Thanks to all who responded about the intricacies and strategies of moving gear onward from my ownership to someplace else.

 

While it's always fun to move stuff around when you get right down to it what you are looking at is just another work process. Pulling stuff out of inventory, assessing the value, keeping paperwork for tax purposes and then some standing around while others apply their idea of value to the same equipment. If one doesn't really need the cash there's no smart reason for a quick explosion of action. 

I made one stupid mistake last night. I was thinking of selling off some MFT gear but I picked up the Panasonic G9 and the 25mm Summilux to go out for an evening walk. It seemed like no matter what I pointed the camera at the images on the screen were great. And I realized that I had finally gotten the black and white settings on the camera just right (for my taste). Had I just closed my eyes for a moment and picked a different camera for the evening...

While, on paper, there are so many reasons to think that the smaller formats don't hold a candle to the larger formats some emotion intrudes when you use them that lets you know that the overall difference between most formats is small enough to ignore. Especially when it turns out that they are so much fun to use. At least I was able to get rid of a bunch of lights and modifiers today. It's a start.

Panasonic G9 + 25mm Summilux

ISO 3200

Handheld through a window.

Remember when a good light lasted forever? Welcome the age of ever improving LED lights and their rapid obsolescence.

 When I learned photography we all used the same "kind" of light. It was electronic flash. While some were better constructed than others or had features such as faster light burst (shorter overall duration) most of them worked in pretty much the same way, and outputted very similar light. There were differences in studio electronic flash equipment which mostly centered around the way different makers handled excess UV output which could cause some color issues. But once we hit the early 1990's UV coated flash tubes became the rule rather than the exception and a good worker could expect pretty much the same results (in terms of color accuracy) from a wide range of products. The nice thing about consistency across product lines was that there was no logical impetus to rush out and buy a new generation of lights every few years. If the lights did what you needed (mostly giving you the right power and recycle times) you would not see qualitative differences between this year's model and the lights you bought 10 or 20 years ago. You could mix and match with abandon. A change to a new system didn't demand a new working methodology, instead it usually just required changing speed rings for mounting modifiers.

The progression of LED lights has been a bit different. Well, a lot different. 

The first useable (for photography and video) LED lights were panels that didn't have very high output and had some glaring deficiencies in their color output spectrum. Early LED fixtures were designed around the only cost effective LED light units then available which were the small, 1/8th inch diameter "bulbs." In order to get enough power out for a workable lighting fixture the manufacturers had to group hundreds or thousands of the small bulbs together onto panels. The panels were big, heavy and, even with over 1,000 bulbs on them, not really bright enough for a lot of different applications. 

Since the panels were big you couldn't practically use them in soft boxes or mount umbrellas on them so modifying the light coming from them required photographers to adapter lighting methods cinematographers have used since the dawn of movie time. They had big diffusion panels set up in front of the LED light fixtures, and each panel had to have its own light stand and attachment gear. It wasn't until LEDs built around Chips on a Board (COB) were made in a form that was similar to a flash monolight that photographers could directly mount umbrellas and soft boxes on them.

But the big issue, and the thing that fueled a legitimate upgrade enthusiasm is that every few years the actual spectral accuracy of LEDs improved, and continues to improve. Those improvements have a direct impact on the quality of the lights we use to make photographs. And with each generation it became possible to make the LED lights more powerful.

People in general are very sensitive to color accuracy in portraits and this is a field where the improvements in parameters like red response and overall color balance had the most effect.

While CRI is a kludgy measure of non-continuous light color accuracy it is a measurement standard we've had in place for a long time and it's a good, blunt tool for discriminating between generations of fixtures. 

My first LED panels had a CRI rating of 83. They needed to be filtered, and the resulting files needed to be worked over in post processing. They were deficient in the areas that most affected portraiture so, as  you can imagine, each improvement in those measurements has led me, like Pavlov's dog, to trade up to the newest tech. 

Three or so years ago Aputure put out a product line called, "LightStorm." I bought their big panels as their rated CRI was around 93 and the upgrade over my previous lights was pretty amazing. Portraits were easier to finish out and the new fixtures were a much easier match when mixing in daylight. I liked them enough to also buy the half height models, the LS-1/2. Since all of these lights were panel designs I still had to pack twice the number of stands as there were lights in order to use modifiers with everything. But the color issues were mostly resolved. 

Recently Aputure, Godox and a number of higher end makers have turned their attention to making more accurate COB style LED fixtures. These have small (think 1.5 by 1.5 inch) output devices which makes them as convenient as traditional flash monolights to use. Most have a Bowen's mount which means you can mount an endless inventory of soft boxes, octa-boxes and similar modifiers at will. Most have fan cooling to ensure reliability when using on-light modifiers. And the newest versions are now rated with CRIs that are very, very close to daylight. Almost all boast CRI's above 95. The lights do well with other, more stringent light measurement standards as well. 

So, unlike flash gear, upgrading isn't just a result of boredom or the desire to have a different internal triggering system; when doing most upgrades from older LED products you'll likely see big improvements in overall color accuracy and overall spectral balance. 

The best lights currently on the market are also remarkably consistent in the magenta/green output which means they are easier to mix and match across brands. 

My Aputure LightStorm LED lights are exiting the studio today. They've been replaced by a small flock of Godox LED lights, all of which are the non-panel variety. They are the contemporary, continuous light version of the standard monolight configuration flash photography uses. I can use them on locations without having to bring extra frames and light stands for modifiers. They are sturdy and easier to pack. 

The models I've purchased all have the power supply parts internal to the light fixture so I don't have extra control boxes or power converters hanging off stands. I have fewer cables of which to keep track. It's a net improvement in logistics but the big payoff is: higher CRI and TCLI ratings for more accurate color. 

Four light units are leaving today. They've been good, reliable fixtures. I hope they go to a good home. 

It's more interesting to consider upgrading for rational reasons rather than having to justify intangibles. It makes for a more emotionally comfortable transition. Better color is generally always a better choice. 

Back in the days of electronic flash the only compelling reason to upgrade, after a certain technical quality level was reached by strobes, was to make your location package smaller and lighter or, conversely, to make your studio light more powerful in order to better handle the combination of slow films and large format cameras. The old ways; f64 @ ISO 64 and be there. It's totally different now. 

We are almost totally LED here. We have some vestigial flash gear but nothing like we used to keep on hand. That's nice. No more waking up in a strange hotel in the middle of the night anxiously wondering if you had packed the sync cords. Or extra batteries for radio triggers....

A couple more colorful images from yesterday. And a question for my readers.

Sometimes it seems like everything is happening on 2nd Street. 

As part of my current mania for downsizing I am thinking of selling off all but my essential cameras and lenses. These would include a fairly large collection of Panasonic mFT cameras and lenses, the erstwhile but eccentric Sigma fp and its seemingly endless supply of accessories, several full frame lenses and many more lights. I could trade all these things in at Precision Camera but they don't buy gear they accept it for trade. And, as I've said, I'm trying to get rid of stuff, not just rearrange the deck chairs. 

Without judging my acquisitions and disposals could you let me know in the comments the ways you have found best to get sell off gear you are done with? Do you list it on some site like FredMiranda.com? Do you move it through KEH.com? Are you brave enough to try Craig's List? Do you have a secret formula for doing transactions on Ebay? Do you package items together (ex: A GH5 + a PanaLeica 12-60mm)? 

Do you sell each item separately? How do you vet buyers? 

Has anyone ever had any luck at selling lights online?

I'm not anxious to act but I'd like to go totally out of character and actually research this instead of just jumping out of the plane first and checking to see if I have a parachute on after the fact....

Thanks in advance. 

 

Walking over the bridge at night. Standing in a chilly breeze waiting for the LED lights to change colors.

There is a charming aspect to having more free time. When you are out walking with a camera and you see something that exists in changing light you feel as though you have a license to linger, to watch the evolution of what might be an interesting or fun image. You stand in the perfect spot and wait for the magic to unfold. For someone who spent years tightly scheduled having the opportunity to be in one spot, to breathe and to soak up the feeling of the place is a gift.

I've walked over this particular bridge a lot. Whoever designed it knew what they were doing when it came to making something that has its own particular visual quality. During the daylight hours the large spans on either side of the road arch up like butterfly wings. After the sun sets a series of lights project upwards and change color gradually; going from cool blue to warm red over the course of a minute or so. 

During that minutes the colored lights also bathe the structure in yellows, greens, magentas and purples.

Whenever I walk over the bridge when the lights are lit I am transfixed not only by the way my camera renders the differences between sky and span but also by the changes over time. The colors blend into each other slowly and steadily. 

Last night I was back out walking with a different camera. I brought along the Lumix S1R and set it to shoot Jpegs. My original intention was to see how well that camera does black and white. I had it set to a tweaked profile I've been experimenting with in L. Monochrome. But everywhere I looked I saw color yesterday. From the first hints of sunset to the last brush of blue color long after the sun had disappeared. When life gives you color it's perhaps wise to change your course and find a profile that accommodates those little visual gifts the universe seems to hand out; mostly unexpectedly.

I'm still breaking in the 65mm f2.0 Sigma lens. I like it very much. It's sharp but not clinically so. It's color rich but well behaved. It's definitely one to keep. 

 

Trying different stuff. Just experimenting for the fun of it. A feeling of freedom.

This is not a "gallery." These are not meant to be "portfolio pieces." You are not encouraged to be impressed or wowed or motivated to express a "like." These are casual experiments I made yesterday evening because I wanted to see what would happen when I used a certain camera and lens in a certain way. The results tell me things about a process that I knew intellectually but wanted to see for myself. 

I've been experimenting with photographic techniques for 35 years but it was almost always in order to be better prepared for an upcoming commercial job. A client might ask for images that can only be made by using a flash in a soft box against a big, bright sun. I could know the steps that I was supposed to take, from research and reading, to get the image we might have all had in mind but more often than not I'd be uncomfortable until I was able to go out before the day of the shoot and try the actual set-up myself. I wanted to see where the process could break down or become difficult and have enough time elapsing between the test and the shoot to make adjustments. To lock down the process. To make my mistakes in private instead of in front of a client. 

I've never been asked to shoot buildings and street scenes at night. But I've been photographing some late evening and twilight cityscapes recently and wondered how things would look after the last of the sunlight was gone and most of the scenes were lit with the street lights and building lights of downtown. I also wondered how a camera like the Sigma fp would handle these kinds of situations. 

I left the house around 5:15 pm and went to the river that runs through town. I hiked over the bridge and into a very familiar downtown carrying, for the first time on a fun walk, a small tripod and my camera with a relatively new lens on it. The tripod was a featherlight Benro carbon fiber model (TSL08C) which comes with a small bullhead on it. When I say it's "featherlight" I'm not using hyperbole; it weighs in at less than the camera and lens. The trade-off is that the tripod only extends to about my upper chest level.

I walked around with my Sigma fp + Lumix 20mm-60mm lens on top of the tripod and stopped to make photos of stuff just to see how it would look with 2 or 8 or 12 second exposures. I also wanted to see how well the "fill light" control, offered on the camera, actually worked. I wanted to know which color balance was best to match what my eyes see in the canyon of buildings after the sun goes away.

I shot a hundred or so images. Some were abject failures and I can now say that I have a better understanding of the extreme dynamic range between black shadows and a spotlit door. I can also see how important it is to do this work on a tripod. Most of you know these things. Or at least you have read "how to" do them. I read the same stuff. But actually working in the dark and trying to find settings by touch and trying to lock focus on a shadowy building exterior with no convenient edges was a part of the process I often overlooked or discounted in my reading. Having to to it in real life was a quick bit of education. 

Seeing the final images was a lesson in instant humility. I had to come to grips with the fact that I am not a practiced urban landscape photographer. I am not an experienced low light photographer; at least not on this level. But the real satori I had is that after the excitement of darkness and solitude in the streets wears off I had the realization that stuff doesn't get more interesting just because the light goes away. 

In the future I'll try to make better choices of subject matter before I repeat the exercise. I need to find willing human subjects with which to add a spark of life to the images. Better still if the humans have something interesting to do while we photograph. 

One thing about doing these experiments in the winter... I have an hour or two of low-to-no light before I have to be home to join the family for dinner. It's fun to play in the free time. It's interesting to see where an image or a technique breaks down in a given lighting situation. So much depends on light.

Again with the mirrors? Come on...

 

The "Widow's Cart."

I heard an expression last week that I'd never heard before. My salesperson at Precision Camera was chatting with me about the differences in the way people buy photo gear; especially cameras and lenses. I'm so self-focused when it comes to buying stuff I never thought there was much of a difference between camera buyers. I presumed that we all worked the same way; we saw a new shiny object, decided it was "better" than the one currently in our hands and immediately traded in the old one, along with some cash, for the new one. Done. Case closed.

When I decide to move on to a new camera system I look at the system I already own and try to figure out its approximate trade-in value. I text the trade-in manager at the camera store and send him a list. He usually sends me an estimate for the value of the used stuff. I bring it all in, he checks to make sure it's in the condition we described, and that it works, and then issues a credit which I use as partial payment for the new system. Easy as pie. No chance of being totally screwed by some nefarious person on Ebay. Even less chance of being ripped off by a stranger responding to an ad on a forum. It's a clean, straightforward transaction that can happen in the space of minutes. 

I walk out of the store with my new, shiny camera system and the store gets near mint gear to sell in their used equipment department from a trusted "vendor." We've been doing the business this way since the beginning of time. Well, at least since the opening of the store many years ago. I know I'm leaving money on the table with each transaction but I also know that I don't have a retail mindset and would hate having to deal online with strangers, and then have to pack and box up items and send them all over the place. My biggest fear (beyond never being paid) would be to have the gear be damaged in transit and arrive to the seller in a state of non-functionality and then having to deal with returns, refunds and hard feelings; usually in both directions. 

So, when my salesperson talked about how sad it was to see, almost weekly, the "Widow's Carts" I had to ask him to explain. 

Well, apparently there are some folks in the Photography trades or the Hobby that just can't, or won't, let go of gear once they've bought it. Could be a collection of half-functioning film cameras from the 70s,80, and 90s or a melange of budget priced digital cameras from the last few decades. There might be boxes and boxes of lenses that were made for cameras with obscure mounts, as well as lenses that were once really good but which have been stored in hot attics, unprotected from humidity, and now covered with haze. Camera bodies that work only at certain shutter speeds. Cameras that must have batteries long since outlawed by the EU and the EPA. Tripods on which only two legs are functional. And filters. Pounds and pounds of filters. So many filters.

Flashes that only work with an old variant of long since discontinued Minolta cameras. Light stands that were too small and rickety to begin with that have only become worse and worse. And then, enough camera bags and cases to roof a house with. Along with the "prehistoric" gear is a smattering of modern gear, like recent Canons and Nikons or Sonys. And, in every collection of anyone past, say 60, is at least one ancient and unusable Leica, or Leica-variant, screw mount camera along with one or two battered and milky-glassed lenses. 

Like plaque on teeth, all this stuff builds up in the closets of the photo-faithful until one day the owner of the far flung and mostly random collection....expires. 

Likely, the surviving spouse (statistically, in most cases, a wife) has been told countless times by the now gone partner how wonderful and valuable (to him) each piece of gear is and, after a time of grief and then a longer time of sorting and inventorying, she is ready to divest her inheritance of a giant collection of photographic "mixed grill." The spouse remembers a camera store that her loved one frequented and brings the whole trove down to them hoping they'll figure out the value of the gear and cherish it as much as her spouse once did. 

And so, my store clerk explained to me, they walk through the store with the gear piled high on a cart, provided by the used department of the store, to meet with the "expert" who must value the gear, decide what can even be resold, and then deal with the expectations of the still grieving spouse (or designated family member). It's a tough time for the trade-in clerk as he'll usually have to inform the spouse that such and such gear is broken and can't be traded in, or it is of such low value that they can't accept it. They'll gently steer the person to Goodwill Industries with the suggestion that most of it be donated. The let down is palpable. 

I've witnessed some version of this chain of evens over the years when I played the part (convincingly) of the innocent bystander who dropped by to shop for a new fill in the blank or something else. I've seen the fitted leather cases, seen them opened to reveal an ancient Hasselblad and battered lenses. Parts covered with the mildew of neglect. Shutters frozen. Lenses iced over with fungus. And it's rarely a pretty sight. 

Over the years, at least since the end of the film age, I've wanted to clear out old gear when I bring in new gear. With the exception of an old Nikon F or a Leica M3 there is nothing in the studio, camera-wise, that's over three years old. All my stuff right now are current models. Current product. No Sears slide projectors. No Walmart film scanners. Just current cameras. 

I would hate to think of Belinda encumbered by the detritus of a photographic addiction. We've spoken about this. We've agreed that the week after I drop over dead she'll have that stuff off to the tender mercies of which ever close photographic friend has outlived me and task him or her with the disposal of the gear. 

Her practiced mantra to the person tasked: Keep whatever you want and get rid of the rest. 

The sad truth is that the older the gear (unless, of course, you've been buying rare editions of Leica M film cameras in lizard skin and platinum) the less value it has. To just about anyone. 

There is a certain emotional logic in my approach to gear acquisition and disposal. I get to play with the latest, most fun stuff while minimizing the emotional impact its disposition will cause, after I'm gone.

I guess there is a current of emotion among some photographers that their sons or daughters might cherish having one of their parent's favorite cameras and lenses. Some families are like that. In my own family my older brother is always nostalgic and prone to sentiment when it comes to the physical artifacts of my parent's lives. He'll hold onto old letters, battered books, unused ash trays and refrigerator magnets. Clearing out my parent's last large and rambling house in concert will my brother was painful. The quote I remember best from him was: "You just have a different sense of urgency than I do..." We were working to clear out the house pursuant to putting it on the market = that was my task. He was likely to stop, grab a convenient chair and spend a few hours reading through an old magazine he'd found, or a letter from someone to one of my parents.

My little nuclear family is different. We have little attachment to objects and memorabilia. I am married to one of the most Zen-like people I can imagine. She hoards nothing, collects very little and can fit her memorabilia into a small shoebox. I have a son who, as long as he's been alive, has never wanted to buy or own anything more than a small assortment of clothes and shoes and his laptop. I offered to buy him a car once and he told me cars were a waste of money and that I should not buy him a new car because he would just sell it and invest the proceeds into an index fund. That's the mindset. 

To burden them with the disposal of an accrued lifetime of battered photographic gear seems like punishment for undone crimes. My method at least spares them the pain of trying to decide what to dispose of and what to keep. Even today's collection of gear represents very small monetary value, when taken in context. It wouldn't make a difference in the lives of my loved ones. Not in the least. 

Better for me to use stuff and move on than to become a museum curator to the bad purchasing decisions I've made in my hobby and career. 

Staying true to my message I better figure out what to do (now!) with those two Leica slide projectors I have in the closet. It's been 22 year since I projected any slides. Don't want to think about those stacked on the "Widow's Cart" rolling through Precision Camera along with my old filters...

 

Photographing a glorious afternoon and early evening. Eighty degrees and beautiful yesterday. If you weren't outside....

I walked on Friday with a friend but I went right back on Saturday afternoon to take another look. It really is different when you go out by yourself. Yesterday was gorgeous. The temperature got all the way up to 80° which meant everyone was in shorts and t-shirts and just enjoying the heck out of the day.

I grabbed the little Fuji X100V and got to photographing. The images below are in reverse order, chronologically. Don't know why but that's how Blogger presented them to me. So we start at the end of the day and work our way back.

Under the Lamar Blvd. Bridge on Lady Bird Lake.

Wringing everything I can out of the camera's sensor.

ISO 6400. Handheld. Dark enough that I couldn't read 

the top dials of the camera.

Waiting for Godot?

The Pfluger Pedestrian Bridge was packed with people.

Some came to sit quietly and watch the purple sunset 

take over the day. Some were just passing through.

A photographer waiting for the light to get just right.

Ah. Barefooted.

Two Friends Talking on the Phone. One Trying to Rationalize a New Camera and the Other Trying to Talk Him Out of Buying it.

 

Long time readers of my blog can be forgiven for thinking I buy every camera I see or hold. I have been through an enormous number of cameras over the years and at times the ones I buy seem like irrational choices. I entertain the conceit that I'll figure out how to use them in my work as a professional photographer and will find a way to make each of them return more money into the coffers than the sum I yank out to buy them in the first place. Sometimes it actually works out that way while at other times the wheel of non-profitability just spin and spin. And my partner and my CPA just stand by shaking their heads. "Opportunity costs!" they say. 

Given this you would think I'm the last guy any of my friends would call to get a "thumbs up" or a "thumbs down" on the wisdom of purchasing a new camera. I certainly would not depend on me to be a backstop for anyone else's reckless spending; especially not in the sweet and savory world of cameras. But in spite of my flagrant disregard for logic and common sense spending I still get a call every once in a while from a friend who is trying desperately to convince himself that it's a great idea to spend a large sum on something new.

I was sitting around the office on a gloomy and cloudy day last week when my phone rang, my computer also informed me of an incoming call, and my Apple watch piled on and notified me, physically and with an annoying sound, that I was being summoned to conversation by a caller. I looked at the caller I.D. and saw that it was one of my close friends.

We spent a few minutes talking about the GameStop affair over on Wall Street and we disparaged our elected leaders again, for a spell. Then he got down to business. He was calling to get my take about the idea of buying the new Fuji GFX 100S and "three or four of their better lenses." I suspect he wanted me to join him in an optimistic assessment of the future of commercial photography by agreeing that this new purchase would be a wonderful way to greet prosperous times ahead. It might just be the camera....

I didn't agree but there's a way to approach disagreeing with a purchase decision of a good friend and it's never the right thing to do to just laugh at his idea and denounce it out of hand. You have to go through the right process. It's a version of allowing one another to "save face." 

My friend is no novice with cameras or photography. He's been working in the business as long as I have. He's owned more expensive MF systems and, in fact, just sold off a Fuji GFX 50R and a lens the week before. As I've never owned a Fuji medium format system he's got to be much more knowledgeable about the advantages and pitfalls of ownership than I am. So, no, he wasn't fishing for technical information; in a very understated way he was looking for tacit approval to pull out his favorite credit card and buy a new object, right now. 

I started out by talking through the advantages of the new system with him. The amazing resolution. The reduced price compared to the previous model. The quality of the lenses Fuji is making for the system. And the idea of making this his primary system which, without a trace of irony, he says he could live with for the next ten years. At the end of this portion of our program we were both in agreement that the camera and the system was great and it would just make perfect sense for everyone to buy one and be done with camera shopping for a while.

At this point I threw in a "But......" And we proceeded to break down all the stuff we agreed to about the system's miraculous features and benefits but looking at them from a different angle. We started with resolution. 

It's my belief that soon 90% of all our assignments will be to make photographs that are destined to be viewed and shown on monitors, TVs, and computer screens of all sizes. If we take that as a given then the two camera systems he currently owns, based around a Nikon Z7 and a Panasonic S1R, are certainly more than capable of far exceeding the potential of current media. Even if a client did want to use a photograph across a magazine spread in one of the most luxuriously printed magazines in the world either of his current systems would do a fine job. In a different way than my business he is lucky that most of his work is in the field of architecture. A subject that doesn't have to confront subject motion and doesn't impose the need for high ISOs with super low noise. Also, both of the systems he owns are among the top contenders for extended and useful dynamic range. 

While the new Fuji sensor might exceed the single frame dynamic range of the sensor in the S1R the ability to use the S1R's hi-res, multi-shot feature is certainly an effective equalizer. Remember, he's photographing static buildings and interiors. Not moving models and never sports or outdoor adventure.

I reminded him that his desktop computer is nearing retirement age and, coupled with the slower hard drives he's been running for years, if he wants to take full advantage of the Fuji's full, raw 100 megapixel files he'll be spending a lot of time making coffee and playing Mind Craft as he waits for files to import and process. 

This, of course, led us temporarily down the pathway of computer replacement as an alternate option. But he valiantly fought his way back to the original subject, tabling the computer upgrade as being something "uninteresting" to him. 

We moved on to lenses and I asked him which lenses really stuck out to him. Which ones did he have targeted to buy with the GFX100S. He hemmed and hawed on this one for a bit since he works primarily (almost exclusively) as an architectural photographer and has spent years amassing arcane, wonderful and frightfully expensive tilt/shift and perspective control lenses for previous medium format systems (Leica and Hasselblad). In fact, he was already, at this early point in the Fuji GFX100S launch, investigating which adapters he could source to cobble his existing lenses onto the new system.

This led to a discussion of how he is working on stuff right now. Which lenses? What format? He admitted that he was working happily, and with a huge selection of lenses, in the 35mm digital camera ecosystem and had previously abandoned larger formats because of how kludgy they were to work with and how much cost and effort it was to marry the right lenses to the right cameras. The current Nikon and Panasonic cameras offered rich pools of lenses, adapted and otherwise, that worked well for him. 

Next up we discussed how many of his clients were disappointed with his current format. How many were clamoring for more resolution, bigger files and higher fees? He admitted that his clients were already groaning under the sheer bulk of the finished Tiff and .PSD files he was already delivering. None had even hinted at any need for technical improvements. If anything they were begging for more manageable file sizes.

At this point I thought I had _________ on the ropes. I thought, for his own financial good, I'd shut down this discussion with the old "one-two" punch. I asked him why, after skating through at least as many cameras and systems as I have in the last 20 years he had any conviction that he'd settle in on this particular system to spend the next ten years with. And I followed up with, "I don't know about you but my business is way, way down and looking ahead for the rest of the year I really don't see it getting much better. How about you?" 

He admitted that, like me, he'd just done a handful of smaller projects over the last several quarters and the work calendar for 2021 was currently sparsely populated. We commiserated about the lack of work for a bit (a common topic for most photographer I meet with these days) and I thought we'd pretty much worked through the reason why I would "keep my powder dry." I also asked, "What if you buy the system now and don't have much opportunity to work with it for 2021 and then, just as work picks up Phase One drops the price of their 100 MP sensor camera, which has a much, much bigger (dimensions) sensor, and you have to scramble to sell the Fuji (at a loss) to grab onto the Phase One?" Could that be a thing?

Like a self-help life coach I tossed in one more thing. "If you have a spare $12,000 hanging around burning a hole in your pocket why not wait till the stock market drops 10% and stick that cash into an index fund? The way the market has grown in the last six years you might find that instead of losing money on a depreciating camera you end up with enough new, free money to pull enough out of your investment to pay for a newer, better camera." 

He thought that sounded pretty good. We wished each other's families well and then ended the call. As I walked into my house I thought, "Wow. That sounded pretty good. Maybe _______ will take my advice and save some more cash. Then I patted myself on the back and told myself that I sounded so wise. I might even want to start taking my own advice!

But by the time I got back to the office and checked my phone I had already gotten a text. It read: "I always enjoy our chats. Thanks for your point of view. I pre-ordered the camera and just a couple lenses from XXXXXXX. Who are you going to order yours from?"

the heart want what the heart wants.

City portrait in black and white. Amazing little camera, that Fuji X100V. (From a walk today with a close friend).

Unicorn on Sixth Street.

I wish, just for me, that camera reviewers would spend a lot less time trying to write and a lot more time shooting the cameras they profess to be reviewing and then posting the results on their sites. You know, in the way that most people would want to use those cameras. Not on flat test charts. More likely on real life.