That OS remains for me the most secure way of engaging the world.

On top of Linux I load the image processing applications I like.  These include RawTherapee, the Gimp, Luminance HDR, and Hugin.

I use RawTherapee for performing the "heavy lift" image processing.  When I need to "tweak" something or want work graphically I transition to the Gimp.  While I've not done a lot of HDR recently, I still low Luminance HDR, just in case.  When the bug hits and want to make my computer cry I use Hugin to stitch very large high resolution images.

Over the years I've paid close attention to differences between commercial and Open Source software capabilities.  What I've found is that Open Source software can be more complex and require more steps to accomplish common tasks.  Coming from commercial software where many potentially important details are hidden from users, Open Source software can be a little overwhelming at first.  

Part of the challenge is that there are so many options and tools and standards that is seems as if nothing is being left out.  However, and this is important to me, once I understood the tools and specifications implemented by those tools, I've come to realize there is nothing more flexible, more comprehensive, nor more accurate (in particular color management) than something like, say, RawTherapee for image processing. 

In fact, if I felt I couldn't live without Adobe "color science" or Fuji "film simulations" or Hasselblad "Natural Colors", all I'd have to do is load the .dcp and .icc files into RawTherapee and select the styles and looks I want during processing.

To back everything up, I buy new USB drives.  This is one thing I will not buy used.  New 5tb spin drives are shockingly inexpensive.  Solid State drives are becoming more affordable.  Everything, RAW files, processed images, documents, works in progress, everything, gets tossed onto a drive every so often.  And I'm tending to keep multiple backups, too, "just in case" something fails down stream.

That's just about it.  Very simple.  Very straight-forward.  Nothing fancy.  I don't pay rent on any software.  No Apple tax.  No Microsoft madness.  No Adobe rent until I die silliness.  I own my cameras and lenses outright and at as low a price as the market offers.  I don't get a boatload of noisy advertisements from the apps and OS I use.  My systems are secure, stable, extensible, and portable.

There you have it.  This is how I manage my photography eco-system costs while living on a fixed income.

Round Three ~ Nikon Nikkor 85mm f/2 Ai and Friends

[Please note: I failed to focus the 135mm Nikkor f/2.8 AiS carefully enough in this comparison. While what I write is true, it relates _only_ to this comparison.  I've gone back and re-checked the resolution wide open.  I've confirmed my earlier observations that my copy of the 135mm f/2.8 Nikkor is indeed just a touch sharper than my copy of the 105mm Nikkor-P. Which is to say, the performance of these two Nikkors are incredibly close to my copy of the Sony FE 55mm f/1.8 ZA.~ 27 December 2024]

I have bought and sold three of these over the years and I really need to stop the constant swapping and looking for "better" or "majick."  Really, I do need to stop.  So this is it.  Hopefully this will be the last Nikon Nikkor 85mm f/2 Ai I dance with.

Across the "interwebs" it's easy to read various people's comments and thoughts on nearly everything.  The word on the street is that the Nikon Nikkor-H/HC/K 85mm f/1.8 has more "character" than the f/2.  And the word on the street is that the Nikon Nikkor-P 105mm f/2.5 is sharper than the f/2 85mm.  The Nikon Nikkor 135mm f/2.8 AiS seems to be unloved.  There is no word on the street for that one that I can find.

I've at various times bought and later sold three Nikon Nikkor-H/HC/K 85mm f/1.8 lenses, so my closet is empty of those just now.  Some say it's sharper than it's younger f/2 sister.  I've not found that to be the case.  At the same time the f/1.8 "does something swirly" to the out of focus background.  If you like "swirly", that is.  Frankly, I'm a little ambivalent about "swirly" since the highlights seem to always have hard edge "cat eyes" which to me feels strange.

Using the famous Sony FE 55mm f/1.8 Zeiss as a reference (everyone who's anybody says it's fabulous ~ have I been "influenced"?) I thought I'd have another look at comparing four lenses.  Here's what I see.

Comments -

Wide open performance from best to worst:

• Sony FE 55mm f/1.8 Zeiss
• Nikon Nikkor-P (Xenotar) 105mm f/2.5 pre-Ai
• Nikon Nikkor 135mm f/2.8 AiS
• Nikon Nikkor 85mm f/2 Ai

The Sony FE 55mm f/1.8 Zeiss is a touch soft wide open.  Stopped down to f/2.8 and f/4 it is nice and sharp.  Here's the thing, I seldom shoot the Sony FE 55mm f/1.8 Zeiss less than wide open (see here for one example) and have been completely satisfied with the results.  Hold this thought.

The 105mm Nikkor-P is nearly as sharp as the Sony 55mm, with the 135mm f/2.8 AiS another eyelash behind these two.  Something I find interesting about this is that I'm looking at four different lens designs from three, maybe four different eras of commercial optical development.  Hold this thought, too.

The Nikon Nikkor 85mm f/2 Ai is the softest of the bunch wide open.  Stopped down one or two clicks cleans things up nicely.  In fact, all four lenses stopped down a click or two look remarkably similar in terms of "sharpness."  The 85mm f/2 stands out in this group of optics for it's lack of "sharpness" wide open.  It's clearly behind the other lenses seen here.

Which leads me back to held thoughts.

The 105mm Nikkor-P is the oldest design in this group and yet it is nice and sharp from wide open.  Conventional "interwebs" wisdom would have us believe it should be the softest of the bunch.  But that's not how optical design and manufacturing historically work.  How to make a sharp lens has been known and the manufacturing process well understood for over a hundred years.  To underscore this point, the Nikon Nikkor-H 50mm f/2 Gauss design is bitingly sharp from wide open.  It's not for the lack of design and manufacturing knowledge that lenses are "unsharp" wide open.

OK, then, what's going on with the pretty little Nikon Nikkor 85mm f/2 Ai? Why is it visibly softer wide open than the other lenses seen here?  After-all, it was designed sometime in the late 1970's perhaps just a couple months ahead of the very sharp from wide open 135mm f/2.8.  

Given that Nikon knows how to design lenses I have to believe that the 85mm's spherical aberrations at f/2 are intentional. The veiling spherical aberration softness at f/2 is nearly gone by f/2.8 and is completely gone from what I can tell by f/4.  If they wanted to, Nikon could have designed a bitingly sharp 85mm at f/2.

Bottom-line:   I'll bet dollars to doughnuts Nikkor 85mm f/2 was intentionally designed to be soft/sharp at f/2.  And I'll bet euros to beer that this lens was very specifically designed as a _traditional_ portrait optic.  Which is why I'm betting that at f/2 the Nikon Nikkor 85mm Ai is _meant_ to soften skin tones.  Now _here_ is a lens with "character."  The effect is _designed_ into the lens.  It's a portrait lens when shot wide open.  It's a general purpose lens when stopped down.

Have a look at the following and tell me I'm wrong.

Nikon Nikkor 85mm f/2 Ai at f/2
Sony A7RII
Electronic first curtain OFF
IBIS set to 85mm

Command Line Interface ~ Linux

Notes to self:  A few useful image processing commands for running in Linux.  All these are much faster to run from the CLI than using an app that's having to manage graphics at the same time. -

convert *.jpg -average <averaged-filename>.jpg – averaging command

convert *.jpg -evaluate-sequence median <output file-name>.jpg  - a different averaging command

mogrify -resize 1920 *.jpg – resizing command

mogrify -bordercolor black -border 10x10 *.jpg – adding a thin black edge to images

mogrify -bordercolor white -border 400x400 *.jpg – adding a white border to images

convert <filename>.<file-extension> -colorspace gray <output filename>.<file-extension> – command to convert a single image to black and white

for i in *.jpg; do convert "$i" -colorspace Gray  "BW_$i"; done – Bash script to convert a bunch of files into black and white

exiftool -a -u -s -G1 <file_name> - to read EXIF image file data

gmic -input <filename.file-extension> scale_dcci2x , cut 0,255 round output <theOutputFileName>.tif - command to perform a DCCI2x upsize

 

Digital Zone System ~ Validation Testing

I wanted to prove to myself something about a Digital Zone System that I've been working on.  

What I wanted to prove was that once I'd set up an input correction curve for each camera I own that the result would match the output of my other cameras, each with their own unique input correction curve.

The cameras I own span recent digital sensor development and manufacturing.  For this validation I chose two different formats, two different megapixel counts, and three different years sensor implementations.

In each case I spot metered the light area to Zone 7 and let the shadows fall where they will.  I did this because in digital I meter for the highlights and process for the shadows.  Keeping in mind, of course, this is the exact opposite of what we do with film.

Here's what I see ->

 

 

To my eyes this is an excellent match. Each input correction curve accurately matches the 1EV step as described by the original Zone System and adapted here to digital.

So here's a little game.  Want to win a free beer?  Tell me which camera made which image.

For me that's an easy bet for the house.  I seriously doubt anyone will be able to pass this test.  In fact, it's rather irrelevant.  Though it does make the point that if we understand our tools and set up our processing environments correctly, manufacturer to manufacturer variations, sensor to sensor variations, and generation to generation developments can all be "leveled" to the point good image making doesn't depend on tools as much as some would have us believe.

Digital Zone System ~ 0EV as Zone 5 RawTherapee processing example

The prior Digital Zone System posts laid the foundation for actual image processing.  I now share an example of processing a 0EV as Zone 5.

Simplifications ~

I don't want to spend my time metering using a spot meter.  Instead, I let the in-camera matrix metering system do its "thang" as I feel its more than "good enough" for the kinds of scenarios I find myself in.  Using the in-camera spot-meter is always an option in those cases where I feel it would be of benefit to meter more carefully.

0EV as Zone 5 input correction curves work well for 95% of my work.  Scenes tend to be flatly lit.  Often whites slide down the tonal scale and blacks crawl up, which means the tones I want to manage are all on the linear portion of the curve.

-1EV as Zone 5 input correction curves work well for me in high contrast situations, such as brightly lit, strong contrast situations.  In those cases (around 5% of my personal work) I see a benefit for expanding tonal separation in the light areas.  Certainly I can shoot everything at -1EV and process accordingly, but this really isn't necessary (see prior paragraph).  Besides, as ISO rises, so can noise in the shadow areas. 

I put as many settings tuned the way I want into the input correction curve recipe that I've saved from my calculations as possible.  These include Capture Sharpen, vignetting the edges, auto-lens correction, luminance exposure curves, luminosity black and white conversion, and a Camera Profile that interacts well with the luminosity conversion for maximum tonal separation in a single action.

RawTherapee 0EV as Zone 5 Image Processing ~

Opening an Image

 

Essential Elements -

• AMaZE de-mosaic used for low ISO images
• LMMSE de-mosaic is selected for ISO > +/- 1000 (depending on the sensor)
   

Applying Input Correction Tone Curve

Essential Elements -

• Luminosity Black and White conversion
• Luminance exposure curves 1 and 2
• Auto-lens Correction
• Capture Sharpen
• Vignetting the edges to taste
• Camera Profile with "Tone Curve" disabled 

Note: For my work I like Sony Standard and Vivid Camera Profiles.  In concert with Luminosity Black and White conversion they give additional tonal separation, this time in the color dimension (where the Digital Zone System is applying tonal separation in the exposure dimension).

Setting Black and White Curve Points

Essential Elements -

• Watching the histogram to verify where pure white and black is in the image, move Tone Curve 2's end points
• Upper right edge of the curve is white
• Lower left edge of the curve is black

In this example I see by examining the histogram in the upper left corner of the display that the highlights are correctly expressed. So all I needed to do was move the bottom left corner of Tone Curve 2 slightly to the right to get the blacks to turn pure black (again, see the histogram in the above image).

Note:  I realize many software do not offer a second Tone Curve.  In those cases it might be worth exploring other tone tools.  There should be tools with sliders for setting the black and white points.  I don't want to disturb the carefully constructed input correction curve.

Rotation, Cropping and Vignetting

Essential Elements -

• Align the verticals/horizontals to taste by rotating the image (where necessary)
• Crop the image to taste (since I tend to crop in-camera I often just shoot at 4:3 and call it good)
• An overall Vignette is already set in my input correction curve recipe, but...
• Now is a good time for me to dodge/burn or add vignette (as I've done to the bottom of the image in this example)

Adding a Pt/Pd Tone

Essential Elements -

•  I've found I enjoy the tints and tones of Pt/Pd images and have created and stored as recipes a number of tints that I can select from
  

Output Image

Essential Elements -

• For the "internets" is downsize the original image, and...
• I often ask the software sharpen the output once more
  

With relatively few inputs I'm able to generate a rather pleasing image (to me, at least).  Every tone is properly expressed.  Nothing is "blocked up."  The light areas positively "glow." 

Digital Zone System (Part Six) ~ Resources and Inspiration

I'm concerned that I've missed something or that I've misunderstood things.  Are there errors in my own thinking and methods?  No doubt.  If readers would like to help me better understand, I'm all ears.

Resources ~

Other than a ton of YouTube videos that erroneously describe how to meter for the Zone System in digital, there are few resources on the internets (again, thank ewe George Bush the Younger). 

Alan Ross Photography:  Can the Zone System Go Digital?

Photography Cheat Sheet: Using the Zone System for Ideal Exposures

Zone VI workshop - the fine print by Fred Picker - One of the most important Zone System references from the film era 

Zone System Manual by Minor White - This is the reference I used.  There's an "eye match" method for setting up the Zone System with film that I found to be very useful. Unfortunately the link to this is just a sample, so if you're interested you'll have to find a used book somewhere.

Another look at the Zone System (film and early digital)

I started a conversation on Pixls.us on the topic.

On Zone System evolution - Zone 9 was pure white early on, and later was changed to Zone 10?  I never knew this and am left wondering why the change?

What I've decribed as a Digital Zone System is not without its dissenters. There is a well-known commenter on camera gear who said -

"For me, it means forget the Zone System when you’re using digital cameras, except as a way to describe tones. Compared to the tools available on modern cameras, it’s crude and in accurate..."

Take from it what you will.

Inspiration ~

When I recently restarted work on a Digital Zone System my earlier life came flooding back.  

I was heavily influenced by Ansel Adams and Minor White for what they had to say about the technical aspects of the film-based Zone System.  I used a Pentax 1degree Spotmeter and calibrated my films and processing to the best of my abilities.  I read through Fred Pickers book on the Zone System, too.  Every photography exhibition I could find in the LA Basin saw my shadow on its doorstep.  Looking at what was possible in expressing a final image impressed me greatly. 

Here are just a few photographers who's works can inspire me, even today.

• Alan Ross ~ assistant to Ansel Adams
• Bruce Barnbaum
• Carl Weese 
• Chris Rainier
• John Sexton ~ assistant to Ansel Adams
• Paul Caponigro 
• Ray McSavaney ~ I wish I'd known of him earlier
• Tillman Crane

 

Bugatti Royale
Sony A6300, Sigma 30mm f/2.8 EX DN
-1EV as Zone 5
Pt/Pd tints added in processing

Digital Zone System (Part Five) ~ Tonal Separation In Three Ways

The Digital Zone System that I've written about here on my blog is just one aspect of controlling tonal separation in black and white digital photography.  

There are two other areas of control that I will now take into consideration.  Taken in total, these controls allow for much greater flexibility and ease in monochrome image creation than us old film workers could ever have imagined.

Here are three areas of tonal separation.

• Digital Zone System ~ tonal separation by exposure value
• Luminosity Black and White Conversion ~ tonal separation by Human Perception Modeling
• Color Contrast Management ~ usually thought of as filtration for color separation (as we did when shooting with B&W film)
  

Digital Zone System ~

As I've already covered in depth methods for controlling the Digital Zone System, I'd like to stress just one thing.  Even though I've written a lot about using -1EV as Zone 5, I've found that generating an input correction curve for 0EV as Zone 5 can yield excellent results.  Not the least of which can be a measured improvement in all the work I've done over the years before coming to the realization of the benefits of shooting -1EV as Zone 5.

Luminosity Black and White Conversion ~

While I've written about the benefits of performing a RawTherapee Luminosity black and white conversion, I believe it's worth revisiting the subject in light of the Digital Zone System.

First, I never use simple desaturation.  As readers will recall, Human Perception Modeling shows how viewers of black and white images see the tones of red, green, blue differently.  Desaturation makes the tones of equal energy colors the exact same tones of gray.  I don't want that.

Luminosity conversion from digital color into monochrome takes into account how humans see red, green, and blue.  In short, Luminosity conversion when combined with the Digital Zone System gives us a further improvement in tonal separation. 

Second, there is a color management detail that applies directly to tonal separation in black and white work. In Camera Profile there are several  selections. One is "Tone Curve" and two others are "Base Table" and "Look."  "Base Table" and "Look" manage colors.

With the Digital Zone System I disable "Tone Curve" because I insert control over the exposure value tonal range by applying an input correction curve.

Enabling either a standard or vivid Camera Profile and enabling "Base Table" and "Look" corrects colors at the post-demosaic stage.  This is important.  The process now becomes:

• Apply input correction curve
• Specify a standard or vivid (for increased color contrast) Camera Profile
• Disable "Tone Curve"
• Enable "Base Table"
• Enable "Look"

• Select Luminosity black and white conversion

We now have tonal separation in two flexible, controllable, and measurable dimensions.

Color Contrast Management ~

Now that we have tonal separation manged two ways, Digital Zone System and Luminosity Human Perception Modeling, we can add a third.

Using the Channel Mixer we can approximate filters used in black and white film work.  For instance, we can use a red filter to deepen blues, yellow filters to lighten greens, and blue-green filters to approximate the color spectrum response of Orthochromatic and wet-plate collodion.  Further, there is sufficient flexibility in the Channel Mixer that we can create any filter we want.

The use of these tools is less measurable and more "intuitive."  We can change settings until we like what we see. 

Taken in total, we now have tonal separation in three flexible, and controllable dimensions.

 

Sony A6000, Sigma 19mm f/2.8 EX DN
-1EV as Zone 5 Digital Zone System
Pt/Pd tints applied in processing