A prediction I can make with confidence: People will continue to make fun, interesting, disturbing, compelling and banal photographs in 2016. Another prediction I feel certain of: We will buy more cameras and lenses.

Image by Chuck Close. Photo realistic painting.

Photography is less like bubble wrap and more like pizza dough. You can't just pop all the bubbles and be done with images. With dough, if you squeeze in one direction the dough will flow out into another direction. You can't eat bubble wrap but you can sure make tasty pizza from good dough. Especially if you practice. 

My most fun camera purchase of the year. The Olympus EM5.2. There

I made most of my income last year shooting with Nikon cameras. One in particular; the D810. But it was not the camera that made me smile most and pushed me to do fun pictures most often. That honor goes to the Olympus OMD EM-5.2. And I'll try to tell you why. 

There is a reason people pay crazy amounts of money for really cool watches. Most of the really cool watches are mechanical. Automatics. Self-winders. We collectively like the idea of precision machining. Of distilling down mechanical engineering to its quintessence. And, apparently we like the same feeling and design aesthetic in our cameras; at least I do. 

The Olympus OMD line of cameras is an interesting milestone in camera development because these cameras, along with cameras like the Nikon 7X00 series, the Pentax K-3s and the Panasonic GH4, represent the point at which most of us will agree cameras became transparently good. To echo a word used by blogger, Ming Thein, all of these cameras have reached and surpassed the point of sufficiency. They are more than adequate for the imaging needs of almost everyone. 

The desire for more megapixels and bigger sensors may have its place in practice for professionals who must, on occasion, be ready to deliver enormous files (while most of the time they will also find 16 megapixels more than adequate....) and for ardent amateurs and artists who have a need to print their images at very, very large sizes. But clearly, for most of us, the sensor and image pipeline development of cameras hit their Honda Accord or Toyota Camry level of sufficiency with the introduction of Sony's low noise 16 and 16+ megapixel sensors, nearly three years ago. The need for the "Bentley" version of a standard camera is largely fiction. 

The one thing my Olympus cameras don't do with my current m4:3 lenses that would make them a match for my full frame cameras is to have an exciting ramp from in focus to out of focus with the lenses I currently own. Friend Frank has consistently shown me that I can get the same effect with faster, higher quality glass on the smaller cameras. I have used his Leica/Panasonic 42.5mm f1.2 lens wide open and I've seen the light (and a wonderfully shallow depth of field portrait rendering).  There are more and more very fast lenses coming onto the market for the smaller cameras which help mitigate this difference between formats. 

But cameras are more than just the sum of their sensors and their lenses. I like the Olympus cameras for several other reasons. I love the tactile feel of the EM5.2 control knobs, as well as their prominence on the top panel of the camera. The size and dimensions of the camera, with the added battery grip are absolutely perfectly sized for my hands. The EVF is great. The image stabilization is one of the wonders of the photographic world. And, counterintuitively, the file size of the raw files is just right for my workflow, and the workflows of nearly everyone I know who is seriously interested in photography. 

Add to all this a sophisticated color rendering, that seems to be a consistent Olympus hallmark, and you've got a great shooting system. Good handling, good color, good viewing, great imaging and metering. It's a powerful system and the camera, currently, brand new, is $899. The EM5.2 ticks every box for me. It's why even though I may stray to other camera systems from time to time, I always come back to the Olympus OMD series for the sheer, exuberant fun of taking photographs. 

I upgraded from the original EM5 cameras to the EM5 version 2 cameras this year. I have two of them. One is black and one is silver. Both are equipped with grips because we shoot video with them and the grips add an input for microphones. I have a fun collection of lenses for these cameras and I'm only sitting on the fence about getting one more lens. I want a serious 70-200mm equivalent and I'm torn between the Panasonic 35-100mm f2.8 (which I have owned and found to be more or less flawless) and the newer, bigger, very well reviewed Olympus 40-150mm f2.8 lens. The Panasonic is smaller and lighter but the Olympus has 50mm of extra reach, which can come in hand. It also has a tripod mount --- desirable for shooting vertical portraits while on a tripod. I'm sure I'll go back and forth until the next project and then make a choice. The only other thing I need to buy is more batteries. Always more batteries. 

But I am comfortable with the cameras and I don't consider the rush to higher megapixel counts in these cameras to be necessary for me. Most client uses for image files haven't changed much since the days of six and twelve megapixel cameras. Yes, used at the bleeding edge of commercial applications, the bigger files are great. But most of us can go through a year or so, professionally, before a project with such stringent and lofty requirements come up.

I'm a bit chicken. Burned by the devastation of the last economic meltdown. I'll use the Nikon D810 not out of necessity but as extra layers of insurance, when I shoot for clients. But when I go out for the joy of taking images and I have no one else that I have to please, except for myself, my choices are much different. It's an important distinction. Work - Play. All the emotion in these kinds of discussions is mostly wrapped up in the artificially binary nature of thinking. Lots of people believe that you MUST make a choice. You must select one system and give it your allegiance at all times. 

I've said time and again that Texans often own a big pick-up truck for hauling crap around and doing work but also own a nice sedan; Honda, BMW or Mercedes --- maybe a Ford Fusion, for those times when parking a dually truck in a downtown parking space just doesn't make sense. 

For my fun camera system of the year I am highly recommending the Olympus OMD cameras. They fill a great niche, are fun to use, and very affordable. 

After almost a year of using them for business and pleasure I am 90% able to navigate their one, non-fatal flaw: the menus. 

Curious to know if you have a dual camera inventory. One for business, another for pleasure. Or am I the outlier here?

A small image gallery of stuff shot commercially last year

with Olympus EM5.2 cameras and M4:3 lenses

(plus an adapted Nikon or two).

Does your lens really need to be the sharpest one in the world to take a photograph of this? I think people will get the content even if the micro contrast is just a little muted.... But that's just me.

From Austin, Texas. The Graffiti Wall. A thought for the New Year. 

Austin is an interesting town to walk around in. Beautiful in its creative energy.

I was walking around the Clarksville area when I saw this. I thought it was beautiful. I walk around here a lot and had never seen this before. Normally it's the kind of shot I'd make with a longer lens like and 85 or a 100mm. But today I had only the 28mm lens I was testing with me. I got pretty close to the painted rock and that allowed me, at f5.6, to take the sharp edge off the leaves in the background. I'd put little red arrows on the image and lie to you about how I spent a couple hours with a calculator and a protractor computing the various angles that might best draw your eye into the picture but that's such rank bullshit you'd probably never believe it.

I saw it. I responded to it. I shot it. Any pretense to pre-shot analysis and planing is just  Monday morning quarterbacking. Anyone tells you they planned it all out is really just saying, "I got lucky and there were some diagonal lines that worked for me."

There's a time for deep dives into design and a time for reaction. The time for deep dives into design is mostly when drawing out the plans for a house or office building. The time for reaction is when you have a camera in your hand and something interesting in front of you to shoot. Go. And try a few variations while you are there....

OT: What do you get the dog that has everything, for Christmas?

If you really want to do the holidays right for Studio Dog you might consider.....tennis balls. She loves them. Really. Just loves them. We have one hallway that's about 50 feet long and when the weather is awful she loves it if you throw balls down the hall. Her main goal is to catch them on the bounce. She'll bring em right back, too.

Tennis balls make dogs smile.

Photo: Studio Dog with tennis ball. Nikon D750. Nikon 50mm f1.8 G. 

How does the 28mm Nikon 2.8D lens stack up? Or should we all just wait for the Zeiss Otus 28mm 1.4?

I think we all do a lot of work with zooms these days and the current thinking is that zooms have caught up with prime lenses (single focal length lenses...) and so there really is no reason to own anything other than each camera makers holy trinity of ultra wide, wide to slightly long and medium to about 200mm telephoto zoom lenses with their f2.8 apertures. Hmmm. I'm not always convinced. 

It's got nothing to do with sharpness or test scores but my reticence to put everything into the zoom lens box is more about size, weight, handling and maybe even native contrast. With a little bit of micro-acuity thrown in for good measure. 

I've been buying single focal length lenses for both the Nikon full frame system and the Olympus OMD system because I think they can be more fun to shoot and that usually translates into more interesting images. I'd recently added a 135mm f2.0 Nikon manual focus lens and a 35mm f2.0 Nikon manual focus lens to my shooting collection and as I looked at my inventory of lenses for the full frame system the two focal lengths I felt I was missing were a 28mm and a 24mm. 

I'll confess that I've never before liked the 28mm focal length. I always felt that it was too long to be strikingly wide angle and too short to isolate primary subjects in the way I'd trained myself to like. But I'm always trying to improve myself and I've seen some really good work done by friends who insist they shot it with 28mm lenses. I have no reason to think they might be lying to me so I decided to start looking around for something in that range to play with. There is the newish 28mm 1.8 G lens from Nikon and it looks nice, in a very pedestrian sort of way. I thought I might just save up for the inevitable Zeiss Otus 28mm f1.4 that's sure to hit the market in time to keep five more bloggers afloat writing "first impressions" reviews and "hands on" reviews, as well as "my review at two weeks."

Then I figured if I waited until after the launch of the 28mm Zeiss Otus it would be followed in short order by the Sigma Art lens and I would have to wade through the new, "My Otus versus Sigma 28mm comparison" reviews before I could make up my mind. Since the pursuit of extreme optical sharpness is more of a dilettante's pursuit I decided to give my avaricious mind a break and think about other stuff instead. So I took Friday off from optical musings and dedicated myself to narrowing down the field of digital audio recorders that are actually convenient to use. But that's another blog...

By Saturday the joy of spending every waking hour with family was growing less alluring and I decided to head over to Precision Camera to torture the sales people with endless questions about digital audio recorders. But every trip to Precision starts with a quick peek at the used camera case for older, film camera and manual focus lenses. Then it progresses to the case with more modern, auto focusing lenses and usually devolves into something totally tangential to my original mission. 

I made it to the modern, used lens case and narrowed down the lovable lenses from a large field of slow zoom lenses that span vast focal length ranges. I was left with two; a 35mm f2.0D lens and a 28mm f2.8 D lens. I played with the 28 for a few minutes, bargained a bit with my exhausted (worn down by the holidays) sales associate and paid a bit over $100 for a nice, clean example of this particular beast. Oh yeah, I also bought another microphone but that's not particularly relevant here. 

I took the lens home and read a few reviews that told me it was quite sharp in the center but less sharp and somewhat mushy on the sides. I laughed a bit, wondered who was so concerned about the corners of a wide angle frame and stuck my new purchase on a shelf. 

Today a cold front hit. Rain poured down this morning and thunder and lightning kept us out of the pool (we swim outside year round). When the rain slowed down I decided to do a long Sunday walk and I looked around for something fun to shoot on a dark, damp and chilly day. The Nikon D750 and the 28mm 2.8D non-perfect lens seemed like a perfect combo. 

I'm betting that most people think of dark and stormy days as crappy times to shoot images and test a lens but I can't think of a better time to do so. You get to use medium apertures (f5.6) and you don't have to worry about huge contrast ranges. Plus you don't have to get all sweaty when you are out walking around. It was 42 (f) this afternoon, and I know that for you living in Colorado or areas of north Texas and New Mexico, that 42 doesn't really count as "cold" but for us in Austin it's comparatively a deep freeze after our near 80 degree Christmas Eve.  

I'll start out by saying that I think this lens is pretty groovy and that I think I'm ready to play in the arena of wider lenses. I actually didn't find the focal length that long today. Don't know why. I guess some people get fatter when they get older while others learn to adapt to wider focal length lenses.

As far as handling goes the lens is a dream. Small, light and relatively bright, it's a pleasure to carry and nice to look through. 

A quick note on viewfinders: When I wrote about focusing manual lenses on AF DSLRs I got some suggestions to try using viewfinder magnifiers made for the various Nikon cameras. I ordered a DK17M for the D810 and a DK21M for the D750. They magnify the viewfinder by 1.2 times which gives you a little more leeway in diopter adjustment and magnifies the viewfinder image. While it doesn't really help with AF focusing the viewing is more fun. I also used the magnifiers in conjunction with a Rokinon Cine 85mm f1.5 this week and was able to discern sharp focus more easily. Thanks to the people who made this suggestion. 

I mention the magnifiers because it makes the view bigger and that's more fun when composing images. The downside for people who wear glasses is that the whole finder is not visible without moving your eye around to see the edges and the corners. 

So, the viewfinder image with the 28mm f2.8 was bright and clear. How is the image quality? Well, sadly, Ken Rockwell doesn't like the lens and thinks that the 24-70mm is sharper. But I found it to be pretty darn good-to-wonderful just walking around and shooting the way I like to shoot. I've set the D750 up with auto ISO to use 1/100th of a second as the lower limit for shutter speeds and I pretty much set the lens at f5.6 for the whole day. While the ISO may go up and down as long as it stays under 3200 ISO it all pretty much looks the same after I post process it.  (more below...)

While Photozone.de and Ken Rockwell bitch about the corners and edges I found that the edges were quite sharp if I kept the lens stopped down to f5.6. I didn't test it wide open but I'm guessing that most of us use a lens like this on 3-D objects and we mostly want the center subject matter to be exquisite and we have various levels of interest in other parts of the image as it ripples away from our primary subjects. I shot an image of this mural about art in Austin and looked pretty closely at 100%. It all looked very sharp to me. Seems to me that a 28 is all about foregrounds and backgrounds, I can't think of a 28mm lens designed for use on 35mm cameras that is optimized for flat field macro work.

In fact, I found the lens delightfully sharp and, more important to me, I found the contrast to be very good, with great micro-acuity and above average nano-acuity. Used on a camera like the D810 I would have no fear in using images of 3-D objects from this lens for my premium, "Hyper-Platinum-Collector's Prints." See my storefront to order... (don't look too hard, we don't really have a storefront).

(more....)

When I shoot with single focal length lenses it takes my brain a while to get dialed in but once I do I kind of automatically look for scenarios that work well for the focal length. This particular 28mm lens seemed to have a lot of character and it pushed me to get looser with my shooting. So loose, in fact, that I changed from using the single point AF modality to using the automatic, all points AF system in the camera. A nice way to give your brain a vacation as you walk around town.

(More....)

 

I hadn't been to the Graffiti Wall in a while but I knew it would be a great place to try out this lens. Be sure to click on the image above (anywhere in the image) to see it larger. I've uploaded the files at 2100 pixel wide images so you won't see them at 100% but you will see them at a decent size for screen viewing. 

The image above showed me that the lens is fun to shoot from the hip. You can focus quickly with a wide angle lens that has a short focus ring throw and the depth of field at 28mm makes up for little faux pas. The color in the images is crisp and saturated and the detail is certainly satisfying for me. 

I think the lens has a little bit of barrel distortion but it seems pretty consistent and not like the mustache distortion on some of the more complex lenses. It's easy to fix in Lightroom and I can imagine that the various Nikon software tools would automatically correct for distortion. I only corrected raw files but didn't see a need to correct Jpeg files; perhaps my camera corrects for them automatically. 

(More...) 

I guess one could get out their digital loupe and really squint at the files looking for the ultimate in resolution and perceived sharpness but I will say that just looking at the images on a well corrected, 30 inch monitor leads me to believe that the lens is as sharp as I would need it to be for professional work. Even wide open at f2.8 the central area of the frame is nicely sharp and contrasty. One only needs to stop down to bring in the corners and far edges. The wonder of using digital cameras is in the post processing software, and with that in mind I ran a few images through my copy of DXO (9.3?) and evaluated the images as well. With some time spent sharpening and correcting the images in that program I would be hard pressed, comparing lenses at f5.6, to understand how much better a lens might need to be. Since this one handily passes my criteria I'm just going to put it into the mix and run with it. Just thinking what a fun combination the 28, 50, 85 and 135 would make, and how much I can do with them. 

Now I'm keeping my eyes peeled for a nice, clean 24mm f2.8D and maybe a 20mm as well. We'll see what the New Year brings. In the meantime I hope we all get more of the message below.....

My Most Profitable camera purchase of 2015. And a nod to a lens that has become an unexpected, almost irreplaceable, ally in the same year.

I've owned a lot of cameras since I started doing photography full time, as a for profit business, back in 1988. I've run through a number of camera systems and I'm here to tell you that there's always one camera in every cycle of business that is the one you make most of your money with.

In the film days I could have tossed out most of the cameras I'd craved and bought and just used a Hasselblad 501 CM over and over and over again. In fact, I think that's what I pretty much did.

In the digital age there are certain cameras that stuck out in their time period as workhorse tools that I always turned to when we needed to get stuff just right, and be reasonably certain that our bills would get acknowledged and paid. For a while it was the Kodak DCS 760. After a few years the megapixel counts increased and camera usability improved enough to make the purchase of a Nikon D2Xs seem practical. That camera turned out great files over and over again....

Then things got hazy for a while as I galloped through mirrorless cameras, mirrored 4:3 cameras and various Sony, Canon and Nikon APS-C cameras. But early this year the equipment drawer got thinned out and two new cameras stepped in to take over image making duties; the Nikon D750 and the Nikon D810.

While I enjoy shooting the D750 more because of its lightweight, more manageable file sizes, slightly better video implementation (and cheaper purchase and replacement price) it's the D810 that I turned to for pretty much every advertising shot, every environmental portrait, and even nearly every video project I touched this year.

There's are reasons why the D810 is my go-to money maker. Usually, when I am shooting commercial, corporate and advertising jobs (as opposed to multiple day events) the size and weight of a camera is NOT a consideration. The supporting gear is far more bulky and cumbersome, and everything travels in cases to prevent breakage. We have a large cart we used to bring everything we need for a shoot into a client's environment. It's efficient to carry stuff this way and, if you are working near enough to arrive by car (as opposed to packing for air travel) the cart allows you to bring stuff you might not consider essential but which may come in handier than you thought it might.

On most locations we light rooms, portraits, processes and most other routine photographs so we're pretty much anchored by lighting in one spot at a time, for a while. The camera can sit on a tripod while I do most things so, all in all, for the most profitable jobs the camera's physical configuration is neutral.

On these kinds of shoots I carry the following lenses: 20mm, 20-40mm zoom, 25-50mm zoom, 24-120mm zoom, 35mm f2.0 prime, 50mm f1.4 prime, 85mm t1.5 prime, 105mm f2.5 prime, 135mm f2.0 prime and an 80-200mm f2.8 zoom that has stood the test of time.

The D810 is highly configurable for shooting. I can put a 50mm f1.4 lens on the front and change the angle of view by changing the crop from 1.2 to 1.3 to 1.5 (DX) and I can do this with raw or Jpeg files. This means the 50mm can be it's regular self or a tighter portrait focal length of around 75mms.
The density of the sensor is such that there is very little quality loss even with the biggest crop in camera.

With practice, and an external monitor that allows for focus peaking, the D810 is a great video interview camera. The color science is really good and the camera provides a big and solid base onto which we can connect microphones, headphones, big lenses and larger HDMI cables. I can punch into the scenes before I start shooting to establish that I've achieved sharp focus at nearly 1:1.

But the main two things that make the camera a first choice in critical picture taking are the resolution of the sensor and the dynamic range of the sensor. Clients are extremely pleased when they can keep zooming in on a large monitor and continue to see more and more detail. They always want to err on the side of "too much" rather than "not enough." While most projects can be well accomplished with a 24 megapixel sensor there's a "shock and awe" confidence booster to having more than one needs. I learned this when pressing a smaller, m4:3 files to poster sized, print blow ups, in the previous year.

The second parameter, dynamic range, isn't usually on client radars but comes in handy to me if I over or under expose frames. The very wide dynamic range enables me to cover my ass without embarrassment. The dynamic range also comes in very handy when I do photographs of people out in the Texas sun. Holding both bright highlights and shadow detail to an almost natural degree (especially with the "flat" camera profile engaged) is almost like an advertising magic trick. Client don't know why they appreciate the looks so much but they do.

When you bundle the above with a decent size, a good battery life and great reliability you've got a package that you come to trust. If you are working on a personal project you can hide your mistakes, the shortcomings of a camera or lens, and anything else embarrassing. You can go out and shoot something over and over again until you get it right. You can save stuff in post. Or almost save it. You can state that the image is the way it is because you intended it "to be art." But when the ability to make the mortgage or the tax bill is on the line there's a satisfaction in having a tool like the Nikon D810 in your inventory. It just flat out delivers. And you'll pretty much always know that it's overall imaging quality is within a percentage or two of all the other top cameras on the market.

For work it was a bargain at $3200.

Now, this doesn't mean that the D810 is necessarily the fun camera to shoot. In terms of real fun that honor falls to the Olympus EM5.2; and, if I am being honest, I have to say that the files from that camera (which I use for event work a lot of the time) would work just as well for about 90 % of the jobs. It's just that I'd have to be on my game all the time to pull off the kind of technical  work that I can just phone in with the D810.

My other favorite camera is more of an emotional choice. I shoot the D750 because the file size is optimal, it's not so expensive if the camera gets trashed or stolen but at the same time I get the look of the full frame sensor,  coupled with endless battery life and a fun sized package to carry around. Where the D750 shines is shooting in low light. But that's not a very big percentage of what I do.

I don't love the D810 on an emotional basis but I do LOVE it on a commercial basis. It's a business camera in every respect. Once the D810 and I make some money I can always sit back and play with the more interesting cameras. It's a comfortable schism and one I respect.

And that's why I have a D810 and keep it charged up and ready.

Oh yeah. The lens. I have to confess that I bought the latest version of the Nikon 24-120mm f4.0 VR lens as a stop gap to file the gaps in focal lengths as I grew my Nikon full frame system.  I was a little skittish about buying it since I had briefly (very briefly!) owned the very first version of the lens and found it to be a complete dog. A reminder of the ancient 43-86mm zoom lens Nikon made in the 1970s that was guaranteed to be unsharp at any aperture or focal length.

I have subsequently found that they've made up lost ground quite nicely and the model I now have is at least up to the standards of its Canon competitor, the 24-105mm L series lens.

I use it for lots and lots of stuff because it's wonderful to have such a wide range of focal lengths at your disposal and even at f4.0 it's pretty sharp in the center. Certainly nice for quick P.R. shots of workers or executives. The wide end is usable for most subjects, at least where sharpness is concerned but you'll need to make sure you have a good custom profile for the lens if you intend to use the wide end on anything with straight lines. Perhaps a good argument for owning a copy of DXO's software.

It's a great lens to use for walking through an industrial plant and stopping frequently to make images of processes or really cool machinery. The VR gives me between 2.5 and 3 stops of image stabilization, which is quite helpful. It's also a great lens to pair with on camera flash for fast breaking, news style images.

The lens sells for around $1,200. I found one taken out of a kit but with a U.S.A. warranty new for around $900. I didn't think I'd use it too much but it goes with me on most jobs and I end up using it a lot. The only place I'm not thrilled with it is for portraiture where I always want more control over depth of field and a different handling of tones and details for faces. I find most modern lenses to be so well corrected that they are vicious at rendering skin tones and at creating pleasing portraits. If I'm traveling light and working mostly with the 24-120mm I then also take along a 105mm f2.5 ais lens as it seems to be the aesthetic opposite; lots of resolution without the harsh, baked in contrast. But then adding contrast is the one thing we can generally do well with almost all of our post processing.

I give the 24-120mm my second highest ranking: A worthwhile lens that returns profitable images for commerce. Just under my ultimate ranking: Damn! That's an incredible lens. But it quickly passes my base level test: Would I buy it again? Absolutely!