Author: Richard

Well in my continued search for a small camera that gives SLR results, I was eagerly looking forward to the Panasonic GF-2, the upgraded version of the GF-1.  Well it was announced last month, and I have been reading the reviews and following the forums closely.  Like many photographers its proven to be a bit of a disapointment to me, not a GF-1 update at all but a camera aimed at people moving up from a compact.  Thats not to say its a bad camera its not, in fact its a very good camera and in some areas better then a GF-1 but its not for me.

You can read more here at Chris Bennett’s Photo Blog and at The Luminous Landscape.

Next week I hope to get my hands on a Sony Nex-5 and give that a test.  Currently of all the cameras I have managed to get my hands on the Panasonic GF-1 is currently winning the race to lay claim to a space in my motorcycle tank bag, and make my bank account lighter.

In the lookout for a small camera, my friend Andrew, bass player of Plagues Fire took the plunge and purchased the new Sony NEX-5.  A camera similar in design to the Olympus Pen and new Panasonic GF-2.

If your after small then the Sony NEX-5 is the camera for you, with a great APS-C sized sensor the same size as Nikon DX SLR’s it has the potential for great image quality.

The cold wintery weather was the ideal time to take a wonder along the Lincolnshire Viking Way long distance footpath, getting some great shots along the way.  Heres a selection of Andrew’s latest work with his new camera.

www.plaguesfire.co.uk/

Today in Lincolnshire (UK) we had the first snowfall of the year.   Just the opportunity I was waiting for to try some more macro work.

There were two shots I was particularly after.

First the old favourite, the red berry half covered in snow.
Second some winter flowering Jasmine.

After that whatever caught my fancy.

The equipment needed was fairly straight forward.   A Digital SLR, a macro lens and my macro flash kit. Once setup I was ready to go.

I set the camera to manual and a relatively slow shutter speed 1/80, this together with an aperture of f/22 to give at least some depth of field, always an issue with macro photography. This would also dramatically underexpose the background, giving me nice black none distracting backgrounds. The two flash heads attached to the lens to give illumination to my subject matter and I was ready to get some snowy, wintery images.

Hope you enjoy and please try yourself.  If you do not have a macro lens try an old 50mm standard lens, most will focus pretty closely, use your tripod and a slow shutter speed to get your exposure, use a piece of card to shelter what your shooting from the wind to stop movement.

If your a Canon or Nikon shooter, their respective macro lens are excelent but if the budget cannot stretch that far try the Tamron 90mm f/2.8 Di, a great lens and much cheaper.

Personally if your a Nikon shooter then the combination of the Nikor 105mm f/2.8 and the Nikon R1 Close-Up Speedlight Remote Kit is hard to beat if you have the funds.