lewis_hizer

<p>Brian M. - "no sane person under 40 is going to pick up film . . ." Yet I just put some long-expired (stored in fridge) film on the 'Bay, and it was fought over and sold almost for what I paid for it 8-9 years ago. Then when I mentioned this fact on my private Facebook photographers' group, I was nicely scolded for not offering it to them first. They were all well under 40 and were willing to pay $7 per roll of old expired 120 color film, and I received multiple offers for my expired 35mm color film. (I'm keeping the 120 Plus-X.)</p>

<p>I'd like to mention that I ROUTINELY used my Yashica 24 with 120 film, without any problem other than a small nuisance at the end of the roll: you couldn't just "crank it off" after the twelfth exposure, but had to keep firing the shutter release as you wound up the paper roll. I found I could safely open the camera in daylight after six more "shots" without any light leaks. There was no issue with the pressure plate, sharpness, or anything else, and oddly enough, in spite of the instructions stating that the camera was for 220 film, there was a 120 start mark inside the camera.</p>

<p>I have a nice rangefinder that just says "Royal" on it, with a 50mm f2.8 Tominor lens, body serial no. 2109x, lens 1989x. Speeds B, and then 1 sec. through 1/300th. Is that one of the models you're interested in?</p>

 

<p>I have a Fuji S3 that I want to carry along as backup in case one of my two Nikon DSLRs goes bad during a wedding. It uses four AA cells for power. Has anyone used Eneloops with this camera? They seem to be a pretty good battery going by online reviews and recommendations. All of my older rechargeable cells were 2300mah but they are all kaput now, so I need some new ones. The S3 was very demanding of batteries, so my main question is this: Are the 2000mah Eneloops powerful enough for the S3, or should I get the 2500mah "XX" Eneloops? In the past, the rechargeable (name-brand) batteries I was using seemed to deteriorate in power capacity after only 20 or so recharge cycles. </p>

<p>I really like the first airplane picture with the camera in it. Even though it's taken in a desert, I can't help but think of the guys who land planes on the Arctic and Antarctic snowfields. Even the spots on the wing surfaces look like ice floes on a blue sea.<br>

I'd really like to get a 20mm Nikkor. I had a 24mm but it just never quite seemed to get anywhere near where I wanted it to, in terms of that sweeping perspective that your pictures exhibit. Rarely used it versus a 28mm - not enough of a change in effect.</p>

<p>Julia<br>

Margaret<br>

Cameron</p>

 

<p>Though several have implied it, no one's put it this bluntly: They LIKE the photos, therefore to tell them that the photos are "bad" is tantamount to telling your friends that they have bad taste or are artistically ignorant. It may not be what you mean to do, but it's going to need a LOT of sugar to make that particular medicine go down. </p>

<p>I wish I could see some of the pictures in question, since the fact that the OP is retired may simply indicate a lack of appreciation for contemporary "artistic" approaches. Are the pictures hyper-artsy in ways that offend academic "rules" you learned forty years ago, or are they uninspired attempts at conventional photography that show many little failures to achieve what the photographer seemed to be aiming for? There are high-priced photographers in my area that show, as highly-featured photos on their ads and websites, pictures with extensive use of extremely blurred areas in wide-angle landscape/interior scenes (Lensbaby effect), rather bizarre cropping (full-length shot of couple dancing, cutting just the heads off through the neck) and many instances of the couple in highly artificial forced poses such as dead center, stiffly holding hands with arms fully extended (picture a capital H) and both staring dead-pan at the camera with blank expressions, like little kids afraid of catching cooties from each other and forced to pose against their will. Some are actually visually striking in spite of not following known rules.</p>

<p>You appear to have the original all-metal made in Japan version, as evidenced by the logo on top of the prism housing. The later ones (with silver plastic top and bottom plates) dispensed with the triangular logo and had only the "ASAHI PENTAX" wording.<br>

I'll guess that you have limited experience with this type of camera, since pulling up on the rewind knob to open the back was a VERY common procedure on many makes and models. So I'll just mention the fact that when loading film, under no circumstances should you ever touch the black, rubberized-cloth shutter curtain. Don't let the curled film leader slip out of your fingers and spring back against it either. It's not as delicate as the metal foil curtains, but best not to touch it.</p>

<p>You appear to have the original all-metal made in Japan version, as evidenced by the logo on top of the prism housing. The later ones (with silver plastic top and bottom plates) dispensed with the triangular logo and had only the "ASAHI PENTAX" wording.<br>

I'll guess that you have limited experience with this type of camera, since pulling up on the rewind knob to open the back was a VERY common procedure on many makes and models. So I'll just mention the fact that when loading film, under no circumstances should you ever touch the black, rubberized-cloth shutter curtain. Don't let the curled film leader slip out of your fingers and spring back against it either. It's not as delicate as the metal foil curtains, but best not to touch it.</p>

<p>You could always try this, as a sort of experiment: get an extra hood, and paint the outside of it with a simple colorful design so you look like you're a fun and frivolous guy rather than "a professional" with that matte black business-like lens guard in place. I realize it sounds kind of goofy but picture how differently you would come across - I once read an observation somewhere that amateurs rarely use a hood, but professionals always do, so if you treat it like a piece of decor or fashion statement you would seem so much less threatening and more "part of the party." But it doesn't really sound like you're having THAT much trouble with the people there - if you're in a crowd photographing hundreds of people, of course you'll encounter the occasional sourpuss. I've witnessed a couple of incidents where a photographer doing "street photography" got hassled by strangers, and in each case he had not interected with his subjects but simply "took" their likeness in a rather predatory and inconsiderate way, treating them as objects (images) to be acquired and not really respecting them as persons.</p>

<p>You should notice a correlation between file size and complexity of subject. If the photo is of a colorful detailed subject with many differing degrees of dark and light, it will be a bigger file than if it is of an evenly-lit monochrome surface. It's not "uneven compression," it's different amounts of "visual variations" in the original scene that need to be translated into digital information.</p>

 

<p>Should have mentioned that my "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" was copyright 1979. I have found the term (again, not spending any real time in looking) in a watercolor text by Rex Brandt, copyright 1963. Also numerous references to "negative areas" and "negative shapes" in older books.</p>

<p>David L. - Thank you. I might add that in a 2-dimensional graphic work, the negative space, whether "empty" black / "empty" white "shapes," or whether areas of "emptiness" composed of actual space (depth, air, voids, etc.) are often very important contributors to the composition. Consider the black areas in your 8x10 picture of the flowers. Were it cropped up to the edges of the petals, each now-separated black area would still have an interesting and varied shape, without any monotony though there is a rhythmic repetition of similar elements. Each separate black shape could be lifted out and placed against a white background and it would remain an interesting shape. (I'm not suggesting it be cropped, by the way.)</p>

<p> </p>

<p>This one, of morning fog on the Grand River, is virtually unmanipulated. It reminded me of a visual metaphor for death. There were a few very faint and ghostly branches off on the lower left edge that threw off the effect so I removed them.</p><div></div>

<p>Ten centuries of Japanese and Chinese ink painting, and the writings of their contemporary and later critics, prove an acute awareness of negative space.</p><div></div>

<p>I have art books going back to the 1950's that use the term "negative space." The first one I found (in fifteen seconds of scanning the titles for one to use as a quick example) was "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain."</p><div></div>

<p>Pure negative space. Shot by window light against a tan wall, negatives developed for contrast. Contact prints exactly as it looks here.</p><div></div>

<p>Actually, my Spotmatic F meters open-aperture with my SMC Takumar <strong>AND </strong>with my Super-Multi-Coated Takumar lenses. Not with my Super Takumar lenses.</p>

<p>I second the suggestion to remove the one with the bride facing the brick wall. It's very eye-catching and the graphic quality is intense, but it has a subliminal feel similar to seeing a blind person trying to grope their way out of a threatening environment while you can't do anything to help them. Do you have one in the same venue with her back to the wall, looking cool or "sassy"? The black diagonals are visually dominating and she should appear unconcerned, instead of trapped by them.</p>

<p>That is exactly how it is supposed to work. When you mount an SMC Takumar lens on a Spotmatic F, the machined groove keeps the mounting flange from pressing the tiny pin in, which would otherwise release the switch. The Spotmatic has no groove, and the flat surface of the flange pushes the pin in as the lens is screwed into place, releasing the auto-manual switch. </p>

<p>The Super-Takumars have no pin and the switch is always free to move on any body.</p>

<p>The SMC Takumars have the pin, and the switch becomes free to move on a Spotmatic but not on a Spotmatic F, where it doesn't need to.</p>

<p>Note more detail in veil, improved composition, lack of obvious cloning marks, better shadow detail on groom's face, less harsh light on both foreheads.</p><div></div>

<p>And Dee Dee, I only skimmed these replies so maybe someone already mentioned it, but you can often FIX a mistake in Photoshop. Be prepared to do so if you get a salvageable image that needs tweaking; recognize when it can be tweaked and improved and be prepared to spend some time doing it. This took me twenty minutes. I could do better. You're an artist, you mentioned, so you could also.</p><div></div>

<p>I have a pretty similar set, 2 bodies only but similar range of lenses, 28mm to 200mm. The 28 in particular is amazingly sharp, and I once studied a landscape shot I'd taken with it under a 100-power Bausch and Lomb microscope and was simply amazed at how sharp the pine trees were along the edge of a mountain crest 2 miles away, all the way to the edge of the frame. (KCH 64). If there had been a grizzly bear walking under them, 2 miles away on a WIDE-ANGLE shot, I could have seen him.<br>

One of their lens brochures I have calls the 120mm "an ideal compromise for when the 85 and 100mm lenses fail to bring the subject close enough, and the 200mm has too strong a pull."</p>

<p>Show him holding an Exakta VX-500 at arms' length and staring at the back as if it had a digital display there, and be sure to include the loud "click-WHIRRRR!" of a motordrive. Don't have the photographer use the wind lever, either. Nobody will notice except the people on this forum, and you'll still be in the upper 5% percentile of accuracy in depicting cameras/photographers in movies and TV.<br>

JUST KIDDING !! The Exakta VX-500 dates from the '60's!!</p>

<p>Before I had scrolled down and seen other similar comments, I was thinking "It's difficult to believe that these were taken in the 21st century," which I mean in a good way.</p>

<p>I just got a "Used - like new condition" D90 from KEH for $650. Ad stated it was "certified fully functional" by Nikon. It arrived in a Nikon box that appeared to be specially printed just for refurbished cameras, and included everything that would normally come with the D90, plus a Nikon 90 day warranty.<br>

The thing is, it's not just "like new," but PERFECT and apparently never touched by human hands. I'm good at finding tiny signs of wear or usage but I tell you, this thing is PRISTINE. If it had been represented as brand new and I examined it with a microscope I couldn't find anything to contradict that assumption. Also, no dust on sensor, no hot pixels, no traces of human skin cells or skin oil anywhere a person might hold one, etc. The one thing I haven't done yet is test for shutter actuations.<br>

<strong>My question is</strong>, why would a camera that appears to have never been used need "refurbishing?" Was there some typical problem with D90s that might cause one to be sent back almost immediately after purchase? Do Nikon's "refurbishings" have a good track record of solving the original problem? Sorry to sound paranoid but it just seems too good to be true, especially since I got $100 off my credit card bill on the purchase (a rewards program thing), so it appears I essentially got a brand new D90 for $550, which makes me nervous. My more typical experience is to buy a camera and find its price drop $200 - $500 a few weeks later.</p>