michael_bender

January 23, 2004

.. the article tries to doctor the truth by softening the wording (the Ambassador went berserk only "according to ONE report") and by completely omitting the fact that the poor bugger was led out of the museum by security, like a low-class yob out of a house where ungentlemanly behaviour is not tolerated

Think also about the damage to Israel's public image. Yuk.

January 22, 2004

There was nothing innate in the installation that made it a homage to terrorism, as far as I understand - nor I found much in the several articles on the incident I read.

Pure undisguised stupidity and extremism combined to form the barbaric whole.

Even if Ambassador's suspicions were true, think only how many ways there were to dismiss and destroy with a few witty words. Yep, true Barbarian, the times of the Great have passed.

January 22, 2004

A glass half full or half empty? Interpretation is what created the situation. The arrogant politician with extremist views saw the thingy - and understood only that there was "blood", and PORTRAIT of a TERRORIST!!!

So, barbarian as he was, he displayed himself before the whole world, the Israeli ambassador that is.

The installation (and I should state very firmly, I do not consider such "installations" art) can equally be interpreted as a Jewish (the artist was Jewish, after all) jeer at the memory of a Palestinian who wanted to be remembered as a moral "Snow White", but ended up being floated in a bath of (fake) blood by the "artist".

Of course, once the Ambassador to the Barbaria did his barbaric dance, any alternative reading was not possible. So all Jewish-owned papers (WSJ is one of the leading 4 in the USA) naturally expressed "sincere" and "objective" views.

Stupidity: the official put himself in a corner out of which it was not possible to excape.

And they say that diplomats are well-educated intelligent people who can speak in understatements ;))))))

January 22, 2004

.. and I am grateful that they show both these people as good men, big enough to forgive and appreciate others.

Compare to what the authors of "Bystander", a quick-buck type of book, chose to tell to characterise HCB. During his american trip, some american journalist or whoever that was was so irritated with the former, that he supposedly was thinking of pushing HCB under a passing car, and supposedly only the distraction of a mad american woman wrapped in an american flag moved the photographer out of danger.

Nothing about HCB in this episode - it is just about the american punk who accompanied him - and written with an intention to smear.

The two bastards who wrote "The Bystander" being who they are.

So thank you for your stories again.

January 15, 2004

If I wanted to show the US using your approach, I'd go and rummage through a big garbage dump site somewhere in LA South Central (poor area the black riots of 1992 came from). Meaningless bits of everything - while the reality behind it begins to be imagined as a huge ghost town, or desert, or a nuclear bomb explosion mass grave.

If you do not have a psychological problem, I'd be surprised. There are PEOPLE in countries, cities and villages. Look at things that are ALIVE - if you psyche can tolerate it, that is.

January 4, 2004

because:

(a) they are taken with the subject very close and background practically at infinity. Small digital cameras have small sensors, and therefore draw typically wide-angle images: sharp through and looking flat, no DOF. These images "cheat" by creating rarer conditions for the shots.

(b) Secondly, the widest use of rangefinders is for moving dynamic shots (e.g. people). All small cameras have bad shutter lag (0.2 seconds and more, with the best only approaching 0.1s). Leica DIGILUX and DIGILUX 2 pre-focussed shutter lag number CANNOT BE FOUND, it's (intentionally, I presume) unpublished by Leica - and does not appear at any independent testing sites. Moreover, electronic viewfinder (i.e. a small LCD screen rather than optical viewfinder) introduces even more lag, and quite seriously. Here's an easy test: in a camera store look through such camera, while keeping your other eye open. You'll see how the viewfinder image visibly lags when someone, for example, walks across the scene, or raises his hand to scratch nis nose, or starts speaking.

The two portraits in that thread seriously "cheat" by presenting two posed static images.

Leica itself understands these points and consistently cheats in its own sample images: one, used to advertise the first DIGILUX, used a shot similar to the poirtraits in question to create artificial and rare conditions for the nice limited DOF and beautiful boke effect.

January 3, 2004

... why not to look at how others photographed in cold winter conditions?

In Russia the technique, consistently, would be: hang your camera off your neck, put your winter coat on top. When photographing, unbutton/unzip the top of your coat/parka/whatever rags you are in, make your shots, put the camera under the coat again.

The technique has worked very successfully for decades and thousands of Soviet photographers using Contax-derived or Leica-derived cameras. (the latter are worse, as their curtains' elasticity is more prone to being affected)

December 30, 2003

.. with the cameras mentioned above. Probably more.

First, all of them HAVE INTOLERABLE SHUTTER LAG. Please check www.imaging-resource.com for exact numbers. None of the smaller cameras goes below 0.1 second, which is a delay that, for example, would miss someone extending an arm to tap another person's shoulder, or a grimace on someone's face. Cameras with 0.07 seconds and smaller are more or less OK, but there are none among small digicams. Leica's own models: the company NEVER made the numbers public, one is left with unsubstantiated claims only, although exaggerated as usual for Leica's boasts.

Secondly (the image above illustrates it perfectly), your images will have that unpleasant flat sharp-through look, as the SENSOR is SMALL. Inability to work with limited DOF, which for the eyes is of the mechanisms signalling depth on a flat picture, is irritating, I can testify as someone who has used a digicam for over 3 years for now.

Thirdly, all of those cameras have squinty viewfinders. Shun cameras with non-optical viewfinders: it amounts to additional delay, which is unavoidable. Look at someone walking through a digicam with an LCD electronic finder, while keeping your other eye open. You will see the image moving its legs with visible delay.

Absolutely the same is true in case one wants to photograph using the little screen on the back. It introduces unacceptable time lag (0.2-0.3 seconds or even more), so good-buy all dynamic "street" shots, posed monstrocities welcome - for the production of which these little cameras are designed on the first place.

To sum it up, there is NO small camera comparable to a rangefinder yet.

December 30, 2003

The kind of "hand" or lever, or whatever you choose to call that extremity that grows down from the lens is supposed to be pressing against the plate of Elmar, and so whenever you focus your Elmar lens, the Waist Finder is being focussed too. It's own lens is a small uncoated equivalent of Elmat fully open (to 1/3.5).

While focussing, one also moves a thin cutout frame inside the finder, which compensates for parallax

The Finder lens can be tuned with two threaded rings that can fix the lens position to match your Elmar focussing

December 26, 2003

Ancient Voigtlander Kontur finder - about $30 on e-bay.

December 8, 2003

"Contrary to what is suggested by the humanist claims made for photography, the camera's ability to transform reality into something beautiful derives from its relative weakness as a means of conveying truth."

Holy shit. Let's rewrite first by converting to a "canonical" form, reducing it to regular logical operators:

A: (Camera is bad about conveying truth) engenders, creates, from this follows that (camera can show reality as beautiful). B: Humanists claim something to the contrary.

Prolbem 1: the logical connection is nonexistent. The statement is non sequitur. It does not follow from (being bad about showing truth) that the medium (can transform X into sth beautiful). The only thing that follows is that the medium can transform it into ANYTHING non-true, be it ugly, beautiful, heroic, neurotic or whatever else.

Problem 2: the statement is arbitrary. The camera is not shown, demonstrated, proven to be "bad" about conveying truth. I can maintain that is pretty damn good about conveying truth, as its use in sciences and law, as a couple of examples, can testify. Certain uses of camera (e.g. manipulatively "artistic") can be about other things except truth, but Sontag's statement as it is is plainly false.

Problem 3: I do not know how humanists claim to the contrary. Because there can be many things negating a statement (non-X may be a set of very many members), I have no idea what exactly they claim, according to Sontag.

To sum up, this statement alone demonstrates the emptiness of Sontag manipulation. I cannot promote such distortion to the category of reasoning in any way.

Throwing crap like that into a discussion will very soon turn it into utter BS, right.

December 5, 2003

"Diplomacy is the art of saying 'nice doggie' until you can find a rock" (Will Rodgers)

December 5, 2003

A good shot

Incomprehensible reactions

So obviously, the recent and massive propaganda campaign against smoking had nothing to do with smoking dangers - was about starting a little racket and lifting money from the tobacco industry.

The industry like a fat pig was chosen to bleed and bleed it they did. Public health question was the cynical manipulation to create support from the plebes (which of course did not get their cut from the racket money)

What amazes me is that every stupid American, almost to a person, has been successfully converted, and not a single one here is capable to see the racket for what it was and is.

Is American public so uniquely dumb? Reactions in another thread, on some security busybodies harassing photographers seem to indicate it is - again, the majority believed in the reality of the "war on terror" and do not even question how on earth photography can be connected to any security issues (e.g. San Francisco bridge cannot be photographed now, under the threat of legal punishment, I heard - pretty much like bridges in Stalin USSR)

No one also seems to see contradiction in that the same people who fight smoking are overwhemingly in support of "drug" (propely called narcotics) legalization.

Deep murky secrets of the American soul...

December 2, 2003

"If I noticed a stranger photographing in my neighborhood for two weeks I damn well would go up to him and..."

Right, first stage is compliance to illegality with huffed complaints in an Internet forum.

Second stage is to comply voluntarily stating that as a good sitizen one wants to help his country to fight "terrorism"

Third stage is active vigilance: taking it into one's own hands.

There was a (war-time? Maccarthy era?) poster in the past: "Be Alert!"

and soon there appeared a graffito: "Be a lert! Your country needs lerts."

That's where we are now, aren't we, turning into a bunch of very patriotic lerts. Not speaking of the fact that you'd be breaking the laws accosting someone in the street where photography is perfectly legal.

By the way, what is it that Americans find so incomprehensible about Stalin-era show trials and full support of them by the public (in spite of being so obviously staged)? Look at this offer of voluntary assistance in catching potential "terrorists" with cameras by our modern-day citizen - and no mass arrests or liquidations have taken place in this country to pressure him into compliance

December 2, 2003

Yep, and a good remark you made too - there is a principle in Jurisprudence that it's not possible to prove the absence of something. (Prove that you never stole apples as a kid) Rather, the accusing side has the obligation to prove the presence of some happening.

Of course, American "justice" system uses or dismisses the notion where it finds it convenient - for example in immigration law: someone who wants to enter the USA on a fisitor's visa must "prove" to an official that he does not have intention to stay.

Now the same in "national security"

December 2, 2003

Why, inside USA I can legitimately do that. It's not the words I would throw around easily about journalists in Near East, or any place where opposing the regulations may cost more than an inconvenience (life sometimes?).

And it's hard to argue against that "war on terrorism" is a political fake. You might also have a pretty good understanding of the term's origins, I suspect. ;)

December 2, 2003

And remember that "war on terrorism" is a lie launched to keep indefinitely (that's why the "enemy" is so unspecific, by the way, not mentioning the obvious source from which the term was borrowed) - precisely to keep population under control while the launchers continue serious crimes/manipulations inside and outside the country. The weak-minded really start to belive the obnoxious propaganda, while the rest cowardly comply - thus justifying this political extremism, that currently poses as American mainstream politics.

December 2, 2003

is what makes opression succeed. Yes, you should have said you'd like to be cited and discuss it with a judge. There would be no sustainable truly applicable charge, that's why the jerk was nervous.

There could have been a very unspecific, generic "misbehaviour"-type with more unspecific "security" overtones.

This is not the first such complaint on photo.net, and cowardice of the affected photographers usually manifested itself in (a) complying to unlawful searches, being escorted, answering illegal questions etc.etc and (b) seeking rationalizations post-factum in the said forum in a slightly injured and huffed tone

Which I believe is wrong

November 27, 2003

Horizontal is adjustable, vertical is not.

The unit that holds the small mirror and turns kind of cuts into the plate, and with time goes lower and lower (always the same "misalignment", which in fact is scraping of metal against metal).

The cheap and easy way to fix is to buy a broken 35SP on ebay for $10-20 and swap the rangefinder unit.

I've done it several times

November 19, 2003

India. Fish of Goa (1) by S. Maximishin</a>

India. Fish of Goa (2) by S. Maximishin</a>

India. Fish of Goa (3) by S. Maximishin</a>

India. Fish of Goa (4) by S. Maximishin</a>

November 19, 2003

While McCurry's non-portraits are undisputably professional, I too do not think much about "pay money, shoot (mostly) posing picturesque natives in bright coloured rags staring straight into your lens" approach.

Most - I attempted to count once in a bookstore - most of his portraits are such direct stares. I wouldn't take his advice as to how to do portraiture. And according to his own admission, he pays them money all right, in most cases.

The whole point of photography from distant places is that is shows you distant life as it is, as much as possible - not posed stares.

November 18, 2003

(a) Shutter lag is autofocus, after pre-focus the lag is non-exsitent.

WRONG. We are talking about lag AFTER pre-focussing AND exposure setting if the camera is on an auto setting.

For compacts this - critical - lag can be even longer than 0.1s (0.2-0.3s). 1/10 of a second lag will make you miss someone tappinng other man's shoulder, or an expression on his face. Do not forget that this time ADDS to the human reaction delay - which is 0.13-0.15s when there is no choice and the shooter is concentrated.

SLR digitals (in spite of their $2000 and above prices) are typically pretty crappy - 0.1 seconds with only a couple of higher-end models that cut on this time. One good exception is Olympus E-20 that is about 0.06 second.

Mechanical cameras can be 0.02-0.01 seconds, and so only human reaction lag is significant, the camera does not introduce any.

By the way, "Leica" (i.e. Panasonic) Digilux is praised as having very short lag, but there is NO numerical measurement on the Net. None. Just bla-bla of digital leica-heads.

Note also that longer delay times (0.1 seconds) do not preclude correct timing of REPEATING or PREDICTABLE moments, one has to get internal timing correct through practice. They do preclude shooting of truly chance compositions.

To compare time lags, check digital camera reviews on www.imaging-resource.com - the measurements are in a separate subcategory.

November 18, 2003

Interesting. S5R looks like a "rapid" update of S5 compact - and it seems to be the first fast compact around.

Looks like it's a steel camera with 35-105 Zeiss zoom, 5MP.

The claimed lag obviously is when pre-focussed (shutter half-pressed already) - and it looks like a very good achievement.

I'd be interested to hear first impressions report.

November 17, 2003

Bessa R viewfinder - 50mm on the illustration</a> and others below

Bessa R@ - 50 mm framelines on photo</a> others below

November 17, 2003

<a href=http://www.leica-camera.com/imperia/md/images/leica/produkte/msystem/kamera/54.jpg>Click here</a> to see how a Leica viewfinder is looks like

Bessa viewfinder is very similar, but covers the equivalent of 28mm view and inside the 28mm "hole" has 35, 50, 74 and 90 mm markers

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Posts posted by michael_bender