2015 Salon de la Photo - Part One - Cameras and Lenses

Wherein I Pontificate in a most Pontificative Manner.  That is to say, here in image and word are my Rather Highly Opinionated views of the 2015 Salon de la Photo, Paris.

Warning: I'm more than a little cranky.

Leica

Great toys for those with money to burn and a need to impress The Great Unknowing Unwashed.

But why?  Because Leica can sell enough to keep production lines open?  Because the world economy is doing well enough that Every Man can dream of owning one and there are enough Hedge Fund Thieves and an enormous emerging Chinese Upper Class?  I can't understand what they're doing outside the context of wealth doing what wealth does.

Maybe it's the price one pays for Bragging Rights.  But to brag over what?    Images coming from these devices are virtually indistinguishable from any other imaging device.  Seriously.  Look anywhere in the world at any image and tell me "... now _that_ was made with a Leica..."  You can't.  So there.

Sigma

Sigma makes some very nice optics and sells them for nearly reasonable prices.  It was good to see my old 300-800mm f/5.6 EX HSM.  I miss that old lens, but it was impractical to use here in France.  It's long, big, and heavy.  Yet I dream of the days when I photographed Bufflehead ducks on the run.  For those dreams I've picked up a smaller and nearly as long Bigron 150-600mm SP, so life isn't all woe and pain.

Sigma had their new 24mm f/1.4 Art lens on display.  It looks like the other lenses in the family of Art optics for DSLRs.  It's big, heavy, and sharp (from what other people report).  If I could put up with the mass and size of a DSLR, one of each of Sigma's Art lenses could do the trick.

As if to prove Sigma can keep up with other players in the lens market in terms of size, weight, and Other Insanity, the team showed off their ever popular 200-500mm f/2.8 Monster.  Yep.  Just what one needs... um... when?  I have no idea, when.  Huh.  Silly, this.  Just because you can, does it mean you should?  [see Zeiss in the following section]


Zeiss

Et voila!  More True Insanity.  You can't see it here, but this lens is nearly the size of a small child.  Zeiss seems to be showing they can build the Very Best lenses commercially available.  Still, this is ludicrous.  I suspect the Very Well Heeled will be the only folks ever to buy these.  The question is, will they ever use them?  As I said, just because you can, does it mean you should?

To balance this snarky attack, I was happy to see Zeiss is still capable of building small if not still expensive lenses in various sizes and shapes.  While one must come from the Rather Well Heeled Upper Classes to be able to buy them, at least a few aforementioned persons can carry them somewhere.  This means those lenses stand a chance of actually being used to, well, photograph something.

Panasonic

It's interesting to me that Panasonic and Olympus have selected the same spec sensor, a micro 4/3rds.  It's even more interesting to me just how different the two manufacturers have approached the same format.  Panasonic feels to me much more like a video than a stills imaging company.  Their GX7 and GX8 cameras feel larger and heavier in the hand than a Canon SL1/100D DSLR.

I also checked out Panasonic's FZ300 and FZ1000 "bridge" superzoom cameras.  [shaking my head]  What's going on?  These things are as big and heavy as any of Nikon or Canon's entry-level DSLR.   Why would a person buy a "bridge" camera when the flexibility of lens interchangeability of a DSLR package is no heavier nor larger?  What's the differentiation/market placement story?  Price?  Nope.  Size/weight?  Nope.  Flexibility?  Tough call.  Bizarre, me-thinks.


Fuji

Back when men were men and cameras used film, Fuji was a great film manufacturer and offered sometimes interesting cameras in which to load their great film.  Fast forward to the Digital Era and it seems as if Fuji's old camera tooling have been pulled out of mothballs and pressed into further use.  The sizes of their cameras and lenses really haven't changed in, what?, 40 years.  From what I read, their sensors haven't changed all that much, either.

So, what do we have in Fuji?  Well, if you're an Old Fart like me, then these devices can seem familiar and I'll bet you'll know instantly how to use one.

In fact, if I didn't mind the Old Film Era camera size and if I could only own one camera for, say, the next 5 years, I might be tempted by Fuji's X100T.  But only as long as I could have the two focal length converters on offer as well.  The shutter is silent and the flash sync speed goes to the moon, which can come in handy when shooting in full, er, sun.

Canon

Where to begin?  What is the company willing to do to enter into a new century?  When are they going to wake up?  Yes, the 20D, and 5D MkII were ground breaking devices in the way they opened markets and wallets and enabled image making creativity, but times change.

Take the SL1/100D, for instance.  Indeed, it's the smallest DSLR currently available.  But that's it.  No WiFi.  No GPS (for those who don't mind the NSA and Apple tracking them).  No swivel LCD display.  No top of industry sensor (it relies on a rapidly aging-fab 18mpixel APS-C).  Why would anyone want one when they could have something at similar prices that give broader capabilities?

It was fascinating to see all the "Pros" walking the show with their "Pro" badges on lanyards around the neck and Canon 5DSR + battery grip + 24-70 f/2.8 L-glass slung over the shoulder.  When they set them on a countertop to talk "shop" with makers of smaller, more capable cameras it was obvious Canon is selling to dinosaurs.  Sure, there are a LOT of dinosaurs out there.  Yet in two years I doubt Canon will be the Pro Camera of Choice.

Sony

Everyone was swooning over Sony's new A7rII Super Toy.  It's nice.  It's feature packed.  It's heavy.  It felt like picking up a semi-pro camera from Nikon or Canon.  Where is the mirrorless size/weight advantage?  And don't give me that "big hands" argument requiring big cameras.  That's _not_ what the Mirrorless Revolution was about.  I find this camera just plain silly heavy.

I took a moment to check out Sony's RX10II "bridge" camera.  As with Panasonic's product offerings in this space I'm gob-smacked.  The camera is huge and rather heavy.  An entry-level DSLR...  um... I've already covered what I feel about that (see "Panasonic" above).

By contrast, Sony's RX1 is an absolute jewel of a photographic imaging device.  It's nice and small.  It's powerful.  It's feature packed.  The new version even comes with EVF built in.  Yes, it has a fixed focal length lens, but how many lenses do you really want and need?  Yes, it's expensive.  Um, and that's why I can't have one.  I have to put this one on the lower end of Pure Camera Bling.  It's on the same scale where I put Leica (with those German devices much nearer the upper end of the Camera As Bling Insanity).

Olympus

Lovely little cameras, these.  Like Fuji, Olympus seems to have dusted off their old film camera tooling when they started making these.  But in the case of Olympus, they started out with small cameras in the first place and their modern image makers remain pleasantly small and comfortable in the hand.

Last year Olympus announced a wonderful looking little lens.  It's an f/2.8 zoom that would be interesting when coupled to their 1.4x teleconverter.  The setup is small for this kind of telephoto magnification.  I'd be tempted if I wasn't already heavily invested in my Sony gear.

IMNSHO, Olympus offers wonderful gear for making stills images.  While I'm sure their video capabilities are more than adequate, it's their Old Time film camera feel that seem "right."   They're smaller than Fuji and not much larger than the Masters of Small Sony APS-C NEX.  Olympus has put an impressive level of technology into a small and supremely capable package.  If you're truly an Old Fart and want film-camera era "feel" to your gear, these guys seem to do the job the way the Photographic Gods meant it to be.

Conclusions

It's obvious that consumers of imaging/video products have many many wonderful products to choose from.  The manufacturers are doing their best to get you to separate you from you money in exchange for a nice camera and lens.  Competition is sharp.  Any of these devices is quite capable of helping a photographer achieve very high levels of image quality.

One way at looking at choosing a new imaging tool is to decide if you want a camera from a traditional gear manufacturer or if you prefer the networking interconnect capabilities provided by electronics suppliers.  I can see where Old Farts (like myself) could take the first approach and where newer generations of folks could feel more comfortable with something from an electronics company.

In this vein, I think traditionalists could be very very happy with something from Olympus.  If they don't mind a slightly larger package, Fuji makes some great things.  Watching how images are consumed leads me to believe that Canon and Nikon's pools of "pro" consumers backed by Big Wads of money for Big Telephotos with Big Apertures are living on borrowed time (even as they're loosing their high paying photography jobs at a horrific pace).

For those who grew up on electronics (or in my case, helped develop the tech in the first place), gear from someone like Sony could be a safe bet for stepping further down the road into a well networked high image quality future.  Like so many people I'm working with little APS-C mirrorless cameras to capture something, WiFi it to a tablet, process it, and then upload it directly to the 'net.  This, as far as I can see, is where image making "lives."  Present, not future, tense.

Sign of Insanity?

In my last post I mentioned having too many 85mm lenses.  What I didn't mention is that two of them had problems of one kind or another.  One had oil on the aperture blades which were only was reliable wide open (that is, completely out of the line of light, as it were).  The other's focusing mechanism sounded like it was an old straight cut tooth gearbox grinding itself to death.

After watching a few lens disassembly videos over on YouTube I realized these problems weren't really all that hard to correct.  I just needed to pick up a couple tools from the local bricolage (hardware store in this part of the world).

The aperture blade cleaning cleansing operation took 30mins from start to finish.  The Nikon 85mm f/2 Ai is now fully operational.  Happiness ensued just before lunch.

Lunch consisted of a salad, bread, figs, and chocolate.  This was good armament for the next task.

Field stripping an old Nikon 85mm f/1.8 K is rather different than working on a newer model optic.   I was a little surprised at the suddeness of seeing a whole heavy collection of glass resting in my hand.  All I'd done is remove the forward retaining ring.  That was all.  I was concerned, but still I was able to quickly sort things out.

Once inside the focusing mechanism I could see the lens had spent far too much time at the beach.  Sand was working it's way into the threads.  Ack!  Out came the denatured alcohol and the Q-tips.  An hour later everything was put to right and the lens was reassembled.

I pursued Nikon's early 85mm design "H" and "K" (same optical formula) because they behave very similarly to the Helios 40 Russian lenses in the treatment of the out of focus areas.  That is, they all "look" very similar to the 1800's Petzval lenses.  Yes, this has been all the rage, recently.  Which is, no doubt, why I felt I needed to "check it out" for myself.  OK.  Call me a Fad Follower.  ;-)

I really enjoy fixing mechanical things like this and today was particularly successful.  I now have three fully functional toys of, well, all the very same focal length.  What to do?  Until I figure that out, it's a champagne kind of night, me-thinks.  It's time to celebrate.

Yet another lens comparison... 50 to 85 millimeters...

I can't help myself.  Really.  I can't.  I should probably seek help.

I found a very very nice Nikon Nikkor 85mm f/1.8 K multi-coated c.1977 optic.  Legion are the comments by people who claim this is the most amazing 85mm Nikkor ever made.  The claim is that the sharpness is incredible.  It's supposed to be superior to modern glass, according to some pundits.

When we returned to the US to clear out our storage unit I picked up an earlier single coated "H" version of the lens.  The one I picked up is much sharper then the first copy I owned some years ago., and it's resolution is very similar to the Nikon 85mm f/2 Ai and Pentax 85mm f/1.9 Takumar (which I sadly sold).

I was, therefore, interested in seeing how the God of Gods (the "K" version of the Nikkor) behaved.  If the talking heads were right, the "K" lens would demonstrate optical qualities "to die for".

And while I was at it, why not take Yet Another Comparative Look at a few 50mm lenses, too?

Using a Sony A6000 mounted to a very stout tripod with the shutter released on a 2 second timer, here is a list of the lenses I compared ->

• Sigma 60mm f/2.8 Art DN - this acted as my "control", since it's perfect from wide open
• Nikon 85mm f/1.8 "K" - the new multi-coated c.1977 toy
• Nikon 85mm f/1.8 "H" - the old single coated c. 1971 toy
• Nikon 50mm f/1.8 E - a 25Euro lens I picked up at the Bievre photoswap this year
• Nikon 50mm f/1.4 pre-Ai - I've had this forever and wish I'd sold it and kept the 50mm f/1.2
• Helios 58mm f/2 44M-4 - a 24Euro lens I picked up a couple years ago
• Sony 55-210 SEL OSS - a cheap compact zoom I picked up at Bievre this year, too

Take a look at the comparison at 100% resolution to more clearly see subtle and not so subtle differences between all this glass.



Findings -

• With old manual focus glass, stopping down one stop brilliantly clears up the center of a scene.  Even the cheapest lenses perform very well stopped down one click from wide open.
• Modern AF glass (Sigma, Sony) can be wonderously glorious from wide open.
• The focal reducer I own (Zonghyi Lens Turbo II) introduces rather obvious focus shift as I stop lenses down from wide open.  The lesson is to focus at the aperture setting I shoot at when using the Lens Turbo II.
• The biggest differences between the various lenses is how quickly, or not, the edges of a scene clean up as I stopped the lenses down.
• Optical performance neither degrades nor improves with the use of a focal reducer.

I like debunking myth and legend by direct comparisons.  This leaves little room for interpretation.  Either something is clear superior to something else, or it's not.  So what do I feel I've debunk?  Two things, actually.

First, I was led to believe the "K" lens was a Gift from the Gods.  I read this on many sites after doing a little research using the Force (Google).  Reviewing my results here the Nikon Nikkor 85mm f/1.8 K Ai is not demonstrably "better" than other not so legendary lenses.  Yes, it's good, but it's not that good.  Just look at the Sigma and Sony cheap zoom performance and you may see what I mean.

Second, claims are often made that focal reducers can improve resolution by shrinking the area of coverage (in this case going from full frame coverage to APS-C).  People think it's logical that when you shrink optical coverage that resolution would increase (in this case by 1.5x), but that is not how optical physics work.  Look at the 85mm "K" lens comparison between the Zonghyi Lens Turbo II and the lens mounted on an adapter that comes without focal reducing optics.

Yes, I need another project to take my mind off such silliness.  Lenses are lenses.  It's hard to find a bad one in the bunch.

Don't believe everything you read on the 'net, no matter how "right" nor how "good" something might feel.  Do your own comparisons and you might see that reality is a bit different than all that.

Ever onward...

OK.  Don't say you've not been warned.  Things may change.  Again.

Here's an interesting idea for integrating multiple optics, multiple sensors, and software to create a flexible very high resolution imaging solution in a very small space.

What got my attention was their article that predicts the death of DSLRs by 2025.  While such statements are easy to make from the point of view of the adoption of mirrorless cameras, I think it's possible that both camera styles could very well go out of style if this new device catches on.

Of course it'll be fun to see if these guys actually succeed or if their product fails to capture the minds and hearts of image-makers.

Coming attractions...

So... what to do in the coming months?  Here are a few ideas -

• DONE - 3 October, 2015 - Paris Zombie Walk - Looking for people with bits falling off in the most ghastly manner possible?  Then this will be the place to be!  If the weather holds I'll likely try my hand at erecting a backdrop and posing the recent near dead in front of le fond.
• DONE - 5-9 November, 2015 - Salon de la Photo - Looking to fondle and touch camera gear and maybe see a few good images or buy some new piece of kit?  This is a huge trade show and all the big photo-companies have their wares on display.  I bought my lovely Sony A6000 at this show last year.  Seriously, all the tasty stuff is here.
• DONE - 27-29 November, 2015 - Vingerons Independent - Looking for a good time or to get lost sampling wine from over 1,100!!! independent producers?  Looking for a reason to walk funny after a few hours of sampling the goods, as it were?  Looking to stock up the cave for the winter? Besides, you _know_ you need help processing those images and the Gift of Bacchus could be just the new "app" you need to "enhance" your sense of creativity.
• 10 January, 2016 - la traversee de Paris - Old cars.  Old motorcycles.  700+ vehicles running the streets of Paris.  Free.  Liberated.  Fun.  Fun.  Fun.  This will be the winter edition and the past three years have been surprisingly dry, if not a little cold.  I hope by saying this I don't jinx the next year's event.
• 3-7 February, 2016 - Retromobile - Old cars.  Old motorcycles.  LOTS of photo-opportunities. I've visited this place every year since moving here.  It's just wonderful.
• 7 February, 2016 - Carnival Parade - Paris is trying to revive it's ancient tradition of celebrating Mardi Gras.  Last year the best groups were from the Americas and boy did they put on a show!
• 6 March, 2016 - Fetes de Femmes - I missed this event last year.  Can't remember why.  But... women and men show up dressed as a queen.  It sounds like fun.  We'll have to see... er... wait.  Hold on.  I'll be away for the month of March.  Something about needing to replenish our supply of porto.  Damn!  Well, a person needs to do what a person needs to do, right?  Good luck.  Have a great time.  

That is all.

This is a rather odd position to be giving a loved one a scalp massage, isn't it?

Textures...

Sometimes an image making theme just shows up all on it's own.  There's nothing I can do when this happens, or so it seems.


This week saw my wife and I on an early metro headed north so she could make an appointment she'd made well before the summer heat had hit us hard.  It was now Fall cool. I tagged along as we enjoy each others company.  Packing my super cheap super small super light camera and lens I wandered off to find something interesting to do.  Inevitably this lead me to a cemetery.

I can spend hours wandering around a good cemetery.  Europe seems to be filled with them so I'm well entertained.  They tend to be quiet and unvisited by tourists and the place I found myself in was just steps away from one of the most tourist crowded places on Planet Earth.  Yet, there I was, all alone with a few feral cats, a couple of squawking crows, and a commanding view of the backsides of rather old artists lofts.  In short, I had the place to myself.


After the usual 20 minutes that it takes to enter into an artist's "mind-space", I discovered one interesting thing after another.  There was something about the light and shapes that captured my mind's eye.  I knew there was a thing or two to be revealed in processing the works later, but I wasn't sure exactly what.

We met friends visiting from our old home town after my wife's appointment.  The man is a photographer too.  He was the one who introduced me to a man who taught me to make hand coated platinum/palladium prints.  He also introduced me to a group of photographers who enjoyed, once a month, sitting around talking "shop" and drinking beers.  I learned a lot from everyone and wish I could meet a group nice people like that here.  It was good to see Patrick and his wife, Mary Jo, again after our several years of living overseas.

The next day I started working on the cemetery images.  I played with the processing just a bit, et voila, suddenly I saw what I'd felt when working the cemetery.  Texture!  Oh, and what pretty texture it is, too.  I had a whole collection of beautiful texture images.


I have to smile at this.  Most of the time I have a very clear idea of what I want and how I will proceed before I start a photo-session.  Not this time.  Serendipity had her way with me.  All I had to do was follow her lead.

The album of images from my hour and fifteen minutes I spent in this magical place can be found on my Flickr site.

Perspectives...

I very much enjoyed the video found in Luminous Landscapes recent article on image making.  I particularly liked Brooks Jensen's point of view.

Have a look and see what you think.

I learned something that I hadn't realized.  Until recently, photo reproduction in magazines and books seldom matched original print quality.  This influenced _how_ we looked at images.

It's pretty easy to understand that even as original print and book or magazine publishing quality approach eachother, _how_ we look at images is strongly influenced by the technologies we now use.

There are some very important insights in these things.  The challenge is how to understand them and use them in my own work.


Yesterday I saw something linked from SonyAlpha Rumors that made me smile.  A German blogger shared his realization that even cheap camera gear can make wonderful images.

It sounded like something I might have said more than a time or two over the years.

Pausing for just a moment...

I tend to push myself.  Hard.  Seldom do I feel my work is "good enough."  Good enough for what? you might ask.  Well, good enough to please me.



The benchmark of excellence are published images in major media journals (of course) as well as, and more importantly, coming from a carefully honed sensibility that I have developed over my 50 years of pushing the little shutter release button.  Er, am I really that old?  I guess so.  Nevertheless, I have what I feel is a very clear idea of what's "good" and what most definitely is not.

So when I stop just a moment a take a look back I'm sometimes surprised.

Take, for example, my recent trip au Mans to try taking a few photos of the Grand Prix de France MotoGP.  I went equipped with all the things I felt were needed for successful image making.  My little sweet Sony A6000 shot in RAW on Continuous AF flipping along at 10fps was the foundation.  Add to this a Tamron 150-600mm SP superzoom and a Sony adapter with translucent mirror (which gets the AF speed up to "acceptable") and a very sturdy (good enough for 8x10inch large format film cameras) Manfrotto tripod.


My hope/desire was to make the kinds of images I drooled over in Cycle magazine in the decade before they went suddenly and very sadly out of business.  Cycle World took over, if memory serves, but the articles and photos were never ever the same again.  There was a certain panache about Cycle that I dearly miss.  There are certain articles about a Kawasaki 550cc GPz motor'd Bimoto as well as a very lovely Ducait 851 that stand out in my mind, even after all these years, as truly outstanding articles illustrated by equally fine photographs.

I'm not sure where to find these kinds of images these days.  The old magazine publishers have different goals these days.  Instagram, Tumblr, and Flickr don't seem to carry the kinds of reportage images of major sports events I like, either.  The on-line sports outlets offer mainly videos to illustrate and report on events.  The format of those sites isn't suited to the need/desire for high quality stills.  Yet, in my Mind's Eye I can still see and clearly (hopefully) remember how things Used To Be.


I thought a lot about how to proceed once I was track-side.  I had no special Press Pass, so I needed to shoot from the spectator's areas.  These tend to be a long ways away from the action, which meant the Tamron super-zoom would be pressed hard into use at the long end of it's focal length range.  This would be a challenge as AF speeds tend to slow at smaller (f/6.3-ish) apertures and the bikes would be circulating at a great rate of knots (as Henry Manny was known to write in Road and Track during the 1960's).  I needed to think carefully about aperture, shutter speed, and ISO, too.  I didn't want too much "noise" to show up in the shadow areas and I knew that I'd be working under a thick cloud layer (it even rained for a short time), but there wasn't much I could do about that, other than to rely on careful image processing.

Of the thousands of images I took that day in le Mans only a few are sharp enough to express the kinds of things I wanted to say.  At first I was disappointed at the "hit rate" being so low.  Giving the whole experience time to unfold, however, I've come to realize just how happy I am with the results.


Gods! many of these are critically sharp and would print very easily to 30x40inches.  I'm not sure how much better I could get.  Well, perhaps with a little faster AF capability (PDAF on a future Sony A7000 comes quickly to mind) I could improve my "hit rate."  But as for basic, solid images that give me pleasure and might "stand the test of time", my current setup and the images I now have in hand are just fine.

When I review my work now it's easy for me to remember the sights and sounds of the whole experience of being at le Mans to watch one of my favorite pastimes; motorcycle racing.

This was a dream come true.  I have a few photos that go some ways to sharing this experience with others, too.

Working backwards...

Laying in bed the other nigh musing my typical musings I thought how nice it would be to emulate the old Pictorialist's work.

On our last visit to the Orsay Museum I found a copy of the Taschen published complete series of Camera Work.  In the check-out line there were two people in front of us.  We waited and watched as a tourist had their credit card several times rejected, followed by a long conversation of how the purchase could be completed, with even more tongue wagging, and I could feel my impatience rising like a bonfire.  I put the book back on the shelf and my wife and I walked out leaving the tourist and the vendeuse to work things out.

The images in the Camera Work publications are beautiful.  Well, they are to me, at least.  I may have a copy of the Taschen re-release some day soon.  I've seen it on sale around the city this year.  Until then I can simply "use the Force" (Google) to find examples of the Camera Work photogravures.

Today before lunch that old Wild Hair hit me hard.  We had pears.  We had a little light.  I had my really inexpensive photo-setup (250Euro Sony A5000 + 100Euro Sigma 30mm f/2.8 EX DN E).  So, why not try my hand to something?  Anything.

Here's the image I chose to emulate.

Here's my original straight out of the camera image.

Passing this through the Gimp - Colors - Components - Channel Mixer, I played with the RGB channels to get a set of tones similar to the inspirational photo.

Looking at the target image you can see a texture that looks a lot like paper.  So I opened a photo that I'd taken of a page I found in an old book, put it in a layer over my work in progress, converted it to pure black and white and set the Blend Mode to Grain Merge.  Using the Opacity slider I tried to find a "nice balance" between the texture intensity and my work in progress so as to not hide the details I wanted to retain.

Then I opened the Gimp - Colors - Curves and looked at the target photo's tonal range.  Returning to my image I matched as closely as I could the inspirational photo's curve.  

I worked deliberately in this order so that the textured image tonal range could be made to match the inspirational image in this early step.  As I take further steps I'm able to re-match the inspirational images tonal range by making small Curves adjustments.

I felt my work in progress was still a little to modern and sharp.  So I passed it through the Gimp - FX_Foundary - Light and Shadow - Gothic Glow filter.  I again chose different opacities for the various filter layers so as to not overpower my base work in progress.

I checked the softened image's tonal range against the inspirational photo and made what I'll call minor tweaks to bring it into line one last time with the target result.  Then using the Gimp - Color - Map - Sample Colorize I "borrowed" the inspirational image's tones and put them on my work in progress.

My work (top) and Ed Steichen's inspirational photo (bottom) -

With this I was able to declare victory and look forward to the image next project.  The total project time from image capture through to final product was less than 5 minutes.

Looking critically at the inspirational image and you'll see that my photos' tones contain just a little too much micro-contrast in the shadow areas and the highlights are not quite as muted as the inspiration photo, either.  Still, I'm very happy I was able to get as close as I could to the original.

Vividly - II ~ portfolio release

A month ago I released "Vividly", a portfolio of dramatic color.  Since then I have made additional expeditions around the city and found color waiting for me nearly everywhere I went.  So, I am releasing a second body of work.  It's called, naturally enough, "Vividly - II".

Additionally, the first version of "Vividly" has been very slightly re-worked.  I wanted to bring some of the text forward on the page, so I changed the background images.  I also made minor tweaks here and there and re-released the work (quietly) to Dropbox.

You can find "Vividly" the first (now slightly re-worked) portfolio, here.

While working on "Vividly" I realized that much has changed in my technical approach to image making.  For years after first entering digital photography I used big, heavy image making tools from the then leading manufacturer of such things.  I used their big, heavy, and hugely expensive lenses, too.  I would carry perhaps 10 or more pounds of camera gear.  Yes, I was pleased with the results, but the dent in my shoulder from hauling all that stuff around grew rather deep and tended to ache as I aged.

Times change.

I now find myself using small, very light weight tools.  Shooting "Vividly" consisted of a single camera and a single lens. The kit weighs less than 1 pound and the dent in my shoulder has gone away.  No more aches and pains after a day spent searching for artistic opportunities.  More importantly to my viewers my images are now crisper and sharper.  This improvement in image quality comes as a direct result of continued research, development and application of sensor technologies.

The new tools allow me greater flexibility than my old technique.  This frees me up to concentrate on the final image by more fully experiencing the world around me.  The changes in photo-technique allow me to enjoy the city and to concentrate on life, the universe, and everything (thank you, Douglas Adams).  And to think that back in the Age of Dinosaurs, long before digital photography, I used to pursue my art with very large format film cameras that weighed up to 60 pounds.

Yes, times change.

I enjoyed creating the first "Vividly" portfolio so much that as I discovered more bold colors around here I knew I had to create a second portfolio.

This second work seems to me to be a slightly stronger than the first as there is more consistency between the images, composition, and subject matter.  While some of the colors are not quite as bold as in the first portfolio, the details and tones still seem to nicely fit the overall structure of the work.  To me this second portfolio "flows" better than the first.

As always, I appreciate feedback.

With that, here is a link to my latest 44 image portfolio entitled "Vividly - II".

Vividly and Somnathpura ~ two rather different portfolios released

It is a little unusual that I'm able to release two completed bodies of work at the same time.

First is a free teaser to much longer work of platinum tinted images of the temple at Somnathpura, Mysore District, Karnataka, India.

The link to the Somnathpura work is found here.


The second is a work of 36 bold color images.  The portfolio contains small scenes of bold color details I found in Paris.  This is distributed for free in it's entirety for personal viewing only.

The link to Vividly is found here.

Both portfolios seem to view well on high resolution tablets.  The works fit the common Android screen aspect ratio, and commonly available viewing software make these equally beautiful to view on iPad tablets, too.

If you have any questions or feedback for me, please feel free to contact me.

Thanks for looking.

Another thought...

I think looking for the "perfect" camera or lens allows people to engage in the research while never having to lift a finger to make a decent image.  It's like a painter looking for the "perfect" brush and saying that until he finds it, he can't make a great painting.

I'm glad I'm looking for understanding and not perfection.  Now how's THAT for rationalization???   :-)

... before we set off on another project...

When we think about "sharpness" in a photographic image, we can look at two things.  The first is "resolution".  The second is "contrast".

Resolution should be by now obvious to readers of this blog.  I've talked long and hard about it.  In short, it's the ability of an imaging system to accurately render a scene to the limits of the sensor. A USAF Resolution Test Chart can be used to measure resolution. Optical effects generally play little part in resolution, except where a lenses spherical aberrations or chromatic aberrations are clearly visible.  Other than this, the image sensor is the limiting factor to image resolution.

Contrast should also by now be obvious to readers of this blog.  It's the transition from light to dark.  The steeper the transition, the more contrast a scene is said to have.  The ability of an imaging system to accurately render the original contrast of a scene can be measured using Modulation Transfer Functions (or MTF).  Many manufacturers publish MTF charts for their various lenses.  But, and this is important, an image's contrast can be modified during processing.

Interestingly enough, the human eye sees both resolution and contrast as "sharpness."

Armed with this information and before I launch off into Yet Another Large Photographic Project Of My Own Insane Design I wanted to see what role image processing might play in creating the illusion or enhancing the reality and perception of "sharpness."

The material -

• Sony A6000 24mpixel APS-C camera
• Sigma 30mm f/2.8 EX DN E
• Nikon 50mm f/1.4 pre-Ai
• Helios 44M-4 58mm f/2
• Manfrotto tripod that could support the god Atlas

The comparison -

• Shoot the Sigma wide open at f/2.8 (just to illustrate how good it is at that setting) and at it's highest resolution aperture at f/5.6.
• Shoot the Nikon and Helios lenses wide open
• Find a section of the scene where the old manual focus lenses visibly "fall off", that is to say, where they begin to display large amounts of spherical aberration that reduces the sense of "sharpness"
• Copy the Sigma f/5.6 image section and place it adjacent to each image sample from the Nikon and Helio so as to enable a direct comparison at each processing step
• Take three steps with the old lenses.  
• First, show the image as it appears straight off the sensor.  
• Second, apply FX Foundary's "Luminosity Sharpen" in the Gimp.  
• Third, using Luminosity Masks dark dark layer (DD), snug up the black end of "curves", while leaving the highlight regions un-modified (creating a selectively "contrastier" image).  Then apply FX Foundary's "Luminosity Sharpen".

A quick note about FX Foundary's Luminosity Sharpen:  

I found this particular sharpening tool after looking at many of the options available in the Gimp.  I started with "unsharp mask" and worked my way through various G'Mic options and some of FX Foundary's sharpening tools too.  None of the other sharpening tools provided the kind of controls and effects I was looking for.  What I was looking for was a sharpening tool that would not increase noise in the smooth areas of a scene.  However this tool works, it does what I want and I've become rather "addicted" to using it.

A quick note about Luminosity Masks:

I started using Luminosity Masks after reading a post on Google+ by Patrick David about a tool he and another David programmer created.  The tool separates an image into nine masks of various intensity.  They are broadly broken into highlights, mid-range, and shadows with three masks for each range.  I can selectively apply changes to specific tonal ranges to an image by copying the base image, adding a Luminosity Mask, and altering the layered image.

The results -

• At first blush, the Nikon and Helios lenses look rather awful when shot wide open and compared against a modern multi-aspheric element AF lens.  Both image sections are low contrast and visibly "softer" than the Sigma image sections. The first time I saw these I felt I needed to buy "better" lenses.
• Applying Luminosity Sharpen does little to increase the sense of resolution in the two old lenses.
• By selectively applying contrast to the images from the old lenses, _then_ applying the Luminosity Sharpen, I can see where the "sharp" portions of the image are very nearly, but not quite, as good as the native Sigma image.  Thinking about this a moment, the old cheap manual focus lenses weren't the entire answer to my image making question.  Careful processing was just, if not more so, important.  I'm happy with how close I was able to come to the Sigma's performance after taking just two simple, quick image processing steps.

Click on this image and head over

to the original Flickr page and look

at this file at 100percent resolution

to inspect the image sections

Why all these machinations?  After reading something about old Petzval lenses where I was reminded that the center of a scene would be "sharp" and the edges would fall off into an interesting "swirling" effect, I wanted to see if I could come somewhat close with current digital processes.  This was the first step in understanding how "sharp" I could make the center of a scene.

The next step is to understand how much "swirl" can actually be delivered by various lenses.

Lens Insanity!

I'm glad I'm not the only person who suffers from the desire to research, check out, and own as many interesting and odd things as possible.

Check this guy's lens collection out!

Yes. Yes. Yes.

I simply must go to Gloucester.  Really, I must.

Here's why.

The question is when and how.  We have no automobile.  We hear the French are still a little upset at the English over the 100 years war and the impending Waterloo celebrations this summer.  Ugh.

Ok.  I need to plot and plan.  Yes.  Indeed I do.

[I'm teasing, of course, about the Troubles between the English and French.]

A little truth...

Here's yet another in a growing list of videos that make the obvious points that can oh so obviously be made.

A great quote...

A photographer went to a socialite party in New York. As he entered the front door, the host said 'I love your pictures - they're wonderful; you must have a fantastic camera.' He said nothing until dinner was finished, then: 'That was a wonderful dinner; you must have a terrific stove.' 

- Sam Haskins

Updating my Big Bird kit...

One of the challenges of selling all my Canon DSLR bodies and lenses to downsize into mirrorless was answering the question: What to do about birds?

Sony A6000 + LA-EA4 adapter + Tamron 150-600mm "Bigron"

I love taking photographs of birds.  When we lived in the States, Jude and I would visit parks and wetlands in search of ducks, small birds, geese, cranes, and large birds of prey.

The setup I had back in the States included a 70-200 f/4L, 100-400 f/4.5-5.6L (deemed the Dust Pump by netizens), and that amazing 300-800mm Sigma EX HSM f/5.6 super zoom.  The 70-200L was for birds very close to the camera.  The 100-400L was for fast movers in flight and the 300-800EX HSM was for, well nearly everything, including birds in flight (BIF).

Coming to France I learned how impossible it was to carry the 13pound Sigmonster anywhere.  I loved the "reach" but there was no way to haul it to where the birds are (Rambouillet, Sceau, etc.).

The 3.5pound 100-400L was nearly perfect, but... it lacked the "reach" I was looking for on the long end.

The 70-200L was simply too short for anything, even photographing sports cars on the streets of Paris during one of the bi-annual Traversee.

Moving everything to Sony mirrorless seemed foolish.  This is why I hung on to my 7D/Dust Pump kit.

Then one day I got sick, lost my mind, and sold the 7D.  The Dust Pump was put up for sale, too.

In my dull daze of illness I found was an article over on Luminous Landscape.  The solution Michael used in Antartica was a Sony A7II, Sony LA-EA4 A to E-mount adapter,  and Tamron 150-600mm f/5-f/6.3 in the Sony A-mount.  His target?  Penguins leaping out of the water.  I couldn't imagine a more challenging scenario.  He didn't know where they were coming from.  He didn't know how far away they'd be.  So he had to be ready and he needed to trust the AF system would be fast enough to capture what he was looking for.  It sounded like what I was facing.

I ordered a lens and adapter from Amazon.  Please remember, I was sick when I made this decision. I had no idea what I was getting.  My new birding solution was based purely on Michael's Antartica experience.

  The "Bigron" at 150mm
The "Bigron" racked out to 600mm
Today I have everything in hand.  The lens and LA-EA4 are finally here.  We still have a copy of that left-leaning Canard Enchaine so I taped a couple pages to the wall and pointed my lenses at it to see what I could see.

First, a comment about the LA-EA4 adapter.  It comes with a translucent mirror and the AF components built into the body of the adapter.  The AF system does not require "internal" power and is driven off the camera's power source.  There was nothing to do but snap the lens on the front and snap the Sony A6000 onto the other end.  Simple and easy.

A further comment about the LA-EA4 adapter is to note that the in-adapter AF system implements it's own 15 phase-lock AF points.  The camera body recognizes the adapter and provides selections for the in-adapter focus points through the standard menus.  The in-camera AF points are disabled.

The Tamron lens (called the Bigron by some netizens) is just under a pound heavier than the Canon 100-400L.  For BIF a person can remove the tripod collar.  This lightens the rig up a bit, but there's no getting around the fact the Bigron is a slightly bigger beast than the Canon.  Yet the all-up kit weight of the Sony/Adapter/Bigron is less than the Canon 7D/Dust Pump.  

In the hand it all feels very familiar.  The diameter of the Tamron barrels are similar to the Canon L-glass.  The Bigron feels a little heavier up front, and is only marginally heavier over-all than the old Dust Pump.

What's been gained?  I now have a one camera solution for everything I do.  The Sony A6000 camera is very light, very fast (11frames per second at full tilt), and very flexible (I can use it for studio work and birds).  The Tamron has almost 60 percent more reach than the 100-400L Canon (400mm on the lens is actually closer to 380mm).  And the Bigron is a fraction of the weight of the old Sigmonster.

What's been lost?  That incredible Sigmonster.  I LOVED that lens, even if I couldn't take it anywhere.  The Sigmonster was sharp as sharp could be at all focal lengths.

As for image stabilization (IS), well, yes, I do miss that, too.  The Dust Pump had decent IS in the lens where the Sony/Bigron kit presently does not.  The Tamron does not offer IS in their Sony A-mount lens (but it does come with IS in Canon/Nikon mounts).  However, there are rumors of Sony releasing an in-body IS APS-C solution in the A6000-form-factor some day soon.  When that hits the streets I'll have a decent IS solution for all my lenses that I currently work with in mirrorless.


Canon 100-400L Tamron 150-600 Nikon 300 pre-Ai (all with NEX adapters of various kinds)
What also been lost is a very slight bit of AF speed to the old 7D/70-200L combo which was very "snappy" and quick.  The AF speed "feels" quite nearly equal to the 7D/Dust Pump combo.  Though in truth the 7D/100-400L sometimes missed the intended AF point.  Compared to the 7D/Sigmonster AF speed, the Sony/Bigron kit "feels" ever so slightly "snappier."  In short, I think I can live with the Sony/Bigron AF speed, though only time and a few live birds will tell me if this continues to hold true.  Bring on the penguins!!!

Having a look at the image quality, I compared the Bigron against an adapted Canon 100-400L and Nikon 300mm f/4.5 pre-Ai.  The test setup was -

• Sony A6000, ISO100, Aperture Preferred, shutter released using 2 second delay
• Big beefy Manfrotto tripod (the one I use for birding and an 8x10inch film camera, if I had one)
• Manually focused at 14x for 150mm and 300mm focal lengths.  It was easy and, besides, the Canon and Nikon lenses were manual focus on the Sony.  AF was used on the Bigron when shot at 600mm.  Manually focusing that focal length was simply too difficult to do accurately, so I threw in the towel and let the adapter/Bigron do what they were designed to do.  Oh, and I ran out of room, so no attempt was made to match the size of the print at 600mm to the shorter focal-lengths.

The results should be pretty obvious.  The Dust Pump and Bigron do a nice job.  They're sharp and contrasty.  If I had to say which images were actually "sharper", I'd lean toward the Bigron at this (very early) point.  

At 600mm it's interesting to confirm what others have seen with the Tamron.  f/6.3 is slightly soft at that long 600mm focal length.  So... Stop the Bigron down to f/8 and call it good.  Good it is, too.  It seems as sharp at 600mm as the old Sigmonster, and that's saying something.

Note: Make sure you look at the comparison results with the file enlarged to 100 percent to see what I see.

Sadly, I think I ever so slightly missed the focus point on the Nikon 300mm f/4.5 pre-Ai as I've seen sharper images out it than these.  Which points out just how important technique is for gaining every last bit of image quality out of system.  It's not just the lens, it's how you use your entire system that counts.

After Jude and I get feeling better (we're still under the weather for the Late Winter flu bug that's been shared by millions) we'll schedule up a trip out to one of our favorite birding spots to have a look at how well the new kit works.

Times? They are a change'n...

As I submitted in the comment section (though it's yet to be cleared for public consumption) over on Mike Johnson's Online Photographer blog, it doesn't take being Nostradamus to accurately predict the End Days of "traditional" photography.  iOS and Android have won the hearts and minds of casual and "serious" photographers alike and there's no going back.

A friend sent a link to an interesting article on this very topic.  One of my favorite quotes is...

Technology has transformed photos from treasured keepsakes to personal propaganda

This goes some ways to supporting a thought I shared in an early post on the topic.  Cultural narcissism is a driving force behind photography these days.  Anyone can, so anyone does.  To the tune of uploading 1.8BILLION images a day to the internet.  Much the uploads are "selfies" and photos of cats, or so it seems.

In a little more serious article, Vincent Laforet predicts the end of the still camera for everyone but the "pros."

Professional photographers (if they still exist then… and I think many, or to be honest some will) will continue to make photographs with DSLR/ Medium format and perhaps mirrorless still cameras – but the vast majority of photographers will continue the exodus towards smartphones...

The software that is installed on those smartphones and iPhones and what you can do with it supersedes the advantage that any one camera system alone gives you for most of us – professionals will continue to need specialty lenses, lights, and larger megapixels to differentiate themselves from the masses...

I don't think Vincent went far enough.  I believe how we consume images has forever altered the very need for a "pro" to create something for us.  So while specialty lenses might make some of us happy, and sports, nature, and wedding photographers can manage their images "look" and "reach" by carefully choosing a lens, none of this is really, actually desired nor required by our "Look At ME!" culture.

Further, Sony seems to already have this covered.  You can have a fully networked imaging system with Big Pixels _and_ your Favorite Lenses at the same time.  Take a look at the QX1 and see if you don't agree.

It's interesting to see for the vast vast majority of button pushers mobile phones are more than sufficient to create wonderful images.  iOS and Android have become the Canon/Nikon/Fuji/Olympus imaging platforms of olden days.

Honestly?  The "need" for someone hire someone else who can monkey a hugely complex camera to record an event or to advertise a product is going away.  What made "professionals" unique is evaporating right before our eyes.

My prediction is that within 4 years pro photographers who make their livings through image making will be as rare as hens teeth.  Either that or they'll have a cell phone to help do the work.

If you don't believe me, take a look at these images.

[UPDATE: Mike's blog just posted further comments on the topic]

Anatomy of a Phishing Scam

I've been looking for a super zoom for my Sony A6000 and have found an optic that could replace my old Canon 70-200L, 100-400L, and 300-800 Sigmonster.

Last night on Amazon.fr I thought I'd found a good deal.

Tamron Objectif SP xxxx

---

Prix conseillé :	EUR 1 399,00
Prix :	EUR 600

First clue there was a problem?  The price.  If it seems too good to be true, then it is too good to be true.

When I tried to put the item into my Panier, this is the message I received.

Message important

Un problème s'est produit en rapport avec les articles de votre commande (voir ci-dessous pour plus d'informations) : Tamron Objectif SP xxxx...

Désolés, cet article ne peut pas être expédié à l'adresse que vous avez sélectionnée. Plus d'informations. Vous pouvez modifier l'adresse de livraison ou supprimer l'article de votre commande. Vous pouvez également voir si l'article est disponible à l'expédition sur votre adresse auprès d'un autre vendeur.

Then there was the request to contact the seller directly, and that was the second problem.

Hello,
The Tamron Objectif SP xxxx is in new condition ( it just had to be listed as 'Used - Like New' ), comes with all manufacturer  supplied accessories, Europe model,comes with 2 Years Europe warranty. It has not been used. The price is €600.00 - free Europe delivery. The shipping will take 1 - 3 days .My return policy is full money back in 30 days.If you really want to buy, send me your phone number, full name, shipping address and I will contact Amazon asap to process your order.
If you have any questions regarding the product,returning or any questions feel free to ask us.

Thanks

Is it any surprise that I then received a request to transfer money directly to the seller?

Thanks for your order. We want you to buy with confidence anytime you purchase products on Amazon.fr.That is why we guarantee purchases from Amazon Marketplace, Auctions, zShops, and Merchant sellers when you use Amazon Payments. The condition of the item you buy and its timely delivery are guaranteed under the Amazon.fr A-to-z Guarantee...

Payment Details:

Amazon requires the payment for this transaction to be done through Bank Transfer.

You must make the payment via Bank Transfer directly to your seller.
Here is the payment info's:

... The Engraving Gallery

PL02109025900000000129733484

WBKPPLPP

WBK Bank

ul. Rynek 9/11, 50-950,Poland...

To confirm your transfer to Amazon, send us the scanned paper from the Bank: Confirm Payment

• The Amazon protection programs offer a set of services that build protection into every step of the item buying process. Some of the elements are automatically included when you buy an item covered by the program element (not all elements are available for all products) while some of the elements are available for a small fee. 
• The funds will not be released under any circumstances! We will keep the payment until you send us your confirmation that you are satisfied to keep the item. As soon as we receive your confirmation we will transfer the funds to the Seller. Until then the Seller won't be able to access the money you sent and in any case you decide not to continue with the deal you will receive a full refund.

• Note: Amazon.fr is fully responsible for the money once they will be transferred and take the responsibility to refund the full amount if there will be any problems during the deal.

Thanks again for shopping with us.

We hope to see you again soon.

Can you spot the typos?  I thought you could.  Amazon holds funds in escrow and direct transfers between buyer and seller are strongly discouraged.  I hereby declare this a phishing expedition!  This thru Amazon no less.

Postscript - this morning I received the following message.

Hi again,
I was informed by Amazon that they send you all the payment and delivery informations. Search your inbox carefully and also check your bulk/spam/junk folder because it might have arrived there.
Please let me know asap.

Thank you!

Nothing in my spam nor in my inbox?  Color me shocked.  The bastards.

Upon closer inspection, there is a website that is hosted in Germany called media.364.  While the prices look incredible, at least one person has been taken for a ride by those folks.  Here's what I found about them. When I asked them what was going on, I was told

If you really want to buy please acces our website : www.media364.com

Again, you can spot the typos.  No, I really do not want to buy from them.  Would you?

Loosely related things ~ the Death of Photography as we knew it

These must be the End Times of photography.  How else can one explain what's going on these days?

Hasselblad used to make world class 2 1/4inch square format film cameras.  They were good enough that NASA contracted the company to make 70mm film-backed cameras that went to the moon as part of the American Space program (the Apollo missions).

To celebrate their heritage Hasselblad recently introduced a camera call the "Lunar."  The sad thing is the model name is for photographic purposes utterly meaningless.  It can't go into outer space and is nothing more than a very very expensive warm-over of Sony's old model NEX7.

What a joke!

Leica, like Hasselblad, used to make world class cameras.  Leica's image shape was the classic 35mm.  In fact, the company "invented" the 35mm format.  Today's 36mm x 24mm "full frame" sensors are the direct legacy of Leica's early creations.

So it's with more than a little interest that Leica recently announced their latest product offerings.  It's called the M-P "Correspondent."   It's claim to fame?  It comes brand new pre-brassed.  That's right.  You get a brand new camera and lens that have been made to look like they've lived 30 hard years in a press-pool working photographer's kit.

According to my calendar, it is not yet April 1st.  No fool'n!  What a joke!

My wife and I recently visited the Magnum Photo exhibition at the Hotel de Ville.  The show was devoted to images made of Paris from Magnum's inception through to the present.

Indeed many of the photographs from the late-1940's up through the 1960's had been made using Hasselblad and Leica camera systems.  The black and white photos are properly and fabulously printed.  The show was very well curated and shared enough information that a visitor could easily follow the evolution of photography in this city.

I was struck by something.  By the 1970's color prints revealed that a massive upheaval in imaging had taken place.  To explain the shift I need to go back and talk a little about the impact of photography on painting.

For hundreds of years painters depicted reality.  They recorded how people looked and scenes of historical importance.  When photography advanced to the point images could accurately record people's likenesses and capture time slices of significant events painters had to find something else to depict.

It's no coincidence that the "impressionists" advanced painting into the door-steps of the abstract.  Subsequent artists took painting further and further into abstraction to the point most casual observers need an explanation of what they are looking at to understand a work.

In the 1970's television had taken it's place in many first world living rooms.  Just as photography had done to painting in the late 1800's, the impact of television was to push photography into abstraction.

The Magnum show filled the years from the 1970's to the present with images of broad colors, simple large shapes, and into the realm of abstract ideas and concepts.  Without an explanation of what I was looking at, I had no idea what the photographer was attempting to say or share.

This begs the question of what is the present purpose of photography?  From what I can tell, photography has moved from accurately recording to sharing experiences and self-portraits (selfies).

Can the displacement of photography help explain the many forums populated with camera equipment junkies who, rather than attempt to make a fine image, spend their spare hours arguing over which piece of gear is better than another?  Is it, then, any wonder that Hasselblad and Leica, the old vanguards of tradition photography, struggle to remain tools of valid creative expression? 

Loosely related things...

Late last year I had six photoshoots with models lined up and, or so I thought, ready to go.  On the day of the shoots four models backed out an hour or two before we were to work together.  These events sent me into something of a tail-spin and I started to revisit the topic of why I do what I do.

While living in the states I enjoyed working with models.  It felt very much like we were working together.  The people I worked with had "as much skin in the game" as I did.  Now that my wife and I live in Europe I've come to see that things are not the same here.

As I try to find a way out of the tail-spin that I find myself in I've come across a few things that help me understand what is taking place around me.

• Each day 1.8 BILLION images a day are uploaded and shared across the internet
• Each month Instagram (an image sharing app) has over 300 MILLION active users
• "Selfies" (the taking and sharing of photos of ones self) has become so popular that camera manufacturers offer products tailored to the "need"
• Sports Illustrated, a somewhat famous magazine published in the USA, recently laid-off all of it's remaining photographers
• Photographs from the 1800's sometimes exhibit incredible image qualities 

I feel that "photography" is dead.  It is dead in the sense we knew it as recently as just a few years ago. The death of "photography" seems to be related to what an images purpose is and how they are consumed.  I use the word consumed deliberately.  I would rather use the word appreciated, but can't bring myself to do that.

Who is going to make the great images that people used to enjoy looking at in Sports Illustrated?  Who is so talented in their image making that they can replace professional artists with decades of experience under their belt?

It seems to me that photography has moved from recording time to sharing experiences.  Where is the of-the-age defining Hindenberg on fire image from the Fukushima disaster?  Where is the iconic photo that helps us understand what happened in that disaster?  There isn't one.  It was all "live feeds" of images and videos that shared the experience of the place.  That's how much things have changed.

I despair the lack of appreciation for how lighting can be used to define, describe, and illustrate a scene.  Amongst photographers certain people are, yes, still appreciated.  I'm thinking of Bill Gekas as I write this. Certainly there remains a (shrinking?) place for workers who know how to gather people together and pose them for weddings. Beyond this what "need" is there for someone to record an event or to make a lasting picture of someone?

This sea of images to consider and review is so vast that finding works which contain the qualities I have come to appreciate is very difficult.  Hashtags and sorting engines bring torrents of mediocre work which have little or no value (to me).  Flickr's "Explore" engine shares hundreds of photos and I'm many times left wondering what the hell is this?  The human curated sites like 500px.com and 1x.com seem to share the same collection of images day in and day out.

The sharing of talents between photographer/model/stylist/couture is no longer "needed" as anyone with an image maker or cell-phone can perform the tasks required to get a picture out of a box and onto a website or into print.  It takes no technical knowledge nor talent to make a wonderful image.  Imaging systems have, by and large, sorted all that out for the button pusher.  Anyone can "look good" as an "artist."

Now more than ever before I need to find, to fully appreciate. and to completely embrace the reasons I make images.  My work will likely be from this day forward for my own and only my own pleasure, contentment, and intellectual-emotional pursuits.

I cannot expect to work as I used to.  Things have dramatically changed.  Perhaps this is an opportunity for me to change as well.  The question is which path, if any, may I best forge?

Sony A6000 - a seven lens comparison

It seems that I'm still on a roll.

Since I already had the test setup in place, why not compare some more of my manual focus lenses against the modern Sigma EX DN E autofocus using the Sony A6000?  Why not look at the center of the scene as well as an extreme edge?  I'm retired and have nothing better to do, right?


The comparison setup didn't change.

• Sony A6000 camera, ISO100, "A" mode, "standard" image style settings, shot in RAW format
• Big sturdy Manfrotto tripod
• RAW images converted to jpg at 100percent quality using Sony's software - no image adjustments were made at the time of conversion
• 600x600pixel segments were taken out of each file - no adjustments to the image were made during the cut/paste process

The following two comparison files are quite large.  So click on them and they'll take you to Flickr where you can download and view the full-rez images.






My comments on these comparisons should be obvious.  The new Sigma 19mm, 30mm, and 60mm (not shown here) f/2.8 EX DN E/Art lenses are incredible from wide open all the way across the field to the very edges of the frame.  These are "keepers".

I think I can see where the old Nikkors have a few challenges, even on the smaller than full frame APS-C sized sensors.  I'm not sure why the edges fall off as badly as they do when the lenses are shot wide open, but they're pretty obviously bad.  My conjecture is that either the lenses were designed for speed and resolution at the center (which is common for designs of that period), and/or there is a fair amount of field curvature that is throwing the edges of the frame out of focus in these 2D scene comparisons.

Sony A6000 - Sony 16mm f/2.8 E, Sigma 19mm f/2.8 EX DN E comparison

I'm on a roll.

Since I had a comparison setup in place, I thought I'd take a look at the recently acquried Sigma 19mm f/2.8 EX DN E and see how it compared against a Sony 16mm f/2.8 E-mount lens.  The two lenses share a somewhat fast aperture, are nearly the same focal length, and sell for similar prices.  Could the performance be similar too?


The comparison setup didn't change.

• Sony A6000 camera, ISO100, "A" mode, "standard" image style settings, shot in RAW format
• Big sturdy Manfrotto tripod
• Sigma 19mm f/2.8 EX DN E shot at f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, and f/8
• Sony 16mm f/2.8 E-mount shot at f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, and f/8
• RAW images converted to jpg at 100percent quality using Sony's software - no image adjustments were made at the time of conversion
• 600x600pixel segments were taken out of each file - no adjustments to the image were made during the cut/paste process 

The image is linked to my Flickr page.  View the image a full resolution to more clearly see the differences between the two lenses.


My observations include the obvious.  Either the 16mm Sony  is really awful or the Sigma 19mm is absolutely brilliant.  Differences between the two lenses should be clear.  To me, the Sigma is the superior optic from wide open and across the entire field.