Fuji versus Nikon. It's not a contest of performance or image quality but one of aesthetics and brand positioning.

On the one hand we have the venerable maker of traditional DSLRs in the form of Nikon. Their once rectangular and hard cornered bodies converted like the conversion of automobile designs; from the sleek lines of the 1960's to the boring and aesthetically non-starting, rounded, aerodynamic shapes of the 1980's and beyond. Think: Mid-1980's Ford Taurus.

On the other hand one of the flagship representatives (and current pop star) of the mirrorless world, the Fuji XT-2. A clear design reference to the early days of mirrored cameras, visually, but endowed with a technological change that seems to be resonating more and more with aficionados and purists in the photographic world. The XT-2 reminds me so much of the generic SLRs of the 1970's; like the Rollei SLRs and even the Konicas.

But they are apt examples of the two factions currently warring against each other for the affections and $$$ of today's camera consumers. It's an interesting point in the history of camera design and marketing.

I watched this Summer as Nikon launched one camera that none of us will buy and a few other models that many traditionalists will consider. The first camera is the D5. It does one thing well and one thing only. It focuses quickly. Not necessarily with pinpoint accuracy, out of the box, but there is a built in app that automatically calibrates Nikon lenses to enable them to achieve focus. Seems a bit sad that a multi-thousand dollar camera and multi-thousand dollar lenses from the same company are unable to focus as accurately as their own grandfather lenses from previous decades, but there you have it.

No doubt that the $6500 Nikon D5 is nicely finished and is probably built to a withstand lots of wear and tear. I am sure the shutter is tested for a high number of actuations. But in all other regards it's a body that doesn't buy you better levels of image quality than you might be able to achieve with any number of camera bodies at half, a quarter or even 20% of its selling price. Who is this camera aimed at? For all practical purposes it is aimed only at sports and action photographers. There are better sensors for the fans of ultimate image quality = even within Nikon's own line. The resolution is a bit light for studio and landscape photographers and the weight is a quick impediment to dedicated street photographers and documentarians.

The technical attribute that makes this camera a non-starter for me is it's antiquated viewing system. Yes, I am certain that its optical, pentaprism finder is unequalled in clarity and transparency. I am sure it is a joy to use to look at the world in as close a condition as our human eyes see the world. But to my mind a camera finder needs to do more. The age of optical finders is dimming and being replaced by electronic viewfinders, and we seem to have hit the tipping point in the acceptance of that realization for a large plurality of serious photographers; professionals included.

I doubt Nikon anticipates selling very many of these cameras. The Olympics are over and more normal photographic life goes on. Too heavy for anything but a work camera and too limited for the kind of work that most of us end up doing. For $6500 the most thrilling thing this camera does, in my book, is to get some 3,800 exposures per battery charge. That may become its claim to fame as it slips into the stream of history.

The Fuji XT2 is, in some ways, the antithesis of the D5. At $1,600 it's near the high end of the price range for APS-C mirrorless cameras but nearer the middle/bottom of the range if you are also considering APS-C DSLRs like the Nikon D500 or the 7Dmk2 from Canon. The XT2 is not engineered to withstand infinite abuse. The frame rates with full AF are not as fast as the big Nikon but, in fact, for the average shooter the Fuji XT-2 brings a lot more to the party.

Being a traditional DSLR camera with an optical finder the D5 will definitely take a back seat when it comes to shooting video. No zebras, no focus magnification, no EVF imaging, and no in-body image stabilization. Wanna use it for video in bright light? Get a big Loupe for the rear screen or get an external monitor. But you probably won't bother since there are much better video solutions out there offering 4K video and all the video niceties for half the price and less. Just Google the Sony A7rii or the A7sii. Or even an RX10iii....

The Fuji XT-2 is the first Fuji still camera that jumps into video feet first. It features image magnification until you start recording. While you are recording video you still have access to focus peaking. The one thing that is twingy is the idea that you must buy the battery grip in order to be able to monitor sound via headphones. A minor gripe since the body and battery grips together are still far less than half the price of the D5.

The Fuji XT-2 seems to check all the right boxes for people who are moving to APS-C, EVF-enabled cameras. The range of lenses is expanding and each of the lenses introduced so far is well regarded. There are a number of fast primes which is like catnip to the older generation of shooters. The EVF moves the camera into the future along with the full range of Sony mirror-free cameras. This allows for continuous live view and all the digital trimmings such as film emulations that you can see as you shoot and zebras, as well as focus peaking (which is very, very practical when shooting with manual lenses).

The black and white and color film emulations resonate with a generation immersed in Instagram filters. The sensor in the camera is said to be wonderful in terms of color and tonality. It feels good in many people's hands and doesn't quickly become burdensome.

But what Fuji has done is to position the brand correctly for a contemporary market whereas Nikon is still branding their cameras to appeal to a newspaper procurement department from 1995. Every time I hear about how brilliantly tough and resilient the Nikon pro bodies are I remember watching journalists from the last century rushing around the sidelines of sporting events with three big, motor drive Nikons around their necks and over their shoulders. One body always had the cool, wide angle lens on the front; one had the short zoom and the third had the long zoom. As the photojournalists ran the cameras bang, bang, banged together with a disturbing cadence. You could watch little parts of the camera bodies fall off as the photographers allowed them to slam into each other like those little metal balls on swings that people used to buy for their desktops....There were five or six one inch metal balls at hung in a row from a little wooden frame and if you pulled up one ball, released it and let it slam into the row of balls the energy would transfer to the ball at the opposite end and it would bounce up. That's what the photojournalists' cameras spent their lives doing. So, of course, they had to be built to take the abuse.

But the abuse was usually a side effect of the cameras not being owned by the staff photographers but by the newspapers or the magazine they worked for. If one broke they could ask for, and receive, a replacement at no cost to the themselves.

With the exception of people working spot news, and pros working high dollar sporting events (one tenth of one percent of working photographers), this "trio camera necklace" of destruction is not the working modality of most present day photographers, be they pros or serious amateurs. Most of us are using one camera at a time or using them in a less frenetic fashion when we do use multiple cameras. We care for them better because we own the cameras and we own the responsibility for their potential demise.

Fuji seems to understand that the market has changed and the branding of cameras has changed. The emphasis is no longer prioritized in this descending order, a la Nikon: 1. Indestructibility 2. super fast focus acquisition 3. dedication to optical view finders 4. Giant, grippable surfaces 5. Image quality 6. Filter and film emulation enhancements 7. Usable 4K video. 

Most of us understand that indestructibility is relatively meaningless when most of us will upgrade to demonstrably better imaging cameras in two to three years. The toll for bullet proof build quality is insanely high given that most (non-sport shooting) professionals and serious amateurs are never going to get near the MTBF of their camera's shutters before the camera is a fondly remembered relic relegated to Ebay.

Most of us require a higher degree of accuracy in our focus than raw speed of acquisition. An ever growing number of us are adamant that we want the feedback and information provided by great EVFs and that we're never going back to what are becoming vestigial optical viewfinders.

We've mostly voted with our wallets against bigger, heavier cameras because the entire cohort of people buying serious, single intention cameras are aging and not willing to over-burden their shoulders and lower backs in the service of camera portage.

The bottom line is that Nikon is still marketing the machine. The specs. The robustness of materials while paying passing lip service to the idea of creativity, pleasant design and ultimate usability. This emphasis on horsepower or clock speed is lost on consumers who have come to expect their technical toys to operate with transparency. Nikon has bypassed the narrative of art and the "magic" of the sensor to keep addressing the concerns of a previous generation: the ability to pound on nails with the camera and not have the camera fail. Thick sheet metal in the new world of bluetooth interconnection. (An analogy for both cars and cameras). This is sad given their ancient history of telling photographer success stories in their marketing...

Fuji is not selling their new camera on the basis of its alloy frame (that's now considered a standard feature for entry to a certain market) nor are they focusing on the life cycle of the camera or its ability to withstand careless battering. No, they are looking at much more urbane and urban audiences and aiming their branding toward the things a new generation is more interested in: How beautiful is the rendering of the X-tran sensor? (implication: it has magic power to make your images more beautiful than other cameras used under similar situations). The size and design of the body is less intrusive and burdensome, as are many of the lenses. It's a camera that one could carry with them throughout a walk in a city without the size and weight becoming an unnecessary burden or something that's big enough to attract unwanted attention.

Nikon is selling a tool while Fuji is selling a companion. A good looking a affable companion.
Stripped down to their essence the cameras do basically the same thing. They use modified Sony sensors to make photographs with the aid of their own branded lenses. But the nut of it is how we've been manipulated to perceive the difference between the whole Nikon line and the smaller Fuji line of X cameras. Again, one is a tool for production while the other is an (affordable) near Luxe item that infers from its design and positioning that it is for people more interested in true art than just rote documentation. A Mini Cooper versus a Ford Edge.

One can easily see that Fuji is attempting to nestle into a space not unlike Leica's; almost handmade machines but at a lower price point. A status symbol in the manner of automatic watches in a world of quartz watches with batteries.

Branding is so much more powerful that actual feature sets or modalities of use. We assess our purchases not in a quantitative fashion but a qualitative fashion that employs subjective measures of the relative value of design versus function.

The reality is that a good photographer can take good photographs with either camera. One line will enjoy increasing success while the other line will show declining success. The momentum toward mirrorless cameras, and cameras of smaller size, has less to do with consumer comparisons between the cameras than the power of blogger, reviewer, magazine etc. prejudices to push consumer preferences in one direction or the other.

Right now there is one company that is clearly winning the branding and marketing wars and that is Fuji. Most of us have never pitted a similar Fuji lens and a Nikon or Canon lens of similar price and spec against one another and so we cannot seriously state that one is better than the other (other than anecdotally). But the mythology of the marketplace as created by iterative marketing and opinion maker propaganda has us salivating about the idea of owning the prime, Fuji lenses; even though they have a limited track record in the market. And far fewer user samples at full size are available.

The same is true in the video market when it comes to differences in Sony A7Sii cameras and offering from all the other makers. The untested consensus is that the Sony is the one to beat, even though some cameras like the Panasonic GH4 and the more expensive Sony A7Rii best the A7ii in some important technical video parameters.

At this point most of the differences between the two categories (mirror-free and traditional DSLR) of cameras boil down to whether or not one wants an EVF versus an OVF and then, whose branding messages you ultimately decide fit your personality or your self-image.

Since this is inarguably the case I would state that Nikon needs to change the hell out of their marketing and branding to make their cameras magical companions instead of cold tools while prospective Fuji buyers should re-apprise their lust for the XT-2 and re-direct said avarice toward the X-Pro-2 which more clearly fits the brand driven desire for elegant design and "best friend" status.

Of all the cameras in the market today I am most drawn to the design aesthetics of the Fuji X-Pro-2. So much so that I don't care if its video is crap or its battery only last for 15 minutes, it's a beautifully done camera. I may be relatively immune though to their particular branding since the joy I feel when handling one fades quickly and my longer term affinity/relationship with the mirror-free cameras from Sony reasserts itself.

At this point in the current cycle of higher end cameras we've begun to attain imaging equivalence across brands and are now engaged solely in a war of creating product personalities through the magic of advertising and paid testimonials. The reliance on increasingly irrelevant pro "thumbs up" in the service of Nikon is becoming downright embarrassing while the understated "we're like Leica only cheaper and sexier" seems to be working out well for Fuji. Sony just hums along selling cameras because they work well and have exotic feature sets that make people happy and productive.... at least that's what their marketing insinuates to me.

Finally, I want to take this opportunity to disagree with those who believe that the success of single intention cameras (those unencumbered by phones) is in making them more and more connected. I beta tested the "ultimate" connected camera in the form of the Samsung Galaxy NX in 2013. You could connect with wi-fi or cell network. Or bluetooth. Or morse code. It ran full on Android Jelly Bean. In every instance the parts dedicated to connection ruined the intimate attachment of the user to the camera and killed its embrace. Get a life. Meet friends for coffee and show them your photos.

Match your camera to your imaging needs, and the way you enjoy working, not necessarily by what rare ingredients were used in its construction or how well the lines of the camera complement your outfits and ancillary wardrobe.

Sexiest camera in my studio today? Probably the little a6300. It's just cute.

OT: The irony of ordering the "Big Breakfast" at McDonalds while browsing through a copy of Food And Wine Magazine.

Elvis Behind Bars.

I woke up early this morning. I beat my alarm clock. I was feeling a bit sore in my left hip because I'd done something kind of zany on Thurs. Instead of going to regular swim practice I headed to the pool in the off hours and kicked 2,000 yards straight through with a kick board. I'm here to tell you that I, at least, have less resilience and ability to recover from over-training than I did when I was twenty years younger...

Anyway, I got up and did yoga stretches for half an hour before swim practice today. We hit the water at 7:30 am and pounded through a bunch of yards, many of which included sets of 200 yard I.M. swims. By the time I exited the pool and showered I was exhausted and starving. Really hungry. Stomach rumbling hungry. Usually I'll go home and have some cardboard tasting, healthy cereal and fruit but today I succumbed to advertising and weakness. 

There is a McDonalds about halfway between the pool and my house. It's a very upscale McDonalds that has been redesigned and is actually a visually pleasant place to hang out in. There is public wi-fi and it's pretty fast. I saw the signs in the window for their "Big Breakfast" and my stomach demanded that we stop and check it out. I surrendered to impulse and agreed. 

It was quiet in the restaurant. There were no other customers at the counter. I ordered the Big Breakfast. It includes: an ample serving of freshly prepared, scrambled eggs, a hash brown assemblage, a pork sausage patty, and a biscuit. I also ordered (without any trepidation) a small coffee. It was ready in the blink of an eye and I took my prize off to a comfortable booth to dig in. 

I hate eating in restaurants alone unless I have something to read. My choice of reading materials in the car today was meager. My choice was a book about the mechanics of swimming; which I had read six times before, a book on chaos theory, and a recent copy of Food and Wine Magazine. I went with the magazine. As I sat in my booth eating a complete meal that cost something like $4.80 I had the thought that I was immersed in several layers of irony. One: that one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the southern United States is host to a much maligned fast foot chain outpost. And that it has weathered the decades while many other tonier restaurants have vanished from the zip code. Two: That a much ridiculed chain would have such nice and comfortable interior appointments. Much more comfortable than the confusing and harsh redo of our neighborhood Starbucks. Three: That I would care enough about food to subscribe to several magazines on the subject and be reading an article about Michelin starred restaurants while dining in the most egalitarian restaurant I can imagine. Delicious irony. But the post workout body wants what it wants....

My review? The coffee tasted less bitter and burned than the usual Starbucks cup. It was actually very good. The eggs were fresh and well prepared. The sausage was inoffensive. I felt guilty eating the hash brown potato patty as it is so fried (but the crunchy texture is certainly satisfying), but the standout was the smallish biscuit. It was as perfect as any biscuit I have tasted.

My only memory of the magazine was of the advertisements for cruises. The photographs in most of the ads were very overproduced and odd flights of visual fantasy.

I took a camera along in the car. It was the Sony A7ii. It stayed in the car. 

Having Retro Fun In Austin. Janis Dress Rehearsal.

Kacee Clanton plays Janis.

If you like the music of Janis Joplin and you dug the whole popular music scene in the late 1960's and early 1970's I think you'll really trip out on the new Janis show that's opening at Zach Theatre this week. The stage set is vintage cool and the music is really great. It will make older Austinites reminisce about the days of yore when Janis Joplin played clubs like the Vulcan Gas Company and Threadgills. Back when gas was a quarter a gallon and rent was almost free. Back in the days before condos and parking meters. Back when a great meal in Austin was the chicken fried steak at the Stallion on Lamar. But enough digression...

My client, Zach Theatre, kindly moved up my dress rehearsal shoot to last night. We usually shoot on Tues. and post process on Weds. morning but I leave town for a project on Weds. and I didn't want to cut things too closely. The show is well set. The costumes were done and the stage design complete. The part of Janis is sung and played by Kacee Clanton. The part of "The Blues Singer" is sung and played by Tiffany Mann. They both have more energy on stage than you can imagine.

I brought along two cameras and two lenses. The cameras were the Sony a99 and the Sony a850. I used the Tamron 28-75mm 2.8 for my wide shots and medium stage shots and the venerable 70-200mm 2.8 G lens for the tighter shots. I set the a850 at ISO 1250 and the a99 at ISO 3200 and I was happy with the noise performance of both cameras when shot this way. I recently re-calibrated the AF on the long zoom (with the a99)  and I am now officially impressed by the sharpness of that lens, even when used wide open.

There were only two challenges in shooting this rock and roll music production and those were the same challenges that people who shoot bands face. First of all the lighting is constantly changing, both in intensity and color. For manual exposure shooters (all that black in the background tends to throw off even the best in camera meters) that means paying careful attention to shutter speeds and f stops. While the EVF in the a99 makes it all a bit easier I did have to do some quick chimping to stay in the groove with the a850. The second challenge is the constant movement of the actors when they perform. They just flat out rock.  Janis was constantly moving and when shooting at f2.8 at the long end of a long lens you find that you've got very narrow depth of field, and that you pretty much have to nail focus for the shots to work. I used the focus hold buttons around the end of the long zoom almost constantly to quickly lock in focus.

The evening was very successful and the Theater will have images a bit earlier than usual. The show is fabulous and once again I am very happy with the results I got from my cameras. Any deficiency in the images is down to me.

The entire event was quite groovy. I'm looking forward to sitting in the audience, unencumbered with cameras, when I get back into town.

Co-Star, Tiffany Mann, as "The Blues Singer"

Co-Star, Tiffany Mann, as "The Blues Singer"

Co-Star, Tiffany Mann, as "The Blues Singer"

The best systems for walking around enjoying life and photography--simultaneously.

Olympus OM-D

When we looked away for a moment the world shifted. A few years ago, when traveling, I would see people at events, at monuments and in the streets shooting photographs. Some were using point and shoot cameras and documenting their vacations to share with friends and relatives. The people who wanted to make serious photographs were toting along serious cameras. Big, heavy cameras. Canons, Nikons and more Canons. All with big, fast zoom lenses on the front. Now it all seems very anachronistic to walk around with a hulking DSLR. It's a trend time shift. 

Let's face facts. No one is getting paid to walk around and shoot in the streets. There's no market brimming with corporations sending out requests for state of the moment street photographs. This is something we do because we love it. But it's a dying trend. We've mined the shaft and plucked out the gold and now what were left with is the love of the exercise and its residual benefit, time spent outdoors looking and living. The reason working photographers buy cameras like the Nikon D800 (the new, defacto professional tool...) is to put them on a tripod and extract from them every square milliliter of excruciating details to bring to the service of their clients. It's what is expected when controlled imaging is commissioned and used in critical applications. But it's a level of technology that's actually detrimental to the practice of the kind of enjoyable, recreational photography we seem to pursue most often, and always for ourselves as the primary audience.

I speak from long experience. I've shot in the street with old Nikon F's and Leica M's as well as with Hasselblads and other medium format equipment. But my recent experiences with street photography in and around Boston and then back home in Austin have convinced me that we've achieved a plateau wherein the technology inside today's premium mirrorless cameras yields a practical quality which, by dint of operational fluidity, matches the level of image quality you'll attain from dragging around much bigger cameras and lenses.

It's all a matter of user relativity. In the grand old scheme it's impossible to argue that, all supporting practice being perfect, that current mirrorless cameras (APS-C and m4:3) are as potentially good as the current crop of full frame cameras. Square milimeter-age will always count. But when we take away tripods, studio flash systems and other accessories and we use both systems side by side to walk through a city for hours at a time the gap between technical superiority and on sensor equivalency starts to fall apart. The bigger cameras cause us to fatigue more quickly and that causes muscle tremors that degrade image quality. The increased blood flow means a stronger pulse and that also affects our ability to steady the whole rig. The smaller pixels in the higher res cameras like the Nikon D800 seem to require the highest platform stability in order to show best results. When a stable platform is degraded (with time, fatigue and other physical constraints) the ability of the more technologically advanced cameras is effectively degraded to the point where the smaller, and more agile format and body styles pretty much achieve actual quality parity.

When we shoot in the street we want good results but we also want to enjoy our time there. To do this it's important to find the optimum balance between the results your tools will give you in a hand held shooting scenario and the weight and bulk you are willing to accept. Almost every commercial, working photographer I know has accepted the binary gear paradigm. One system for ultimate, no holds barred, commercial image making and a totally different system for recreational use. We still want big, lush files, quick operation and a range of delicious lenses but we're no longer anxious to power lift our way to nice images. We're also learning that ultimate resolution or ultimate perceived sharpness aren't nearly as important, for most kinds of carry around photography as choosing the right subjects and being in the right place at the right time.

You can argue all you want but a smaller, lighter system goes a long way to extending your range both physically and emotionally. In the past, when we shot film, I did my commercial work with a range of mostly medium format (and some large format) cameras. But I never considered taking my four by five inch view camera out for an ambling stroll across town. It always had purpose on its side, not exploration. I supplemented those larger cameras with Leica M cameras and their much smaller lenses. In the early days of digital we used five pound Kodak/Nikon bodies which had short battery lives and very heavy batteries. We found various point and shoot digital cameras, like the Canon G series or the Olympus C-3030 type cameras to press into service for our portable, recreational rigs.

Now we don't have to make as big a compromise for portability. We can get relatively equivalent performance our of at least three different choices in the world of mirrorless when compared to traditional DSLR systems. In the case of the Nex 7 (I may be prejudiced...) we can also have a sensor that is better that most of the APS-C DSLR sensors, extant.

After having shot for three or four hours each day, in Austin and Boston, over the last seven days I can pretty much declare that, for me, the days of walking around with larger cameras have come to an end. There are three systems in the mirrorless category that I would use without reservation for the kind of fun work I normally undertake for my own enjoyment. I present them here.

Fuji X-E1

If I were starting with a totally clean slate I would probably be seduced by the Fuji X-E1. The sensor seems to be state of the art for color and low noise and the lenses are reputed to be very sharp. The 18-55 kit lens is a 2.8 to f4.0 which, coupled with good high ISO performance, makes for a good all around package, right out of the box. Two things hold my back from trading in my Sony Nex stuff and taking the plunge: One is that I've just gotten to the point with my Sonys of understanding them completely. Knowing how to wring the best performance out of them in most situations. I'd be reticent to go through yet another learning curve.... and the second reason is that I'm using the Sony DSLT cameras professionally and with the LAEA-1 adapter I can use the lenses from the DSLT system to supplement the Nex lenses while retaining most of the operational features (wide open metering, all modes + exif).

On the other hand the Fujis, right out of the gate, seem to have a better selection of better native lenses... But then the Sony has a superior EVF, better autofocus and equal usability with legacy lenses. Between the three systems I'm talking about I think the real choices come down to lenses and how the camera feels in your own hands...

If we're looking at sheer acceptance the camera that most advanced photographers have chosen for a second system (and, for a large number, even a primary camera system) is the Olympus OMD.

The benefits are very straightforward: This particular camera may have the best image stabilization ever implemented in a still camera. It's amazingly good. Like science fiction. And unlike the in body stabilization of my bigger Sony cameras you get to see the calming effect of the IS in the view finder. The next benefit is the electronic viewfinder. While all three of the these camera systems give you EVF's the Olympus version seems the most graceful. By that I mean that people in general find it more comfortable to use. Easier to look into. 

While the Sony Nex 6 and 7 have higher spec'd EVFs the only thing that really matters is the actual user experience and even I'll admit that Olympus wins that contest. When you add in the wide range of really wonderful lenses that are already available for the system it's hard to argue against it. I've often said that if Olympus had beaten Sony to market with the OMD it would have been my first choice for a second system. With the 12mm, 25mm, 45mm and 75mm lenses for the Olympus system I would have a fine wide-to-telephoto system that still fits in a tiny bag.  And it would be a lens system that is made more remarkable by the relative speed of the lenses.

I am looking forward to seeing how Olympus will top the OMD. There are rumors of a more professional camera coming down the pike but if my anecdotal surveys of users are any indication it will take a lot to move current OMD shooters to another camera. There just aren't that many things people actively dislike about the current body. The one thing they might consider is a "big type" version for seniors. I do hear the occasional grousing about the size of the buttons....

Sony Nex 6

I think the best value on the market right now would have to be the Sony Nex 6. It's got a good sized sensor (16 megapixels, APS-C size) that's been well proven in popular cameras like the Nikon D7000 and the Pentax K-5. It's a tiny camera, almost pocketable with the right lens on the front and it's been deeply discounted lately. While I like the eccentric dial design of the Nex 7 the 6 will appeal more to linear photo thinkers and people who have become used to dedicated dials for everything. I don't like the new 16-50mm lens as much as I like the old, much maligned 18-55mm kit lens.  If I were considering sticking my feet in the waters of mirrorless high performance cameras I'd start with the Nex-6 and the original black 18-55mm kit lens. It's a great package and used with some skill and knowledge, could be used for 90% of most photographers' work.

There is no right choice. All three of the systems have a lot to offer. If you don't do photography for a living you might find that one of the three systems above matches your needs more directly than the larger systems to which we've been consistently acculturated. As Apple showed us with the phone and Honda showed North America with cars, there is no shame in downsizing our tools in order to make them more usable.

One more thing. It's wise not to discount the power of symbolic sizes and shapes when considering a tool for a task that cries out for either discretion or collaboration. A smaller and lighter camera is often times perceived to be used only for fun and recreation and not for news, documentation and commercial gain. When people are confronted with big cameras and lenses they often are moved to believe that the photographer will be using the images he takes of them for his financial gain. They rightfully expect that if they are part of the amalgam that makes profit then they too should be rewarded. Especially if they perceive that they are giving up their rights of privacy. Very little of that stigma attaches to cameras with smaller profiles and less "professional" appearance. In fact, I'd say the user of the smaller cameras is more easily ignored, overlooked, discounted which, in the end gives them more access, and more intimacy. 

To be honest, at this point there's very little difference in the sensors between camera shapes (excluding the less than 1% who are using full frame sensor cameras) and most of us would be able to get the kinds of images we want out of either a big DSLR with big lenses or a smaller camera with equally good lenses (albeit half the size). Technology is allowing us the option of being in everyone's face and combining a program of aerobic weightlifting while shooting OR finding a new way of shooting that is sleeker, more agile and far more comfortable when used on the street or traveling around the world.

Of course, the usual disclaimers and caveats apply. If you have a nice camera of any size and no reason to shred your budget then no one is pushing you to rush out and change. If you shoot stuff on a tripod and need ultimate quality, professional project or not, then you are still a candidate for a very high resolution, traditional DSLR or DSLT equivalent. The camera itself, considered in a vacuum, won't make you a better shooter. But access, calm muscles, even breath and a lighter load might....  Just a thought after spending some quality time in the streets....

Business Portrait from December.

I had a photographic assignment late last year to make images of a spa out near Lake Travis. We spent a day photographing different services, with models,  as well as interiors and exteriors. It was fun and crazy and I got to work with a bright, young art director named Mary Beth Taylor from one of my favorite insanely creative ad agencies, Clutch Creative. When we wrapped up the main day of shooting we still had one image that we needed to do; the owner, Melissa.

She runs a very high energy business and I wanted to remove her from the day-to-day interruptions and make her portrait here at the studio. We scheduled her portrait for a different day. I set up my usual lighting design for portraits with a large, softlight on the left and a fill diffuser on the right. I used a light gray background. When we finished shooting my regularly planned shots I noticed that the exterior light, coming from my wall of northwest facing windows and gliding through the white diffuser I had been using for fill, was nicer and softer than the lights I'd been using. 

I turned off the big flash but I left on the modeling light for fill. I tried some poses that were out of my normal routine and, when she turned around in the shot above, I loved the feeling of motion and connection. I had Melissa do variations of this pose for a few more shots and then we moved on a tried a few more poses and experimented with looser crops. But this was the image I really wanted that I didn't know I wanted until I saw it. I have yet another resolution for this year: Be open to the available light instead of always lighting everything to death.

I shot this image on my Sony a99 camera attached to the 70-200mm 2.8 G lens. The camera was anchored on my wooden tripod. I shot in raw and processed the image in Lightroom 4.3. The image required me to color correct the side of her face away from the light. The tungsten modeling light made that side too warm. I used an adjustment brush to make my corrections.

I often pine for the 85mm 1.4 Zeiss/Sony lens but images like this serve to remind me that I'll need to end up shooting at more reasonable f-stops like f4 and f5.6 if I want to keep both of my subject's eyes in focus. I really like using the 70-200 on a tripod because it has a mount that takes the weight off the camera and balances out the system. Which the twist of a lock button I can go from horizontal to vertical very easily. The 70-200mm is good at f2.8, better at f4 and wildly excellent at 5.6. It's the right tool for the job, if your job is making portraits in the studio.

Nice to start the year with a portrait I really love. Kind of sets the bar for the year.

blog note: Thanks to all the people who signed up for Wyatt's workshop/road trip/BBQ fest. I predict you will have much fun. I further predict that I'll sneak up and meet everyone for lunch. I'm a sucker for great BBQ and anything photographic...

Also, keep the comments coming. The feedback loop is priceless.

When it rains it pours. Two new cameras come into VSL studios.

I think my friends knew that this would be inevitable. I was on the fence about buying the Sony a99 until I spent a few quiet hours handling one and then I knew I had to have it. I've played with a Nikon D800 and I shot a few things with a Canon 5Dmk3 but in my humble opinion the Sony a99 is currently the best all around photographic production tool for most professionals right now. I picked one up today from the folks at Precision Camera and I couldn't be more pleased. I went right into the menus and, after having spent many months with the a77's I doubt I'll have to consult the manual for anything other than how to set up the focusing range stuff.

To Sony's credit they left all the stuff that worked well alone. The menus now seem absolutely logical to me. And just as importantly the batteries are interchangeable between my Sony a99, a77 and a57's. What a nice touch! Instead of having to wait for the battery in the box to charge I could toss a fully charged battery from the Sony drawer into the camera and get started configuring the camera to my preferences.

What led me to water and forced me to drink? With the local economy recovering I've had several large, and venerable clients come back into the fold and now we're booked up in December, right into the holidays. Several of the jobs are multi-day corporate events with lots of available light shooting and even though I am now more comfortable shooting high ISO with both the a77 and the a57 the images I've seen from the a99 are at least two stops cleaner. That, and the fact that Michael Johnston at the Online Photographer upped the blogger ante by plunking down for a Nikon D800 and some jolly lenses and you know that we really must keep up with the Johnstons. (just kidding, really!)

My first real test of the camera will be at Zachary Scott Theater this week when we do the dress rehearsal shoot for White Christmas. It should be a hell of a lot of fun.

I have also done several video projects lately and missed having manual audio level controls and a headphone output on camera. To say I am excited about the a99 is an understatement. Looking through the viewfinder is a big affirmation of my decision to go all EVF all the time.  I cannot see much difference, if any, between a good optical finder and the EVF in this camera.  I'm heading out to shoot some stuff just for fun in a few minutes so I guess this is the first in a series of rolling reviews on what is now my new flagship production camera. Thank you, Ian, for putting one aside for me.  You know me too well.

But wait, there's more.

I also picked up a Sony Nex 6 to add to my Nex 7's.  Why? I like the new interface and I like being able to choose a less dense, less noisy sensor for certain kinds of shooting and it seemed like the right thing to do while I was already in the middle of hemorrhaging money. I just happened to have an extra battery and memory card in my pocket so I had the camera strapped, lensed and fully operational before I even stepped out the door from the store. It's going to be a busy week breaking in cameras and taking test shots but I guess that's part of what I signed on for.  So far the Nex 6 is working well with images snapping in to focus and the finder showing sharp and snappy images.

I have the 19 mm Sigma on the Nex 6 and the 30mm Sigma on the Nex 7 and we'll be testing all of the permutations of those combinations in the very near future as well. So, two new Sony cameras in two days along with two lenses in two days. I guess I am officially getting over my Post Recession Trauma Disorder and getting on with my life as a photographer.   Off to shoot and look.

We'll know more soon. 

Fully Committed. Shooting a play with an old, manual focus lens.

Martin Burke in Fully Committed.

Camera: Olympus Pen EP3.  Lens: 45mm 1.8  ISO 1250.

One of my favorite actors of all time, Martin Burke, will be starring in the one man play, Fully Committed, at the Zachary Scott Theatre, opening this evening.  Last night was the dress rehearsal.  The play is about the person in the basement office of an ultra-trendy, Manhattan restaurant whose job comprises sitting at a desk taking telephone reservations from a group of the most entitled, eccentric and sometimes sociopathic group of patrons imaginable.  Martin plays both sides of every conversation, including conversations with the slimy head chef and the head waiter.  At the same time he also fields calls from "friends" who are anxious to let him know they've landed acting jobs in parts that he also auditioned for. 

Martin is amazing and the play is so much fun.  So fun, in fact, that I was able to convince my 16 year old son to come with me.  I was going to shoot images during the dress rehearsal that we'll be sending to the press today.  

First, let's talk about the photography part.  I would be covering one actor on a small stage. I wanted to try something a bit different and I'd been champing at bit to pit two of my favorite lenses against each other to see which would emerge triumphant.  It wouldn't exactly be a fair fight as one lens would be on my Panasonic GH2 and the other on my Olympus EP3.  What the Olympus has in design panache and build quality it gives back in resolution...Yes, that has been remedied in the OMD but I'm still holding out...

I wanted to shoot my Olympus 45mm 1.8 and my Olympus (old school Pen) 60mm 1.5.  How would the ancient legacy lens do against the young favorite of the m4:3 crowd?  How would I do pitting my skills in manually focusing against the fast sample rate and quick AF of the EP-3?  Who would emerge as the top contender in the America's Top Small Camera Contest (A trademark of the Shooting with the Stars Corporation, ltd.)?????

Martin Burke. Fully Committed.

Camera: Panasonic GH2. Lens: Olympus 60mm 1.5  ISO 1250

I brought along the two bodies I mentioned, the two lenses I mentioned and also the Pan/Leica 25mm 1.4 and the Panasonic 14-45mm zoom, as well as two extra batteries per camera.  Everything packed into one small Domke camera bag with room to spare.  Lots of room to spare. Ben and I left the house a bit early and headed to the theatre. Little did we know that the city of Austin was hosting one of those "everyone-with-nothing-better-to-do-come-to-the-park-sit-on-the-grass-and-listen-to-jazz" things where hordes of people looking for free entertainment drive in from the suburban hinterlands, and fill all the roads between me and the theatre with hapless, confused and generally incompetent drivers who are afraid to make left hand turns.

Through a combination of patience and profanity in equal doses we were finally able to arrive at the theatre with five minutes to spare.  Ben settled in to a comfy seat behind me and I got to work setting up my cameras.  They were both set identically.  ISO = 1250, manual shutter speeds, manual apertures.  White balance set to tungsten. Noise reduction on stun (low) and each camera set to large, fine or extra fine jpegs. (The Panasonic has only "fine" as a choice...).

My routine with the Panasonic was to push in the little wheel on the back, top right of the camera which magnifies the finder image.  I would fine focus the 60mm lens and then touch the shutter button which got me right back to the 100% finder image.  Then I'd be able to shoot for a while without worrying about focus until Martin moved.  The method was quick and pretty accurate.  When I hit sharp focus the lens worked well.  Most of the time I was shooting with the lens set to between f2 and f2.8. 

My routine for using the Olympus was to evaluate exposure on the VF2 screen and then rely on the camera's autofocus for the heavy lifting.  I even used the face detection AF for a number of the shots.  

I think both cameras did well.  The GH2 files seem a bit more solid and I find that I actually prefer to manually focus my lenses.  Probably a holdover from the past.  I was happy to see that neither camera seemed to struggle with noise at the 1250 ISO setting.  I found the controls on the Panasonic, especially the push wheel for toggling between, and setting, aperture and shutter speed to be more usable than the two different dials on the EP3.  I also found the files on the GH2 to be a bit cleaner and more robust.  There is a color difference between the cameras but nothing that can't be duplicated or remedied in Lightroom or some other piece of software.

The big difference to me was in the lenses. I much prefer the look of the longer, 60mm lens. I think it has a sharpness and contrast that the other lens doesn't quite share. They are very, very close and by f2.8 and beyond you'd have to have your nose stuck to the front screen of your monitor to see the difference, but, at f2 the winner for contrast and center sharpness (to my eye) is the ancient metal beast of a lens.  The 60mm f1.4.

The big caveat is the fact that it was used on a body with 24% more pixels.  

Why use the smaller cameras when I have bigger, faster stuff?  Because I wanted to and because the action in the play was constrained to a smaller space which meant fewer changes in  focal length ranges were needed.  The prime lenses are nicely sharp and gave me the opportunity to work at higher shutter speeds.  That's always nice.  Next time out I'm going to match up my old 70mm f2 against the 60mm 1.5 and see which one really is best.  Nice to see Olympus re-introducing so many high speed primes.  It's always a nice option in the age of relentless zooms.

The biggest issue I had, technically, last night was all the laughing.  Most of the play is so funny that I found myself laughing out loud with the rest of the small (family and friends) audience. Hard to keep your equipment steady during a full out belly laugh. Ben thought the play we great as well.  Score one for fighting against video games....

Both cameras made it through the show with their original batteries.  Paranoia proved once again to be unnecessary.

I've already made reservations to go back and see the play again.  All fun all the time.

Hope you've got your Summer in a good trajectory.  It's not nearly as hot in Austin as it was this time last year.  The lawns are green, the pools are cool and it's even possible to go (comfortably) for long walks.  With a camera.

Thanks for reading.

The Sony a57 Goes to School.

This is an available light photograph shot for Kipp Austin College Prep, a charter school here in Austin, Texas. I had an assignment there yesterday.  We spent most of the day photographing representative kids in their K-12 program. The images will be used on the web and for various printed collateral.

I was using several cameras during the course of the shoot but today I'd like to give my general impression of the Sony a57 as I just finished post processing about 650 files from that particular camera. (I shot around 2200 frames, divided among three cameras...).

I used a fast, wide angle zoom on another camera but I used only the 85mm 2.8 Sony lens on the a57. Having used the camera for several, previous, low light shoots I was confident using it at 1600 ISO which gave me a good range of exposure options as I moved through the various buildings at the school. I shot Jpeg.  I didn't have any issue with using Jpeg. In the past I usually shot raw but I've gotten into the habit of doing a quick custom white balance when I first enter a room and leaving the camera set there.  It generally means much less post processing after the fact since the color balance doesn't change or shift as it would in AWB as you point the camera at different scenes with different dominant colors and no real white references in the frame.

Unlike the a77, which has a superfine Jpeg setting, the a57 has only fine and normal.  I used fine.

The lens is a bit primitive in its AF construction. It's still using the little "screwdriver blade" drive shaft connected to the camera body.  But in any lighting situation where I can see to focus, it's pretty fast to lock in focus and it doesn't spend much time hunting.  I really like the performance.
In the scene above there was enough light to allow me to shoot at 1/320th of a second, f3.2 (one third stop down from wide open).

I think the bokeh (ha. ha.  I said, "bokeh") is nuanced and lazy, infused with echoes of plum and spices, blended for a nice, long finish, with hints of soft tangerine...  Actually, I think the out of focus areas are rendered softly and without much Sturm und Drang.  Whatever.  I think it looks nice in the parts that are out of focus...

While the finder in the a77 is better at previewing color and contrast than the a57 I found my routine white balancing exercise gave me the confidence to shoot even when the EVF showed colors to be a bit wonky.  If they were too wonky I would go back and re-do my WB.  Takes 15 seconds at the most.

When photographing kindergarteners it's always good to go in without much gear and without any flash.  The flash draws the kids like moths.

The Sony's also share the attribute of having fairly quiet and pleasant sounding shutters when the electronic first curtain is engaged.

As a lower tier camera, aimed squarely at entry level photographers and hobbyists, I find several things that I quickly figured out work arounds for.  The saturation levels for the standard Jpegs are much too high so I lowered them.  The metering (multi area) is not as accurate as the metering in the a77 so I either rode the exposure compensation adjustment or switched to manual, depending how long I'd be in one area. I didn't have much issue with highlights burning out and I routinely added back some black (+7) in Lightroom 4.2.

The benefits of the a57 are these:  It handles 1600 ISO to my complete satisfaction.  With menu modifications it is a charming Jpeg camera.  The standard files (with reduced saturation ) are very sharp at 1600 ISO and require no additional sharpening.  When correctly exposed the files have very nice, neutral color.  The battery life is good.  Not good like a Nikon D3s but much better than my Olympus EP3 or Panasonic GH2 and, just a bit better than my Sony a77's.

The camera is very light weight.  I'm familiar enough with my most used buttons that I am able to use the camera and set controls without having to take it away from my eye.

The camera is good enough, from a speed and quality of file point of view, to make a good, workable professional camera for someone who is thinking of starting a small wedding photography business or portrait business.  I am comfortable using it for professional assignments but confess that I'm working hard at using its bigger brother, the a77 for most things because I really like the "look" I'm getting by shooting very sharp and noiseless images at very low ISOs.
That camera is returning me to the kind of lighting I used to do with my old, medium format cameras, and that's not such a bad thing...

As far as I know the a57 is not waterproof or bullet proof.  It's just a fast handling, straightforward choice for people who prefer to "pre-chimp", shoot in low light and who want to use an EVF for most of their art or work.  It's a great back-up camera for the a77 but because of the higher quality of the a77 EVF the a57 is not a replacement for it.

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