The Online Photographer

Implementation Would Be Everything

Yesterday, reader Bear wrote:

"I'd like Leica to get together with Apple and build an iPhone into a Q2 or 3 or whatever...that would give me both a reason and an excuse to cart a camera everywhere. I might look a bit silly holding a camera to my ear instead of my eye though...but I probably would still buy it!"

I've actually always wondered why Apple doesn't do this. I used to wish for an "Apple Camera," but that was before the smartphone era.  

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, "I trust a good deal to common fame, as we all must. If a man has good corn or wood, or boards, or pigs, to sell, or can make better chairs or knives, crucibles or church organs, than anybody else, you will find a broad hard-beaten road to his house, though it be in the woods." That's the original quote from his Journal, in 1855. Folk wisdom streamlined it to: "Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door."

It might have been true in 1855. Not any more. For one thing, big companies don't take ideas from random citizens—there's way too much liability in it. Whatever they do, they get pestered by people claiming the idea was theirs, like a hiker in Maine in the summertime gets pestered by black flies. They'll not only not use your idea, they don't even want to hear about it—my father, who was a management consultant for 30 years, told me about one company that wouldn't even open letters if they had any idea that there was a product idea inside.

Of course, companies also do steal ideas all the time, but good luck getting them to admit it.

So, mental exercise only: picture some compact but good quality APS-C or Micro 4/3 ILC such as a Ricoh GRIII, a Sony A6[x]00, or (okay, Bear) a Leica Q2. If it had a phone touchscreen on the back of it, with all the functionality of an iPhone, would that be something that would appeal to you?

Implementation is everything
I doubt I'd like it, and here's the reason: it would entirely depend on implementation, and the chances they'd screw it up are exactly 92%.* My family had a little Boston Whaler once that was supposed to do everything: it had oarlocks and oars if you wanted to use it as a tender, a transom stern so you could mount a little outboard motor, and a mast well for a little sunfish-style sail (don't know what that rig is called) [UPDATE: It's called a lug rig, technically "balanced-lug rig,"and such boats are called luggers. So now we know.] Well, it was horrible at all three tasks.

Skerry with balanced-lug rig. Illustration thanks to
John C. Harris's The Life of Boats blog.

Of course, a phone itself replaces approximately a dumptruck's worth of traditional tools, objects, documents and implements, from maps to calculators to books, and does a lot of new stuff besides, so it's already a Swiss Army knife. So maybe it would accommodate being stuck to the back of a camera without issues.

Still, my opinion is that they seldom get cameras quite right, so I'm guessing that adding a phone would be more cooks than the broth could bear.

Would you buy such a thing?

Personally, my seven-year-old iPhone had a seizure over the weekend, which scared me, even though it seems to have recovered. I guess it's of the age that I should be thinking about a new one when Apple comes out with the iPhone 14 in September. I'll have to have a print sale before then, if I intend to be able to pay for the blasted thing.

Mike

*That's a "monkeybutt number." Pulled it out of a monkey's butt.

Book o' the Week:

The Beatles: Get Back. The story of the band's last year, coinciding with the release of Peter Jackson's documentary Get Back.

The book link is your portal to Amazon from TOP, should you wish to support this site.

Here's the link to B&H Photo

Original contents copyright 2020 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. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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

Speed: "Statista tells us, 'In their 2018 fiscal year, Apple sold more than 217 million iPhones. After the release of the first-generation iPhone in 2007, the unit sales of the Apple mobile device saw rapid growth year after year, peaking at 231 million in 2015. iPhone sales have stayed relatively stable since then.' After completely re-engineering the iPhone into a Leica (a large and complex task), the incremental sales to apple would be vanishingly small—how many Leicas are sold today? Even a million could be mistaken by Apple as a rounding error. That isn't to say that owning such a thing would be interesting, useful and probably fun."

James: "Although I own both a Ricoh GR III and IIIx and absolutely love them (I also have a Leica Q2 Monochrom), I much prefer using a viewfinder. My favorite camera is the Fuji X100V. On the Q2 and X100 I never use the screen to compose. Focusing with a screen is a compromise I am willing to make with the GR series. I find phones difficult to take photos with. I am always accidentally touching the screen so that it suddenly doesn't allow me take the photo. I haven't mastered holding it by the edges.... :-)

"Additionally, the GR series has a handgrip and buttons which are very easy to use. It's even more remarkable given its size and the fact that it has a APS-C sensor. If I had to choose between the Leica and the GR, I would pick the GR every time. Is this hypothetical phone/camera going to have buttons/dials to change the aperture, exposure compensation, etc.? If it does then does it actually work as a phone with all these extra controls?"

Mike replies: Re holding a phone, you don't have to hold it by the edges. Just look on the back where the lens is, and wrap your hand around the back so that it doesn't cover the lens. Perfectly easy and natural. (But I still think the go buttons are in entirely the wrong places. And I hate the way its exposure adjustment works.)

KeithB: "Here is the somewhat cheeky user tip I wrote for the Apple Community Discussion board about submitting ideas to Apple."

Mike replies: That's very good. Tells it the way it is.

Mani Sitaraman: "What I really want is 1.) the digital interface on my Nikon DSLR to be as simple to use as the camera app on my iPhone and 2.) for my in-camera image files to be seamlessly transmitted without excessive fuss to my iphone/iphotos database so that I can forward them."

Omer: "Yeah, but no. I get enough stares when my camera is at my eye, what would those stares turn into if the camera were at my ear?"

Mike replies: Made me laugh. And that's the last word!

Great Expectations

Matt O'Brien wrote in response to yesterday's post:

"All of these reasons are why I am waiting for the [Leica] CL2."

The late Leica CL. It was Leica's me-too X100[x],
but failed to slay the dragon.

Alas, Fuji excepted, these are woeful times for people who like smaller-than-24x36mm sensors, and the Leica CL is one more reason. On May 17th, Leica Rumors published an internal document from Leica advising its dealers how to handle any questions they might get about the CL and TL from "distributors, customers, and the media." Essentially, the document says that sales of cameras with smaller sensors are in die Toilette (again, Fuji excepted, I would guess) but that the FF segment is still a bright spot, and that this state of affairs "has prompted Leica Camera AG to discontinue its CL-/TL2-system cameras." The company adds that it'll be concentrating on FF cameras going forward.

On the good side, the rumor filters through that Leica is surprised at the success of the Q series. (See Peter Wright's comment.)

Leica did affirm that it'll service any CL or TL2 for six years from date of purchase. B&H lists the CL as discontinued, but, in what is no doubt a glitch, lists the TL2 as being both available and discontinued. I have a feeling if you were to try ordering a TL2 with lens (same price as the TL2 without lens), your order would be cancelled.

Six years might be a good prediction for the extent of survival for "legacy" smaller-sensor ILCs. (The legacy is from the days when "chips," as they were called then, were exponentially more expensive the larger they were.) If I were to wax acerbic as is my wont betimes, I would fire off a snarky comment about how we'll soon all have to drive giant pickups like the GMC Deniali [sic] and take pictures with proper bricks and bags of giant lenses if we can't be satisfied, like good sheeple, with the phones Apple gives us. But I won't go there, and thou art welcome. You might think Fuji is also excepted from this six-year dire prediction, but they're only one decision away from it. Remember that Nikon was "committed" to APS-C in the early days of DSLRs, until it wasn't any more.

But, as Matt knows by now from other commenters, he's unlikely to get a CL2. But hey, Matt, join my club—I'm waiting for the Panasonic GX8 Mark II. Comma, dammit. Miss Havisham is still waiting for her bridegroom, too—we all have our great expectations!

Mike

P.S. Note the categories for this post. :-)

Book o' the Week:

Inspiration Leica Akademie (English and German Edition). A "group show" of 76 Leica Akademie photographers from 16 countries worldwide, curated by Heidi and Robert Mertens. It looks to me like this is going out of print soon, so act soon if you want one.

The book link is your portal to Amazon from TOP, should you choose to support the site.

Link to B&H Photo

Original contents copyright 2020 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. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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

xf mj: "I just upgraded to a used 'big dragoon' Olympus to pair with a new-to-me 80–300mm-e lens, but these last posts had me really thinking I should replace my ol' 2011 E-M5 + 20mm combo with a Fuji X100v. I still very much enjoy the digital equivalent of a walk-around, almost pocketable RF with a wide-normal, and those posts were a good reminder of that love. For a few years every other comment I made on TOP expressed my allegiance to that E-M5 combo.

"So I do a deep looking back at the image quality etc of all these guys. It's all good. Quite good. What the industry achieved with that Fuji, probably with this CL, with the E-M5 Mark III, etc., is more than good enough. They are all great. They are all capable cameras, some with IS, some with good weather sealing. All I ask of everyone who owns these cameras now is to treat them nice and sell 'em cheap to me someday on eBay!

"The market has briefly forgotten this segment for the time being. Hopefully it will twist back around. Some possible evidence in the vehicle realm: I live in a rural coast area, and all the big truck bros are now into buying used Minis to drive around these days. They want stick shifts, good gas mileage, and some fun handling. Gives me a weird kind of hope. Heck, maybe a fun-to-drive, compact, reliable, light-duty truck will be back in vogue soon too!"

Mike: Strange, I just noticed the other day that I'm seeing more Minis on the road around here. There's a Mini parked in a driveway that used to serve as parking for one of those 700-HP Dodge Challengers.

A mini point-counterpoint:

Kirk (partial comment): "As to the Leica CL, which I own. The images out of that small and agile system are extremely good. It's a product that required a better educated market, and the interchangeable lens capability makes it head and shoulders better than the Fuji X100V. I owned that camera as well—until I shot with the CL. Then it was 'Adios X100V.'"

Kenneth Tanaka (partial comment): "Re: the Leica CL, alas, 'tis fading to history. No surprise to me. I owned one for a couple of years. Yes it was kinda kute. Yes, it loved M lenses via an adapter. Yes its native lenses were nice. But the package, as a whole, was, typically for Leica, overpriced, outdated, quirky, and under-featured. I felt no sentimental pangs when UPS took mine away."

stmpjmpr: "Re 'Leica is surprised at the success of the Q series': I'm surprised that they're surprised: The Q gives a lot of the Leica feel and quality, but for those of us whose eyes aren't up to the manual focusing of the M. Its simplicity, quality, and M-inspired styling are alluring. To Yuan's point in the comments, it is EVF-based, but it's quite nice in manual focus mode."

darlene: "In 2010 I purchased my last DSLR, the D700 for an Iceland trip. My favorite Iceland photos were actually made with the smaller Canon G7 because it stayed in my pocket and was easily accessible, although the D700 images are 'prettier.' Not long after, I acquired my first mirrorless camera, an APS-C Sony NEX-7. The D700 was sold off after it slept for a year in my gear closet. I shoot tech cameras with digital backs in the studio, and Fuji APS-C cameras for all my other needs. No longer do I have a need for the 24x36 sensor. If I did not shoot medium format, that might be a different story, but medium format and tech cameras make me happy. The 4/3 system never interested me because I found APS-C good enough for my smaller format needs."

More on Those $6,000 and $7,000 Cameras

ChrisC wrote, yesterday: "I’m not sure if this is something you have already posted about, but to add to your comments on economics: Boots Theory.

Cool.

Here's The Boots Theory, in case you don't want to follow that link: "The boots theory comes from a passage of the 1993 novel Men at Arms [by the late Sir Terry Pratchett], the second novel to focus on the City Watch, in which he muses about his experiences of poverty as compared to his fiancée Lady Sybil Ramkin's conception of poverty:

The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles. But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while a poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet. This was the Captain Samuel Vimes "Boots" theory of socioeconomic unfairness.

I've never heard of "Boots Theory" per se (thanks for that) but I've written about that very thing, for instance in the first paragraphs of this post from 2015. Three points by way of commentary: I heard once that the MacArthur of the MacArthur "genius" grants made his fortune in insurance, but that he self-insured his own cars. It might be apocryphal that he said "insurance is a ripoff" by way of explaining why. Next point, consider that my father, when we moved to Washington, D.C. in the 1970s so he could work for NASA, paid $200k for our house in Maryland just across the D.C. border (Zillow "Zestimates" its current value at 11 times[!] that), and he paid cash. (He was Dave Ramsey before Dave Ramsey was Dave Ramsey.) Then consider that for most middle-class people, the no. 1 or no. 2 expense of their entire lives is the interest on their house. As I said in that 2015 post, "the reality of having no money is that it costs more. Not 'more' in any diffuse general sense, taking into account intangibles like limitations on life choices and personal satisfaction: it just costs more in plain ol' money." The third point: my grandfather, an investment banker whose lifestyle I like to semi-humorously describe as "Downton Abbey at one-quarter scale," used to say you should "buy the best." When I was a young teenager, I asked him why, and he said "if you buy the best you only have to buy it once." There's Boots Theory right there...

...And a bit of advice I probably should have followed when it came to cameras!

And believe me, I've often thought about what might have been. I actually wrote a manifesto-style little essay in the 1980s declaring that I wanted to be like Eugene Atget, and continue doggedly with one technique for my whole life, except in my case it would have been what I called my "Photo 101 technique": a 35mm camera, fast B&W film, and smallish prints reproducing the whole negative out to the blackline:

Photo-101-technique prints. Paper size is 11x14 inches.

At the time I couldn't even image how such an ordinary technique would be come obsolescent, although of course now it has. So what might my life have been like if I had stretched for that out-of-reach M6 at Industrial Photo off the beltway in Maryland back in 1984, and then kept using it and actually fulfilled my little manifesto? I might still have it today, and be using a newer one or an M7 or something. Would I still be at it?

If I had bought an M6 and three lenses back then and kept using it, I would have been way ahead of where I actually am. I can't estimate how much I've wasted spent on cameras since then, but $20,000 is way too low an estimate.

Of course, it's a moot point, because I turned out to be a writer—a magazine/Web writer—rather than (primarily) a photographer. I didn't know that's what was going to happen, at the time. (Funny, though, I still consider "Photo-101 style" B&W my "real" work. I've never been able to completely "own" digital inkjet prints in color as being wholly "me.")

My point here is smaller than you think
And an answer to Thom and everyone else who suggests used gear: it's been my observation that a certain subset of hobbyists prefers used gear, probably because it's a financial win: it's cheaper, still useful, and satisfies an urge for thrift that's important to them. But by "hobbyist" I certainly didn't mean "rank beginner." They're not hobbyists. Yet. A hobbyist would more likely be someone who already has a number of older cameras (the older they are, the older their old cameras). I would counter the "buy used" approach with another subset you're very familiar with: those who are so eager to own the latest thing that they'll discard superseded models that are still in great condition and still have a lot of life left in them. (Y'all know who you are. Haven't we all done it at least once or twice?) The ones who own an X-Pro2 and just have to have an X-Pro3 as soon as it appears. That's a big group too.

I won't ask Thom how many times in his career he himself has been satisfied to buy a 5-year-old camera for his professional and personal work. It's not a fair question, as I well know, because we have to write about the newest gear and we need to be familiar with it, he much more than I.

Several readers took me to task for creating a litany of "apex" cameras and not considering the reasonably-priced alternatives that are good enough. D B wrote: "Re: the question 'are hobbyists being priced out of the hobby,' I agree with Ken T.: you (we) are not. What the heck do you (we) need a Z9, A1, or GFX 100S for?"

But that's an interesting aspect of this: how can an enthusiast site survive if it doesn't consider the best gear in the field at least occasionally? But it's been getting sort of pointless. If I write about a $6,000 camera body, the portion of readers with a real interest in the product is just so small, for the simple reason that most of them would not spend that much on a camera even if they can. I know I wouldn't. Some of you would read it anyway and might even enjoy it, but, well, there's that "what has this got to do with me" reaction that I worry about, too. The equation has gotten more...fraught, let's say.

All I was really saying with the post is that the trend to five- and six-thousand dollar camera bodies might be putting a damper on enthusiast participation in the hobby, merely because those prices close off what is conventionally considered to be the most interesting and most desirable end of the market to a greater proportion of us—that is, the total set of "all hobbyists" or all enthusiasts. I do think that's true to some extent, notwithstanding a.) those who don't desire the apex cameras, b.) those who are satisfied to buy five-year old cameras, and c.) the existence of capable intermediate-priced models. (I'm also saying that those models wouldn't exist at all if we lived in a more egalitarian society, but that's just theoretical musing.)

As John Camp wrote, "Your complaints are reflected in virtually every hobby that equipment freaks have come to dominate—hi-fi, photography, music, horse competitions, computer gaming, sporty cars. But at the extremes, except perhaps for a very, very tiny professional minority, it's all Veblen."

Anyway, I don't mind if you disagree with me. It was actually a smaller point than many people took it to be. It's just a bit of a practical problem for me these days, that's all—since I ought to be making smart decisions about what to write about.

Mike

Book o' the Week

 All About Saul Leiter. The Amazon writeup for this book says "Photography lovers the world over are now embracing Saul Leiter"—and oh boy, is that ever true of me—"who has enjoyed a remarkable revival since fading into relative obscurity in the 1980s." One of my favorite photographers. Beautiful photopoems. Saul's Early Color (which you can still get for around $300) was one of our all-time bestselling book links. (I bought two, one to thumb and one to not touch!)

This book link is a portal to Amazon.

Link to B&H

Original contents copyright 2020 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. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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

Nick: "When I started reading about cameras and photography in earnest, ca. 2009, I coveted the near-top models: Not the huge, pro-grade cameras, but the higher-end enthusiast cameras, like the Nikon D70. I talked myself down a bit ('for the time being,' I said) and bought into Micro 4/3 for a fraction of the price. I figured I'd sell it and get a 'real' enthusiast camera in a couple of years.

"Now, 13 years later, my income is higher, but I've stopped reading gear sites almost entirely. I just made my first gear purchase since the pandemic started: A $320 used OM-D E-M10 Mark II to use as a second body. My last purchase before that? A $320 used OM-D E-M10 Mark II to replace a Mark I that died a week before a scheduled trip to Japan. I make a good bit more now (even inflation-adjusted) than I did then, but between the rapidly increasing prices of enthusiast gear and my contentment with what I had on hand, my covetousness dwindled to almost nothing and my priorities shifted. My (still limited) disposable income goes to getting to new places to take cool photos (see above about the trip to Japan), not on the gear with which to take them. From my point of view, the lack of focus around here on gear, especially stratospherically-priced gear, is definitely a feature, not a bug."

Mike replies: I'll tell you what else pertains: consistency. Once you've done 13 years of Micro 4/3, you might want your new pictures to continue to look like your old ones. I understand this isn't always the case; sometimes people are eager to make a break and create work that has a new look. But sometimes we don't want that.

Stephen S.: "I have owned thirty Micro 4/3 camera bodies, from the bottom of the range to the top, all purchased used. Regardless of how much they were used (going by shutter count and cosmetics,) the factor that most determined which ones would fail was how much they originally cost. The lower-end cameras were far more likely to have shutter failure, command dials that didn't respond, broken battery doors, and LCD screens that blanked out, sometimes at varying degrees of tilt. It seems to me some corners were cut in their design, in order to cut costs. When they were new, it may have had made sense to save several hundred dollars by buying a lower-end camera that could produce the same images, even if it was lacking a few features. However, if buying older gear used, it now only costs a little bit more for the higher-end models, and in my experience they are far more reliable. With warranties expired, and in some cases even paid repairs completely unavailable, this is an even more important factor."

MIKE: "Boots Theory? So true, but instead upgrade to Furniture Theory. Do we imagine that the rich have to go out every two or three years to replace their IKEA furniture? Or do we conjecture that the family probably hasn't bought a new table in centuries, not since great great great great (you get the idea) grandfather bought the Chippendale table that's still in the dining room. My Dad always said the Rich live cheap."

David Lobato: "Several years ago there was an article about tripods. Photographers often bought cheap ones to start. Then when its limitations arose they bought an incrementally better tripod, and so on. Turned out that it was much more cost effective to initially buy an expensive tripod."

Mike replies: It's about the only thing I've done right. I bought a very expensive Gitzo Studex in maybe 1982, used it for 30 years, then replaced it with a very expensive carbon fiber Gitzo Mountaineer which I'm sure is my last tripod.

We Love Cameras

Apropos simple cameras, I finally learned why the IS on the A6600 sucked so badly: operator error. Natch*. When I got the camera I checked that it was "On," and on "Auto," but it seemed to be having little effect, to the point that I was beginning to dread having to report to you that Sony's IBIS (Sony calls it SS, for Steady Shot) in the A6600 sucketh**. But I'm using a Sigma 30mm Contemporary lens. Even though it's an E-mount lens and communicates with the camera, does it report its focal length to the camera? It does not. After a succession of actions too boring to relate, I went on YouTube to help me locate the SS in the @#$! menus, and learned that the focal length was set to 8mm, the first choice on the list of focal lengths. No wonder the IBIS didn't seem to work! With SS set to "Manual" and 30mm, it actually...worked. (Not as well as the Fuji X-H1's IBIS, but worked.) Presumably this wouldn't have happened if I had just paid through the nose for Sony's Zeiss 24mm.

Why did I need YouTube to locate SS in the @#$! menus? Probably because the SS controls are buried in the Video menus. I don't shoot video so I ignore those. What, stills shooters don't benefit from IBIS?

By the way, it looks like Sony has finally dropped the price on that Sonnar T* E 24mm ƒ/1.8 ZA. It was $1,100 forever, but now you can get it for a mere $798. I don't know, maybe it's just a temporary sale. It's a lens I like a lot, the Zeiss Sonnar 24mm, but I'm eventually going to get around to pitting it head-to-head against the Sigma 30mm Contemporary and I have a feeling it's going to smack the canvas headfirst. And the Sigma is a spectacular bargain (truly) at $264.

The Sigma 30mm is the Butterbean of APS-C primes.

I hope the very expensive Zeiss Loxia I have coming knows what it's up against. Butterbean don't take no sh*t.

When I confided my SSNAFU to Ctein, he replied that he had the Olympus OM-D E-M5 for years before he learned (from Moose) that it would do focus bracketing. Simply because Olympus called it something different from what he expected in the @#$! (and I quote) menus.

Quote o' the Day:

"I hate cameras."

—Photographer and longtime Smithsonian
Instructor Kim Kirkpatrick

Defender
However, still on this subject, TOP reader Walter C. Foreman of Lexington, Kentucky, USA, felt compelled to rise to the vilified E-M5's defense:

"I submit this photograph," Walt writes, "in response to a recent TOPic in which the Olympus OM-D E-M5 received—rather than affection—disgust, scorn, maybe even hatred, as an example of the 'wretched excess' that has crept into modern digital cameras. It failed to be simple enough. Ironically, the E-M5 was the digital camera with which I finally felt the compatibility and ease which, back in the last century, I had felt with the Olympus OM-2n. [Gasp! —Ed.]

"Much of the distaste expressed on TOP for this camera focused on its menu system, not on the photographs it produced. Yeah, there’s a lot of stuff in there, somewhere, but since I don’t need most of it, my approach has been to ignore it, just leaving it in there, somewhere, where it can’t bother me. If it turns out that I later want to use some piece of digital magic, I can find its address.

"Meanwhile, it feels enough like an OM-2n to have won my affection: to the simple but wonderful capabilities of the OM-2n add the power to vary ASA (sic***) from shot to shot, the option to autofocus, and the very long rolls of sensitive medium, oh, and weathersealing, and I was in love again.

"I still use the original E-M5. It wanted to take its own photograph for this submission, and I have honored its desire with this self-portrait."

We will let Walt have the last word. Because we love cameras.

Mike

*"Natch," short for naturally, is a 1920s expression that people of my generation don't actually use. Well, except for Yr. Hmbl. Ed. occasionally, when he is being antiquarian.

**Best football comment of 2021, yelled by a fan just before a ref announced a penalty: "After further review, we suck!!"

***Walt wrote the "sic," not me.

Book o' the Week:

Ernst Haas: New York in Color 1952–1962. "When Haas moved from Vienna to New York City in 1951, he left behind a war-torn continent and a career producing black-and-white images. For Haas, the new medium of color photography was the only way to capture a city pulsing with energy and humanity. These images demonstrate Haas's tremendous virtuosity and confidence with Kodachrome film and the technical challenges of color printing."

This book link is a portal to Amazon.

Today at B&H Photo

Original contents copyright 2020 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. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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

'Stop Switching'

[Comments have been added.]

That's the advice of Thom Hogan of ByThom.com, who says your New Year's resolution should be to never switch camera systems again.

He makes the case for it. Charting some of the real switching dilemmas of the past, he concludes, "there's now no clear benefit. All you're doing is showing your angst and wasting money."

I also noted this sentence in passing:

"Oh, you switchers all tried lens adapters, because that seemed to be a solution that kept you from buying new lenses, but I've been amused as person after person attempting that trick quickly tires of it and succumbs to new mount lens buying."

He has further comments along that line, but let's not steal his thunder—you can read his article for yourself. I merely wanted to point out that this has been my observation over many years too. That's why I'm always advising people to make sure that all the lenses they want are available in the lensmount of the camera system they choose. Every time I say it, I hear from those few people who are happy using adapted lenses, bless 'em, but that doesn't change the fact that most people who count on using adapted lenses "quickly tire of it" once they actually have to take pictures that way.

Thom makes specific prescriptions for users of specific brands, too, in which the phrase "just get better at using it" keeps recurring. Sobering thought...that we should just get better at using what we already have. What a concept. The guy's no fun.

Another good recent Thom post: "2022 Is Going to See Changes."

Makes me want to...switch
So, when you read this post, was your reaction a.) to think of course I'm not going to switch, I already have what I want, or b.) to anxiously start thinking about switching again?

I'm in group "b," but then I'm a nut when it comes to cameras. Too old to change now*.  :-)

Mike

*Not really, but that's my handy excuse and I'm sticking to it.

Book o' the Week

American Geography by Matt Black, a great name for a photographer but a terrible internet name, impossible to search. Stan Banos calls American Geography a "handsome, well thought out and put together book." Matt's work is outstanding.

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Ben Marks: "I had to laugh at Thom's idea, because it contains an unstated assumption that the relevant question is 'either this or that' and not 'why not this, but also that?'

"And let me just tip my hand here: I have Nikons and Leicas, a Fuji XPro-1 and an Olympus OM-D, a Pentax K1 and.... Well, you get the idea. And yeah, I am a bit of a photo gear hoarder. But the mortgage is paid and the kids aren't hungry, so....

"I do endorse the idea that no single piece of gear will be the one that makes you happy. But being able to take pictures in lots and lots of different situations, and with lots of different 'looks'? That has been shown, historically, to make me very, very happy. So when a piece of gear comes along that promises to add to those capabilities? Let's just say I have my eye on you, Nikon Z9."

Steve Biro: "If the purpose of one's involvement in photography is strictly to produce images, if one is a professional photographer or if one is attempting to do photography on a tighter budget, then what Thom writes is absolutely correct. But if photography is also an enthusiasm, if one is also a gear enthusiast or if one becomes bored periodically, one system isn't going to cut it. Over the years, my personal solution was to simultaneously run two systems that were different enough to make it interesting. I would gradually update bodies (usually as a camera maker would bring out the next generation) and add lenses to keep them reasonably current. For a while, when Micro 4/3 came out, I was running three systems. I could afford that at the time but not as I head for retirement. I'll probably go down to one main system (likely Fuji) with one full-frame body and two or three lenses to go with that.

"But if practicality is paramount, Thom Hogan has it right."

John Krumm: "I find that I yearn to switch every so often. The first switch was the hardest. It gets easier from there. I'm neck deep in keywording, re-organizing, and occasionally re-processing all my digital images since around 2008 when I bought an Olympus 420 and a 14–42mm kit lens. I get to revisit my history of switching, from the 4/3 cameras, then Micro 4/3, then Pentax K1, then Ricoh GRII, then various Fuji mirrorless cameras. Each had their charms. Got my eye on a Panasonic S5, which looks pretty sweet, but I'm resisting so far. "

John Krill: "I switched from Nikon DX cameras to Fujifilm X series cameras for one reason only. I wanted to use prime lenses. Wide to normal. And not the fastest (waste of money). I got them and I love them and the cameras. Especially my current everyday camera, the Fujifilm X-E4. I stopped using the X-Pro2 and it is now my backup. Hell of a backup, no? Anyway, I am very happy with Fujifilm cameras and primes lenses and have no desire to switch to anything else."

Joe Holmes: "I have reached the point where I can't see ever being disappointed shooting with my four-year-old Nikon D850, or my even-older collection of lenses. But to answer your question, yes, that does make me sad. I miss the thrill of new equipment."

Rick Popham: "Thom has an unusually clear-headed approach to gear advice in this age of Internet influencers. But I love switchers! Back in the day when my favorite camera store was still around, and Nikon and Canon kept leapfrogging each other, I got a lot of used Nikon gear in very nice shape. The source was a wealthy dentist who would trade in his gear and switch systems each time one frog would leap over the other. The guys at the store used to call me whenever 'Dr. D.' would start talking about the latest Canon releases (I shot Nikon).

"Nowadays I shoot mostly Micro 4/3, but would really like to trade in my Nikon F gear to try some of the new Nikon Z stuff. I guess that's a big enough change to call it a 'switch.'"

Kirk: "I didn't know that switching systems was a bad thing. I always thought it was fun and kept the process fresh and interesting. I guess I know better now. I wonder what other pursuit we can find to suck the fun out of next."

Mike adds: Kirk has been, um, known to switch from time to time. That's the problem of being a blogger...everybody knows your business!

Zack S: "I have a decent Fujifilm system; an X-T2 and six Fuji lenses which I acquired over a long period of time. Have two different pinholes for it and a zoneplate too, all in Fuji mount. The only adapted lens I have is a Holga lens in a Nikon mount and the adapter for it, but they do not work well together. Never really understood the whole adapted lens thing. When I got into the Fuji system I sold all of my Nikon things to avoid using adapted lenses. After all, what works better with a camera then lenses designed to be used with it?"

Hank: "I shoot a lot with old Leica rangefinders—I have II and a IIIa that I enjoy using very much, and the results, technically anyway, are really top notch. But I also keep my 'old' Nikon FM3a, partially because it really is a much 'better' camera than the Leicas (it does a lot more, more simply), but mostly because I seem to get more pleasing results out of it more often. With digital, I seem to be the opposite—the cameras which do more confound me a little, and they are less enjoyable to use. My little Ricoh GR III (and now GR IIIx) always seem to punch above their weight, and I end up with more interesting shots using them. Maybe it is because I expect less, or maybe because I am just more relaxed shooting them. Whatever the reason, I like 'em!

"All of which means that there is little out there now that appeals to me. I just sold my Panasonic S5. It was an excellent camera, and very good with my old Leica lenses, but never felt 'right.' I see no need to replace it with another camera of its ilk. I am beginning to learn, at nearly 60 years of age, that certain cameras do one thing very well, and once you figure out what it is, you’re golden. It’s a very personal thing, and no reviewer out there has the same needs that I do (apparently!)."

Huw Morgan: "I think the joy is slowly disappearing from the camera market just like it did for the PC market. When technology was advancing in leaps and bounds, switching cameras and computers was fun. Each switch brought a measurable jump in functionality, whether it was autofocus speed, compute speed or portability. Now that we've reached maturity in both areas of technology, a change brings little in the way of any wow factor. Right now, I think anyone would be very hard-pressed to pick a winner between a Nikon z6II, a Canon R6, and a Sony a7 IV. The pain of switching is huge compared to the tiny advantages one platform might enjoy over another.

"On the computer front, I recently upgraded from a 6 year-old desktop with a seventh generation Intel processor to a new desktop with a 12th generation Intel processor. The difference was marginal. Compared to the 'good old days' when Moore's law was in full swing, the upgrade was disappointing. The fun of technology has shifted to other areas like virtual reality and electric cars. Photography is no longer a technology race; it's back to being a profession and an art form where expertise matters more than tech."

Pak Ming Wan: "That comment about the lens adapter is so true. I bought a Pentax-K-to-Micro-4/3 adapter, with speed booster (i.e. it reduces slightly the focal length magnification) and used it for about a week or two. I finished by buying the lens I really wanted in Micro 4/3 (the Panasonic-Leica 15mm ƒ/1.7) and I haven't looked back. I haven't seen any advancements in camera technology that might make me switch. This is also supported by viewing Salgado's exhibition of 'Amazon' in London, where you can see his prints based on 2010s technology or earlier. They look perfectly fine to me."

Trust (and Aggravation)

I mentioned in the previous post that when a camera feature works inconsistently it inspires the opposite of trust.

Trust is the most important thing about any camera to me. Mostly, you gain trust in a tool by using it a lot and learning it well enough to demystify its quirks and foibles. You figure out what's happening and come up with a workaround, and then you're fine. But consistent performance is almost equally important to trust. Once I can't trust a camera, it's outta here.

I had a camera briefly that had inconsistent apertures. Really mystified me until I figured it out; you could stop it down to ƒ/8 and sometimes the hole would be a little bigger, sometimes a little smaller. An acquaintance who used the same lens patiently explained that he always moved the aperture ring at the same deliberate speed and in the same direction and as long as he did that the aperture would be pretty consistent. Well, I wasn't going to do that. Away it went.

A talented friend many years ago shot with a camera the design of which seemed nearly perfect for him, a rare bird called the Plaubel Makina 670. It was a compact 6x7 camera with an extensible bellows and a Nikkor lens. My friend, however, was bedeviled with problems with the film advance. I might be half-remembering and half-inventing this story, but, as I recall it, he first assumed he had a bad sample and bought a second copy of the camera; then, on the second one, he decided to be patient and get it serviced. Next, what happened either two or three times was that he sent it off for repair and got it back only to have it break again. As this process went along his frustration and irritation levels went up and up, and of course his trust in the camera as a tool went in the other direction. How can you get immersed in photographing when you always have it in the back of your mind that your camera might randomly stop working?

Having heard his tales about these trials and tribulations as they happened, one day I realized I hadn't heard an update in a while and remembered to ask, "so what's the status of the Plaubel?" He seemed perfectly calm about it. He explained that after the last time it broke he decided he was done with it. Didn't want to put up with the problems, didn't want to deal with selling it, just wanted it out of his head. So what became of it? "I put it in the back of the closet," he said, "and I'm pretending it's not there." Made me laugh.

...But it's a trick I adopted. I've had a couple of monumentally frustrating possessions that I did the same thing with. Just put them in the closet and commenced pretending they weren't there. Not worth the aggravation.

For all I know my friend's old Plaubel is still sitting there! I'll ask him and report back if I get an answer.

Anyway, trust is not on any feature list. And you can have trust in any camera you know well, old or new, full of features or not, pro or am, big or small. If you know what it can do and what it does and you know you can count on that, that's worth a lot.

Mike

UPDATE Wednesday: My friend no longer has the Plaubel. He also once had a collection of thousands of rare vinyl records, many very rare, and got rid of them all once CDs came along. He acknowledges that the vinyl collection would have been very valuable now, but says "you know me, move on and don't look back." It's true, it's the way he's always been.

Book o' the Week:

The second edition of old friend Bruce Barnbaum's The Essence of Photography is just out. Bruce wrote for Photo Techniques when I was Editor. I always enjoy his insights into the art and craft, even if his technique isn't the same as mine. I still learn. Mastery is fun to read about.

The above is a link to Amazon from TOP. Here's the new edition of The Essence of Photography at The Book Depository. The following logo is also a link:

Original contents copyright 2020 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. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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

Michael Perini: "I remember when I got my first job in a real, established photo studio, the thing that surprised me the most was the amount of 'testing' we did. No new equipment ever went on a live shoot until we 'trusted' that we understood it, and that it worked as expected in a consistent manner. Film was bought by the case from the same emulsion batch and kept cold in the film fridge. Each emulsion batch was tested on standardized targets and the same few people as models. Some batches needed 05M or 05Y and the batch was marked. We would test possible lighting setups for the kind of job we were about to do. Cameras and lenses tended to be slightly old but very well maintained. Every year we would send them to Marty Forscher's Professional Camera Repair for a CLA.

"To this day once I am comfortable with a camera, I find it hard to buy a new one without a compelling reason, and even then the old one stays as backup.

"Although that was Film, I think the lesson applies even more to the digital era. A camera that is known, trusted, and familiar enough in operation to just disappear, is usually a greater benefit to pictures than the latest technology. That is not to say that I don't enjoy the benefits technology has brought—I do—but I am never in a rush to have it, and I test it until I trust it."

David Dyer-Bennet: "Oh! And this exactly explains my relationship with face detection (in real cameras, point-and-shoot cameras, and camera phones. Every time I try to use it, it fails to lock on just when things are time-critical—and then, of course, it's not focused, either. So I hear so much about how it's a great feature, and I absolutely believe it—but when I'm in a hurry I can't afford to have it fail, and when I'm not in a hurry I don't need the help. If it's not rock-solid reliable it's not useful. So it remains turned off in my cameras.

"In fact this explains a lot about real photographers' interactions with cellphone cameras, I think. They do so much—a lot of the time. But they're not consistent, not reliable."

Stephen Scharf: "Actually, what you've described as 'trust' may not be on a feature list, but it is actionable and measurable from an engineering perspective. The examples you've given of sketchy, inconsistent, or unpredictable performance or operation is managed by a type of engineering called 'Robust Engineering.' 'Robustness' from a Design for Six Sigma perspective means that key functional responses or attributes (whatever they might be, accurate aperture or reproducible film advance in the examples you've given) perform to specification...in the presence of noise factors. A 'noise factor' is anything that takes a functional response off-target, adds variance, or both. For example, missing or incomplete functionality to due to say, humidity or temperature changes is a lack of robustness due to environmental noise factors.

"Fortunately, there are very effective ways to deal with this. A specific type of Design of Experiments (DOE's) known as Taguchi Robust Design DOE's can be performed to make functional responses robust to the effects and impact of noise factors. A classic approach are to use the Taguchi Robust DOE L12 or L16 designs.

"Good thing is, mature and sophisticated companies like Fujifilm already use these powerful statistical techniques during development. So...I don't think you need to worry about the new medium-format GFX50S II from a 'robustness' perspective."

"Cheers, Stephen, your friendly neighborhood Six Sigma Master Black Belt."

hugh crawford: "The Plaubel Makina 670 had a horrid reputation for breaking. I am amazed how many 'mint condition' examples are for sale at ridiculously high prices. Probably because they never worked long enough to get wear marks. I almost bought a used one once but when the owner of the camera store saw that I was looking at it he refused to sell it to me because he knew I’d break it. And then two customers started telling how awful their own experiences with them were. When they worked they were wonderful, beautiful cameras.

"Pre-1975 Plaubel cameras are pretty wonderful; always wanted to try a Pecoflex but was told that the spare parts were in some sort of limbo after the Japanese bought Plaubel. Camera Barn in NYC apparently bought all the stock in the late '70s and dumped it cheap."

Simon: "Trust in tools! So, so important. Thank you for writing this. I became aggravated with digital Leica M's after too many problems, especially Leica batteries losing their charge not long after purchasing original ones for $150 each. My Fuji X100S keeps going after many years, and I plan to upgrade to the latest model soon. I am not surprised Koudelka raves about these tough little cameras! If only the focus ring stopped at each end (macro and infinity), like on a mechanical rangefinder, so we could focus without looking through the viewfinder."

Howard Sandler: "On the other hand, when you shoot old vintage film cameras with all their quirks and sticky shutters and light leaks, you don't have to be a good photographer. If anything turns out at all, you impress yourself."

s.wolters: "In the 'eighties there was a group of British photographers that inspired me to buy a Plaubel Makina 670. Among them Martin Parr, Chris Killip, Paul Graham and Anna Fox. Most of them used that camera and their gallery prints were really stunning for that time. A friend in Singapore helped me to get one for an acceptable price, but after 10 rolls the mechanism got broke and the camera had to be send back to the factory. After they repaired it, it still made an awkward sound when transporting the film. The best thing about this camera was that I made a good profit when I sold it. By that time it was already out of production but somehow it was still very popular amongst connoisseurs."

Any Birders Out There? Basic Birding Camera

This question comes from my nephew David, a family man with a lovely wife and two toddlers in Texas. I told him I have very little experience with long lenses and would ask the brain trust—which would be you.

Hey uncle Mike, had a camera-type question. I currently have a Fujifilm super zoom type all in one (I'm out of town and don't have it with me, so I don't know the model number) but I've been getting into birding and it's a frustrating camera to use. The autofocus and shutter are both very slow, and the autofocus loves to focus on foreground twigs and backgrounds instead of the bird. I know the DSLR market has gotten far more affordable recently, but I'm pretty illiterate with types, models, lens terminology, etc. So, I figured I'd ask the expert! What would you recommend for an inexpensive DSLR and long lens capable of manual focus, with a fast enough shutter for birds, that will give sufficient quality for identification? I'm mostly focused on making sure I have enough detail to see important field marks. Thanks in advance, and hope things are going well!

He gave me permission to post the question here. I was thinking Micro 4/3 might actually be the best balance. Pretty sure he doesn't have the budget for a Sony RX-10 1-incher (what version is that on now? IV?). But I really don't feel competent to make a recommendation. Can you help?

Hawk
I had a surprise encounter with a bird recently. I was looking at a house in Canadaigua. The small backyard had a tall wooden fence around it, the kind you can't see through, and as I walked into the yard a large hawk of some sort hopped up from behind the fence and perched on the fence looking at me. I walked slowly toward him. He let me get to within ten feet or so before spreading his impressively large wings—but he only flew a couple of feet to a nearby branch. I know very little about birds but it didn't seem like entirely natural behavior—perhaps it was sick or hurt? Or perhaps the homeowner fed it? It certainly looked sleek and healthy.

We have a lot of raptors in this area, although I've seen fewer this year than in years past. There don't seem to be as many turkey buzzards about for one thing. Anyway the hawk was quite beautiful, and, as has happened before, it took me aback to be so close to such a large bird.

The one thing I can tell you about bird photography: if you want to really appreciate great bird photography, just try doing it yourself. Not easy!

Thanks for any advice, bird people.

Mike

[UPDATE Monday morning: David sends thanks for what he called the "information firehose" in these comments. I didn't "Feature" many because I don't want to seem to privilege any recommendation as being favored; I figure many people know what they're talking about and everyone knows more than I do. David reports he's been loaned a Canon EOS XTi and with 18–55mm and 55–250mm lenses by his mother-in-law in Idaho—they're currently visiting out there. So he's going to try that for a while and see what he can learn from the experience. I have an AF VR-Nikkor 80–400mm ƒ4.5–5.6G here (a donation) and I offered him that, but that would mean he'd still have to buy a body. I told him I'd keep the Nikkor around so he can borrow it in the future if he wants to.

He says, "I've kinda gone crazy on birds. Got some pretty nice binoculars, started recording a life list, took students on birding walks [he's a high school science teacher]—it's been great. Seen over a hundred and fifty species in the last 13 months." Thanks to everyone for pitching in with suggestions! —Mike]

Book o' the Week:

Byways: Photographs by Roger A Deakins. Damiani, September 2021. Note: PRE-ORDER ONLY. The little birdies are telling me that these will go fast. This is the first monograph by the legendary Oscar-winning cinematographer Sir Roger A. Deakins (born 1949), best known for his collaborations with directors such as the Coen brothers, Sam Mendes and Denis Villeneuve.

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:

Sharon: "No advice on the camera but my husband got an awesome photo of a hawk that let him get very close. He was big but really just a baby. You could tell by the markings on his chest."

Thom Hogan: "Since my name was summoned [James wrote, 'I'm sure Thom Hogan will chime in here eventually' —Ed.]...'Birder' is different than 'BIF' [birds in flight —Ed.]. If you look carefully enough, you'll find lots of sub-categories of bird photographers. The problem with the OP? I don't 100% know which one he is, as his question has contradictions in it. But I'd say 'bird ID' is what he wants. For bird ID, long lens (with stabilization) is more important than anything else. Many in the bird ID camp are perfectly happy with something like a Coolpix P950/P1000. For the BIF crowd, things change to AF being the most important attribute, and at the moment for BIF that goes (in order of best to less best) Sony A1, Nikon D6, Canon R5/R6. The 'value' product would be the D500. That said, in all cases there is a learning curve, and that's what trips up most: the just-press-a-button-and-it-works crowd is going to be continuously disappointed in some, if not all, of their bird photos."

The Spectrum of Gearheadism

Something occurred to me yesterday. When it comes to "gear enthusiasm"—sometimes called "gearheadism" except that seems like such an inelegant word—some things require associated skills and some do not.

What would you call this? Active and passive gear geekery maybe?

It struck me that wristwatch collecting is probably as close as you can come to a purely passive or undemanding form of gear enthusiasm. It really requires nothing of the collector except that he or she like watches and wants more than one. The only skill required is telling time. We'll make an exception for guys like Nick, who you met two days ago, because he can take them apart and put them back together again and it's what he does for a living. But I think you can be a watch geek without having much in the way of skills. (As I'm learning on YouTube.)

At the other end might be guitar connoisseurship. Does it make any sense at all to collect guitars if you can't play guitar and know nothing about music?

Although I'm sure there must be non-playing guitar geeks out there, because, well, because geekery.

Some skills and activities require equipment that's so utilitarian that I imagine it can't inspire much in the way of gear enthusiasm...I don't think, anyway. (I don't know.) Knitting, maybe. Do knitters argue over knitting needles? I have a friend who has become a late-in-life potter. He's quite good at it, in my opinion. He's certainly enjoying himself. But I've never heard of a potter who is a connoisseur of throwing wheels or kilns, and has to have just the perfect one, or has to have many alternatives at hand. Maybe I'm just not close enough to it to know. Do those people exist? It seems to me like it would be akin to collecting refrigerators. Surely some kilns are better than others. But if you have access to a kiln you're doing okay. I just can't imagine a potter poring obsessively over kiln catalogs and constantly upgrading to better and better kilns. Maybe once or twice as finances improve. At the very least, I'm going to venture the claim that there's no one who's vitally interested in pottery equipment who isn't a potter. There probably is (see above), but you've got to admit the notion is pretty absurd.

Sometimes gear geekery makes less sense the less you're fitted to practice what it requires. For example, bicycle gearheads certainly exist, but how good does your bike need to be if you're sixty pounds overweight and have the stamina of an 80-year-old couch potato? Surely your bike only needs to be so good and no better in that case...and might even be more difficult and inappropriate for you to use as it comes closer to being a specialized high-end ultralight racing machine. Can you be an archery geek if you don't have the strength to draw back a bow?

Rock-climbing requires gear, but I can't imagine being interested in the gear without being active as a climber. And being a climber is highly skill-based as well as fitness-based.

Some forms of gear enthusiasm might need associated skills only in certain ranges. For instance, surely it's possible to be a car nut without really having any special abilities as a driver. It's probably true that some of the middle-aged guys you see proudly piloting the latest Corvette can't drive any better than the average commuter. As "supercar fails" and "Nurburgring crash" videos attest, lots of guys own more car than they can actually handle. And yet at some level, driving ability surely comes to the forefront...for instance, if your focus is autocross.

Maybe that's one reason pickup trucks are so popular. There's no presumption that you should have any special skills as a driver. (Again, that I know of. Maybe I'm just an innocent.)

In some pursuits, knowledge is the most important thing. My brother collects gems, and you'd think that's a purely passive pursuit, except that the amount of knowledge he has about it would fill a book.

Would birdwatching qualify as a passion that's mainly knowledge-based? It certainly has an activity component, though. (My brother knows how to facet.) It's a form of non-invasive collecting, if you will. You collect sightings on a life-list, but you don't actually molest the birds. If you're doing it responsibly. The moral equivalent of hunting, to adapt William James's famous phrase? The other examples of mainly knowledge-centric hobbies I can think of fall mostly under the heading of collecting rather than gear enthusiasm per se, though.

And in other pursuits, wealth is a prerequisite. Consider Minnesotan John Allen's collection of antiquarian wooden speedboats. Gear geekery of a high order, but you can't collect antique boats without being rich, I wouldn't think. Luxury watch collecting certainly falls under this requirement. John McEnroe, the tennis player, is a devoted art collector, but once said his participation is severely limited because his net worth is only $100 million!

Poor guy....

Photography is flexible
On the spectrum of "active skills required" (guitar geekery) to purely passive (watch geekery), photography is remarkably flexible. At one end of the spectrum, being a photographer can require a great deal of dedication, visual aptitude, and skills. But on the other, well, anyone can take a photograph—just point it and shoot, as the phrase has it. You might not get a masterpiece, but you'll get something. Anyone can participate.

With photography, you pick where you want to be on the active <—> passive scale. You can just collect gear and rarely if ever use it. Or, your whole focus can be shooting and you can all but ignore the gear. As an example of the latter, at the magazine I used to edit we once got a very nice portfolio from a woman in the Midwest. When I asked her what camera she used, she said something like, "I don't know—a Pentax, maybe? My daughter got it for a photography class." She offered to check and get back to me. No gearhead she!

Photography as a passion is unusually generous and accommodating. As a shooter you can be what David Gilmour is as a guitarist*, but photography can be a very involving hobby without requiring that you take pictures at all. Quite remarkable, all things considered.

Mike

*And he collected guitars, as you might remember.

Product o' the Week:

The Apple Watch Series 6. This is a portal to Amazon from TOP.

The following image is also a link. You support TOP by buying through these portals.

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:

Nicholas Hartmann: "I can speak to gearheadism (as you define it) with regard to pottery and birdwatching. No, potters do not geek out over wheels. Some potters own a wheel, although I know many other very experienced and skillful potters who are happy to use any studio wheel that's available. I believe this is because there's no upside in terms of perceived quality or (much more importantly) conspicuous consumption. A potter's wheel that costs less than $700 is probably a piece of junk, but $1,500 gets you a wheel that will literally outlive the potter or withstand multiple generations of abusive students. Few potters own kilns, since even the small electric ones are expensive, hot, and power-hungry, and there is almost no skill or craft involved in using one—it's much more cost-effective to pay for space in somebody else's. Where potters geek out is with glazes, and with firing technologies like wood-firing. But in both cases, the reason to spend money on more glazes, or on a wood-fired kiln the size of a house, is not to be seen spending the money, but to get results that are unobtainable in any other way. That's not gearheadism; it's called 'art.'

"Birdwatching is actually a hotbed of gearheadism, focused (sorry) on optics: how much you are seen to have spent on your spotting scopes and binoculars helps establish your place in the pecking (sorry again) order. Another status signifier is how much you spent to get to where you use the optics: birds seen at or from the farthest West of the Aleutian Islands, for example, can be added to one's USA list, and the more expensive the trip to get there, and more lurid the tales of weather and other hardships endured, the higher one's status. All this is part of the sport of 'listing': what counts is how many birds are on your 'life list,' and vast sums are spent to spot just that one more species that will put you ahead of the other guy (and, as with most such hypercompetitive equipment-based pursuits, it is mostly guys). Most listers aren't actually interested in the birds themselves, except insofar as knowing about the bird helps them find it. But you can also (be seen to) pay a guide for that....

"My assumption is that ever since humans became humans, guys (yep) have been sitting around the campfire one-upping each other about this great flint deposit only they know about, or how the oak branches from over the next range of hills give your spear a much better grip and durability."

Geoff Wittig: "When it comes to bicycles, ironically it is the less fit cyclists who benefit the most from the high tech ultra-lightweight machines. The better your physical condition, the less help you need from technology to make that 40 mile ride, unless you're an actual racing competitor."

Sharon: "I disagree with some of your observations. If you are out of shape, then a good bike is vital or you won't keep exercising. A very good bike is lighter and easier to ride than a cheap clunker. When my son was young, I took him roller skating. I hated using their skates so I bought good skates for both of us. It was a different sport with good skates. The wheels rolled so smoothly—they were a pleasure to use. So I think, the worse you are in some endeavors, the more you need good equipment. Maybe I missed your point, though.  :-)  "

Mike replies: No, I take your point. When my son was eight or nine his guitar teacher said that it's appropriate for a beginner to have a good guitar because they are easier to play and to keep in tune. Of course he was teaching out of a local guitar store. And a grizzled old golf pro once told me that actually all duffers have it wrong with regard to fitted clubs. He said he was a scratch golfer and had the ability to adjust to any set of clubs, so he didn't mind playing with anything; but a set of fitted clubs greatly benefits a beginner who is just learning the swing, he told me, because they won't learn to swing while compensating for clubs that don't fit them. So I see your point about the bikes.

Ken Bennett: "Birdwatching can get quite competitive, and there is plenty of very expensive gear to buy and argue about. Most birders don't care, but some do. (Leica vs. Swarovski! 80mm versus 60mm scopes!! LOL)

"Knitters are less competitive, in my experience, but they tend to collect yarn. A knitter's 'stash' can take up a large room, or more. Yarn seems to me to be like buying a brick of film back in the day— you dream about what you can make with it. The collection of yarn can overtake the making of things.

"All the guitar nerds I know also play. Some of them are even pretty good."

Thor D.: "There is a certain element of owning gear that I find many cultures relate to value or ability signaling. So while some gear may not actually require specific knowledge or skill to enjoy as objects, owning that gear without a certain level of competence would be seen as posturing, which has always been interesting to me. Would a beginner guitarist be able to show off a fancy guitar collection with pride if not able to play well enough to do them justice?

"As for bikes, this is true too. I remember a neighborhood that I frequented was lousy with very wealthy folks who would ride around on $5,000++ mountain bikes that they never even rode off the sidewalk. There is no logic to that, but if you have the money then why not I suppose. As an avid biker I often drooled over the titanium frames and high end components, but after riding a few I realized the difference was so minimal compared to my $600 bike that my bike lust diminished almost instantly. I am just not a good enough rider to need them and fortunately some part of my brain accepted that."

Keith: "Some triathletes have gearheadism really bad, especially where bikes are concerned. They would rather spend many thousands of dollars on high tech carbon fibre bikes to cut wind and rolling resistance, and save a few grams of weight, all in the name of supposedly shaving a few seconds off their bike time. It's funny/sad, since the person on the bike is by far the least aerodynamic part of the system. They would be far better off to buy an OK-to-nice bike, and spend more time training to ride faster. But no, they think better gear is the answer. We call them posers. It's exactly like handing a Phase One camera to a beginner photographer."

John Krumm: "I had an economics 101 professor in college, a fun lecturer with a Greek accent. He was giving us a lesson about something, and mentioned that he collected camera lenses. He had used them when younger, but really just loved the lenses as objects, so now he kept them nicely arranged in a drawer and occasionally took them out for dusting and admiration."

Keith S: "Some of your examples describe collectors rather than gearheads. For a collector, collecting itself is the hobby or pursuit. A watch collector would be more comparable to a stamp collector than any gearhead. A gearhead is obsessed with acquiring the latest and greatest, or different types of, equipment and gear for his interest, usually in pursuit of finding that elusive 'last' camera, stereo system, or bicycle. The difference is that a gearhead intends to use, or at least try, every piece of gear he acquires. A person can be both a gearhead and a collector such as a photographer who has a plethora of digital cameras, tripods, bags, etc. he uses or have tried while also collecting vintage cameras and lenses he doesn’t intend to use."

Mike Plews: "One sign of gearhead syndrome is the desire for a piece of equipment thinking it will change your life, getting it, and then never using it. My Stanley #55 combination plane comes to mind."

Lesley T: "More about bikes. And gear. And guys (or at least the subset of bicycle gearheads).

"We cycle a lot, although at about 75 and 80, we don't cycle nearly as far, or as quickly, as we used to. My husband likes good gear, but it has to work and help to get the job done as efficiently and easily as possible. It infuriates him when we see a couple out riding and the guy is out in front on a (very) expensive lightweight road bike while his wife is lagging behind on a heavier and more cumbersome department-store machine. I have to restrain him from yelling out the window, 'If you want to ride together, and for her to like it...GET HER THE GOOD BIKE!!!' So yes, good tools can help to get the job done, and to make the experience more enjoyable."

James: "When it comes to bicycles. Sigh. Yes. Gearheadism is rife. But as for road racing bikes there is a put-up or shut-up moment. You go race. If Thom Hogan says 'your equipment is not holding you back, your form/fitness is,' there is no proof. With bikes, you can go and get proof any weekend in the summer (or for Cyclocross, fall) you like. Race fees are under $100. Go and race. You will see how much more it matters to be fit than it does to have a nicer bike.

"So, if you are a gearhead in bikes, you have to admit that you are in it for buying the bike, not for the added speed. But we do it for the joy of the thing."

Rob de Loe: "In a conversation about photography I once made the (naive) point that painters surely didn't obsess about gear the way photographers do. A person whose wife was a painter chimed in about the intense and boring technical debates he was subjected to when the painters showed up about brushes, paints, canvases, etc. I think Nicholas Hartmann nailed it: people like to differentiate themselves from others based on technical knowledge and gear. It's a status thing. I've seen people leave hobbies primarily because the gear improved to the point where "anyone" could do it, so it wasn't competitive enough anymore."

wts: "There's a hobby where gear is irrelevant because you can't buy it—railroad mileage collector. That's a person who may go to almost any length to ride a train over a given stretch of track, record it, and boast about it to his fellow mileage collectors who didn't or weren't able to 'get' that track. This is a very frustrating hobby for younger participants as tracks have been continually taken out of service over the lifetime of the older collectors. Walking or riding over a rail trail doesn't count."

cecelia: "As a professional knitter, I can assure you that there are genuine debates about different kinds of knitting needles. However, even very top-of-the-line knitting needles are affordable compared to cameras and watches. Knitting, unlike watch collecting or digital photography, has its major expense associated with a consumable: yarn. A knitter's yarn collection is called their 'stash' and many knitters have extensive and expensive stashes far bigger than they can use in a lifetime. Books have been written on stash."

Mike replies: Gem-cutters often have a stockpile of rough. When he was younger, a friend who is a cutter and dealer took out a very large bank loan—on the order of a home mortgage—to buy the stock of rough of a retiring cutter he knew. The guy gave him a fantastic deal and my friend was able to first cherry-pick the stock, then sell the rest of it piece-by-piece and pay back the entire loan. It gave him a great start on his own stock and was a wonderful gift from the older cutter.

Ian Hunter: "I have always been surprised by new watercolour painting students turning up with cheap paints and watercolour paper. I always advise that good rag paper and artist quality paint make it so much easier. Two good-quality brushes are always enough and better than a bunch of cheapo ones. Sometimes they listen!"

Gordon Buck: "Pocket knives...."

Malcolm Myers: "My wife has bought a couple of 'gearhead' Singer featherweight sewing machines, a 221k and an even more expensive 222k. But she hasn't got the one with the red S model which is even more expensive but is actually not any better. And then there are the wrinkle crinkle versions which literally go for thousands. For a sewing machine...."

Tex Andrews: "Well, I think geekery divides into two basic subsets: appreciation geekery (wine, cheese, jazz, sports stats, but also watches, cars, boats,paperweights, art, etc.), and tool geekery (anything that has to be used for a task to be appreciated—knives, saws, woodworking tools in general, etc.). Anything I don't make but am 'into' is appreciation geekery if I know much about it. But then I also make stuff, so there's maker's/usage geekery in there as well. With power tools, I'm a Makita guy, although there are some tools by other manufacturers I admire. You are correct in identifying photography gear as having a spectrum, and I think it's from appreciation through usage. That's why Leicas get collected, but then also have usage geekery."

Mike replies: That's an excellent distinction and one I never thought of.

Mikko Kalavainen: "Knitters definitely geek over the needles and the yarn. BIG time. And they usually have a whole closet of yarns that may go unused for a loooong time. Yours, Husband of a knitaholic. "

JH: "Mike, I think you greatly underestimate OCD!

"I could easily write a response longer than your post about the people I've known who are dedicated to collecting various things and sometimes using types of gear. From my experiences:

"People buy fancy watches as bling—they're jewelry, not timepieces.

"You don't have to be a musician to collect the guitars of famous people.

"Knitters obsess over yarn. They can own rooms full of it.

"The artist who bought our farm has three kilns she installed in our barn, each for different materials.

"My experience as a racing/track day instructor is that the ability of many drivers is inversely proportional to the ability of the car—it's a zero-sum. One of the best drivers I taught brought a Ford Fiesta to the track.

"Birdwatching is about collecting sightings (or in my case photos) and simply being outdoors. Birdwatchers tend to be conservationists, sometimes obsessively so.

"I know many people who collect cars and never drive them, they just look at them (maybe like their trophy wives?) I know some who are good drivers and they tend to have only a couple of cars which they exercise regularly.

"Many times I've been asked to help photographers who are loaded with high-end gear they have purchased but never bothered to use. Many bought it just before that fabulous trip they planned.

"Collectors are really interesting in what they choose to collect. Sometimes it's just the beauty of the items, sometimes it's memories of them. I had an Aunt who collected toothpick holders; another, plates from tourist spots. I know people with thousands of records—classical, jazz, rock, etc. I know people who have tens of thousands of books, some of a single category, like mysteries. An artist friend has thousands of cheap Mexican carved figures she picked up on trips there—and just finished cataloguing them. A prof in college collected Edison cylinders, then recorded them and manipulated the recordings to make them sound like HiFi. A friend collected electrical/electronic/scientific instruments. When he died he left three rooms of them which his widow still has not figured out what to do with. One of his sons has collected one of every Apple computer—but he makes his living writing about them. A cousin is married to a guy in the guitar pick business who collects them from famous players.

"I could go on, but won't. Enough is enough, especially in comments...."

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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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."

The iPhone as Teacher

I've been having great fun shooting panos with the iPhone lately. Took this on my walk yesterday. I walk up Welker Hill most days for exercise. It was cold up there yesterday bro—32°F/0°C with a hard wind. The wind was coming straight out of the West when I walked back down the hill, and I was coming straight out of the East. As I pushed on, it pushed back. I had on two hats, a fake down vest and my Winter coat. I passed Dave coming in from his barn and all he was wearing was a pullover and a billed cap. But he's a lot tougher than I am.

Sometimes I think any camera can be a teacher and show you how to do something new. I've never shot panoramics with anything—no judgment, I was just never drawn to that way of seeing (although I've greatly admired several panoramic shooters over the years, most notably Aaron Hobson and Pentti Sammallahti. And my favorite photographer, Josef Koudelka, has published many panoramics—including, I think, a whole book of them). Of course, I did do my "one" pano, because I like to try everything once (um, photographically speaking), but that's not the same as working that way.

I've been (finally? Belatedly) trying to take the iPhone more seriously as a camera. Not for any ideological reason, just because I find I shoot a lot with it now.

I still do have problems considering it a serious image-maker...

Oops! Crop from the above

That would take some Photoshop skills to fix. The wind was stiff enough that the occasional gust was knocking me around, and it was difficult to hold the phone very still.  Here's a single shot:

It was late in the day. Such a pretty day. Those clouds were moving. Did I mention it was brisk?

I'm not very good at panos yet. I have a tendency to shoot things too close to me, such that I get that loopy swooping perspective anomaly that some people hate and some people play with. All things considered I'd rather shoot with a large single-shot panaoramic camera—only then I wouldn't be be doing panos at all.

The other thing the iPhone is teaching me is how to shoot square. Speaking of Aaron Hobson, his father Mark, who reads TOP, is a very experienced professional who's been shooting personal projects with his iPhone in recent years, and he shoots square. I think Mark processes his pictures with Snapseed or something like that. Square seems like the ready-made solution for anyone who complains about not being able to hold their iPhone while shooting. Shooting square means you can hold the phone vertically and get the same aspect ratio in the pictures.

Shooting square is fun. It's easy and somehow also challenging at the same time. I can't be more clear than that because I don't really understand it. But maybe you know what I mean.

Do any of those medium-format digitals shoot square? Such that you see square in the viewfinder I mean.

Curiously, the one time in my life that I shot extensively with a square-format camera—well, there were two times, the first being a Kodak Instamatic when I was a kid—was with the Exakta 66 in the '80s, and as a matter of course I always cropped to the vertical with that camera. I don't know why; it's just how I saw with it.

I'd rather there weren't a camera in the phone. But since there is, might as well have fun.

Incidentally, play is the solution for any photographer's block—the doldrums, boredom, lack of inspiration, a rut—just find some way to play. Fool around and have fun. Be goofy. Be free. It'll shake your tree and get you going where you're going again.

Mike

Book o' the Week:

ArtCurious: Stories of the Unexpected, Slightly Odd, and Strangely Wonderful in Art History by Jennifer Dasal (Penguin, 2020. Adapted from the popular podcast.)

This link is a portal to Amazon, through which most anything you purchase will be credited to TOP. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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:

Jeff in Rhode Island: "SQUARE: This is one of the advantages that I really love about working with mirrorless digital or phone cameras. We have the ability to previsualize different aspect ratios. I often have my Fuji X-H1 or X-E2 set up to a 1:1 aspect ratio with B&W as my rendering intent. This is something I could have only dreamed of in terms of previsualization and flexibility in the analog days."

DavidB: "The mis-matched power lines might be a result of the strong winds causing the lines to move as the multiple frames were captured."

John Y: "I grew up using 35mm films. When transitioning to digital, any aspect ratio not 3:2 completely turned me off. Now I’ve unlearned that stupid bias and come to appreciate different compositions/subjects call for different aspect ratios, and vice versa."

Mark Hobson: "Hey Mike—thanks for the mention. FYI, I shot with rotating lens pano cameras as part of my pro shooting repertoire. One of those pictures—see them here—one of 50 all made with Widelux cameras for the Allegheny Hospital: Portrait of an Urban Hospital book, was Aaron's inspiration for all of his work."

Bruce: "For those jagged power lines, there’s a great app, Touch Retouch, which makes correcting those incredible easy on the iPhone. As well as having a decent clone stamp and healing brush. Definitely worth the $2 to try."

John Shriver: "Koudelka created The Black Triangle, a book of panoramic photographs of coal mining devastation. Josef Sudek created two panoramic books, Prague Panaorama and the posthumous Sad Landscapes, also of coal mining devastation. Sudek used a Kodak Panorama No. 4, hand loading it with 4x12 sheet film, since 103 size roll film was already unavailable."

Scott Reither: "I find the wider the pano format, the more challenging it is to compose well, and the closer to square I get, the easier it gets. For my eye, anyways! For years, I used Linhof 617 and 612 panoramic cameras, and found the formats very challenging. It did not come naturally at all. One thing I love about the Fuji GFX cameras is, they have seven image ratios that you can set, and it blacks out the area so you see that actual selected format. I had been wanting for that in a camera for years—it seems so obvious. With the raw, you can always change your mind later and undo the crop, if you want.

"You’re going to love the 50R when you get to use that!"

German Pronunciation of German Camera and Lens Names

Ever wondered how classic German camera names are actually pronounced in Germany? Here's a nice little video of a native German speaker demonstrating proper German pronunciation. 

Of course, brand or marque names don't have a proper pronunciation...even if they are of a particular nationality and even if they're a real word, such as a surname. In Lexington, Kentucky, there's a road called "Versailles Road," and the proper pronunciation is not the French pronunciation even though the name comes from the French. It's pronounced "ver-SALES," and that's correct...in Kentucky. 

We learned this with Nikon. The name is pronounced differently in different languages and regions, and, according to the company, which is the ultimate authority, each one is correct; the variant pronunciations in the U.K. (NICK-on) and U.S. (NIGH-kon), for instance, are both proper—one isn't right and the other wrong. 

A few of these were news to me, especially Voigtländer as "FOTE-lender" (that's not quite it, but close) is not something I think I've heard before. That's a good example of the point above, though...there's an accepted pronunciation in English and it's different than what the name sounds like in German.

The Leica lens names are cool. I think I might try to say them that way in the future. ZOOM-ee-cron. 

Interesting stuff!

Mike
(Thanks to Eamon H.)

Gear o' the Week:

If I could shoot with any 50mm focal-length-equivalent lens, it would not be unobtanium: it would be the relatively modest, relatively older HD Pentax 35mm ƒ/2.8 DA Macro Limited on APS-C (it has recently been revised with new coatings). I don't know how it measures and couldn't care less. If you care first and foremost about pictures, especially prints, it is one beautiful lens. Luverly. As a normal too. This link is a portal to Amazon, through which most anything you purchase will be credited to TOP. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

B&H Photo also has the Magic Macro, naturally.

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.

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Featured Comments from:

Thomas Mc Cann: "Many years back Braun did a little survey in the U.K. asking what was the preferred pronunciation of their name. The answer was 'Brawn' and not 'Brown' so ever since that is what they use in the promotions.

Zyni Moë: "Voigtländer is hard for native English speakers to get right: is a case where the 'v' is /f/ (unvoiced) not /v/ (voiced) which often it is in modern German, which mostly uses 'w' for /v/: 'Wankel' is close to 'Vankel' in English. 'Vater' is then 'fater' (but 'a' is /a:/ not /a/: is a long sound like 'father' in RP English and not a diphthong like 'fate'). But 'v' is in fact ambiguous in modern German: sometimes it is /v/ not /f/. This is because in Mittelhochdeutsch (middle high German: 'middle' is 1000–1300 or so, 'high' means people who lived high up in mountains spoke it, not low down on plains, yes, really, this is true) pronounced 'v' as /v/: after this there was a consonant shift to /f/ (mostly) but the orthography did not change. Is even more funny that I think in Althochdeutsch these sounds were /f/. Approximate but wrong rule in moderm German is that 'v' is /f/ in words which originally were German, /v/ in imported words. And that is the easy bit for Englishers: 'ä' is usually /ɛ:/ and this vowel does not really exist in many English dialects at all. 'Länder' is close to 'lender' but not the same: the 'ä' is longer. You must wrinkle your nose a little as if there was a bad smell, too.

"But it is completely fine for there to be different pronunciation in English: my English friend says /vɔɪtlændə/ I think if he is not trying (and he can speak some German, and could get it right if he tried I think). If you are having a conversation in English with someone English who pronounces 'Paris' /paʁi/ ('paree') you should immediately start having a conversation with someone less annoying. Note I am not native German speaker (my native language derives from latin, so is not even closely related). I did/do sometimes still live in Berlin though."

Chris Dematté: "As a native German speaker I can assure you: the way he is pronouncing 'Voigtlaender' is completly wrong. You have to listen to Austrians anyway because we are the only one who are speaking a decent German...  ;-). "

Charlie Ewers: "Where I live in Maryland, the French name Beauchamp is pronounced 'Beechum.' Where we used to spend summers in Maine, the name of the town Calais is pronounced 'Cal-us.' Seems like French is the easiest language for us Americans to butcher.

Mike Cytrynowicz: "Actually, Voigtländer is pronounced more like 'F$@#ed-lander' imagining the cursing person to be in some parts of the UK where they tend to say 'aw' when we say 'uh.'"

longviewer: "Let it be 'Lowenbrau' beer = Löwenbräu which sounds more like lervenbroi in German. Thanks for letting me say this; clearly it's been simmering inside me since the late '70s when this marketing took place...." 

Mike replies: That's taking the long view!

robert e: "My favorite pronunciation database is Forvo. It's massive, easy to use, and for many words and names you can listen to recordings from a variety of speakers from all over the world. I find it as charming as it is useful. It's crowd-sourced, boasts 'nearly 6 million words pronounced in over 390 languages.' And there's a pending word list if you'd like to help out. Re Nikon, while our (US) way of saying it may be 'correct' per the company (though, really, what else are they going to say? ), it does seem to be an outlier per Forvo (albeit the sample size is still rather small)."

Albert Smith: "Re 'a few of these were news to me, especially Voigtländer as "FOTE-lender" (that's not quite it, but close)...' Wow, I was really off. I've been pronouncing it COSE-EE-NA for the last 15 years.😀"

Rick in CO (partial comment): "One trick for names like Rollei is to remember that when you see two vowels together, the second vowel is 'hard' pronounced—ie. Roll-EYE. Same for Leitz or Leica. However, not true for umlauts like in Voigtländer which is also seen spelled as Voigtlaender. This becomes a 'soft' e like 'lender.' Much fun!"

Steve Rosenblum: "I would like to see a similar video for Japanese photographic terms."

Digital Dreams

I have this persistent daydream of a camera that doesn't exist. Picture a cube. On the front is a lensmount; on the side is an adjustable handle, preferably switchable from the right to the left side so each user can choose. On the top of the cube, put yourself in mind of the kind of foldable hood that was commonly found on medium-format film cameras like a Hasselblad, Rollei, or Bronica. Then imagine the screen being somewhat larger, not in an extreme but in a balanced way, such that it's a bit easier to see but so the hood still gives good protection from impinging light.

The native format is square, but a switch can change the aspect ratio from square to (4:3) horizontal and vertical. The fine-focusing loupe, which was physical on Rolleis and Bronicas and the like, would be electronic. The hood might still have a flip-up blind, but simply with a hole in it, to put your eye up to and block out more light for when you might find yourself in very bright situations.

I also daydream a raft of ideas for how to make the camera as simple as possible while also making it as effective as possible, but I won't go into those. That parcel of notions is maybe a separate bundle. Importantly, though, is an overall concept of what the camera should be: specifically, that it should not try to be all things to everybody.

What you'd have is a digital TLR, more or less. I find it kind of weird that no one has yet done this. Why "rangefinder style" cameras aplenty, but not one TLR-style?

My name for the camera would be Strassenkamera (Straßenkamera), German for "street camera." Why? Because it was my observation over the years that pointing a camera with an eyelevel finder at strangers in public drew their attention, but pointing a camera using a waist-level finder, while looking down at the camera held in my hands, did not.

My pick for a manufacturer would be Sigma, because Sigma could equip the camera with a Foveon sensor and a Foveon sensor could be adapted for a B&W-only version of the Strassekamera; and, Sigma is the least "me-too" of all the major cameramakers.

No real need to discuss further; this is pie in the sky as they say. It's fun to think about. Then again, all of my previous digital dreams have come true: the "decisive moment digicam," the rationalized knobs-and-dials SLR-style camera, and the black-and-white only camera.

Mike

Gear o' The Week:

I'm going to get a review unit of the Fuji GFX 50R as soon as the weather gets nice. Believe it or not what really appeals to me about it are the simplified controls. It has all the features I like and not many I don't like.

The above link is a portal to take you from TOP to Amazon. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Here's a handy portal to B&H Photo, which also sells the GFX 50R:

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:

John Robison: "And, with digital, the image on the waist level screen would not be reversed left to right. Win win."

John: "I bought a Sony R1 just so I could take street photos in Europe at waist level. It worked out great; I got some of my best people shots ever because anyone looking at me looking at the camera must have thought I was reviewing my photos, not taking them, and never looked twice. Once I left it next to me on a bench and just glanced down and pressed the shutter when I saw something in the frame. The downside was no IS, which is why I sold it, but I'm totally onboard with the looking down approach."

Willem: "There was a prototype that looked squarish, like a Blad, by Samsung."

Bill Pearce: "Just give me a 6x6 sensor for my Hasselblad, and you'll see me at the foot of a highway off-ramp smiling and begging for spare change."

Earl Dunbar: "One million times yes."

James Bullard (partial comment): "I have been wishing for something like that for as long as I have been shooting digital."

Dave Levingston: "I have long been puzzled by the lack of some sort of hood over the screen on the back of digital cameras. It's not like no one knows how to do that. There were some add-on hoods available back when few digital cameras had decent viewfinders, but I think there is still a need for them and I don't understand, with all the bells and whistles our cameras have now, why that simple feature can't be added."

Aaron Hines (partial comment): "The 'digital mirrorless TLR' sounds like a fantastic idea. Hasselblad's 907X is surprisingly close, except for the square sensor and top-down viewfinder arrangement."

Mike replies: In my mind, the hood is the crucial part. To block impinging light and protect the finder image. I do like using rear screens in the flip-up position, but it's an awkward workaround and it doesn't work well in every kind of light because it's not protected. Plus you have to hold the camera away from your body instead of comfortably nestled against you like a TLR. So the Hasselblad 907x is actually not very close to what I envision. As Dave says above, making a TLR-style hood is something we already know how to do.

Also, in my mind the camera doesn't have to have a larger format sensor, because the size of the viewing screen is independent of the size of the sensor.

Bruce Polin: "We have the same digital dream, or at least very similar. The closest thing out there to that shooting experience, by far, is the cube-like Hasselblad 907x. It's made to shoot waist-level with its large tilting touch screen. Both the mechanical controls and the lovely digital interface of the 907x really could not be simpler. They even made a beautiful grip which makes the package even closer to the dream. Although the default crop factor is more like 645, there is a square crop option. When this camera became available I jumped on it, as I knew instinctively that I would love to work with it, and I do, warts and all. The camera is definitely not for everybody, ie not a 'lowest common denominator' kind of design ...something I really admire Hasselblad for getting behind. It's so different than the other large sensor offerings. It's almost as if the team in Sweden made a very polished prototype and decided, what the hell, let's put it out there and see what happens."

Kenneth Tanaka: "Much of your list is filled here:

"Plus quite a few items that you've not thought of. You should try one of these out rather than the GFX 50R. (Hasselblad 907x-CFV II 50c with 907x Control Grip and 45mm ƒ/3.5)."

hugh crawford: "This is exactly the camera I want. The only thing that you left out is a global shutter for high speed flash sync.

"The thing I can’t figure out is that when camera design was divorced from the constraints of all the machinery that is no longer there, the range of camera shapes actually contracted. The weird thing is that the medium format camera makers that are left all abandoned the features that defined medium format."

Rudolph Geesink: "Well, don't dream any longer, the Hassy 907X comes very close with its movable screen, especially with the 45P lens a very small combo."

Joeb: "I guess the folks replying the Hasselblad closely meets your requirements forgot any sort of budgetary restraints. I'd have to sell my car when the credit card bill arrived! Maybe Panasonic, Sony or even Olympus could cobble something together at a price even I could budget for. But that's for me—I have a mortgage to pay and want to eat once in a while."

Mike replies: It's odd/funny—I will fantasize an imaginary camera, but I fantasize it being in my real-life price range. Why do I do that? You'd think it would just be easier to fantasize having a lot of money. It's a bit like what somebody once said about Santa's flying reindeer —that Occam's Razor would simply posit that Santa have a flying sleigh in the first place and dispense with the reindeer altogether.

Would Anyone Like a Panasonic GX9 Grip?

Does anyone need a nice grip for a Panasonic GX9? I'll send you the review copy for free and I'll cover the cost of shipping as long as you're in the U.S. If you're overseas, it would probably be cheaper just to buy one directly off eBay.

These grips are 3-D printed by a 36-year-old electrical engineer from the Czech Republic named Viacheslav Pronin. It incorporates an Arca Swiss mount. The grip is made of PETG, a glycol-modified version of polyethylene terephthalate (PET), usually used to make water bottles. The handle is hollow, which accounts for its lightness. On my gram scale which I use to measure my tea, it weighs in at 54.4g (1.92 oz.). One grip takes just over six hours to print. You can buy one from Viacheslav Pronin on eBay for $22 (shipping is free).

It's a nice grip for the GX9. I liked both the camera and the grip and I think the grip improves the camera. It makes it easier to carry and easier to handle. (You can only buy the camera with a lens in the U.S. It's a good lens, though.)

I only have the one, so the first person who asks for it gets it.

[UPDATE: Claimed, by Dana T.]

Mike

Book Product o' This Week:

Is it too late for this? 2021 is still young. There are two reasons to value these Michael Kenna calendars from Nazraeli Press: one is that his originals are 8x8", so these pictures are meant to work at wall-calendar sizes. The other is that Michael's calendars can actually increase in value! Dan Smith suggested this, and he reports that some older ones sell in the hundreds of dollars. "The printing is excellent," Dan wrote, "and the calendar is beautiful."

The above link takes you from TOP to Amazon. This week's pick is not available at Amazon Canada, but 2019 is. Hey, the pictures are still good. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

 

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.

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My Early Adoption of Drones

Contributed by Bruce Hedge

Wow...a huge new area of photography has developed (ouch!) in only about eight years. I've had a business doing aerial photography in Central Victoria, Australia, since the mid 1980s. The main platform was a Cessna 172 from the local Aero Club, flown by an exceptionally skilled pilot.

I looked at helium balloons as a platform, but they were not practical in any sort of wind, and had all sorts of other complications, so I gave that a pass. For some jobs, I jumped in a Bell Jet Ranger helicopter, but the cost per hour and the float fee generally prohibited that option. Roll on 2013, and the first DJI Phantom came on the market. I immediately saw the potential to use it as an aerial photography tool, but it did not have a camera attached. After a bit of research, I settled on the Nikon J1 camera with 10mm (28mm equivalent) lens. It had the required quality sensor, weighed only 300 grams, and, most importantly, could be set to take a photo every five seconds.

I rigged up a Heath Robinson plywood and styrofoam platform underneath to hold the camera pointing forward and slightly down, not having a clue about the potential aerodynamic effects. I was very pleasantly surprised at the results. What a game-changer in my aerial photography business! The DJI was deployable anywhere, (my Royal New Zealand Air Force piloting in a previous life meant I was fairly sensible about how, when and where I flew until rules were developed very quickly by the Australian Civil Aviation Safety Authority). I set the camera to take a pic every five seconds, took off, eyeballed the position, and got good at positioning the camera to take fantastic unique photos of properties for local real estate agents at a cost much less than photos taken from aircraft.

The flight time of those early DJIs was only about seven minutes without the camera, and it dropped drastically to about four minutes carrying the 300g payload, but most flights produced at least one usable photo out of the 50 or so taken. (There was no remote video vision to guide you in those days!) I bought another eight batteries, and used the setup for three years, even at weddings, where it created quite a talking point!

I had three first generation DJIs, crashing two, and cobbling together one last one out of the bits from broken ones. As the technology raced ahead I fell behind, and finally realised the competition was using state-of-the-art DJI Mavic Pro and better units. They had such luxuries as collision avoidance, much longer flight times, and absolutely astounding photo quality from very small sensors, plus, of course, ability to see where the camera was pointing. Extraordinary gimballed image stabilisation and amazing video (from which you could extract frames) were the icing on the cake.

I've also discovered the artistic side of low-level aerial photography, being able to get previously impossible photos. Most TV docos, adverts, and travel movies have a significant number of drone sequences, but the restrictions about where you can fly them have limited some otherwise great pics. Unfortunately, idiots will always be with us.

When I think of the "Model T Ford" DJI I started with, and what is now available on the amateur market, I wonder what will happen in the next eight years. We live at an amazing time!

Bruce

Book o' This Week:

Peter Lindbergh On Fashion Photography, with text in English, French, and German. Original coffee table version or small 40th Anniversary version, take your pick. Both are hardcovers. The links above will fly you through the air to Amazon.

Original contents copyright 2020 by Bruce Hedge. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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Drone On!

I got to see a drone the other day, finally.

A local friend, Pam, just got her realtor's license, and she bought one. Fortunately for her, her seven-year-old grandson was visiting a few days earlier when it arrived, so she had an eager and attentive onlooker helping to supervise.

She sent it up for a demonstration flight for me. It sounded like a giant swarm of angry but distant bees, which spooked the chickens. She made it go up, down, execute smart turns, and hang motionless in the air. It made an "instrument landing," softly.

She said hers weighs 249 grams, because anything over 250 grams must be registered with the FAA. It cost about $450, she said. I'll try to find out the make and model for those who might be curious.

She didn't take a picture, although that's its purpose of course—to take aerial views of properties. I didn't take a picture either, because I was on my walk and the cameras were slumbering at home.

Dangers associated with the drone: the clutches of the small spidery branches of trees, way up high and out of reach; resentful rednecks with shotguns—possibly apocryphal; and, perhaps, neglect of the other work one is supposed to be doing that isn't as fun.

I know drones have been popular with photographers for a while now, but I've never seen one in action before. A drone is far down on my list of potential purchases, but it was interesting to see it in operation and I feel better educated. It was about like I expected and yet seemed more accessible and straightforward in person than in my imagination.

Anyone here using a drone regularly for photography?

Mike

Book o' This Week:

Peter Lindbergh On Fashion Photography, with text in English, French, and German. Original coffee table version or small 40th Anniversary version, take your pick. Both are hardcovers. The links above will take you to Amazon.

Original contents copyright 2020 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. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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Featured Comments from:

James Gaston: "Recently purchased my first drone, a Mavic Air 2. I registered it with the government and took an exam to earn a license. Oh, I'm in Canada so the rules may be different elsewhere. In the short time I've had it it has forced me to learn how to edit movies because I think that's what it is really good at. For this I've found the free Davinci Resolve is excellent for learning how to edit films. It reminds me a bit of Lightroom in that it is non-destructive. Perhaps all video editors are? It's the only one I've used. Not that the drone's still photos aren't fine. But they are not as satisfying photographically as photos from my Nikons and Fujis. Drone photography is a different experience and, assuming you have a place to fly a drone, it provides a lot of new vantage points. If you are looking to buy a drone I recommend spending enough to get one with obstacle avoidance and also a GPS. This will put you over that 250g threshold I'm afraid. The drones that lack these are hard to control (they don't know if the wind has blown them off course, for example) and easy to crash."

Aaron Hines: "I am sure many others will also chime in, but any commercial drone use requires a pilot with a FAA UAS Certificate and drone registration (for any drone up to 55 lbs). Commercial use includes performing work that is not compensated. While the chances of getting caught may or may not be very high, if caught the fines levied can be substantial. I use a drone for photography work regularly. Working for a municipal government, we use aerial images for all kinds of things, from informing the public to GIS mapping and everything in between. For example, viewing a residential area inaccessible by other means during flooding."

Andre Y: "It sounds like your friend has either the DJI Mavic Mini or Mini 2 (the 2 just came out recently). I had the original until a tree ate it due to my less-than-careful flying. It's a great beginner drone except it has no proximity sensors other than the one for the ground, so it can be crashed into things like trees. The photo quality is fine, but I got it primarily for video. Either way, it outputs an overly sharpened, contrasty image, which could be a problem if you're trying to match it to footage shot on a different camera. The Mini 2 has raw stills, so at least that can be adjusted in post to taste. I'm waiting for my next project before deciding which drone to replace it with, but I think there's plenty of photographic potential (cf. Edward Burtynsky and George Steinmetz) as drones offer a perspective that would have been hard to get before."

Mike replies: Yes, the only aerial shot in my portfolio was shot from a helicopter! I rented the helicopter for a job, shot the job in 20 minutes, and used the remainder of my half hour to shoot for myself.

Simon: "As well as the obvious value to estate agents, a growing number of photographers like dronerangers.co.uk have been using aerial images for some time. There were stunning photos and video of the spectacularly damaging floods created by Storms Ciara and Dennis in various part of the UK in early 2020. They have become popular in sports coverage (where permitted). In cycling events they allow viewers a bird's eye view of a race unfolding which is impossible from even the tallest grandstand."

Ernie Van Veen: "From my experience, the real danger in purchasing a drone is in the very short amount of time it takes to realise you wasted your money and want to sell it for half the price online. I use mine twice a year, whether I need to or not. It’s good for checking the roof and gutters."

Peter Wright: "Yes I use one. It sounds like the same one your friend has. The Mavic Mini is 249 grams. (I found the rotor protectors to be an essential accessory!) I have been using mine to photograph the construction of a large church as part of a project I have been doing, and have been flying it both outside and inside the building. It means I can get some pictures that would be otherwise impossible. Attaching the cross at the top of the tower on the exterior, and installing the stained glass rose window on the interior would be examples. The downsides of such a small drone are that it cannot fly in anything more than very slight winds, and the camera is JPEG-only. However, for screen use or prints up to 8x10 it works very well."

Can't Be Afraid to Be Flexible

Okay, okay, I'll admit it: For the kind of shooting that's most natural here in Finger Lakes country—driving around, and looking around, and finding all kinds of scenic tidbits, distant framings, slices o' life, cloud formations, lakescapes, critters, houses and buildings, deer, doggies, graveyards, vehicles (of various sorts!)—and even, occasionally, humans—a mid-range zoom is really the most appropriate lens to have on the camera.

Okay I said it. Please don't tease me, please.

(Although I recently learned, when trying out the Panasonic GX9 and the the slower 12–60mm lens not long ago, that a lens with the long end longer than 70mm is best. Hereabouts anyhow.)

You never know what you're going to
stumble upon up here.

I like primes best, and 35/40mm-e is my favorite focal length, but results are what count and one mustn't be afraid to be flexible. Even when it comes to settled habits of mind.  :-)

Mike

Original contents copyright 2020 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. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Book of interest this week:

PhotoWork: Forty Photographers on Process and Practice, Edited by Sasha Wolf
(clicking on the link above takes you to Amazon)

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Featured Comments from:

Grant: "Cool! An Amish F150."

Eolake Stobblehouse: "When I can't go above 100mm, I really miss it. I see so many compositions in the distance."

Electric Trains and the Electric Flash Lamp

Right now is the time to be buying Christmas presents to put around the tree for kids. Toys tend to come and go in popularity, but electric trains continue to have "traditional" associations with Christmas in the U.S. I was at a Christmas celebration just a few years ago where there was an operating electric train circling the base of the Christmas tree.

Turns out there was a photographic connection, way back.

In 1899, a man named Joshua Cohen invented a product for photographers called the Electric Flash Lamp. The Flash Lamp used electric current to ignite flammable magnesium powder used as flash for lighting photographs. Prior to that, flash powder, invented by Adolph Miethe and Johannes Gaedicke in Germany in 1887, had to be ignited manually, which was known to be perilous to the photographer. Magnesium flash powder itself was risky to bystanders, pets, small children, and structures! (It would be interesting if we could have had pictures taken just after the explosion of the "flash"—they no doubt would have showed surprise and alarm on subjects' faces. Alas, there were no motor drives on the old glass-plate box cameras of the day.) Cohen's invention later had other applications, notably being used to ignite underwater mines for the U.S. Navy.

A year later, Cohen, who later spelled his name Cowen, used the profits from his invention to start another company, one that made toy trains. He named that company using his middle name: Lionel. Lionel Corporation went on to dominate the market for electric trains, becoming the largest toy manufacturer in the world in 1953.

Lionel trains have been through many changes of ownership since then, and it's a long story, but at one point it was purchased by an investor group that included rock star Neil Young, who took an active hand in creating products and who to this day continues to be a consultant for Lionel's high-end products. Another former owner whose association might be less a point of pride was the malignant Roy Cohn, who has cast a long, dark shadow across American politics and about whom the less said the better. Cohn was Cowen's grand-nephew, and bought the company from him when Cowen retired in 1959.

The generation that treasured toy trains is aging out now. According to Kalmbach Publications, which publishes Toy Trains and many other train-themed magazines, the center of the train-loving generation in America is males who were 10 in 1950, when electric trains were the number-one Christmas wish for boys. That boy, who might have gotten up on Christmas morning to find a train set up around the tree, would be 80 now, and might have spent his whole life having a soft spot for toy and model trains.

As for the Flash Lamp, although many obsolete products and processes continue to be used in photography by enthusiasts and antiquarians, I've never heard of anyone still using magnesium powder flash! Much less Joshua Lionel Cowen's Electric Flash Lamp. But it served its purpose at the time...several purposes, it turns out.

Pirie MacDonald, Jacob Riis, 1906

If you'd like to read a little more about very early flash photography, there's a well-written, succinct article about the pioneering, Danish-born, progressive-era photographer Jacob A. Riis (who I think looked a little like the character "Cliff Clavin" on the old TV show "Cheers") by Miriam Bader at a site called Khan Academy that I thought was good. Flash powder was the newest thing when Riis started using it. Here's a quote: "Initially, Riis used a revolver to shoot cartridges containing the explosive magnesium flash-powder, but he soon discovered that showing up waving pistols set the wrong tone and substituted a frying pan for the gun, flashing the light on that instead. The process certainly terrified those in the vicinity and also proved dangerous. Riis reported setting two fires in places he visited and nearly blinding himself on one occasion." Ah, the good old days.

Mike

Original contents copyright 2020 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. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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Cyber Monday Deals, a Computer, and the Two Cameras I Covet Most

SONY LENSES on sale

NIKON CAMERAS and LENSES on sale

FUJIFILM CAMERAS and LENSES on sale

CANON CAMERAS and LENSES on sale

Superpowerful superlight: For Apple fans, the MacBook Air with the new integrated M1 chip might not be the best computer, but it's got to have a shot at being the best-yet travel laptop. 0.63 inch thick (1.6 cm) and 2.8 pounds (1.3 kg), with specs that would have sounded implausible to a science fiction writer twenty years ago. All for less than that Sony/Zeiss 24mm ƒ/1.8 lens I like so much (the price on that is never going to come down into the realm of reason).

You can get a hundred bucks off if you preorder the MacBook Pro M1 today too.

[WARNING! Somewhat NSFW illustration past the break]

 

The Most Popular Large Format

Why was 4x5 (called 5x4 in Britain) the most popular large film format? There are two reasons.

First, and far and away foremost, it was the largest film format that could conveniently be enlarged. Four-by-five-inch enlargers were common and made by many manufacturers; they were competitively priced, although you wouldn't call them cheap.

Enlargers that could handle 5x7 and larger sheet film were greatly less common and considerably more expensive. Long ago in antediluvian days when punk rockers walked the Earth, I worked on an 8x10 color enlarger owned by Northern Virginia Community College, where I was teaching at the time, and it was a formidable beast. Floorstanding, yet towering over my head (I'm 6'2"—or at least I was then; now I'm 6' 1 1/2"), it was given its own room in the Photo Department. It was said to have cost $10,000 back in 1984, about $25,000 today. At around the same time, I bought my first 4x5 enlarger for something like $800.

Me at about the time I was teaching at NVCC and working on that 8x10 Durst. I almost threw this picture out the other day, by mistake! And it's the only print that exists. Photo by then-girlfriend E.H., who is now a doctor in San Francisco.

Ansel Adams had a homemade 8x10 enlarger. When asked what camera he used, he liked to answer "The biggest one I can carry!" He photographed with an 8x10 for years, although eventually a Hasselblad became the largest camera he could carry. His final assistant, John Sexton, last I heard, uses a 4x5 Linhof Technika and enlarges his negatives (only so much—he's a great craftsman and his technique is highly optimized) using Saunders/LPL enlargers.

Second, the cameras are small, light, and handy. You can even handhold them (see: press cameras, for example the famous Speed Graphic and Crown Graphic made by Graflex we were talking about a week or so ago). Everything can be smaller, lighter, easier to carry, less expensive, and handier to use. The lenses can be shorter (50mm on a FF camera is roughly the same angle of view as a 150mm lens on 4x5 and a 300mm lens on 8x10). Of course each sheet of film is cheaper. Consider just the difference in weight and size of carrying six film holders for 4x5 vs. 8x10!

As a consequence of the two factors above and its resulting popularity ("popularity" relative to the LF world, that would be), 4x5 was more plentiful and more ubiquitous, easier to find, and cheaper to buy, and the film was more readily available and produced in greater variety.

Larger large formats
It should be remembered, though, that 4x5 was a compromise, if an intelligent, considered one—the balanced, just-right solution in the middle. It really is a good, viable option to get a larger camera and then contact print, which was my nefarious plan with the old Single Use Device (which I sold in 2015, I believe, although I still have the lens). For most of his life as well as for the lion's share of his famous photographs, Edward Weston used an 8x10 camera and made contact prints.

Here's a video showing Edward's simple darkroom:

I don't even think he owned an enlarger. By the way, notice that in the video at a little after 9:00, it shows Edward in the passenger's seat of a car, scanning the landscape. Legend has it that Edward never got a driver's license because that way, he never had to share driving duties and was always free to look out the window. (Also by the way, when the film was made that those clips came from, Edward was already suffering from Parkinson's and having trouble with the disease's "masking" of facial expressions. I imagine that's why he appears to be somewhat less than normally animated.)

If you scan your negatives anyway, that's another argument for going ahead and shooting 5x7 or 8x10. A V600 is the same scanner regardless of what size neg you slap on it. [This is wrong I guess; you need a V850. Ouch! LF is expensive.]

Incidentally (I'm kinda rambling now, sorry), the most Edward was ever paid for a photography in his lifetime was $250, and the client was Eastman Kodak Company. He sold seven (color!) images to them at that price. If he were alive today I'd ask him to do a print sale with us! (Okay, made myself laugh, and that's half the battle.)

Mike
(Thanks to the reader who mentioned that YouTube video)

Original contents copyright 2020 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.

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Featured Comments from:

Tom Duffy: "Another nice advantage of the 4x5 camera compared to anything larger was the ready availability of preloaded film packs, which allowed you to shoot 16 pictures in fairly rapid succession. You could then swap out film packs in daylight and keep shooting. The film base was very thin so developing was more of a chore than shooting with real sheet film and you needed to use a glass negative carrier in your enlarger to keep the film flat while enlarging."

Greg Heins: "Surely another compelling reason for the appeal of 4x5 (or 5x4) by the 1960s was the fact that the various Polaroid options existed in this size with a film holder that slipped into the camera back almost as easily as normal film holders. I remember going off to an Adams workshop in 1968 with an 8x10 and being surprised to find myself the only person among the dozens of photographers there with anything larger than 4x5. But the learning value of being able to examine and discuss Polaroids, even with their various deficiencies, was made very clear to me as I watched my colleagues that week. Not to mention the fact that pulling Polaroids was a part of every commercial photography process, even to the extent of using a 4x5 and Polaroid to nail down the lighting (and often the client approval) before replacing the back and lens to shoot 8x10 film."

Larry Angier: "That video was nice! I had the honor and pleasure to teach with Kim at the second Al Weber Mission Portfolio Workshops at Mission San Miguel years ago. He was a pleasure to work with and had such high energy! His wife Gina accompanied him. Besides the legacy and having to walk in the footsteps of his grandfather Ed, Kim took his own road. He worked for years as a carpenter and contractor and transitioned into photography on his own terms using film and traditional photography to create his own legacy. A few years after, Kim, Gina and their son Zach had a major show at the National Steinbeck Center in Salinas showcasing four generations of this photographic dynasty. It was quite a show and the opening was well attended with many influenced by so many decades of great work produced by them all."

Richard Man: "Re '...the most Edward was ever paid for a photography in his lifetime was $250...': There is a YouTube video of the Weston 'kids,' filmed not long after Edward passed away, if I recall correctly. They were saying something like 'Wow, the collector's market really has driven up the prices of Edward's prints!' and they were talking about how they had gone up to $600–$700.  ;-)  "

Mike replies: Maybe ten years ago, the curator of photography at the Art Institute of Chicago mentioned that you really couldn't get a good Edward Weston print, printed by Edward, for less than $800,000. It might have changed since then, too.

G Dan Mitchell: "While I cannot speak for John (nor his wife Anne Larsen), when I met him in the Yosemite backcountry a few years back they were using Hasselblad medium-format cameras."

Mani Sitaraman: "One of the now almost forgotten (and then little-known) uses for an 8x10 enlarger was to make a 2x enlarged 'contact sheet' of a roll of 135 or 120 film onto a single sheet of 16x20 paper. I have seen one from a roll of 35mm negatives, and it was unique and, well, beautiful. I expect an enlargement from a roll of 120 film would have been even more striking. I'm struggling to recall the title of an exhibition in the 1980s(?) that displayed a series of 16x20 'contacts' by some famous photographer."

Mike replies: William Klein?

It's Expensive Because It Was Cheap!

This is one of the odd features of buying old stuff on the used market: sometimes things become expensive because they're cheap.

Let me 'splain. Sometimes things are great bargains on the used market. They become popular and sought after because they're great bargains. Influencers recommend them as good bargains, and the echo chamber parrots the recommendations until it's common knowledge. People follow along, and seek these bargains out. And then, with market forces working in their usual way, competition for these great bargains...drives the prices up. So then people find themselves competing to pay a lot for something that, originally, everyone wanted because it was cheap.

Weird.

Here's a similar thing. There was a CD/SACD player, I seem to recall, that sold by the bushel because it was good and also very cheap. But then what could the company do as a follow-up to its success but produce a more deluxe, expensive player? At which point people were saying, wait, I only wanted one of those in the first place because they were cheap; why would I want "the same thing only better" if it's also more expensive? (The company went out of business. No room to move, I guess.)

Sometimes companies do such a good job of branding themselves in their chosen niches that they have trouble moving out of them. Volkswagen once tried to create a luxury car to compete with Mercedes-Benz, and from what I hear it did a good job—the car was called the Phaeton, an old word once applied to certain kinds of horse-drawn carriages. (Before that, it was the name of the ne'er-do-well offspring of a water nymph and the sun god, who was given the keys to the family car and drove the chariot of the sun off course, scorching Earth. Maybe Phaeton's driving that chariot again now, who knows.) VW evidently failed to consider why anyone buying a high-prestige car would want one with an "everyman" nameplate. Kia ran into the same problem with its K9, a car that tried to hide its doggy associations by having its name disguised as the K900 in the US. (No one was fooled. I like dogs, so I would have preferred the straight-up "K9." I'm usually in the minority about things like this.) It's apparently a nice luxury car. But one little problem: it's a Kia.

Sometimes there's a more basic, stripped-down version of a desirable product that's sold as a "good enough" budget version for students or beginners. "Entry level," they're sometimes called. Fewer of such budget models sell, so that, later, when neither version is made any more and perhaps the company is out of business altogether, the budget version is scarcer. And scarcity drives the price up.

An example of this is the Bronica SQ-B medium format film camera. The "B" was for "basic." It was originally an entry-level, less fully-featured variant of the SQ-Ai aimed at students and newcomers to medium format, sold as a kit. Well, now they're more rare, so they go for higher prices than the SQ-Ai.

All versions of the Leica R4 are cheap now, but when people still wanted them, the simpler, stripped-down R4s, originally prized because it was more accessible to people who had less money, actually became more desirable than the fully featured R4. The value-to-price equation flipped upside down.

Related to this is the upside-down valuation of some collectibles. Imagine a book author. Her first book sells poorly because it isn't very good. Later she hits her stride, writes masterpieces, and becomes famous. Enthusiasts collect her works. The problem then becomes that a collection can only be complete it if includes all her books, including her first, unpopular one—which are scarce because nobody bought them when they were new. But there are lots of collectors, and now all those collectors need that first book. Again, scarcity in the face of demand drives up the price, until that author's worst book is selling for ten times the price of any of her other books.

That's the reason why some early Japanese Leica copies—originally cheaper knock-offs—sell for more than the real Leicas they copied.

And then there's the "latest is best" phenomenon. A product is introduced, achieves success, runs its course, and is superseded. Eventually, all of the models of a given line or product type become outmoded and old. But then the used market still prefers the latest version because it's assumed to be "the best." It had the latest revisions, right? And the last models remain the newest. I haven't checked lately, but for a long time you had to pay more for a Leica IIIg because it was the last Leica screwmount camera.

But c'mon, it's a screwmount camera. They're all ancient now. The IIIg was discontinued the year John F. Kennedy was elected President. Does it really matter if something is 60 years old vs., say, 68 years old? But "latest-is-best" seems to survive in peoples' minds even as time goes on.

Still, of all these little weirdnesses, and others like 'em, "expensive-because-it-was-cheap" seems the strangest.

So when you encounter something in the used market that seems to be popular and selling for high prices, don't just assume that it has to be good because the price is high and/or it's in demand. You also need to do enough due diligence to figure out why the price is high and why it's in demand. It might be for some reason other than what you assume.

Mike

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Featured Comments from:

hugh crawford: "OK here is an example.

"In 1955, '56, and '57, Porsche decided that they needed to sell a low-end car. Cheap paint, no side windows, no carpets, cheap seats, a joke of a roof that was a collection of sticks and a tent to go over it, optional hubcaps, even a cardboard interior I think. They called it the Speedster. They also sold a Coupe with lux everything. Fancy adjustable seats made of leather stuffed with horsehair, wool carpet, glass windows, chrome bumpers and hubcaps. Every attempt to make it look expensive and a list of options that goes on and on.

"Here is a comparison of the prices when new and what they sell for now. Note that the Coupe is listed with no options which is sort of a joke because I have never ever seen one with no options, and the Speedster was not offered with any options.

1957 Porsche Speedster
Original MSRP $3,215
Low Retail $179,600
Average Retail $255,000
High Retail $439,800

1957 Porsche Coupe
Original MSRP $3,665
Low Retail $58,500
Average Retail $95,600
High Retail $151,200

"As you can see the cheap one was the one to buy. Even today collectors are wary of no-sunroof 911's from the '60s and '70s because they are worth enough more that people have the sunroof welded shut when they restore them.

"P.S. I often am astonished at the Pentax K1000 selling at higher prices than the much much nicer K2."

Crabby Umbo: "I'm with Hugh! As a Pentax 'fan,' I'm amazed how a camera as rough and clunky as the K1000 costs more than the more refined KM and K2. Sure, I get that it was the camera of choice for people in college learning photography, but that means there are zillions of them out there! I have a few, but I got them cheap/free. I've always maintained that if you had a SP500 (which I see all the time on eBay for 50 bucks in mint shape) or other Spotmatic, you pick up a K1000 and say: 'what happened?' I.e., the Spotty's being butter smooth and the K1000 being loud and clunky. The 'now cheaper' KM has a shutter closer to the old Spotmatics, hence much smoother, it seems. Go figure...."

Robert B: "Anecdotal saying about the Phaeton here in Germany was that it was constructed around a perfect air-conditioning system because one of the owners of VW, Ferdinand Piëch, late offspring of the famous Porsche family, was extremely shy of cold air drafting over his bald head. Seemed to be a bad selling story for a Veblen good. But I know some professional drivers who loved that car especially for long distance rides, not least because of its comfortable, electrically driven massage seats...."

hugh crawford: "More about that VW Phaeton.

"Ferdinand Piëch was chairman of the executive board of Volkswagen Group in 1993–2002. He was also the grandson of Ferdinand Porsche. And before he was kicked out of Porsche by his cousin (you could write a book. Several have already been written), designed the 917 among other things.

"He wanted to build a really nice car that was better than Bentley, which VW owned. The Phaeton is basically a Bentley Flying Spur, built on the same production line, with a nicer interior. The air conditioning vents disappear behind the wood in the VW when not in use. Not particularly utilitarian, but it shows how determined they were to make the interior not look like a pinball machine.

[Comparison of Bentley Flying Spur and VW Phaeton]

"Mr. Piëch generally got what he wanted. He had 12 children including two with his cousin's ex-wife, which gave him more shares in Porsche than the cousin that kicked him out. Then he married the nanny.

["The Porsche Story: A Fierce Family Feud" from Der Spiegel]

"He was also responsible for the Bugatti Veyron. But the Phaeton was the real poke in the eye to the rest of the automobile world. Because it was a VW, not a Bentley, Lamborghini, Audi, or Bugatti.

"I met him once. Scary guy."