Oh the things you can do with those LED lights!!!! (Apologies to Dr. Suess).

Every day I read some expert on the web who tells the unwitting and incurious that LED lights aren't ready for prime time, can't be of interest to photographers as long as we can get our hands on some sort of flash mechanism, don't hold a candle to the brilliance of XXX other lighting  equipment. But I fundamentally disagree. If you want to do interesting things it helps to use interesting tools. And I find LEDs most interesting. 

The image of Erin, above, was done for Zach Scott Theatre's (world) premier of Steven Dietz's play, Mad, Hip, Beat and Gone. The lead tech and I decided on LED lighting for the session because we were shooting for both video and a stills and, well, flash doesn't work so well for video. We were shooting black and white and we're projecting the images up to 24 by 30 feet as part of the on stage production design. The look, feel and style of the images is just what the art folks wanted. And the two hours we spent working under the cool lighting of the LEDs was pleasant. Four lights, a couple modifiers.

Of course the web experts will tell you that you can't get good color out of LEDs but that's not true either. The above shot of the cook is lit with LEDs mixed with the lighting in the kitchen. If you look at the inexpensive florescent bulbs under the hood vent you'll see a classic green spike. But that was coming from the Flos, not the LEDs. I could have used flash but why? This is the image I was looking for and the blend of light sources is part of the magic. Need more color purity? Turn off the overheads and put more LEDs in to take their places. (color pumped up but not corrected in Snapseed).

From the very first day I used a decent, modern LED that plugged into the wall I've been sold on the what you see is what you get accuracy of the way the lights track. I like the way they can mix and blend with ambient lighting and I love the quick, no hassle set ups. When I go battery powered I love the fact that I can get good color, ample output and not have cords to trip over.

In fact, I liked LEDs so much I asked my publisher at Amherst Media if I could write a book about the subject. It's still the only book out in the market for photographers that is a dedicated introduction to LED lighting. If you are curious about the future of lighting I humbly suggest you read my book. At the very least you may come away comfortable with what you already have in your light kit but with some curiosity satisfied. 

I'm loving their use as Hybrid Lights. Crossing over between video and stills. Easily. 

Here's a link to the book at Amazon:  LED LOVE

Note: Don't want the book but want to support the VSL blog? Any link you click on here will take you to Amazon and, on that particular adventure, anything you buy counts. I'll get a small commission at no extra cost to you.  Thanks very much for the support!

I have been interviewed about photography (mostly business topics). It's a podcast.

http://www.thecandidframe.com/

Ibarionex Perello is a photographer, writer and interviewer. His latest book is: Photoshop Master Class: Photoshop Inspiring artwork and tutorials by established and emerging artists. He works in Los Angeles and he's really fun to talk to about photography.

He took time out of his busy schedule to interview me for his blog, the Candid Frame. (hit the link at the top of the page)...

I ramble on for quite a while but Ibarionex did a good job at reining me in...

Please go and listen to the interview, if you want to hear how different I sound from Ron Perelman....

Thanks Ibarionex.

(Not an April Fool's joke).

My favorite book about the business of photography.

Now available at Amazon.com 

Canon and Sony both Announce Medium Format Cameras Today.

Photo of Dirk Van Allen for Live Oak Theater. Hot Lights. Spot Lights and

other tools of lighting controlled liberally used.

In almost simultaneous press releases both Sony and Canon announced today that they would be introducing large sensor, medium format cameras in the next quarter. The announcement caught the photographic press by surprise since neither company is known for making cameras larger than those based on the 35mm film size. Both companies held press events in Tokyo early this morning.

Canon spokesman, Fol Ja Nau, elaborated on the company's plans saying, "We were not content to play in the secondary photographic market behind Phase One and Hasselblad. With declining sales in the compact camera (point and shoot) markets we wanted to find a niche with fast and sustainable growth and very good profit margins." The company plans to roll out a fully integrated camera, based on their wildly popular EOS-M camera. The sensor will be a 2.25 cm by 2.25 cm CMOS variety with 60 megapixels of resolution. "We have chosen to put the bulk of design money and development resources into the sensor so the camera itself will be very cheaply made and, well, rather difficult to actually use."

Fol Ja Nau went on to say that the camera would have a "green" "recycled" aluminum alloy frame covered with a new polymer skin that, "would be nearly as durable as conventional plastic." While the camera will feature a 3 inch twisted syster LCD screen on the back research by Canon shows that the main market for the new camera will probably be satisfied to just hold the camera at arm's length to focus and compose on rear screen so no eye level viewing options are planned at this time.

An interesting aspect of the overall design is the vast number of engineering compromises made on the sensor chip itself. In order to maximize low noise at previously impossible to achieve ISO settings Canon engineers have reduced the overall dynamic range of the camera's sensor to four "f" stops. "This allows us to offer a product that seems in line with the expectations of a whole new generation of advanced image makers." Nau adds, "At ISO 650,000 the dynamic range drops to two and a half or three stops but detail holds up very well."

The new line of medium format cameras requires new lenses which can not be used on existing, smaller sensor cameras. To date, the company has been circumspect in sharing the new lens development roadmap but are said to have a fully plastic kit lens, with polycarbonate mount, that will cover the wildly popular 18 to 55mm range equivalent (when compared to APS-C cameras). The engineers at Canon are excited to announce that they have achieved a weight neutral lens by eschewing any material made of real glass or metal in the lens. They have also patented a process for filling each lens with helium gas which, when combined with the already negligible weight of the product actually renders it gravitationally neutral. The camera will have an f-stop range of 5.6 at wide angle dropping to f11 at the telephoto focal lengths.

Already several photographers have expressed an interest in looking at whatever Canon finally produces, while the product has already been reviewed (in depth) by both Ken Rockwell and Steve Huff. A well known, Atlanta based photographer and workshop leader, has already pronounced it to be the "ultimate camera" and the only one he will ever need for the rest of his life...

Meanwhile, Sony has taken an alternate route in producing their medium format offering (available mid-summer 2013). Working with various scientific adhesives they have bound together nine of the Nex-7 sensors and have devised a way to stitch high resolution images from the grid of sensors, capable of firing at 15 fps, to generate a 200 megapixel file. Says Buckeroo Rinzai, chief development engineer for mondo-big Sony products, "We had many of these sensors sitting around the office since consumers seem to dismiss both high resolution and high color purity, much preferring high ISO performance at any costs.

"We decided to kill two cranes with one origami project and used our advanced joining materials to create a "sensor collage" capable of amazing imaging potential. Using a bonding material known as Haute Glu bolstered with an anchoring material known in the trade as Du Uct Taape we are able to hold the prototype in any orientation without fear that one or more of the individual sensor apparati will dislodge and effect the overall quality of the image."

Rinzai acknowledges that Sony would not have been able to complete this project without outside expertise in the form of their partnership with Hasselblad.  While Canon seems to have chosen a very, very utilitarian approach to both design, materials quality and usability in order to optimize high ISO chip performance, SonyBlad has taken a different approach to the design of their camera.

In a rare meeting at the middle of the geographic design world they will depend on the aesthetic nuances of the Akron Industrial Design Skool for the haptics and appearance of their new medium format product. The emphasis will be on big rubber handles embedded in rare woods and accents done with the skin of Albatrosses. For an additional premium in cost customers can also have the bodies made from a blend of glowing comet materials and minced Hermes scarves.

Asked about lenses for the upcoming camera officials at Sony played their cards very close to the chest. Sources who have been briefed say that Sony will pursue a similar course to that which they instituted for the introduction of the Nex mirrorless camera line and introduce the camera without any lenses at all.  "It will give customers time to get comfortable with the ergonomics of the camera body without introducing the confusion that can come from adding lenses too soon!!!" Stated outgoing Sony president of the week, Bradford Munchton.

Hasselblad will make an adapter, cleverly manufactured with Platinum and ground unicorn horn, which will allow the use of all their current lenses on the new HassyOny camera, upon introduction.

Asked for comments officials at Olympus were tip lipped, saying only, "We will continue to make cameras that work really, really well and which customers enjoy using. We are also committed to increasing the ample suppy of different kinds of lenses available for our cameras."

Board members at Nikon declined to be interviewed for this article but a spokesperson for their imaging divisions in EMEA did conjecture that the team is too busy to look at the medium format market right now, saying, "We've got our damn hands busy trying to make the stuff we already sell work acceptably. I think Sony sold us sensors that are thicker on one side than the other. Our customers get to chose the side on which they would like sharp focus. We are always committed to customer choice...."  Pressed for further comments the spokesperson would only add, "Now, if we can just get the shutters to stop throwing sticky rust and decomposing mirror material on those damn Sony sensors we'll be good...really good."

The guys at Pentax were taking a long weekend and not available for comment.

Phase One officials were forthcoming and candid. "We've got a big head start on all these medium format newbies. Plus, we're sitting on an enormous pile of cash. Think Apple-Style cash! We've watched this kind of attempted market cross over before. We'll crush them and increase market share into the process. Our marketing analysis shows that the majority of photographers will be shooting medium format in the near future and that we will dominate that market. We are already taking proactive steps to blunt the momentum of our rivals. We've dropped the price of our new 35mm sensor-sized camera from $67,000 to $59,000 and we're sure its new streamlined size will sell like....hot cakes."

Happy April 1st.

My most useful commercial lens. The 70-200mm 2.8.

If you are a generalist, like me, you probably do a lots of different kinds of assignments. If you go back and look at the exif information embedded in your images you might find a surprising trend. You probably assume that you need a wide range of lenses and you might assume that you use your 24-70mm equivalent more than any other lens but the math might tell you that you were wrong. I presumed that I was a single focal length user. A 50mm or 85mm guy. I presumed the reason I liked my images (for commercial assignments) was that the focal lengths I used for work mimicked or corresponded with the different focal lengths I use for my personal work and fun.

But it's not true. The math tells me that the "money maker" lens for me is easily the 70-200mm 2.8. Maybe it's because I shoot a lot of speakers on stage for corporations that tips the scale in the direction of the heavy duty longer zoom. Maybe it's the work I do every month for Zach Scott Theatre which requires me to reach out and grab images from a prescribed distance. But it's more than that.

I seem to have a telephoto vision and it colors everything I shoot. From actors on pianos to cowboy boots. While the faster 70-200mm zooms are useful for low light shots a lot of what I shoot are objects or people that I am actively lighting and the fast aperture becomes less important than having this range of lenses at my disposal.

When I set up to photograph boots for Little's Boot Company in San Antonio, I started out by putting the Sigma 70mm f2.8 macro lens on my Sony a99. And why not? It's the sharpest lens I have in the drawer. It would seem perfect for a product shoot like this. But I liked the compression of the boots and the background more than I would have liked the ultimate expression of sharpness... And really, at f8 either of the lenses would probably give the camera sensor a good run for its money...  By shooting a little longer focal length I could get focus on the front and back boot but start rolling off the sharpness on the background and the part of the canvas background that extends in front of the boots. More magical. I could also keep the camera position the same but zoom in or out to equalize the size and composition of the boots in the frame. 

When we move on to food photography most people instantly make the assumption that macro lenses would be the logical tool but even here I like the ultimate framing flexibility of the 70-200mm. In the example just above we were flirting with as little depth of field as we felt we could get away with. I was working very near the long end of the lens, near 180mm and what I gained was not just a more limited depth of field but also the compression that I talked about in regards to the boots. It's an optical process of pulling shapes together and creating a more graphic shot.

The magic comes when you use some form of continuous lighting because it becomes easier to see what you'll get in the final image. With LEDs or Tungsten or Florescent you'll be able to nimbly switch from wide open to mid range to fully stopped down and immediately compensate exposure with changes in shutter speed. I find it a much more fluid way of working that using electronic flash which would require more chimping and more complex changes to the camera and the lights. (Take a shot and review. Turn the flash up or down. Take a shot and review. Turn the flash up or down, repeat...).

In every system I've owned, from the Canon to the Nikon to the Sony system the first purchase, along with two identical camera bodies, is the 70-200mm f2.8 lens. In the Canon system I used the 70-200 f4 because I liked the lighter weight and I felt that the lens was a bit sharper at f4 that its fatter sibling. Even for the time that I shot with the Olympus 4:3 system the 35-100 f2 was my go-to lens.

In all honesty a generalist photographer could make due with a very circumscribed system. Unless you choose to do a lot of architectural documentation you could do 99% of the work that pays the bills for most pros with just two lenses and one body. I'd yell at you to get a second body on the off chance that you experience a failure but I'm pretty sure about the two lenses. One would be the  lens everyone seems to have, the 24-70mm 2.8.  And, of course, the other one is the 70-200mm (your choice when it comes to f2.8 or f4).  If you are called on to sometimes take a few interior architectural shots you might want to add a 20mm lens to the list but it's not mandatory. 

All the wider lenses are artsy and dramatic but in the end very few paying clients really like to deal with the wild forced perspective of the amply wide lenses and most photographs I know who shoot commercial soon tire of the "spectacular focal lengths.

The idea that professional artists need to have every focal length covered is a mythology promulgated by the camera companies. And why not? It's there job to sell you as many different products as they can. Just as your CFO will tell you that it's your job to resist buying extra lenses that don't add to the bottom line.

In the course of two weeks almost every job I've shot, from portraits to food to stage craft to corporate events, revolved around my reliance on the 70-200mm (or equivalent) lens. There are always exceptions. Like the guy whose job consists of shooting the interiors of airplanes and recreational vehicles. He's probably got a collection of wide and superwide glass and rarely uses anything over 50mm.  Or the woman who shoots car racing, soccer and other field sports. Her lens sweet spot probably starts at 300mm and heads north from their. They are outliers. The rest of us fall nearer to the center of the Bell Curve. But that's just workaday photographers. If we change the discussion to art then all bets are off.

Why I like this image from Uchi.

This dish was photographed with a Kodak SLR/n full frame, no anti-aliasing filter camera using a Nikon 105mm macro lens. It was lit with several flashes and the light was modified in such a way as to make the scene appear to have been captured in soft daylight from a window.

I like the image because I think it is successful on two commercial levels. First, it was a very accurate representation of the dish presented to me by the chef for inclusion into a magazine article. Second, it was done quickly enough, without the hesitation usually delivered by teamwork, and because of the immediacy of the photography the food retained it's moisture and freshness.

I like that it forms a pyramid and that the greens are such a nice counterpoint to the red tones of the beef. The crumb to the far left of the frame gives the image a nice glance of imperfection and the fact that it is going out of focus gives the  image a sense of depth.

I am happy that I included the top rim of the plate so that the food doesn't exist in some sort of oblivion. The revelation of the edge of the dish against a darker background gives me a reference for size and gives me cues about the disposition of the food on the plate.

I mostly like the delicacy of the whole image. The precarious perching of all the parts gives a temporary and ephemeral nuance to the entire idea.

The uploading of the file to Blogger makes it a tiny bit darker than it really is. Think one third of a stop brighter, overall...

I also like the fact that I got paid to play with food and sample some of Tyson Cole's art.

Just revisiting a favorite image taken with a Sony a77.

Jill in Xanadu. Zach Scott Theatre.

Stage lighting only.

And a few more from the same show.

 all images photographed with the Sony a77 and the 70-200mm f2.8 G lens. 

All lighting from the stage lights.

Going Places. Planning the trip.

Everyone has an idea of what might constitute the "perfect trip" for them. That idea might change as we gain more experience and spend more time actually traveling. When I was in college the trip I wanted to take was the classic "backpack and Eurail through Europe trip. I spent a semester doing that with a girlfriend. Now, I don't think I'd have the same enthusiasm for carrying around a big back pack, camping out in freezing weather and making fried eggs on a Blue Gaz stove in an Alpine meadow as ice melts off the tent. I've traveled enough for corporations to be a bit spoiled.

While landscape photographers might want to go into unsullied nature to find the confluence of beautiful land and perfect light people interested in music would rather haunt the music clubs and concerts of big cities ready to document that once in a lifetime performance.

Right now, 2013, I have the idea that I really want to spend ten days discovering Tokyo. Not all of Japan---that's too big a bite to chew off---really, just Tokyo. I have several friends who lived and worked in Japan and they are quick to tell me how misguided I am. That I should consider Kyoto for the gardens and the temples, etc. But that's the trip for them, not for me.

I have a lust to be in a big city, filled with people and buzzing with energy 24 hours a day. My own Lost in Translation tour. So I've been building momentum. Gearing myself up to get geared up. Planning to start planning.

I know I want to go alone. So I'm planning to go in the middle of the Fall. Ben and Belinda will have settled into the routine of work and school. Neither would really have the option of taking that much time off for an adventure that really revolved solely around me wandering the streets taking images and video of things I find quirky, exciting, whimsical, funny and abstractly definitively Japanese. Nor do I want to take time for planned lunches and formal dinners. I'm not interested in building team consensus in the morning or making a visit to a must see site just because it's in someone's guidebook. I'll go alone and then, when it's everyone else's turn I'll stay home and hang with the dog while they do their thing.

I know I'll want to use some of the massive airline miles I've accrued over the last ten years and never used. I'll investigate the best way to leverage those points from affinity programs to pay for airfare and upgrades. I've pegged the first week and a half of October as a slow season so I'm looking around to see when the black out dates are and how I can get around them if I want to get specific with my arrangements.

I need to figure out where I'll make base camp  and find a hotel that works. My biggest concerns for lodging are quiet and a place to charge batteries.

Then I need to start writing proposals to companies who might think that co-sponsoring part of the trip in exchange for a series of articles written about my experiences in their factories or engineering facilities are worth some sort of traded value. I'll start with Sony and go from there.

When I get closer to the date I'll start packing. I'll want to take two identical cameras. One reason is to have an identical back up that works exactly the same and takes the same lenses, batteries and attachments as the primary camera. Second is to have two cameras that can be set the same and use interchangeably while walking and shooting so I can use two different lenses without having to stop and change them out on a single body.

If I were packing to go tomorrow I'd take two Sony Nex-7's, two of the 18-55mm kit lenses and the 50mm 1.8 OSS lens. All of the lenses have IS and I like both choices. For me, convenience and general competence outweigh performance at the zenith of possibility. The above cameras, two chargers with six batteries and ten 16 gigabyte SD cards is an awesome imaging system for traveling and it all fits in a small and inconspicuous bag. No flash and no tripod. I've been down both of those roads before and come to the conclusion that it's not possible to be prepared for every and any eventuality. It's better to plan for an optimum part of the curve and work there.

The real gear is a good pair of comfortable walking shoes and a good attitude. That and a jumbo helping of curiosity.

I've traveled with cameras for the better part of 25 years now and I've done it every which way. I took 25 pounds of medium format Hasselblad gear with me on assignment to St. Petersburg, Russia, along with nearly 100 pounds of lighting. That was a logistical (but at the time, necessary) nightmare.

One time I went to Rome with just the right kit and I wrote in my journal about it. I said I would only want to bring a fast, auto focus camera body and a medium range, fast zoom. At the time I was thinking 28-85mm f3.5 or f4. Now, with nice ISO at 800 or so I would revise that to be a medium range zoom that ends up at f5.6 on the long end. As long as it's reasonably sharp.

If the past is a guide to this trip then it will go something like this: Arrive and sleep.  Get up every day as early as possible and walk the streets in targeted areas just absorbing the sights and shooting the things that interest me. Ten to fifteen miles a day. A card of images a day.  Every night, after supper, I'll sit in my room and write about the day in my journal. What I saw. What I ate. What I heard. What I bought. And so on.

The secret to making it all work in my head is to have a goal in mind before I step on  the plane to go. I can already envision a show of images at several of my favorite galleries. Right now I'm thinking black and white but that may be because it's the way I worked on my most successful trips in the past. And I like the way black and white prints work on the walls.

The new wrinkle will be a conscious integration of video. Snippets tied together with the intention of digging down into some interesting aspect of the trip. I'm not sure what that will be yet but it will come to me before departure.

Why am I sharing this? Because writing out loud is a good way of making it real and gaining the momentum to follow through.  But I'm also keenly interested to hear from you in the comments or offline if you've traveled to Tokyo recently, or live there now. What would you see? Where would you go? What are the new social trends? Where would you base camp? And, if you shoot or have shot in the streets there, what cameras and lenses did you find to be workable or optimal?

My long term goal is to make several trips there and to really see the city before things change again. I want to share my interpretation of the experience with my friends and a wider audience.

Final (vital) question: Can you get good coffee without too much fuss in Tokyo?

Thanks.

"Mad Men" window dressing in Boston.

Since most of us who write and read the VSL blog are guys I won't expect us to know about the Betty Page shop in Boston, on Newberry Street. But it was right around the corner from my hotel and when I got in to town in the early evening I took a stroll just work out the flight kinks. There was this window and in it were mannequins that looked incredibly cool. Perfect models from the 1960's. They weren't going anywhere and they weren't charging SAG/AFTRA rates so I decided to spent a minute or so making their portraits. The "models" were very cooperative but they really didn't have much range when it came to gesture and expression....

I loved this profile of the red head. I shot it with the Sony Nex 7 and the 50mm 1.8 lens at near wide open and handheld. When I got back to Austin and started looking through my files I was happy to see just how controlled the noise was and how sharp the lens is, even when shot nearly wide open. I've included a shot that's around a 1:1 crop just so you can see what to expect from the system. I'm very happy with the overall performance; especially for the size and price.

The final shot, the group shot, was photographed on a different evening using the 

Sigma 19mm 2.8. I consider it a "must get" lens for any of the mirrorless systems.

Old Magazine Assignment. My Three Favorite Chefs of the Moment.

Emmett. Owner of Asti and Fino Restaurants. 

Marion. Owner and Executive Chef of La Traviatta

Peter. Chef to the world.

 I'm leaving for Boston on Monday. Tonight I'll write my last two blogs until next Friday. This is one of them. These images were done a long time ago. The magazine assignment was to figure out my five favorite chefs in Austin and to write a small profile of each one which would touch on their significance in the Austin foodie scene.

These are the three scanned files that I found today on a CD rom I burned over twelve years ago. I did the assignment with a Leica M6 camera, a 90mm Summicron lens, a 35mm Summicron lens for Emmett, and Tri-X film. I printed each one before I did a final scan for the magazine.

I thought about them today because I was querying my chef friends for restaurant suggestions in Boston. Looking at the images today reminded me of how much autonomy we had in our styles back then. It was fun.

I'll be ignoring the blog until Friday the 15th. If you get all vitriolic in the comments you'll still get moderated. I've given my dog the password and she's a ferocious editor. And fiercely loyal...

One more blog coming.

So Much Sturm und Drang about cameras, I thought we should take a break to contemplate cupcakes...

Sometimes you just have to stop and smell the cupcakes...

Sony Nex 7 with 50mm 1.8 OSS lens. Shooting through the glass case.

Mom. On a Visit to San Antonio.

I'm always dragging a camera around but I'm so investing in being in conversations that I don't put it up to my eye and use it nearly enough. Yesterday I was visiting my parents. The occasion was my father's 85th birthday (he is hale and healthy, thank you!). I was sitting on a couch across from my mom and I liked the way the light was coming through the window so I brought the camera up to my eye and shot. I took five or six shots and I got the shot of my mother that matches the way I think about her: Sharp, in charge and ready to discuss anything with a ready command of the facts of the moment.

I was carrying the a850 around with me and I used an 85mm lens.

The visit to San Antonio was good. We caught up on the family news and had a great dinner. It was nice to take a day away from the office and the phone. I should use my camera more and argue less. Seems to work out well.

A really great blog on change and competition by one of our readers:

http://armorfoto.tumblr.com/post/46392764589/from-hot-type-to-bottom-feeders

Randall Armor is a veteran photographer and teacher and he's written a really good blog on competition and change in the world of photography. It's a great read. And, as soon as I finish what's in the queue in front of me I'm going to settle in and start reading his other blog posts. If they are as good as this one I'll be quite happy.

If you disagree, disagree with Randall. I'm just pointing you in the right direction...

Window Reflection.

Near Emerson College. Nex 6. 50mm 1.8 Sony OSS Lens.

New "Holy Grail" of Cameras Spanked by the Real Deal.

It's fun to watch the blogger/reviewers hyperventilate over the latest, new faux rangefinder, the Fuji X100s. But before you snap one up and become part of the (limited) single focal length club, etc. you might want to take a moment to head over to DPReview and check out their studio comparison of a few different cameras in relation to the new golden boy. Don't care about ISO 200? Plug in ISO 1600 and be surprised.

It's fun to watch when the hype doesn't match. Can the early reviews be that wrong? Or have they never taken the time to pick up a ___________ or a Sony Nex7 and really compare?

Becoming a fun spectator sport. Remember last year when it was all about medium format?  And people think I'm fickle....

edit:  Here's the raw comparison. How much noise smoothing is okay? Would you rather have detail or.....?

I'm going to be that, downsampled to the same size the Sony noise will pretty much match the Fuji noise....you'll just be left with more apparent detail...

Of course the Fuji may have unbelievable handling and style. That's important too.

Renee. Close Up.

Early Portrait of Artist.

goal: find interesting people and then photograph them...

Shooting Buildings In Boston. Sony Nex 7 and 50mm.

We've got a lot of open land here in Texas. Our buildings tend to be spread out. Most of our cities are pretty recent so we've got road that started as roads instead of horse paths. But wow! Boston has such a cool collection of buildings from various slices of history and narrow, twisty-turn-y streets. It's perfect for a bout of building stacking...

We were leaving Boston on Thurs. afternoon and we'd been all caught up in college visits for most of the week. The light wasn't great and the weather was freezing but I didn't want to leave before I got in a couple more hours of unfettered photography. I grabbed the Nex 7 and the 50mm Sony OSS lens, shoved an extra battery in my pocket and headed out of the revolving front door of the Taj Hotel, slipped across the street and walked through the park.  I knew what I was looking for and where I could find it. I was looking for something we don't really see in Texas. I call it time-travel-building-stacking.  The intersection of buildings from different eras in different architectural styles.  The buildings seem to cascade off into the difference almost as if someone grabbed a folder full of building images and went nuts layering them in PhotoShop.

The 50mm 1.8 OSS lens was perfect for this. A much tighter angle of view than most people would expect for shooting buildings made necessary by the desire to stack them. A wider angle lens would emphasize the first building and diminish the impact of the buildings behind it. A lens much longer than the 50mm on the Nex would be too limiting, giving me only small slices of the buildings and never really allowing more than two or three in a frame.

The EVF in the Nex worked to my advantage as I could see the relative tonalities while composing. I could make quicker adjustments (with instant feedback) to exposure and I knew when it might be smart to turn on the DRO for more shadow details.

Eventually my watch propelled me back to the hotel to pack and head to the airport. The city of Boston must be a relative heaven for people who are really into architectural photography. The little I saw of the city (how much can you see in a week?) made me want to turn around and head right back. A lot of wonderful stuff.

The Reckless Camera Purchase. The Sirens of Tech Just Past.

I like the new stuff just fine but there's some quirky part of my brain that's always looking out for cool cameras from the recent past. I always liked the idea of big, hunky, bullet proof Sony full frame cameras but the timing was all wrong. When they were launched I was deep into my Olympus and Canon journey. I noted them, thought the build quality and high resolution was neato and then filed the information away in some cobwebby part of my brain. Along with the formula for mixing up homemade Dektol and the directions to my favorite old restaurant (now a new high rise condominum).

As you probably know, somewhere in 2012 I took a left turn and bet it all on Sony. For the most part I'm happy with my decision. The cold, hard reality is that whether you shoot with a new Sony, Canon or Nikon the images are all very good. All the cameras are competitive and any one of the offerings from the big three are at least competitive with whatever else is in their class. But, as I've joined a "tribe" of camera-hood I feel duty bound to at least give my Sony's a nod of approval from time to time.

Logically, my love for the marque comes from the certain reality that, of all the current cameras in the world the absolute best from any company is, without any doubt, the Sony Nex 7. With the right lens in front of its sensor the camera is unbeatable by any other current camera; including any Leica or medium format digital camera. For handling and cuteness it makes the flagship offerings from Canon and Nikon look oafish and clumsy. Runs resolution and sharpness rings around all the other mirrorless swill and kicks dirt in the face of the new rabble of faux rangefinder cameras. Can you imagine preferring a Fuji X100s? Giggle. You can't even change the lens on that little toy.... So, rush out and buy Nex 7's while you can.  (humor alert: Kirk does not think the Nex7 is the only good camera on the market. Save your scathing rebukes for politicians or bankers....ed.)

With a bag full of Sony's premier platinum product at my side why would I want to go digging through the compost pile of cameras past? Hmmm. Interesting question.

Being a fossil in the photography world I actually am programmed to enjoy all kinds of stuff that really doesn't matter in real life. I'm programmed to want full frame cameras because that's mostly all we had in my formative years. Due to the effectiveness of marketing and it's slave, advertising, I've been demographically trained (male, over 40) to believe that anything made out of Magnesium Alloy or Titanium (aka: Boy Metal) is inherently more valuable than anything else. Even though I know better, logically, I've been battered into looking back at optical viewfinders to see if I was mistaken about the incredible value (to working photographers) of electronic viewfinders (I was not mistaken). And mostly I wanted to buy the Sony a850 because David Hobby, Zach Arias and Steve Huff all wrote about the beauty, charm and necessity of full frame cameras (or in the cases of Hobby and Arias, MF cameras) before they came under the spell of the newest Fuji fixed lens point and shoot tool, aka: the Fuji x100s.

There are many things to recommend the Sony a850 and the Sony a900's but developing raw files in Lightroom is not one of them. That bugaboo and the widely accepted view that their Jpeg engines aren't as good as the "big two" leads one on a epic journey to discover the ultimate raw converter solution for Sony's ex-flagship cameras. There are a few upsides. I like the built-in image stabilization. I like the idea of a simple menu, made simple because the cameras have so few "modern" features. I like the full-frame-i-ness, and looking through the uninformative optical viewfinder makes me feel just like a real, pro photographer.....from the 1970's.

Two things drove me to buy the a850. One is the fact that it's a black metal camera and no real man can resist black metal cameras. The second was the low, low used price which was barely above the price of a nice lunch for two at the Tour d'Argent (get the pressed duck). My rationalization was that it would be nice to have a back-up, full frame camera to pair with the Sony a99. That way two lenses could cover an assignment handily without having to make compensations and accommodations for cropped sensor camera backups.

Ah, the steps backward.  The howitzer-like shutter and mirror slap. The mute and uninformative viewfinder. The simple menu structure. The dedicated buttons sitting right outside for everything I normally use. The incredible dynamic range and color of the sensor when used at ISO 200-400. The wonderful color speckles and glittering white dots when used at higher sensitivity settings. Double the battery life of the DSLTs. And twice the weight.

Just a brief dalliance. But doomed for failure and regret as I'm currently using the camera all wrong. I have the Rokinon 85mm lens on the front of the camera even though there's no method of pre-judging actual sharp focus by zooming in on the image. I'm working in Jpeg even though DP Review was dismissive of the "jpeg engine." (Really? It's an engine? Seems more like just a software application to me...). And I even have the Jpeg thing all wrong. I'm using it in black and white mode and goosing the sharpness and contrast. Surely, I'll be plagued with halos around my highlights. I had no idea my highlights were so angelic...

Seriously though, aren't there digital cameras that you never tried but always had a hankering for? If you could pick one up now for pennies on the dollar don't you think it would be fun to try it out? I never owned a Nikon D1x but I was always curious. Same with the Panasonic L1. I always thought that was a sexy camera. I was very happy to have tried out a Canon 1DS mk2 for a while. It looked different, in its images, that later Canons. Not better or worse, just different.

So, today I'm tooling around with the a850. An absolutely reckless and unnecessary purchase. But maybe a lot safer than leaving my money is a European bank.  Have you ever succumbed to marketing from a previous age? Do you have a Leica M3? In your quest for new and powerful have you considered old and eccentric? Might be the ultimate hipster statement: vintage digital.

Just thinking about portraits today.

I loved the process of shoot portraits on 4x5 inch sheet film. It always seemed so...serious.

We'd start out shooting black and white Polaroid to get the look and feel of the lighting locked down.

Then we'd move on to shooting a few color frames to see if the addition of color changed the graphic design of the shots.

Once the subject and I were happy with the final color Polaroid I would grab a stack of film holders and we'd get down to business.

After the last frame was shot I always felt sad. I never wanted to stop taking photographs.

I found these images in a box with hundreds and hundreds of other Polaroid test shots.

It made me stop and re-think my current practice wherein I get everything set up and then we spend some time shooting and chimping until I get everything zero'd in and then I start to shoot in earnest. I think I'm not spending enough time up front to get everything right before I start. I'm depending to much on the digital ease with which iterative corrections can be made as we go.

Next time I shoot I'll test more at the start and then shoot fewer frames during the shoot. But with more concentration.

These were done with one of my old Linhof TechniKarden cameras and the 250mm Zeiss f5.6 lens that I loved. It's amazing what one finds upon opening mysterious little boxes.

Speaking of larger formats you might want to watch the interview with the CEO of Phase One that Michael Reichmann just posted over at www.luminous-landscape.com.  It's pretty interesting:
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/essays/is_mf_dead.shtml