Over on my other blog, I’ve been writing about The Amateurs [aka The Moguls]. The film stars Jeff Bridges. He has an excellent personal Website. Bridges is a keen photographer himself and you can see some shots of rehearsals for that film taken by him with an ultra-wide-angle camera.

You can see more lovely examples of the effects possible with this hardware at the sadly defunct Widelux Blog.

Wayne Mackeson takes lovely black-and-white portraits. I could blog so many of his images, but have chosen to embed just this one—”Tío Carli and his Mother”—not because it’s his best, but because it’s both naturally warm and neatly composed.

Tío Carli and his Mother

Originally uploaded by Mackeson ap Meugan

Back in September, Panasonic invited me to an event at the Tower of London where they presented their new digital SLR camera to photographers, enthusiasts, and the media. Full disclosure:

1. in return for my attendance they gave me a free point-and-shoot digital and
2. I’m not a digital camera expert.

Perhaps Panasonic hoped to convert me from film.

Whatever their reasons, I think Panasonic are doing the Right Thing. I have seriously thought about buying one of their digital point-and-shoots with anti-shake, but theirs is not a big name with the professional photographers, despite the carefully cultivated connection with Leica. (The question of whether or not most professional photographers consider Leicas serious working tools is one I’m not going to get into here.) Getting a bunch of smudgers together in a room and giving them the chance to try out new toys and get over their (possibly macho) suspicions of a company with a reputation for producing nice consumer hardware is smart.

Panasonic’s online outreach extends much further than just inviting bloggers to munch canapés and hear their spiel. They have started a free (and non-proprietary) UK landscape photography Website with competitions and rating systems and other interactive shininess. This is, in turn, part of their wider support for the Our Place UNESCO World Heritage site project. Images from this latter project were shown during one of the talks to demonstrate the landscape capabilities of Panasonic cameras, but something seemed to have gone wrong somewhere between exposure and display because, although they had clearly been taken by skilled pros, they weren’t reproduced too well. (The irony of this will be clear when I review the FX-33 below.)

Panasonic had invited a range of enthusiasts to fill the the audience too. It was interesting that one of the dedicated tech writers (possibly the guy from CNET) left long before the end, even though the event was well organized and informative, and the picturesque setting, the Tower of London, was well chosen for photography. We were introduced to personnel from Panasonic, including personnel from HQ in Japan. And the presentations took place in front of a gloriously bright and clear Pansonic TV. In this respect Panasonic’s range of consumer hardware turned out to be a strength. You can take a memory card from any current Panasonic camera and plug it into a current Panasonic TV and watch your own photos. They were, of course, keen to point out that they have been making camera hardware for years. One surprising statistic they offered is that Panasonic make more camera flashguns than any of their competitors.

Unfortunately, when we released into the natural sunshine later, armed with actual L10s, we weren’t able to fully explore the potential of their new digital SLR or publish the results freely without qualification. This was understandable, given that the model was still undergoing revision and we probably didn’t have enough time to get to know it well enough to get the best out of it, but it makes writing this post hard. Over at Photography Blog they’ve been naughty and published some pre-production shots from the same event.

All I can say is that the L10 felt reasonably well built—perhaps sturdier than a Sony Alpha-100, but nothing like as substantial as an old film Minolta Dynax 7 or Dynax 9—that it was nicely and sensibly laid out, that I almost came to appreciate the live preview and fold-out screen (but of course found myself using the viewfinder because that’s natural for me), and that it was loaded with lots of features, many of which I could see myself using. I was particularly amused to note that the L10 has a “film” button which could be engaged to produce effects at the time of exposure (rather than later with Photoshop), including black-and-white, colour saturated, and retro looks.

My main disappointment was that the sensor is not a full-frame, so wouldn’t offer me the same lens and aperture physics that I rely on to get the effects I want with film SLRs. I do my job before I press the shutter, not later, opening Photoshop. The L10 does, however, conform to the four-thirds standard which I guess makes it compatible with lenses from other manufacturers in this consortium. The big boys at Digital Photography Review have a fuller preview of the L10.

Although I haven’t used it much, preferring a cheap film SLR of course, I have to say that the FX-33 is a marvellous gadget. Features like its face detection, that identifies and focuses on people in a scene, and Intelligent Auto, that decides which of the camera’s many modes to apply in a given situation make getting consistently good results easy. To my amazement, it plugged into one of my Linux (Ubuntu) PCs to transfer images via USB cable without a hitch. ePHOTOzine has more details. One of the most impressive demonstrations of the Lumix point-and-shoot range I saw was when one of the speakers, not himself a photographer, connected a similar camera to that TV monitor I referred to earlier and showed us a bright, punchy shot of the Tower grounds that, back in the 70s, would have made a sell-able tourist postcard. I’d recommend the FX-33 as a Christmas gift to anyone looking for an elegant camera for a non-photographer, even at its full retail price

UPDATE: The L10 is Editor’s Choice at Popular Photography.

One of this week’s featured articles on Wikipedia featured the smallest functioning 35mm camera, the Rollei 35. In celebration I took a dip in Flickr’s pool of images taken with a Rollei 35.

Untitled
Originally uploaded by jonnypawnshoppe

Slashdot links to Slate where Michael Agger reflects on the grubby history of the cameraphone. At the foot of that article is a link to picturephoning.com which I have added to the link bar.

I’m surprised I didn’t see this when it appeared at the end of last year, but The New York Times reviewed the state of the digital SLR market for laypeople just as it felt that the cameras’ prices had moved into the consumer price range and the article can still be viewed outside the newspaper’s subscription barrier.

Yes, I do often ramble on about what I believe to be the superiority of film cameras for candid portraiture, but if I were a sincere snob I’d discard my electronically enhanced SLRs for rangefinders instead and develop all my own film. This post is an excuse to revisit one of my favourite gallery sites.

The rangefinders used by the real masters of street photography, of which the most famous are those made by Leica aren’t just small and light; they’re amazingly quiet. But you really need to know your stuff to handle one of them with confidence. (There are also photographers who are skeptical about the claimed advantages of going old-time.)

The guys on this site, however, do know their stuff and do believe the hype. They make their case with some lovely galleries of magical images they capture with their anachronistic tools. This, for example, is a beauty, but some of my other favourites [note that links might be slow to respond] are here, here, here, here [Not Safe For Work], here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Whether you are using a hefty metal-bodied film SLR camera or a tiny digital point-and-shoot, you will take better photos with it if you support it properly when you open the shutter.

If the person who sold you your camera kit had you pegged for a beginner then there is a fair chance that (s)he tried to sell you some kind UV filter for your new camera’s lens. (S)he might have given you some sales guff how it will cut out haze and protect the delicate glass of your lens. Very few people get up early enough or high enough to have to deal with haze and those who do so on a regular basis are usually landscape photographers who will be far more discriminating about their choice of filters (and cameras, and lenses). As for protecting the glass of your lens: that’s what a lens cap is for.

On top of all this, high-street camera shops will usually try to sell you this kind of add-on filter at a hefty premium over the price you’d pay if you waited till you got home and bought one separately online, but since you’re already handing over several hundred pounds/dollars for your main purchase and are particularly worried about protecting that investment they reckon (often correctly) that you will be less likely to notice or care about the extra expense.

Yes, it should remove certain unwanted wavelengths of light, but any filter attached to your camera lens will inevitably cut down the total amount of light that gets in. This means longer exposures and a greater chance of motion blur. When you first buy a camera a far better way of spending a similar amount of money and achieving the opposite effect—that is, being able to get away with shorter exposures—is to buy some kind of physical support instead. (Here I’m just talking about portable supports as an alternative to hand-holding for everyday photography. I’ll talk about full-size tripods for things like formal group shots some other time.)

Almost all modern camera bodies have a screw hole in the base. Using this you can attach your camera either to a tripod itself or to a base plate that slots into some kind of holder. The screw hole is almost always of the 1/4-20 (1/4″ diameter, 20 threads per inch) standard. Even my Webcam uses the same fitting.

I used to buy dirt-cheap mini tripods or even get them free with multipacks of Kodak film, but I’ve begun to use them more heavily than they are built for so I keep breaking them. Unlike lens filters, when it comes to buying camera supports you have to be prepared to pay extra to get a reliable one. I’m not really a fan of throwaway bendy wirepods any more, but, if you’re a casual snapper you might be able to get away with picking up a couple. They are at least easy to carry and discreet in use.

Another inexpensive choice is a small bean bag. You don’t even have to screw your camera into this; you just sink its body into the material and balance the beanbag on an available surface. You can even buy “pro” bean bags, like The Pod which comes with a lens holder.

There are tens, perhaps hundreds, of different conventional small monopods and tripods you can buy and I couldn’t possibly test or review them all. I have had good experiences with both camera branded (e.g. Hama) and shop branded (e.g. Jessops) ones. If you already have a large tripod by a “name” manufacturer and you want to be able to swap your camera between that and a smaller equivalent then buy your mini tripod from the same company you bought your maxi from. The plate that screws on to your camera base should be compatible with both sizes so it’s just a question of slotting the camera in and out of the respective holders. Do check this first of course!

Monopods are underrated by the way. They’re easy to carry; they’ve no moving parts to go wrong; and they provide a large fraction of the extra stability that other supports do. But the biggest practical advantage of tripods over monopods and beanbags is that you can walk away from them. So, for example, you can set up your camera on some nearby surface, start the timer, and shoot yourself and your friends at more than arm’s length.

Perfect for this kind of thing is the gadget I am currently playing with: the (SLR version of the) Gorillapod by Joby. So far I am pleased with it. Its flexibility comes at the price of the rigidity of a conventional tripod—and it doesn’t come at a small price in cash either—but it’s more than just a neat toy or talking point; it’s a handy tool, and the sort that inspires an unhealthy affection amongst some of its users.

[Perhaps after they noticed the incoming link and read this Joby will give me my next one for free...]

Many short lenses (by which I mean lenses labelled 50mm or less attached to a film camera) have built-in lens hoods, plastic cowls that shield the entrance to the glass from stray light. Sometimes these can be retracted into the body of the lens when they are not in use. Most longer lenses come with detachable hoods.

Originally, I thought this lovely photograph had been marred by dirt somewhere between the outside world and the film, but the real cause of the bright band across the centre of the image was strong sunlight shining down over the church behind the two women in the image.

Although I took care to stand in shade, the lens of the camera was high enough off the ground for beams of sunlight to fall steeply into its opening. Unfortunately I had removed the lens hood when shooting inside the church and not replaced it before taking this photo. It is probably less important to retract or remove the hood when it is not needed than it is to extend or attach it when it is needed, but you should still try to avoid leaving it exposed to knocks or allow it to make you look like a paparazzo/a when your aim is to blend into the background.

Remember:

• Always use a hood to protect the entrance to your lens from stray bright light: sunshine, stage lights, and/or floodlights.
• Always use the hood that came with your lens—the wrong hood might not fit exactly and might cause the light you really want to collect to fall off damagingly.
• Always take advantage of hoods that can be attached both ways round—these can be stored discreetly on the lens itself by screwing them onto the lens back-to-front when you aren’t using them.

Although obviously posed, this photograph is a delightful combination of beautiful subjects with contrasting but correctly exposed flesh and hair tones and nice highlights. I chose the aperture well to lift them out of their surroundings, but keep both faces acceptably in focus. (Their features aren’t as punchy and defined as they would be in direct light, so the image is more flattering than forensic.) Sadly, even Photoshop couldn’t fix the flare that smiles across the middle of the negative.