So, Changing Gears for a Moment. I Want to Talk About a Pitfall of the Portrait Business.

In all the years I have known Belinda she has never complained about her face or seemed to be particularly self-conscious. So this image is here, at the top of the article, because I like it and I won't get sued for using it in conjunction with this topic...

I am in the business of making portraits for people. In order to make money doing this I have to make portraits of people in such a way that they will like the end result. But what do you do when a person just doesn't like the way their face looks? How do you handle the customer who feels that their face is not particularly photographable? Where is the intersection between customer satisfaction and business survival?

I bring this up because last year I'd taken a number of photographs of key executives for a mid-sized company. We created a style for the company and followed through on that style for every portrait. A few weeks after the shoot; and after all the selections had been made, and all the photographs were retouched, one executive got in touch with me and told me that she regretted her choice of blouse. She felt, after seeing it in all of its saturated (almost magenta) glory, that is just didn't match the expectations of her professional culture. I take things like this in stride. The office manager had already gotten in touch and scheduled an additional session for several new hires and, since we'd be on location at their offices, it would be very little additional work to re-shoot our disappointed customer in a better choice of wardrobe. 

She was very happy to have another shot at wardrobe selection and the re-done image was exactly what she wanted. We did not charge a fee for the re-shoot. My philosophy is to make the client happy with their portrait in any way that I can and that includes re-shooting if they are disappointed in any way. It's just good business. 

Recently the office manager got in touch again to schedule a session for another new hire. She also asked what I would charge to shoot another round of portraits for a different executive; one we had photographed in our first session, over a year ago. I told her that I would add the second portrait in when we came to photograph the new hire at no charge. If the executive was unhappy with the original portrait I wanted to fix the situation, and if another try at bat would do the trick I was certainly game. 

But I wanted to know what the person wanted to change; what would be different in the second attempt? Was it another wardrobe issue? No, it turns out that she just isn't at all comfortable with being photographed, doesn't like her smile and could be tough to please. What could I do differently this time?

I arrived at 10am and set up lighting, etc. The new hire was a fun attorney in the same age demographic as me and we developed a more or less instant rapport. We both have a kid in college, we both have spent the last 40+ years in Austin, Texas, our politics are solidly aligned, we both have technical backgrounds that are different from our current vocations. Getting a great expression from him was simple as pie. 

When we finished up sharing hands and exchanging business cards my re-shoot client stepped into the conference room we were using as a temporary studio. After the first client left I asked her to tell me what she didn't like about the last round of portraits and she was very honest. She told me she has always hated the way she looks in portraits. It quickly became apparent that her anxiety about being photographed was creating enough tension so that she was having troubling relaxing and showing her real self. I don't have any magic bullets for dealing with difficult portrait situations but experience tells me that people relax over time. Even making them bored beats photographing someone who is uncomfortable.  Neither of us had pressing business following our session so we starting making a few images, looking at them and then talking through what we wanted to fix. 

But most of the time we talked and got to know each other. She told me stories about her children and I shared stories about Ben. She's an avid golfer so I told my two favorite golf stories; one about getting an inadvertent,  four hour long, private lesson on driving on the 7th tee box of the Barton Creek Country Club's Fazio Course with Ben Crenshaw and Tom Kite, and the second one about playing eighteen holes with Sugar Ray Leonard (the boxer), who spent a good part of that time talking about the birth of his youngest child...

At one point, while flowing along in conversation my reticent subject, she said she had an epiphany and realized why she didn't like the look of her face. It was a cathartic moment that cleared out a lot of the tension she felt. The final frame I shot was clearly the best of the batch. We had spent thirty or forty minutes chatting and shooting. It was worth the time.

I'm editing down the number of images I'm putting up in her online gallery (for selection) and I have no idea if she will like the new group of images better than the last ones but I did take the step of retouching several image candidates just to show her what we can do in post processing to change a few of the things she is not particularly fond of. It takes some time to do this but it's my preference not to have single customer/client in my home market who has anything but good reviews for both my work and my commitment to creating work that.... works. For them.

I find that when things aren't going smoothly the power of just slowing down and getting to know your subject is more important than anything technical that you might try. After all, it's rarely a technical glitch that causes someone to have buyer's remorse about their portraiture. The usual culprit is that the session didn't go long enough or deep enough to penetrate the glossy outer layer of a person's defenses and show something real and authentic (and positive) about the subject. The only way around it is to go through the process and find a way to make connections that give clients a pathway to show themselves genuinely to the camera. Same applies to video interviews. You have to get through the protective shields that we all surround ourselves with. The shield is there to keep us from getting hurt but it also keeps the portrait process at a distance. 

Some people are more inclined to make that shield thick and strong. I think the only cure is time, and the shared process of creating a safe space for clients to show their honest selves. 

A Great Blog about Mirrorless versus DSLR by ATMTX...

https://blog.atmtxphoto.com/2017/04/11/why-dslrs-will-ultimately-lose/

Andy always has an interesting take on formats....

Did I mention that I'm posting more and more stuff to Instagram? I wonder how that will work out.

Chanel for Zach Theatre Marketing Project. 2017

I am putting up favorite photos on Instagram. 

I would enjoy your feedback there. 

Here's the address:

https://www.instagram.com/kirktuck/

Comparing style and technique. They are intertwined.

I can shoot available light as well as anyone but on important assignments (or when I just want stuff to look really good) I bring along lights and I've learned to use them effectively. I have several friends who are full time videographers and they are sometimes at odds with the way I shoot video. They have bought into the idea that "good" video work should be cinematic. But like every term tossed about these days nearly every person with a camera has their own definition of "cinematic."

What I see most often from my "cinematic" friends are very, very flat files with no well defined blacks, not much structure in the shadows, milky and opaque mid-tones, endless highlight tonality and very low color saturation. Much of their work is "available light" which means: "Hey, these cameras are so noise-free I can use them without having to set up lighting. No, I am not looking at their ungraded S-Log files I am looking at their samples and their finished work.

The friends whose work I know best are both fairly accomplished videographers and I understand that they prefer a flatter contrast than I do. They also seem to enjoy files with about half the saturation I want. They also have, in the past, dreaded setting up lighting that I would routinely consider mandatory.  That's all okay. It's style versus style. Taste for taste.

But I recently swapped files with a good friend and he said he struggled to get the same kind of color and contrast out of his dedicated video camera that I've been getting out of my cheaper, all purpose camera. We compared technique and we more or less concluded that lighting a scene, well, made all the difference in the world. Controlling variables is the magic bullet.

So, let's talk about light. Here's the first fact: digital image files look best and are measurably better (meaning they have the highest potential sharpness, lowest overall noise, best dynamic range and most saturation) at their lowest ISO. This is almost always the "native" ISO of a device. You can extend the ISO range of many cameras but the lowest ISO, without extension, is the native ISO of your device. While an A7Sii may be useable at 12,000 or 96,000 ISO there will be a deterioration of all the desirable attributes listed above. It is true of every digital camera sensor.

Here's a second, related fact: Getting good exposure is more than just getting enough photons on a sensor to make an image, it also means getting good balance, from light to dark, in the image file. Yes, most cameras with Sony sensors generate files that can be "pushed" or "pulled" in post processing. But, if you are underexposing because you live in fear of overexposing your highlight tones you will be degrading the tones and information in the shadows of your image and, when you "pull up" your exposure via curves, levels, or just straightforward exposure sliders you are shifting crappy, low information parts of your tonal curves from the shadow areas into the mid-tones. By having fewer bits of information to work with in your mid-tones you are sentencing your mid-range tones to a life in which optimum separation of details and tones never meets its potential.  Want a "better" camera? Buy a meter and learn how to use it. Or really pay attention to all those exposure indications that come bundled with your camera. A balanced file is our initial aim point.

What this all means is that in order to realize your vision of a file full of good information; from shadows to the highest highlights, you need to expose correctly in the first place. If you are "saving" highlights by pulling down curves, or "opening" shadows by pulling up curves, you are losing vital information that is essential to the optimum file integrity you pursue.

If you are videotaping or photographing in a location with low light you have only one real choice if you are to pursue ultimate technical quality (and by extension garner the artistic control you desire) and that is to add light to your scene in order to get closer to the optimum exposure at the native ISO, or to use wider apertures and slower frame rates, or shutter speeds, to get the same exposure results. Since depth of field is generally determined by what you need to keep in focus it makes sense to have lights handy and to know how to use them.....well. Changing depth of field to compensate for not lighting isn't always a workable compromise.

There is a reason that Hollywood blockbuster productions don't scrimp on lighting, or attempt to shoot feature movie files at nosebleed high ISOs. They get the best bang for their production bucks the closer they hover near native ISO for their cameras and the closer they hover to the idea of balanced files. We may have different tastes in the look for files but we can generally agree that most feature productions aim for uniform lighting styles which means most film are well lit and lit well enough to use the cameras the way in which they were designed to excel.

While it's true that there are many fast lenses and that fast lenses will save you if you need the speed and don't mind a very, very narrow depth of field the fact is fast lenses can't do much to help you if the lighting contrast of your scene is out of whack. If you are shooting interior locations and showing some exterior scenery you are playing around with a set of variables. To max the image quality of your still or video camera you have limited options. You must either bring up the level of interior light on your interior subject or bring down the level of exterior light which your camera can see outside --- nothing else is an optimum image quality solution, no matter how badly you want to think you can always fix the problem in post.

If you opt not to light your interior subject you may have to let your exterior burn to white ---- if you want the light on your interior subject to be correct and ample enough not to use up your accurate shadow detail. Just for reference, most of the information in digital files is engineered to be in the mid-range to highlight areas. The nature of the way files are created takes advantage of the fact that our eyes see less tonal variation in shadows and so camera makers don't put as much information in the areas of shadow. The eye is much more capable of detail discrimination in highlights, and when the files are written detail in shadow areas of the files is somewhat compromised, by design, in order to maximize detail in the medium toned and highlight areas; areas where your eyes and brain are most sensitive (it's a "rods and cones" thang). If you choose to "hold" the highlights in your exposure (under expose) and sacrifice the mid-tones with the idea of fixing it all by lifting the shadows in post you'll be pushing up the part of the file with the least bit depth and tonal information and placing it onto the visual curve at a part of the curve where the human eye has much more ability to discern and value the opposite kinds of visual parameters. Pulling shadow mud up into the mid-ranges only gives you mid-ranged mud. Achieving acuity in visually vital parts to the tonal curve requires balanced files.

Let's move on to one more vital part of the whole quality chain. This is color balance. This is most important to still shooters who like to shoot and stay in Jpeg, and to filmmakers who are using any camera file except raw files (and, in the case of Canon, many aspects of what are traditionally expected of raw files are already "baked in" to their cine cameras...).

If you are shooting any of the popular video camera profiles (or Jpeg in still cameras) it really doesn't matter (much) what your camera's bit depth is or how color is written. The basic balance of the color spectrum is locked in when you shoot the file. You may be able to adjust the colors somewhat but making any significant changes to the color results in throwing away valuable spectral information that's a necessary part of a full information file. Shifting color balance after exposure is like working with a light that only puts out partial colors ---- something is missing that needs to be there to make sense to the human brain when looking at a finished representation of a scene. After the fact color balancing on anything but a raw file always involves tossing away information that you need in order to have color that reads as "real."

If you have a file that's too yellow and you change your RGB curves to "add" more blue you may find that what you are really doing is tossing the yellow information altogether which will affect your greens, reds, oranges and their sub-hues. There is no free lunch in post exposure color correction. Except, sometimes, in raw files.

You have choices. You always have choices. If you decide to rescue a scene by placing a subject that should be in the mid-tone range down into the shadow range to later bring it "back to life" in post you'll be "reviving" an image that's already been damaged and lost information. If you add to that the degradation of also having to throw away pixels to color correct you will have thrown away even more valuable information. At some point, without actually going in and painting back color with a brush, you will never be able to get to the aim points that constitute a "good" file, or a file that looks good. There's just not enough magic in the software to save the results of low information files.

Raw is a different story. But raw isn't magic either, the same basic constraints apply, the only difference is that in raw there is a lot more leeway for slop because the raw files start with more native information. You can throw more away before the files look as crappy as baked in files because there is more to through away to begin with. But even raw files have their limits.

I'm a plodding photographer and a more or less novice film maker but I am a creature of habits and most of the habits have survived from the days when files were very fragile and there was very little information in the files to compromise with. I am a stickler for getting things right before I push the shutter button to make a photograph, or push the red button to start making video.

Step one is always exposure. If the exposure is off one way or another then it's not always practical or practicable to get a good, solid custom white balance. There are logical steps to doing the process correctly. In film making and in photography the first step is always exposure. After the right amount of light is falling on the sensor only then can you make a perfectly accurate custom white balance. Anything less than a custom  white balance will require changes in post and those changes will require you to throw away information. Even if you are shooting video in S-Log the two steps to proper file creation are still carved in stone. Exposure and then color balance. Then everything else will fall into place.

Finally, to my friends who are working with inexpensive (+/- $1,000 cameras) to mid-priced (+/- $12,000 cameras) I would council shying away from using S-Log ( or V-Log or C-Log) profiles in any environment except full, high contrast sunlight. The reason is simple, Log files work by shooting super flat and then mapping the resulting files into a fixed gamut. It's hard to do well and requires shoehorning wider data into a smaller gamut space. Some aspect has to be interpolated in order to fit. You may use curves to bring down shadows into a usable and range and visually desirable contrast range but it's rare for me to see files color managed this way that don't have milky, almost opaque mid-range tones and lifeless near shadow tones. Just doesn't look convincing. The only way it really works well is with cameras that shoot at higher bit depth and write color as 4:4:4:4. Those cameras? Sure, use all the Log profiles you want...

I'm a proponent of getting as close to your desired "final look" as you can get while operating your camera and only depending on post production for things that absolutely can't be changed any other way. Is shooting and doing post (laboriously) in S-Log 3 really more desirable than taking time to put up a diffusion scrim on top of your subject to mediate the collimated rays the sun? I think the change in the quality of light speaks for itself, and the scrim gives you added control and uniformity. Sure, you might be able to get a decent file by presenting a flatter file in post but is it in line with our preferred visual references? Don't we want to see deep, rich black? Don't we want to see contrast in our mid-tones? Don't we want to see open and airy highlights?  I contend that we do and that the current style of flat light, vague saturation, and muddy shadows and lower mid-tones is a short-lived style that will soon recede from general practice.

Much like the mania for shooting everything with super narrow depth of field is already looking like a "last century" style because of it's massive overuse. In fact, one could say that these styles are analogous to the constant zooming that amateur film makers did in the 1960's when inexpensive zoom lenses first flooded the market on the front of consumer-accessible Super8 movie cameras. And we tired pretty quickly of that kind of "tromboning."

The bottom line is that if you start your process with a file that needs rescued you will never squeeze out all the imaging potential your camera is capable of. I may make files that are a bit too saturated but it's easier to get rid of excess saturation information in post than it is to add it to a file in which the color was absent because non-linearities in color curves change the look of the file as you add saturation. And the color spectrum shifts. I can start with a perfectly exposed file and throw away information to make the file conform to my vision but it's much harder to take a dark file and make it lighter with the same quality as an optimum file. It's true in reverse as well. If you start too light you might be able to get to a workable file by pulling down the curve to recover highlights but if you start with a file that is right on the money you can shift it with total control to a lighter version.

Pianists practice scales and keyboard exercises so that when the opportunity comes to play real music they will have already mastered the techniques and muscle memory required to play well. Sloppy technique is not a sign or great artistic promise or merit. It is only a signifier that you still have some technique to master and some skills that need practice. In digital imaging style and technique go hand in hand. You master technique in order to master your style. Anything else is just wishful thinking or playtime.

Early Sunday Morning Photo Assignment. Who Schedules a photo session at 8 a.m. on a Sunday?

Leslie for Zach Theatre. ©2017 Kirk Tuck.

"It was the only time we could schedule five different actors, an art director, two artistic directors, a make-up person and a wardrobe person, all at the same day...." -client.

I got up early. Well, early for a Sunday... packed the car with interesting equipment and showed up at the front door of Zach Theatre at eight a.m. We spent all morning, and some of the afternoon, shooting new images for the upcoming show season at Zach Theatre. Everything was shot against a muslin background which will be dropped out to white; but not by me 😂. 

Rona was the art director and, in addition to being a great creative collaborator, she dropped by Austin Java this morning to pick up (really good) coffee, killer muffins and breakfast tacos. I must pause here to say that the black bean, feta cheese and avocado tacos were wonderful. She pulled up with the chow right at 8 a.m. on the money. I was already dragging a cart of gear to the front doors of the theater.

We did this shoot differently than many of my recent shoots. There are two big things I want to talk about. The first is listening enough to bring the right gear for the project. I've been on an LED/Continuous light jag for some time now and generally use the Aputure Lightstorm LED panels for just about everything. But I am cautious. I want to be prepared. So when we shoot at the theater I always ask if we've be doing any shots with motion. Like dancing. Or people twirling around in fancy costumes. Or jumping from the balcony. I'm glad I thought to ask yet again because we had one person who did some big dance moves and another who did big dress twirls. Not to knock the continuous light world but on a shoot like this it just makes sense to go with flash and freeze the frames that need to be stop motion. No horsing around with high ISOs and noise reduction solutions today...

I mostly used two lights. A 500 w/s flash into a 72 inch, white umbrella, and a 500 w/s flash into a 36x48 inch softbox. Simple and straightforward. 

The addition of flash to the mix gave me the chance to "take a risk" and prove to myself once and for all that shooting at the base ISO of just about any camera on the market today would give me very good, very professional images. At the last minute I pulled the A7rii and A7ii out of the camera bag and stuck them back in the drawer. In their places I substituted a Sony RX10iii and a Panasonic fz2500. I was hellbent on testing them together; eliminating as many variables as possible and seeing just how good each camera (and each lens) would be if I zero'ed out the effects of motion blur, camera movement, and high ISO noise reduction blurring. 

I used the Sony for the first three actors and the Panasonic for the last two actors of the day. The lighting stayed pretty much the same with a few little adjustments. Both cameras were set to their lowest ISOs (native) the Panasonic was 125 and the Sony 100. Both lenses were set to f8.0. Both cameras were set to face detection AF. And, in the end both cameras were nearly identical in their results. It's pretty much what I expected. 

We worked hard this morning. The actors were wonderful. The experience was well worth getting out of bed for. The cameras were whimsical, but well behaved. And now I have proven, at least to myself, that, used properly, both cameras are well suited for studio work like this. They both make very nice raw files. Adobe's Lightroom takes care of everything else. 

It's been a long week working on projects for the Theatre. I shot candid b-roll video on the "Billie Holiday" stage a week ago Saturday, followed by a tech rehearsal shoot on Sunday evening and a dress rehearsal shoot on Tues. evening.  Weds. morning was consumed with photographic post processing and the afternoon taken up with video interviews of the "Billie Holiday" director and the lead actor. 

Thurs. and Fri. were taken up, in large part, by video editing for the same production. Yesterday I shot and post processed at kid's play called, J.J.'s Workshop, and finally, today was the all consuming, season brochure project. With the exception of the two non-video "Billie Holiday" shoots all of the projects have been done with the one inch sensor cameras. They've worked out well. Stop worrying about sensor size and make sure you nail the lighting, composition and timing.

Here's a few more from this morning.

This is an approximate 100% crop from the image just below. It started life with the Panasonic camera.

The full frame of the image just above...

don't know what I said to get this much laughter but I wish I'd written it down...

the "over the shoulder" shot is a perennial Zach Theatre favorite. Wigs and tiaras = wow. 

For those who offered condolences about the recently deceased Sony lens: I want to thank you and let you know that the wake for the passing of good glass was cathartic. We raised a few glasses to its memory and vowed to replace it with something virtuous. Thank you!

Click thru and buy something if you have the time and money.

A new lens? A nice shirt? Maybe a new watch. 

Damn it. I just lost money. I was thinking about watches and went to Amazon to see what's what in watches. I ended up buying a demure, little Seiko automatic. It's the same on Ben has. Not too pricey but totally unnecessary. Oh well. It's nice to look at. 

The Sad and Accidental Destruction of a Lens Earlier Today. It Could Have Been Worse...

 It is with no small degree of sadness that I must announce the passing of a valiant and steadfast lens. While the Sony FE 28-70mm lens was relatively new to the lens cabinet he was a jovial addition and quickly made friends with a diverse group of lenses from several different systems. He'll be remembered for his convenient size and weight as well as his ready wit. Often, he would muse to no one in particular, "Who needs anything wider than twenty-eight. Really?!"

We lost him around 11:30 am, CST, today when he seemed to leap in front of a Sony A7Rii camera and the new 85mm lens in order to save them from an accidental tail wag. The assorted gear was sitting on a shelf about four feet from a (dreaded and obviously dangerous) Saltillo tile floor. The CEO of VSL had lifted his companion, Studio Dog, up off the floor in order to carry her across the way to the studio. One swish of a tail was all it took.

The brave little lens was swept from the countertop with a fair amount of force and hit the floor with gusto, bouncing at least twice. Its companions came to no harm because of his brave intercession.

At first there was hope that 28/70 had survived. There was no "apparent" damage. But a cursory check with the lens on a camera indicated that it had lost the ability to focus and had partially lost the ability to zoom.

It was a sad loss of great potential; the lens had only been out on a few test runs, but we had great hopes that this would be the one to turn the tide and revitalize the entire photographic industry. I thought it might be "the chosen lens" of which the legends speak...

A eulogy will be said by his close friend, Sony 24-70mm f4.0 in a small, private ceremony. The wake begins after supper this evening.

To say I am devastated may be slightly overstating the situation but I will state for the record that this is the last time I'll put loyal and valuable camera gear on the counter next to the front door again. If we can save one other camera or lens from the same tragedy our caution will have been worth it.

We have maintained a safe space for lenses for over 20 years without incident. That sign (which brags of our safety record) gets replaced on Monday and, hopefully, will read = "No lens accidents in over 2 days".

Please....no flowers.

A new lens purchase. Sometimes nostalgia takes precedence.

In the early days of my time as a photographer I could barely afford three lenses. I made them do everything on every job. There's always been the mythology that to be a "professional" photography one needs a Pelican case full of lenses; every focal length the maker of your camera provides. It's a paralyzing mythology for a lot of young photographers who can't afford all the glamorous glass they've been led to believe they need. But as one progresses in one's career it becomes pretty obvious that there emerge preferences for certain focal lengths and, at some point, the majority of images from some well known photographers end up being made almost exclusively with one favorite lens; one favorite focal length.

When I started out I made some logical decisions (at least I imagined that they were logical...). I bought a nice, used Canon FD 24mm f2.8, an even more used Canon FD 50mm f1.4 and a newish Canon FD 85mm f1.8. I used them mostly with my Canon EF SLR and my ancient back-up camera, a Canon TX, which boasted shutter speeds all the way up to 1/500th of a second!!!

I used the 24mm sparingly, pressing it into service to shoot interiors of new homes for developers and the exteriors of new apartment complexes being built in central Texas. The 50mm was my standard street shooting, new documentarian lens. But the real money maker was the 85mm f1.8. I used it to shoot portrait after portrait, and to build my business. There was a flow for me and it was always toward the medium telephoto focal ranges. Something just clicked in my brain whenever I picked up the lens and aimed it at someone.

Over time I followed in the routine pattern of photographers and decided that lenses of all variety were a vital necessity for a growing imaging business; that I would be letting my clients down if I did not have every focal length from 14mm to 300mm (and beyond), with 10 or 20mm of difference in between each of the primes. Crazy, but that's the way so many people roll ---- they think they need almost overlapping "coverage" even if they must go into deep debt to achieve it. Can't let those clients down, right?

Well, give it thirty years or so, drop 300,000+ photographs into your Lightroom library, and you begin to be able to see a clearer picture of what drives your work, your art. A bit of informal data mining shows me that the vast majority of work I've done was completed with focal lengths between 85mm and 135mm but that the vast majority were done right around 85-90mm.

When Sony came out with their G Master 85mm f1.4 I was momentarily intrigued but then I lifted one up and all my interest vanished. Damn thing is a weighty brick and the price tag must have been calculated by the ounce. I've been making do with a Rokinon Cine 85mm t1.5 but I was getting tired of manually focusing everything and remembering to stop down, etc.

Why not just use the (very sharp) 85mm focal length on the 70-200mm f4.0 G? Because it's too big and unwieldy for an every day, tagalong user. So, I was thrilled when Sony came out with their FE 85mm f1.8. I read some reviews, watched the guys on TheCameraStoreTV compare it with the similar model from Zeiss, and finally decided to pick one up.

I drove out to Precision Camera this morning, dropped my six hundred bucks on the counter and walked out with one in the box. It's utilitarian, manageably small and the front element (67mm) looks very cool. I haven't shot with it yet ---- I'll do that all weekend long on two jobs coming up --- but I like the way it balances on my A7ii.

When it comes to my full frame, working cameras I am very happy to be circling back to the basics. I'm loving the new FE 50mm f1.8, the 85mm holds great promise, and I'm toying with getting a 24mm as well. That will be the last one of the trio I'd buy. I've got a nice, small 24-70mm Zeiss lens that seems to handle that focal length well. At any rate, I'm getting a nice, nostalgic hit of pleasure from my new purchase. And reasonably priced as well.

Now, when will they come out with a new RX 10 series camera, complete with a super fast 85mm equivalent lens? Happiness across formats.

P.S. owning a wide range of lenses is hardly necessary for a working photographer. In retrospect most of the focal lengths I ended up buying I would gladly trade back for the time I spent working for them.....

Full frame versus one inch? Nope; it's not a contest.

One of these images was made with a $1500, one inch sensor, bridge camera while the other was made with a camera most would consider either "the" or "one of" the current state of the art, full frame camera ($3200) coupled with a $1500 lens. If I pull them onto a 27 inch Retina screen and blow them both up I can tell that one is less noisy, a bit more detailed, and has slightly nicer overall tonality (chalk that up to increased dynamic range). Would my client care which camera made which photograph? Hardly. They are looking for the right moment, the right expression, the right composition and the right emotion. The idea of "extreme" technical differences between these cameras would be laughable to them. So, which one is from the RX10iii and which was created by the A7rii? The one on top is the RX while the one on the bottom is the A7xx.

I was thinking about the images I recently shot for Zach Theatre as I drank coffee this morning and read the usual sites. I start with the Washington Post, dabble in the Wall Street Journal and NY Times and sometimes end up seeing what's new over at DP Review. Today, chomping on a waffle, I started reading through the comments on DP Review that readers had left on the Fuji medium format camera review. That inspired me to also read the review.  Given all the hoopla attached to breathless "previews" and "first impressions" looks at the product I presumed that DP Reviewers would find the camera (GFX 50S) to be a very big step up from the full frame contingent from Nikon, Sony and Canon. It was not the case. 

While the reviewers found the camera endearing and brave they also had to admit that the output from the Sony A7rii was, in some cases, very close to the overall quality in comparison and, in some cases, even superior. Add in fast, sharp lenses and great zooms and the review soon devolved into a study of just how far 35mm sized systems have come and how the system really determines how well the various  cameras will work and how high the quality of the output will be. And they mentioned that it would be nice if the two MF cameras focused, you know, more rapidly. And more importantly, will the quality of MF translate into the kind of work you do. 

I laughed at one point when someone on the DPReview staff earnestly wrote that there was a difference of .08th of a stop in some performance aspect of the Fuji MF versus the H-Blad mirrorless MF camera. A pea under the mattress of the reviewer princess, indeed. 

As expected, the comments ran the gamut but the schism was between people who encouraged putting off a final judgement until the MF makers could rush faster lenses to the market in order to match the (mindless) equivalency between the systems, and the people who already knew that this kind of MF camera, coupled with slow lenses, at misguided focal lengths, would render the product only useful to collectors and people anxious to show off their purchasing power (awfully hard to bring your luxe car into the night club with you on the end of a strap...).

Which brings me back to the question of competition between formats and sensor sizes. There are differences but they are aesthetic specific. You need ultra thin depth of field you go one way, you need incredible reach you go another way. But point of view, mastery of lighting, directing and composition mostly trump a lot of technical considerations....at least where clients are concerned. 

I have several full frame cameras but I find myself preferring to shoot most things with a one inch sensor camera. When it comes to producing video I am even more firmly in the one inch camp. Master the techniques of photography and the absolutism of format tyranny fades. It's nice.

While the commenters at DP Review seemed to think that there were never fast lenses for medium format systems I remember owning and using the Zeiss Planar 110mm f2.0 with a Hasselblad 201F for a while. That and the 150mm f2.8 seemed plenty fast to me.