""Attention
Jeff, the Captain has turned off the "Holy crap
your busy" sign so feel free to get back to your
normal blogging schedule.""
Yes, I do have to say that I have
been inordinately busy for the past few weeks, attested
to by the pathetic amount of updates I have posted over
the past month. But things are starting to slow down
again so I should be able to slip back into my normal
pace of an update every three days or so.
--
Following is a very short clip from
an izakaya that me, my wife, and Line (a new friend
from Denmark) went to last week. Take note of the guy
wrestling himself into his sport coat in the background.
He was about as drunk as I have seen a person get yet
still remain upright. He actually fell into us as we
were paying at the register. No harm, no foul though.
Getting bumped into is a whole heck of a lot better
than getting hurled on...
Izakaya
clip 0:19, 2.6 MB
--
Fodor's recently put together a small
slideshow about Kyoto. They are setting it up to coincide
with the upcoming release of the movie "Memoirs
of a Geisha" and they have used some of my photos
in their slideshows. Check it out. In addition to some
shots that you should already be familiar with you will
also find excellent shots from other photographers.
Fodor's
- Memoirs of a Geisha
Fodor's
- Kyoto
:Let's see how much traffic this ends
up driving to Sushicam. I know they only listed my name
in the credits but if someone Googles my name they are
sure to find Sushicam.
--
I've been loving my Canon 5D.
It is by and large the best camera
(digital, medium format, or otherwise) I have ever used,
and I don't see myself upgrading when Canon eventually
comes out with a new model. 12.8 megapixels at full
frame is just fine for my purposes. With the 5D I can
make some seriously large prints, so for me the extra
pixels would just add to the amount of storage required
when shooting.
But like any SLR, it is not very discreet
when it comes to taking candid shots. The shere size
of the camera when coupled with a good (fast) lens along
with the mirror slap you get when you take a picture
ensure that all those around you are very aware of what
you are doing. This makes SLRs quite difficult to use
for street photography.
So I had recently been looking for
an alternate camera to use for taking the more candid
type of shots.
Enter
the Epson R-D1.
I remember reading about this camera
when it was first released and thinking to myself, "what
kind of an idiot would buy a camera like that?"
Well, as it turns out, I now have
the answer to that question....and idiot just like me.
Being the first ever digital rangefinder
camera, the R-D1 is definitely bleeding edge
technology. Rumor has it that Epson only produced 10,000
of them. Partly as a way to test the waters to see what
kind of a market existed for this type of camera, and
partly just to prove that it could be done and make
Leica look bad for not making their own digital rangefinder.
(A run of 10,000 is laughably small when it comes to
digital cameras)
We all know EPSON makes great printers.
They also produce the awesone P-2000
and P-4000 portable viewers/storage devices.
But up till recently the digital
cameras they produced were pretty dodgy. I've used Epson
didigtal cmaeras in the past I like to thik of them
as the "AMC Pacer" or Gremlin" of digital
cameras. Their lack of performace is only ecslipsed
by their hideous looks.
But I do have to say, after only a few hours of shooting
I know I am going to love this camera. It has the solid
feel and smooth operation of an old rangefilnder, yet
the benefit of being digital. (No film reloading after
24-36 shots, you can change the ISO on the fly, check
your histograms after you take the shot, etc...)
Truley, the best of both worlds.
I do have a couple of old 1960's and
70's film rangefinders (Olympus DC and Yashica Electro
35 CC) but I have been seriously bitten by the digital
bug and find it really hard to go back to shooting film.
And being a person that works in an environmental field,
I also like how "clean" digital shooting is
compared to traditional wet film processing. No nasty
chemicals, and no consumables. Just pop in a memory
card and a freshly recharged battery and your good to
go.
Like is said before, lately I have
been doing some research on finding a better digital
camera for candid situations. Time and time again I
kept coming back to the R-D1. But the $3,000 price tag
kept scaring me away.
Then today while I was up in Shinjuku
I wandered into a used camera shop and found a perfect
condition used R-D1 on sale for 178,000 Yen. ($1,476
at todays Yen/$ exchange rate!) Needless to say, more
than 50% off from retail was too good of a deal for
me to pass up.
To complete the package I picked up
a new Voigtlander 40mm f1.4 Noctilux that also happened
to be on sale.
The R-D1 does have a 1.53X crop factor,
so the 40mm is a little bit long (61.2mm). So my next
purchase is going to be a wider lens, most likely a
21mm or 24mm which will give me an equivelant field
of view very close to 35mm which is just about perfect
for street photography.
So expect a lot more "slice of
life" type photos here at Sushicam since I now
have a digital camera that is both small and light as
well as having great image quality.
It's also a lot less imposing to use.
When I point a big SLR at someone they can't help but
feel a litel bit intimidated, but a rangfinder is an
entirely different animal.
First of all it's small. Both the
body and lenes are incrediably compact compared to an
SLR. This allows you to be a lto less intimidating to
your subject. You look more like a person taking a snapshot
instead of a half-Canon half-Man cyborg barricaded behind
a wall of camera gear.
Second of all it is very quiet. No
annoying mirror slap. Just the muted "snick"
of the shutter being tripped.
Third of all it is manual focus. If
the light is bright enough you can just set your desire
aperture and then use zone focusing to get the shot.
(Assuming your lens is wide enough) I do the same thing
on my SLR with Zeiss glass, but rangefinders have extremely
accurate focusing. Much more precise than even the best
SLR.
Fourth of all it has a 1:1 viewfinder
which means I can keep both eyes open while shooting.
This is great for a couple of reasons: It keeps me from
getting run over by an errant taxi or rickshaw, and
it also allows me to see what is going on outside of
the fame. Sometimes allowing something extra to either
enter or exit the frame and then taking the shot can
take what would have been a mediocre photo and turn
it into something truley breathtaking.
The Epson R-D1 has just made photography
a whole lot more interesting for me....
Comment 32
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