The Online Photographer

Sunday Support Group: If You Didn't Get It, You Haven't Got It

Dans les champs de l'observation le hasard
ne favorise que les esprits préparés.
(In the fields of observation, chance
favors only the prepared mind*.)

                                            —Louis Pasteur

-

I had one of those days yesterday. Let me describe it and see if you know what I mean.

I've got one hand in my pocket, and the other hand is
taking a picture (with apologies to Alanis Morrisette)

I had an hour to kill while my snow tires were being swapped out for my summer tires at Trombly Tire and Auto. So I brought the A6600 and Sigma 30mm Contemporary along, with my rain hat and a camera bag just in case I got caught in the rain, and I wandered around town for an hour and took a bunch of pictures. And all except one "turned out," as we quaintly used to say. That is, they were sharp, clear, and well exposed.

But I didn't get anything.

I've been through the files four times now on the computer, and I just don't think anything quite rises to the standard of being what some now call a "keeper." Much less printable. ("Printable" is still my standard for a successful photo, in my head, even though I seldom print any more.) They're just random snaps of buildings and sidewalks. Pictures I've essentially already taken  dozens of times. Yeah, I know photographs are all technically unique, but you know what Neil Young says, it's all the same song. I took the same pictures last month and last year and I could take the same pictures next month and next year. It's just me out playing my usual tricks. Just snapshots. And I don't mean that in the good sense.

In my somewhat harsh opinion, a lot of photographers on the 2021 internet ought to entertain this as a possibility more often: you just didn't get anything. I see an awful lot of random snaps that sort of resemble photographs that work, but actually aren't. I'd show you what I mean but I've never been comfortable holding real peoples' work up as negative examples; it seems too unkind. They didn't ask for my opinion. And of course, many of the pictures I see are by people who are new, young, inexperienced, or who (yes, let's face it) have the visual aptitude of Helen Keller.

But I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.

One thing I've noticed when this happens to me is that I keep going back to the pictures in the folder and looking through them again. It's like I can't believe I didn't get something. First I'll select one and work on the file a bit, then think, nah, that ain't it. Then I'll go back again and select another prospect and work on that for a little while until realization dawns again: this just didn't quite work. This just doesn't quite make it.

My default attitude appears to be: hey, I worked for an hour, I got all this raw material, there has to be something here.

It's just that sometimes there isn't.

If you didn't get it, you haven't got it. It's not there.

Slagging off?
The other day, after I posted those five test shots in the "Mikey Likes It" post, longtime reader Ernest Zarate wrote, "I really like that puddle photo. It was a terrific coda after a string of pleasant, undemanding snaps of your walk." Shouldn't I consider that comment kind of insulting? He's complimenting one picture but sort of slagging off the others.

I didn't take it the wrong way at all, though, because Ernest got it completely right. "Puddle" was the only good shot I got during that little walkabout, and I already knew it before he commented on it. It was the only scene I "worked"—took multiple shots of while thinking and observing and moving around—exploring it through the viewfinder you might say—and when I got back to the house I was already thinking I hope I got it and wishing I had spent more time working it. Since we're looking at the little man behind the curtain here I'll admit I Photoshopped that one, too. (That might ruin it for you, but we have to be forthright with one another when we're talking about nuts and bolts.)

The rest of the pictures I took on that sortie are just incidental. (Although there's one lake shot I'm still deciding about.)

The magic of photography as I see it and as I practice it is that "sometimes the magic happens." That is, sometimes it comes together and you've got yourself a picture—according to your specific idiosyncratic tastes. I know it's the business of professionals to get good pictures on purpose, pictures others will approve of, of subjects they're assigned, so it's not like my view of photography is the only one. But for me, the whole point of photography is that those mysterious personal hits are out there, and sometimes you're going to find one. Or it will find you, however you want to look at it.

Discipline
Photography requires a certain discipline because you always get something. The camera makes a record of some sort out of everything it's pointed at. This puts the onus on us to successfully ignore all the drek and winnow out the ones that work. But just because we always come back to the barn with "results" doesn't mean we got anything. When we get nothing, we have to have the discipline to know we got nothing, and not try to force it to be "something"! I've probably spend three-quarters of my life as a photographer trying to pretend something works when I know it doesn't. As Cartier-Bresson says in one of his interviews, photography is a no-no-no-no-no-no-no-yes proposition. It's not enough to have the taste to select the yes shots. We also have to have the discipline to not be swayed by all the no shots.

Of course I love it when I get a yes. But truth be told, I'm actually kind of relieved when something is an obvious no as well. It's all those "almosts" that give me fits.

How I know which is which, usually, is that a picture starts to bore me before I'm even finished doing the basic editing on it. When I get a good shot, on the other hand, I can't stop looking at it...I want to revisit it again and again. I'll even come turn on the computer just to see it again. Like listening to a new favorite song over and over.

It's not like I don't know it when I get something good, so why do I try to force things to be good when they just aren't?

To my view—in my chosen style of working—it's all about those ones that work, and how you encourage chance. For me, walking around town making tight little compositions of doorways and architectural details is probably not the best way to get a good picture. But the fact is you never know what you're going to find. You have to get out there with a camera in your hand, get warmed up, get into the flow, and start looking and clicking. It's not going to happen when you're sitting in front of your computer thinking about it.

But getting out and working isn't a guarantee that anything will work, either. You can work all day and get nothing worthwhile; or you can kick the ground with your toe and find gold. You just never know. You have to trust your eyes and trust your gut to know which is which.

The two keys are to know it when you get something, and to know it when you got nothing.

Mike

*One of Ansel Adams's favorite quotes.

Book of Interest this week:

The Education of a Photographer, Edited by Charles H. Traub, Steven Heller, and Adam B. Bell, Allworth Press, 2006, 256 pages. A small but rich gold mine of short essays and interviews by and about photographers. Also available from The Book Depository with free shipping worldwide.

Original contents copyright 2021 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Leon Droby: "On days when I come back from the field knowing I have nothing (and, like today, knew I had nothing even before I left the field), at least I got some practice time in."

Rob White: "I believe it was Ansel Adams that also said he considered it a successful day if he got one good shot out of a hundred."

Mike replies: He also once said 12 (or was it 15?) really good shots was good year's work. I'd like to find the quote....

Jeff: "'Twelve significant photographs in any one year is a good crop.' —Ansel Adams."

Stuart: "Oh where did you get that hat, where did you get that hat? Apologies to Sullivan. No—seriously—where did you get that hat?"

Mike replies: It's an Outdoor Research Seattle Sombrero. Surprisingly effective at keeping rain off of you even when you're not wearing any other rain gear. I use it when I take the dogs out when it's raining or when I meet friends for walks on days that threaten rain. I always feel faintly ridiculous when I wear it but it's actually not that bad looking.

Bahi: "Happens to me often. And, sadly, I often take the easy way out: I treat the best of them as usable."

Stan B.: "I've contemplated this very topic quite often. No, all the sincerity and effort in the world does not guarantee success—at least in the short term (your daily outing). Point in fact, one day last week I walked the entirety of the Las Vegas strip from Fremont St. to the Luxor casino (approximately seven miles). For that effort in 100 degree heat, I got one keeper (at the very, very end). The following day after that exercise in near self immolation, I decided to take a different approach. I went to a café, had two of the most delicious cappuccinos I ever had in the USA, took a (very) short walk, sat down for a Margarita, and on the way back to the hotel walked right into the keeper of the day. Now, I don't have to tell you which is the preferred manner of working for the very same result(s)."

Albert Smith: "One culprit for me is the lack of financial investment/cost to shooting digital. When I shot film, I had to ask if this image (in the finder) was worth 75 cents? This made me more selective and much more inclined to really tweak the composition before pressing the shutter release. It also taught me about exposure because slide film had no 'fix it in post' rescue plan. I went out yesterday and today, and have over three hundred images on my card. I just went through them (before seeing this post), and am shocked how I can see the evolution of a final shot...move left, get higher, reduce exposure, etc., all represented by an actual crappy shot. When I shot film, my goal was to only have that last, fully tweaked and evolved photo.

"I'm glad that I'm not paying for film and processing anymore, but it might improve my photography if I shot like I was."

Thomas Rink: "I think failure shouldn't be dismissed too easily. Sure, it feels better if you've made some successful pictures—but if you are able to recognize failures, this also means that you know what works for you. As a seasoned photographer and artist, you take this for granted. But apparently this is something that many are missing, or feel insecure about. This is judging from the vast amount of books, forums and videos which aim to teach what a 'good picture' is and how to make one. Better times ahead!"

Luke: "I recently 'got one,' the best in a long time. I saw it, I 'worked' it, I knew it. I printed it big. Half the satisfaction for me is just confirmation that the process still works: I can see it, and work it, and get it. And happily delete most of the rest."

robert e (partial comment): "Perhaps the photography lesson that took longest to sink in for me was to stop trying to re-take the photo after the fact, in post. You got it or you didn't, as you say. A hard lesson, but so liberating when it does sink in!"

Dandelion Problem

Just in case you think you've got a dandelion problem. This shows only about a quarter of the field, too.

I have to say, though, it's really quite pretty around the region while the dandelions are in bloom. You see patches of yellow like this all over the place. It doesn't last long of course, but that's the problem with flowers.

Speaking of pretty, look what else I found. I usually take a "test shot" of my shed with any new camera, and I was poking around in the image at high resolutions enjoying the details and the lens rendering. (Michael Reichmann coined a term for this that stuck: "pixel-peeping.") Here's the full image:

And look what I found:

This is about 200% after you click on it. Is that some funky-looking interference pattern, or what? Evidently aliens have made my shed into a hidden communications relay station or something. A lovely little accident.

I went out photographing in the wet this morning, so I have a bunch of new stuff to look at. Sony files seem to play very nicely with Photoshop and ACR.

Mike

Book of Interest this week:

How Photography Became Contemporary Art: Inside an Artistic Revolution from Pop to the Digital Age, by Andy Grundberg, Yale University Press, 296 pages. A longtime critic and observer attempts a synthesis. Good reading. Also available from The Book Depository with free shipping worldwide.

Original contents copyright 2021 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Romano Gianetti: "Welcome to the fashion of removing antialiasing filters on our cameras. As an electronic engineer, I fight with it every day...and I am appalled at the idea that people prefer apparent sharpness to a more correct sampling of the real, analog world. This is a clear example of aliasing: impossible to remove after the fact...and unfortunately no so easy to explain, because the math under it is not trivial. Fortunately, just a bit of focus miss or a less sharp lens will fix it...but only before the shot. Once you have it, the only solution in post is to paint over it."

Jeff: "When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that's a moiré."

Matthew: "'When two patterns of lines cross to form new designs, that's a moiré.' Wisdom found elsewhere, but I think of it every day."

Rob de Loe: "The sensor in the Fuji GFX 50R is quite prone to this kind of aliasing. The 'Enhance' tool in Lightroom sometimes can tidy up some of it (note the qualifiers). I tend not to see it in my files because I usually stop down far enough for diffraction to eliminate the problem. This is where the GFX 100S really cleans up: the more advanced sensor is vastly less prone to aliasing."

Sigma to the Rescue!

Right from the start: your mileage might vary here. I get that. I'm only talking about myself, and when it comes to gear I'm just one more guy with his own particular idiosyncratic tastes. We're all alike inasmuch as we're all different. So don't take this too hard.

However: in my history with reduced-sensor Sonys, the normal lens has persistently been an impediment.

You might say this is because I'm persnickety, and you would be correct, but it's not like I'm entirely unable to adapt when it comes to lenses. When I bought my first DSLR, a Konica-Minolta 7D, used, in 2006, it came with a Konica-Minolta 28–75mm zoom (made for K-M by Tamron, and Tamron still sells versions of the lens today), and I used that one lens the whole time I had the camera. It was a 42–110mm, more or less, on the 7D.

But we like what we like. I like a "wide normal" prime somewhere within 5mm of 40mm as my main lens. Any shorter or longer and I can't stay happy forever.

Sony has such a lens, the Zeiss-branded Sonnar E 24mm ƒ/1.8 ZA (I'll refer to it as the "Zeiss 24mm ZA" in this post). I've owned it in the past. It's not like it's a bad lens—not at all. In fact I liked it a lot. And there is nothing wrong with its specs—nice focal length, nice speed, acceptable size, and a good weight for the cameras.

The problem for me over the years is that it's just too darned expensive for what you get. Every time I've thought about getting back into Sony, the $1,100 whack for what I'd consider the main lens is like a barricade. I wouldn't so much mind paying for the Zeiss 24mm ZA if it were a really outstanding lens; but it falls a little short of that. It's very good rather than great.

If it cost the same as the Zeiss Touit 32mm ($645) I couldn't complain. But it's almost twice that. Why oh why?

Compare its $1,100 cost to Fuji's excellent options. The wonderful Fujifilm XF 23mm ƒ/2, the so-called "Fujicron," is fully a peer of the Zeiss 24mm—it might be even a little better—and it costs $450. And the Fujifilm XF 23mm ƒ/1.4 R is a better lens in every regard (apart from being only a little bigger and heavier) and it's only $900. Yes, you'll have to spend $300 less to get a better lens—life is hard. Also available from Fuji is the slower 27mm pancake (40mm-e) for $400.

The Zeiss 24mm ZA even costs more than the premium normal zoom option for the A6xxx cameras, the Vario-Tessar T* E 16–70mm ƒ/4 ZA OSS—and that's a Zeiss-branded lens too. How can a simple 24mm prime with eight elements cost more than a lens of similar build quality that has double the number of elements and is stabilized to boot? That makes no sense.

If I were Sony—but I'm not
Maybe this is just my own issue, because of my overly specific tastes? Could be. But Sony has no other option in the same focal length range—and the 24mm sticks out like a sore thumb among the few other short primes it does have. It's much more expensive than any of the company's other options among wide or standard prime lenses for APS-C.

If I were Sony, I would have ensured long ago that there were a much more practical option in a moderate-wide prime. As it is, the price of the Zeiss 24mm ZA is like a big, burly bouncer saying "keep out." For example, the A6600 right now is $1,200. But add a Zeiss 24mm ZA and the cost of admission is suddenly $2,300. That might still seem cheap to you, but it's a very different proposition from $1,200. Every time in the past I've considered getting back into Sony, that's what has kept me away.

I probably should have just kept my original Zeiss 24mm ZA, the one I used with my NEX-6 all those years ago. But you know why I didn't? Same problem! Too expensive. I had too much money tied up in it and I needed to get some back out.

Sigma to the rescue
Anyway, the lens you saw pictured in the illustration of the Sony A6600 yesterday (that was the first occasion I've ever used studio lighting for an iPhone picture, by the way) is the Sigma 30mm ƒ/1.4 DC DN Contemporary for Sony E-mount. It's certainly not a compact lens, and at 45mm-e it's right at my cutoff point at the long end, but it's a bargain at $290.

For that price, though, can it be any good? That's what I need to know next.

Mike

P.S. By the way, it was clear all day yesterday and the grass is all shorn. And I took a bunch of pictures.

Book of Interest this week:

How Photography Became Contemporary Art: Inside an Artistic Revolution from Pop to the Digital Age, by Andy Grundberg, Yale University Press, 296 pages. A longtime critic and observer attempts a synthesis. Good reading. Also available from The Book Depository with free shipping worldwide.

Original contents copyright 2021 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Mikey Likes It

I got a Sony A6600 last night. Furnished by LensRentals for review. It arrived via FedEx late in the day.

We're in that time of the year when the lawn is trying hard to get out of control. With all the rain, the grass grows vigorously and I can't cut it because it's wet. I like to mow one section at a time to break up the chore, and it's like a race of sorts...will there be enough dry days to keep it all in check? Will I win or will the grass win? I last was on the lawnmower about four days ago, and I cut grass for an hour in a persistent light sprinkle. It never got going but it never stopped "spitting."

So last night I did what I always do when I get in a camera for review...wandered around the neighborhood for twenty minutes snapping pictures of anything and everything to give myself something to look at. It was dark and wet, but oh well.

And it makes perfect sense in a TOPpish way that I'd be trying out the A6600 now, since it's just about to be replaced. A new Sony top-o'-the-line APS-C camera is due by the end of this month, according to SonyAlphaRumors. This has happened at least once before, that I've tried a camera at the end of its lifecycle. Trust TOP to be in there last with the hot reviews!

I'm just avoiding the rush, is all. Stepping out of the rat race and finding a nice spot under a shady tree to sit and rest and think. No pell-mell hustle-and-bustle here at TOP Rustic World Headquarters. Not even naps are mandatory.

The A6600 is a good seller, though, so the closeout discounts are modest. B&H Photo, Amazon. I don't think you should be in any rush to buy, though—might as well wait and see the new one.

Obligatory lake shot with orange accent

ƒ/1.4 mystery fleur

Rustic HQ in all its frumpy glory. The neighbors use the
field opposite as a parking lot. I work on the porch.

Fallen tulip petals. Look closely, you can see raindrops.

Puddle

...That woeful genre of c. 2000 ff.: "test shots."

It's funny, but I seldom enjoy shooting more than on these little jaunts. It's no-pressure, the opposite of an assignment. I don't even care what the pictures are of...they can be of nothing but a puddle and it doesn't matter. (I like the puddle, though.) I'm just trying to get a feel for the camera, work out how to hold it, listen to the sounds it makes, see how fast it focuses, start to learn the controls...mostly, see if it fits, and see if I like it or not. The purpose is to give myself some stuff to look at on the computer...see how much headroom there is, take a look at focus accuracy, check out the noise and enjoy the sharpness, compare the raws to the JPEG engine. You know, just get a feel for things.

I plan to use the review camera to compare two lenses that are totally un-alike. I also got some reader-donated Nikon stuff in recently, and...well, more about that another time. Suffice it to say I've been shooting a lot.

It's not like the A6xxx series is unfamiliar. I have a NEX-6 from way back and a reader-donated A6000, and I reviewed the A6500 a while ago. To be honest, the reason I wanted to try this one was because it was rumored that Sony had improved what are sometimes called the "haptics," the feel of the controls. I just wanted to see what was up with that.

That, and I wanted to get my own mitt on the larger grip, which houses a larger battery.

If I'm honest, I also wanted to get a "grip" on the A6600 so I can be up to speed when the new one comes out.

Brutalism
At first my impression was somewhat negative. I know it's a snowflake thing to say, but the thing is actually a little...heavy! Seventeen and a half ounces on the kitchen scale, which doesn't sound like much until you compare it to the A6000 at 11.5 oz. Add a substantial lens, and we're a long way from the old NEX-5n, that's for sure, that tiny camera which, with the other early NEX cameras, was the now-distant ancestor of this form-factor. The new grip is very nice and beefy, but it creates a little dissonance because it's still, well, short. Really short! It's about exactly the height of my index, middle, and ring fingers. There's no place for the pinky to go, except to sort of curl around underneath the grip. Which felt all right sitting at my desk, but...?

The A6xxx form-factor is a bit polarizing. I like it, but dare I say that it might be time for a rethink? Sony's "brutalist" style (the term comes from architecture) has kept its designers from doing some obvious practical things that would improve the ergonomics pretty substantially. Like, just put the PASM dial on the top of the camera, fer Pete's sake. Yes, it's nice and design-y that it's set flush into the top plate, but we have work to do and we just want the thing to work well. As it is you have to roll it with your thumb which doesn't make the most sense for a clickstopped dial. And, as the whole internet says in unison, "ADD A FRONT DIAL SONY" so the four-way switch on the back doesn't also have to be a dial. Nobody ever liked that; it was just something we accepted because the cameras were tiny. When they used to be tiny.

And I don't even like front dials. But sometimes they just make sense. As it is, in A(perture) Priority I get to have either the +/– or the aperture on the control dial, but I have to choose.

I haven't held a Z camera yet, but I'm looking forward to it. It looks like Nikon put some real effort into just what I'm talking about. If it makes the cameras look a little odd, like they wouldn't satisfy the teacher in an advanced industrial design class, that's fine with photographers as long as it makes the cameras more satisfying to hold and the controls easier to manage.

The proof's in the puddle...er, pudding
Once I got outside and settled into the flow of shooting, though, my concerns evaporated. It's a lovely camera to hold and work. My homeless pinky complained not, and the weight was nothing. Actually, regarding that, this camera is 17 and a half ounces and the "perfect weight" for a camera body (i.e., ideal per my own tastes) that I arrived at way back in the '90s was 18 ounces. In use the A6600 just reinforces that old determination.

The menus are a bit of a Br'er Rabbit thicket, of course, but I have a week with the camera. Another race to the finish, that will be.

The other camera I've been shooting with is a Nikon D800E, and it's not going to be a great big mystery to longtime readers which of the two Mikey likes. Oh, and those controls? Yes, they do feel more substantial, smoother, more deluxe. They've lost the lightweight and hence somewhat flimsy feel of the A6000's dials 'n' buttons. The A6600 is one well-built brick, really a solid machine, sophisticated and deluxe. And a pleasure to use. I'm sure familiarity played a part, but I'm impressed. Hey Mikey!

Mike

P.S. A moment of silence please: I also learned on SonyAlphaRumors that the a99 II, the a77 II, and the a68 have all been discontinued, which means that's the end of Sony's original Alpha SLRs and "SLTs." And, by extension, the end of the lineage of the old Konica-Minolta DSLRs.

Book of Interest this week:

How Photography Became Contemporary Art: Inside an Artistic Revolution from Pop to the Digital Age, by Andy Grundberg, Yale University Press, 296 pages. A longtime critic and observer attempts a synthesis. Good reading. Also available from The Book Depository with free shipping worldwide.

Original contents copyright 2021 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Antonis R: "The Sony mystery: how can they miss obvious design issues with their bodies' ergonomics over so many iterations? Are they from some other country that just invented cameras? Imagine if they got the ergonomics (and menus) right like...Nikon, Canon, Fuji, (ex-) Olympus, Panasonic et al. (leaving film brands aside). They'd be hard to beat given their electronic prowess. My own experience is only with their a7R III but it proved the reviews right. The baby Sonys are no exception. Argh!"

Mike replies: It's said by some that the new camera will have the same design as the A7C. Although I would have said the A7C has the same design as the A6xxx series, there are some differences. And there could be more differences when the design is adapted back to a top-of-the-line APS-C. We'll see, but I'm interested in seeing what they'll come up with.

Canon v. Canon

The other day in the "Competition from Used" post I said, "It's almost like we're in the exact opposite situation of the one we were in at the turn of the millennium." Which got me to thinking.

Back then, Canon had just introduced the D30 (not 30D, but D30) a "reasonably priced" digital SLR that had a three megapixel sensor. It was bigger news in the photography world then than anything at all is now. Photo writers across the globe breathlessly ventured the holy-grail claim—that the D30 it was almost as good as, or as good as, or a little bit better than, the results you could get with 35mm film! This was hotly and happily debated far and wide. I was Editor-in-Chief of Photo Techniques magazine at the time, and at the magazine we offered a selection of "Collector Prints" taken with the new D30 by a guy from Canada I had met a few years earlier by the name of Michael Reichmann. Michael's prints were meant to show off the new Canon and make the case for digital as something that might actually be viable for enthusiast non-pro photographers, an idea to which there was still a lot of resistance at the time.

Now cut to today and compare that situation to this: the Canon EOS M6 Mark II is in its second iteration already and it's hardly even made a blip on my personal radar screen...even though I prefer small cameras and tend to pay attention to them. Lens options are limited, but paired with its standout 32mm ƒ/1.4 normal prime lens, its capability compared to Y2K norms is just insanely good. It's a small carry-around camera no bigger, really, than an original Barnack Leica. (Strange that Leica would let another company call any camera M6, but maybe some kind of statute of limitations has run out.) The little lens, which is about two and a quarter inches long (56.5mm) and weighs just slightly more than eight and a quarter ounces (235g), is nevertheless a no-apologies fast normal with superlative performance—and very nice bokeh I might add. The little camera has a spectacular 32-megapixel sensor (more than ten times as many pixels as the D30, n.b.) and is reputed to be very fast. Any way you look at it, the little M6 Mark II runs rings around the hot news from October 2000.

Despite all this over-the-top goodness, though, the M6 II barely moves the needle in today's world as far as consumer excitement as concerned, at least that I can tell. Certainly nothing like the frenzy of interest in the D30 in 2000.

The lens and camera together cost $1,328, which might be somewhat of an impediment to interest, but then, it's neither a compromised camera nor meant to be a budget alternative. And consider that, adjusted for inflation, that $1,328 would have been only $866 in 2000, the year the Canon D30 came out at $3,000 and DPReview called it an "unbeatable" value for money. Put the other way around, the D30 would cost $4,600 today. That was cheap compared to the digital SLRs that newsrooms were paying $25,000 for only a few years earlier. And by the way, DPReview calls the M6 Mark II "a good bit cheaper" than the Sony it competes against (they must mean the A6600). Of course, you might also want the M6's removable $199 EVF-DC2 viewfinder, but that's up to you.

The M6's only problem? Odd, but it might be a little too old fashioned. Not enough bigger/better than its biggest existential threat and wannabe competitor, the smartphone.

Mike

Book of Interest this week:

How Photography Became Contemporary Art: Inside an Artistic Revolution from Pop to the Digital Age, by Andy Grundberg, Yale University Press, 296 pages. A longtime critic and observer attempts a synthesis. Good reading. Also available from The Book Depository with free shipping worldwide.

Original contents copyright 2021 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Ken Bennett: "Back in the fall of 2000, the university where I work hosted a presidential debate. I was going to cover it shooting all film, of course, but Canon Professional Services offered to loan me the as-yet unreleased D30 digital camera. So I got one and shot some test images, figuring they would be okay for maybe a website, and I was amazed at the overall quality of those photos. I ended up shooting most of the events surrounding the debate and some of the debate itself with that D30. Had a double-truck image in the alumni magazine from one frame, and it looked great. Nothing like today, of course, but easily comparable to or better than the Fujicolor 800 color neg we were shooting at the time.

"Then I had to send it back, which turned out to be a huge blessing. I had shot 1,500 frames and had no idea how to handle them; editing, viewing, captions—none of it. I was used to shooting film and scanning individual images for print reproduction (or making actual prints in a darkroom). So I spent the next couple of months figuring out how to manage all the digital files. Then we got our first D30 that winter, the second one a few months later, and a pair of the original 1D bodies the following year. (Four megapixels! Eight frames per second! Amazing autofocus! Seriously, they were da bomb, and the later 1D Mark II was my favorite Canon ever. Shot a lot of good photos with those.)

"Kudos to Canon for the D30. It changed my life and my career in so many amazing ways. I could go on at length.  :-)  "

Tom Burke: "I use Canon cameras and have for many years, so the M line ought to interest me. However, it doesn't—there aren't enough good lenses (and none from third party suppliers that I know of) and a lot of the cameras are missing viewfinders—I need a VF.

"I was however attracted to that sensor, so I bought the M6's cousin, the 90D, which has the same sensor in an APS-C DSLR body. Yes it's bigger and heavier than the M6 but it's lighter than the full frame camera I had previously. I'm delighted with it, and given the price of Canon's R series, I suspect I've bought my Final Camera. The 90D and my iPhone 12 Pro will do me for the foreseeable future.

"I never had a Canon D30, but I did have its successor, the D60, which I bought used. That was my first DSLR and was the game-changer for me—previously I'd had EOS 35mm SLRs."

R. Edelman: "The Canon D30 made me think of Bill Biggart, the photographer who was killed at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. He had some film cameras and a D30. The only images that survived were from the D30. Even though the lens was ripped from the camera, the compact flash card survived. That's one tough camera."

Ed. note: Bill Biggart's website is still up, and contains a picture of his ruined D30 as well as a small selection of his recovered 9/11 images. 

Blog Note

I've caught up with the backlog of comments and have just now posted many new "Featured Comments" on posts going back to "Three Pictures Under Discussion" from last Thursday. I hope you'll check them out, and humble apologies for the slow service.

Mike

The Girl in the Kent State Photo

"Last May, when Mary Ann Vecchio watched the video of George Floyd’s dying moments, she felt herself plummet through time and space—to a day almost exactly 50 years earlier. On that afternoon in 1970, the world was just as riveted by an image that showed the life draining out of a young man on the ground, this one a black-and-white still photo. Mary Ann was at the center of that photo, her arms raised in anguish, begging for help.

"That photo, of her kneeling over the body of Kent State University student Jeffrey Miller, is one of the most important images of the 20th century. Taken by student photographer John Filo, it captures Mary Ann’s raw grief and disbelief at the realization that the nation’s soldiers had just fired at its own children. The Kent State Pietà, as it’s sometimes called, is one of those rare photos that fundamentally changed the way we see ourselves and the world around us...."

Keep reading at WashingtonPost.com

I don't know if you'll be able to see this or if it will be behind a paywall for you. I hope the former. It's a fascinating article. By Patricia McCormick in the Washington Post Magazine, April 19th, 2021.

Articles like this take us back to first principles, by reminding us of the power and depth single images can have in the culture—and, in this case, of the sometimes sinister influence they might have in the lives of those photographed. "That picture hijacked my life," Mary Ann Vecchio said. She blames an Indianapolis Star reporter who turned her in to authorities.

A telling comment: "I'm a living person, and I'm in a history book!" Mary Ann says at one point. And, but for that picture, "I might have stayed anonymous forever."

If you can't see the article, you can see the picture here. (Again, I hope you can. I don't have a subscription to TIME.com and I can see it.)

The student photographer who took the picture, John Filo, is now head of photography for CBS. The article also describes the effect the photo had on him and his life. For example, he felt very guilty when he realized Mary Ann was not a student protester at all but merely a 14-year-old runaway who happened to be passing through the area. She had met the dead boy, Jeffrey Miller, only 25 minutes earlier. The article recounts John and Mary Ann's emotional eventual meeting.

Thanks to Scott Kirkpatrick for alerting me to this. You might remember Scott from this post.

Mike

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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Rene: "This murder and those of the other victims at Kent State and Jackson State in Mississippi on May 15th had a profound effect on my life. I was a 25-year-old graduate student at a state university in a conservative state. As the only graduate who went out on strike at my university as part of the national student strike, I tended to stand out. Within days I was purged from the university and 'strongly advised' by the State Police who came to my home to leave the state. Discretion being the better part of valor as they say, I left within a day or two; my decrepit old Volkswagen bug just making it out to a more liberal city in another state before collapsing.

"It all turned out well in the long run (I'm now 75) but it changed the course of my life and took it in directions and to places I never would have imagined. It's part of the journey that led me to photography."

Douglas Howk: "Being a Kent State alumni (class of '68), I was invited to a fundraiser at Ted Kennedy's home in McLean, VA. Most of us were still in shock at what happened, but we remembered the animosity of the Kent townsfolk toward us students. Being both anti-war and a veteran (Army, '65), I could sense the hatred of a polarized nation. Sounds familiar."

Phil: "Thanks Mike. That's an incisive lesson: to contemplate the effects of a photo on both the person who took it and especially the people in the photo. It's something that all us street photographers should stop and think about, once in a while since, by definition, we're snapping pictures of people who didn't choose to be in our photos.

"I was 10 years old when the Kent State massacre took place. I don't really remember it at the time. But I do remember that summer, during our family trailer trip across Canada, somewhere in the prairies the CSN&Y song 'Ohio' came on the radio from some local radio station and my older brother and I stopped and listened raptly. I've always remembered that moment. My parents weren't keen on that 'hippy music' but my brother pointed out that this was protesting when the students were shot and my parents both stopped and listened with somber attention. That moment certainly was one of those inflection-points one has as a kid."

albert erickson: "I am a Kent graduate class of 1970. Yes I was on campus that day. It was my last day of undergraduate school. I was not directly apart of the demonstrations but nonetheless it affected my life more than I would ever realize at the time. I was commissioned a second lieutenant a month later as a result of completion of Army ROTC and faced with a decision about Viet Nam. Fortunately I never had to make that choice but was assigned stateside. I hold a place in my heart for Kent and those who were a part of that demonstration and following events. To this day I sit on a board at the University and make several trips a year back to the school. That day and those events were a large part of who I am today. Thanks for mentioning this today."

For Your Toolkit

I read about these Sharpie Metallic silver markers on a home products website, where they were recommended for marking on black surfaces.

As photographers we always seem to be buying gizmos made of shiny or matte black plastic. Suppose you'd like to mark your camera battery with its purchase date (because rechargeable lithium batteries "age out" eventually)? How about marking lenscaps so you know what lens they belong to? Marking cards? Writing on a wall-wart to remind yourself what the darn thing goes with? I have a drawer half full of old wall-warts whose purpose is lost to history. At the same time I'm a little scared to throw them all out because I know that right after the truck passes I'll discover that I need one. (As Michael Scott said, "I'm not superstitious, but I'm a little stitious.")

I should mention that it's best not to mark on cameras or lenses unless it's going to be out of sight. It affects resale value. And has the odor of vandalism, I have to say, like marking up a hardcover book.

Anyway, according to the vast number of comments on Amazon, sometimes these arrive dried out, but mostly they work as advertised, and they can write on stone, glass, plastic, and all sorts of other surfaces, and the ink shows up against both dark and light backgrounds. They dry fast, are permanent, don't fade, and you don't have to shake them.

It's risky to post this before trying these first, but your exposure will be pretty limited in any case: three bucks for two.

Mike

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Original contents copyright 2021 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

Gordon R. Brown: "Longtime user of these Sharpies on my flashcards, batteries, and battery chargers. Highly recommended. I like the suggestion of labeling the wall warts."

Sunday Support Group: How Many Calories Should You Eat Every Day? (OT)

I've been writing from time to time about my diet experiment. Recently, I'm sorry to report, the news has not been so good. I hit a rough patch. I started cheating on my diet and didn't seem to be able to help it. My weight began to go in the wrong direction.

But it was a mystery to me. What was going on? After more than a year of eating plant-based, wasn't I well adapted to it? I thought I was. Didn't I like it? I thought I did. Where was I going wrong?