Richard & Caroline's Blog

While circular screw on filters are convenient, square filters such as the well known Cokin System are necessary, for things such as graduated filters.

As you camera system gets larger its not long before you realise you have spent a couple of hundred pounds on filters for each lens size.  Its at this point you start looking at filter systems.  While the Cokin system is possibly the most well know, I decided to invest into the 100mm Lee Filter system.  Now I have a single set of grad’s and a polariser to fit all my lens and cameras, with the aid of just a few adapter rings.  These filters can now be used on my Large Format Lens’ my Hasselblad Lens and my DSLR Lens.

Of course everyone now wants small and more compact high performance cameras such as the Sony NEX, Olympus and Panasonic MicroFourThird’s systems.

So with that in mind, Lee have produced a very high quality smaller filter system the RF-75.

Chris Bennett recently purchased this filter system so with Chris’s kind permission I borrowed it this weekend to give it a try.

The weather this weekend was not conductive to good photography, plenty of rain and hardly any blue sky in sight, but there was a brief spell of sunnier weather Sunday afternoon for a couple of hours.  So with that small windows of opportunity, I put the laptop down and left my Adobe Lightroom alone to try and test out the filter kit.

I headed out to the local church and first took a quick snap with a naked Leica 35mm f/2 Summicron lens.  The above shot is pretty much straight from camera with nothing done to it.

It was now time to test the filter system.  While Chris has a number of adapter rings suitable for his Sony NEX System lens, only one of them is compatible with a lens I had; the Leica 24mm f/3.8 Elmar.  A quick lens change from the 35mm to the 24mm lens and I was ready to test.

The adapter ring screws onto the filter thread of your lens and then the lens holder clips on that.  There is a knack to getting the holder on, but once on its securely held.  I decided to try the polariser to enhance the blue sky.  If your a Sony NEX or MicroFourThird’s system user you will have a advantage over me at this point, as I was testing this on my Leica M8 rangefinder so could not tell through the viewfinder what effect the filter was having.  I took two shots with the filter in different orientations just to make sure.

I found the filter system very well made and any difficulty in its use was more down to my choice of camera rather then the camera system.  I would say its a definite improvement over there 100mm system and well worth looking into if your lens do not need the large 100mm filters.  Of course if your lucky enough to have the Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8 even the 100mm filters are not large enough!  But Lee even have a solution to that.

Many would say filters are no longer required in todays digital world, and while a lot can be done in Adobe Photoshop and simular products, somethings its just easier and faster to get it right in camera at the point of  image capture.

Thanks Chris for letting me test this out, and if your luckily enough to have an investment in a small camera system then I suggest you take a look at this system.

So what do I think of about camera ergonomics?

Traditionally, its all been about quick and easy access to the major controls, focus, shutter speed and aperture.  With a Large Format Camera, like my Ebony above, all the key controls are built into the lens.  The camera is just a big box, and focusing is even more simple, you just move the front lens bellow backwards and forwards, hence the leather bellows linking the front and back.

Ergonomic wise its all simple and easy but it is not the fastest way to work.  A major advantage is the huge glass viewing panel at the back.  The down side, once a film or digital back is mounted you can no longer see the viewing screen,and setting up is very slow.

My D200 is possibly the ultimate modern digital SLR with the typical controls of most high end cameras today.  With so much automation available the camera is covered with switches, dials and buttons but the basics are still there.  A manual focus ring for those who want to use it on the lens, and a dial on the front for aperture and a dial on the back for the shutter speed; with this being an electronic camera, if your not happy then you can swap round what the controls do.  Buttons for drive modes, the main program and semi program modes such as fully auto, shutter priority, aperture priority and finally manual for those who want it.  With it being digital you also have controls for ISO and White Balance.  While seeming very complex its actually very easy to use, the best of these would be the Canon 1D , 5D, the Nikon D3/4, D800.  All the control you need easy to get to, but they are big and heavy, compromised slightly in there image quality compared to Medium or Large Format, or even the simple lens designs in a 35mm Leica due to the retro focus design of SLR lens in order to accommodate the mirror box, but still the best all rounder.

Generally it seems to be the less you pay the fewer controls you get, with most compacts and a lot of the early Micro Four Third cameras having key controls missing or buried in a sub menu.

My Nikon V1 is much like this, all the key functions are hidden in the menu with just a few mode functions (not the ones you need) easily available.

There are a few compacts and CSC that are now getting better, and the tradition control layout does seem to be making a come back, with Fuji using its traditional control layout of a shutter dial on top and an aperture ring on the len. Most of them even have traditional optical viewfinders.

If I am honest, the traditional control layout while easy to see at a glance whats set on the camera as you pick it up, it not as good as some of the modern electronic customisable systems now available.  With your camera to the eye its not quite as easy to adjust the aperture of say a Fuji X100 as it could be, but the traditional layout is my favourite.

The Sony NEX range while having a terrible menu layout was not my faviorate to use camera, but with the introduction of the tri control layout with the NEX-7 it is now one of the best out there.  Very customisable, allowing you to adjust shutter speed, aperture, exposure compensation, iso etc, what ever there controls you wish, also with customisable buttons its arguably the best CSC camera yet available.  It needs very little improvement to make not only one of the best CSC’s around but one of the best all round cameras.

Would I buy one, no not yet.  For me the view finder needs to be better (though it is the best EVF currently available) a few button arrangement tweaks, but the biggest issue is the lens, while the 24mm is very good, they cannot do justice to the sensor.

When Fuji released the lens for the new X-Pro1, the 18mm was criticised for being the weakest of the set, but even that lens is better then the best lens available for the Sony NEX range currently.

Camera manufactures need to consider the whole system, its an area that not only new starts like Sony are weak at, Nikon released the Nikon System 1 over a year ago now and where are the fast zooms, the fast primes, the small pancake lens.

When all cameras are to a degree compromised then for me my choices are simple, i’ll take the bad ergonomics of the Nikon V1 but with its very small lens and very fast auto focus, excellent EVF, and if wanted the best quality, i’ll use my Leica M’s, with lens that are un-compromised.  Still if set up time allow and your willing to carry the weight a Large Format Camera cannot be beaten.

TF, used to be called TFP now often TFCD.

It means Time For Print or Time For CD.

Basically the photographer and the model both work for free unpaid, each covering their own costs. Both work hard to get some great images that would benefit both their portfolios.

At the end both get copies of the final edited images for their own use.

I don’t often do TFCD but I have some testing I want to do, so in return for an hour of your time modelling for me while I test some equipment and lens, i’ll then shoot you for an hour producing the shots you want, a full studio shoot, two hours in total with the shots then going through professional post production.  A selection of at least twelve shots, sent to you via cd or available by download at a resolution suitable for printing.

See my website rbphotographic.co.uk for my contact details or reply to this post.

Its always fun testing a new camera. It seems to inspire you. 99.9% of the time we less need a new camera and more often then not need inspiration or training to get better results from what we have.

Most of us do not get anywhere near the capabilities of our current cameras, buying a new camera is generally an excuse, but sometimes it can help ones photography.

Testing a new camera general involves three things for me. How it feels in the hand, its user controls and ergonomics and of course lastly but often most important image quality.

Now if image quality was all important then we would all be using large format 10 x 8 cameras, capable of shooting about 1 fame every 15 seconds but taking about 20 minutes to set up on a big heavy tripod.

Often the image will not wait that long, so we sacrifice image quality for speed, ease of use and portability. The invention of the 35mm camera back in the thirties by Leica showed that the majority of us were perfectly willing to trade off image quality against portabilty and weight. Then in the sixties the West discovered the Nikon F SLR, and we have never looked back, until now.

How many photographers in the last couple of years have given up carrying a big heavy SLR and now carry a Sony NEX-5, NEX-7 or Panasonic/Olympus micro four-thirds camera.

I am unusual that I have all of the common formats: Small format covered by my tiny Nikon V1, moving up in size to my Leica and my big Nikon Digital SLR’s. All of which can be carried over ones shoulder and wielded without the need of a heavy tripod. Moving up I have my Medium format equipment, my Hasselblad, while it can be used handheld, its much easy to use on a tripod. Finally there is my Large Format camera, my Ebony 4 x 5 camera. Impossible to use handheld, needing a big heavy tripod and slow to use, but the ultimate in image quality.

I take with me the camera best suited to the occasion. If carrying the Medium or Large format camera then I generally have the V1 with me as a light companion.

Still, despite all of these cameras, I have once again bought another. I have been really enjoying my film Leica M4 and getting some great pictures from it.

But the cost of 35mm film, developing and scanning means that it does not take long before you could have purchased a high end digital camera.

Yesterday I visited the Lincoln Photography Show, I had no intention of buying a camera unlike last year where I wanted a new compact and came away with my Nikon Series 1 V1 system, but this time was just intending to have a good look around.

It was a good show, I got to try the new Nikon V2, a great improvement but not significant enough to want to replace my V1, and I got to try out lots of the latest new Nikon and Canon telephoto glass; 200-400mm zoom at f/2.8 anyone?

The Sony R1 was also there, it felt great in the hand and it was fitted with the optional EVF which really made it a great usable camera.

The big suprise for me was the second hand stalls, lots of equipment, Large Format, Medium Format and even the odd Leica S2 and M8 on the stall belonging to  www.stephenspremier.com.  The S2 was stunning; if I ever gave up the day job and became a full time professional photographer unlike the part time photographer I am now, then it would be the camera for me; one of the best, no the best studio camera I have ever used. Though at £15,000 for a second hand body with no lens its hard to justify the cost.

The M8 was a great surprise, in mint condition and a good price.  I opened up the box and had a good look, interestingly the shutter dial only went up to 1/4000 second,  a standard M8 goes to 1/8000, and the shutter was very quiet, a few questions asked and it came to light that this was an M8 but upgraded to full M8.2 spec with the new M9 shutter, but in many ways better then a M8.2 as it did not have the stupid snapshot mode.  This made it a bit of a bargain.

Well I had to have it, and www.stephenspremier.com, were even kind enough to post me out two new IR filters free of charge which arrived today. Great service.

Now I only have the problem of trying out the camera and doing it some justice. With Winter on its way and the low dull light we have, I may have to arrange a studio test shoot to really give it a try, until then I just have these few test shots taken today.

There just quick snapshots really and not really processed well yet, I still have a lot to learn about getting the most out of the files using Adobe Lightroom V4. What ever camera you have light is key and can make or break a picture.

Still I am having a lot of fun getting used to its Feel, Ergonomics and Image Quality.