starshooter

<p>I was a photojournalist for oh, 35 years I guess, and worked for a time for the world's largest news gathering organization. I covered presidential campaigns, all big league sports, riots, Hollywood parties, Broadway backstage, the United Nations, the Olympics and a lot of small stuff too. Depending on the assignment of the moment you might want a really fast lens or maybe a zoom instead. Zooms that get you f1.4 are not around. Of course I always carried three or four cameras, maybe four camera bodies with three lenses. The extra was so you could put any of the lenses on it without taking one off of it first. Digital of course lets you shoot color or b&w and holds a lot more shots than our old 36. I photographed Robert Kennedy just before he was shot with a 180mm f 2.8 Sonnar lens and got some great head-and-shoulder photos but nobody used those. Time and Newsweek used my photos taken with shorter lenses. In photojournalism you never know what's going to happen next and you better have plenty of lenses available.</p>

<p>When I was a teenager one could buy well used 1949 Fords for 50 or 100 buks. They were okay cars but tended to have a lot of small, nagging problems. Water pumps went out and cost you $15. Considering you could get a tire for $10, the water pump price was a bit high. Well, I bought one Ford that looked great but it was in the shop soon. My mechanic explained he'd have the car back on the road soon but there was a problem -- some kid changed all the small Ford engine parts with Chevrolet parts. Lord knows why. I think you should try first to put Nikon parts on Nikon, or third-party parts made for the Nikon.</p>

<p>I have film and prints from World War I and they are fine. I don't believe that if you scan and digitilize your film and prints that you will have done anything worthwhile. I have 8 1/4" floppy disks and 5 1/4" floppy disks and there are only a tiny handful of places in the country that can read them. And 90-100 years from now, the same length of time from World Waar I to now-- do you really think anybody will be able to read your digital images?</p>

<p>Ice ain't nice to film. Spread the word.</p>

<p>Silents became sound. Inferior Eastman Color replaced gaudy but high quality Technicolor. Most older Eastman originals are faded and useless. Technicolor is shot on three strips of b&w and will last for a few centuries. Hollywood studios are shooting on digital and making film backup copies. Digital is so much cheaper to distribute it is not funny once you get past the startup costs for the new equipment in each theater. You used to have to crank the family steed (automobile) in the morning to get it started. Then they invented a self-starter. No more broken thumbs. Progress is messy and can be a pain and it is not even always truly progress. But the ease of distribution and the almighty dollar will settle the tale, as usual.</p>

<p>Well, you really need to see a lawyer. I think the notion is correct that if an average judge sees you got pretty good photos he's gonna say "where's the beef" regarding Raw vs. Jpeg. I understand your frustration and find it a little hard t believe the photog would just forget to set his camera to raw unless he's taking too large a workload for himself. I have to wonder if it's really worth the trouble for you. On the other hand you could "jawbone" the photog and try to get him to make a settlement that will work for you.</p>

<p>I'm an old broken down news photographer and am used to what we call "quick and dirty." You set up yourself and your equipment so you can grab a quick shot. Hopefully you will be able to compose another right away but at least you have something. When Elvis is in the building you need to get an image fast without a lot of fuss. In my car I usually have one of a variety of point-and-shoot or mechanical film cameras that can be set to be used as such.<br>

When your car breaks down on the road you may need more than just one tool to fix it. I have several, so to speak.</p>

<p>You havve posed an important question and one that will never really be resolved. When I worked for a major news service in 1970 I took a photo in Central Park in New York City that was well liked. The New York Times used it, for instance. It was a photo of a woman pushing a baby carriage in a broad expanse in the park and there was patches of snow on the ground. The effect was that it looked like she was on a beach or something (B&W photo). I "pulled everything together" using a 300mm lens. The news service said I had to note in the caption that I used a telephoto lens. In older days you could manipulate the devil out of photos and even fake them. This is not a bad trend but the question basically is "how much is too much Photoshopping?" You have to decide for yourself.</p>

I iz confoozed. This thread seems to suggest if ya haven't heard of a guy or gal then he/she does not exist. There are MILLIONS of folks shooting photos for pay and a handful of names noted here means nothing. I know quite a few people who just shoot film and are doing okay. Housewives who shoot kids,cameramen who shoot visual arts works for publication, panoram photographers with film cameras 40 to 90 years old that no digital I have ever seen can match, "art" photographer who won't go near a digital camera or an ink jet printer to save their soul, nostalgia shooters who go into wet darakrooms ande produce old fashioned prints with the scalloped edges like the 1950s, TO NAME A FEW.

<p>I got the impression from your post that anyone who does not march in lockstep with your own personal views is a really bad person. I would not dream of telling the citizens of Nihon how to run their country/lives. We can't get our act together here much less tell others how to live --armed drones aside.</p>

<p>You need to get an understanding in place ahead of time. Question -- if I sell photos that were developed at, say, Wal-Mart, should I pay Wal-Mart part of my fee? Think about it.</p>

<p>When I was your age (a LONG time ago) what I really wanted was to be a magazine photographer. I talked my way into Jayne Mansfield's orante "pink palace" on Sunset Boulevard and got some nice shots and generally hustled, hustled, hustled.<br>

It was dificult then and I think it is harder now. It is sometimes almost impossible to find out who to hit up at various magazines for work. But I like your work (you have a sense of humor, for one thing) and I think you can do it. I would think for you a way in is through ad agencies. There are magazines who cater to these agencies and you can get some clues from them and maybe present your portfolio to some of these agencies.<br>

I'd look hard at dance magazines, too.<br>

PS I have had my photos in hundreds of magazines around the world including Time, Newsweek, Life, People and Oggi, the largest magazine in Italy at the time. Good luck.</p>

<p>Well, if it is the 2.8 lens you are talking about it appears to weigh a whole 900 grams. I would think the size is more difficult than the weight. I had a spare day in Mexico City when I was there for the 1968 Olympics and went walking around downtown with a heavy NIkon F with the motor drive, a Nikkormat body and several lenses. At th end of a day I was listing to one side like a boat ready to sink.<br>

Years later I went walking around in a Tokyo suburb and carried a simple Canon with a fixed lens. My photos with the Canon were better, maybe because I didn't get all pooped out carrying all that stuff in Mexico.<br>

Are you yet another photos intimidated by the Fast Lens Crowd and is that why you carry an f2.8 zoon to shoot in broad daylight? Maybe you should try carrying a couple of small, lightweight prime lenses and see how it goes.</p>

<p>Years ago I had a client that wanted me to shoot photos from a helicopter. I was fearful that something might go wrong and I would be stuck with no fee and a bill for the expensive helicopter rental. So I asked for a sky-high amount of money, several times what my normal rate might be ($175 per hour vs. $25 per hour). They paid it, and the photos came out great.</p>

<p>This is all very interesting. I have an Ansco Viking 4.5 and the focus won't do anything but move between 20 and 30 feet. I guess I will have to try some of these solutions. The camera is in amazingly good shape and everything else seems to work. The viewfinder is tiny but you can't have everything.</p>

<p>If you're taking a photo of a friend, say, six feet from you, and there are mountains in the background, well the mountains are at "infinity." The symbol for infinity on your camera lens distance scale is like an "8" lying on its side.</p>

<p>I have been buying mostly "third party" lenses rather than lenses from the camera manufacturer since the 1960s. I bought many a Spiratone lens. In general, it used to be that camera manufacturers' lenses were of a higher quality than lenses from independent lensmakers but the independents were a bit quicker at getting something new onto the market. These days it seems Sigma and others are making fantastic, high quality lenses the don't take second place to anybody. I have owned Nikkors and Leitz lenses, worked with Hassy and Canon and Rolleiflex and hands down the sharpest lenses I have ever owned is a 35mm f2.8 Sigma I bought used for $25 and my 19mm Vivitar wide angle.</p>

<p>What is an xsi?</p>

<p>I am currently making very large prints for exhibition in art galleries of photos taken in the 1960s with a 3.5 Rolleiflex and in the 1970s with a Yashicamat. Both cameras produce fine negatives without grain, very sharp, up to 16x20 inches and beyond.I stopped using the Rolleiflex because it literally fell apart with hard but not abusive usage. I still have my Yashicamat and it still works. I loved both cameras and don't think you would go wrong with either.</p>

<p>The examples are either a bad use of Kodachrome or lousy scanning. the older people look worswe than they really are and the colors are off. Kodachrome is, in my humble view, a lot better than this. Kodachrome was just another tool which worked fine if you wanted very high quality and off-the-chart colors. You don't use a Rolls Royce to haul horse manure.There are better tools for that.</p>

<p>Beverage, huh? Somebody maybe has had one too many. Would it be too much to ask what camera you are alluding to? I would hate to guess.</p>

<p>I always take my Rolls Royce to an ex-hippie shade tree mechanaic who lives in a tent on free-rent government land and I am always disappointed.</p>

<p>Since I won a Rolleiflex in a raffle for a buck in 1957 -- none.</p>

<p>A camera is a tool like a monkey wrench.<br>

Would you not buy a BMW beause you didn't like the brand of tools the last mechanic used on it? There is no "best." Who has the best spouse, the best hound dog? Only you can put your grubby little hands on a photographic tool, try it out and decide. Unless you're one of those non-photographers who want to look "cool" and not have to bother taking snaps. Then you need a Leica. Get an old M series with a 90mm f2 lens. It was lousy so they didn't make very many and it's worth a lot of money and "cool."</p>

<p>I have a Leica 3f with several lenses and can't say I liked it very much. It was pretty good for its day but you had to squint through one window to focus and another to compose and use a thingamagig slid into the cold shoe for the 90mm and 135mm lenses. No lever wind, of course. Later I had a Leica M2R and loved it a lot. You know what they say, sometimes nostalgia ain't what it used to be.</p>