personal screen

<p>Dawn colors. Olympus E-PL1, 14-42 kit lens</p><div></div>

<p>Well, I'm an engineer and a PhD... I do not know if I lack skills, but I hope I can read numbers. <br>

Decline in sales is stated in the same pg. 26, a bit above. Last quarter from 433 down to 389, nine months from 1,152 down to 1,323, i.e -10% and -13% respectively. Despite this, film share grew from 25% to 27% of the total sales. Only "graphic communication group" has growing sales figures.<br>

Getting back to an all film company, however, means throwing away nearly three quarter of the sales value, and wait for further reduction. Does not seem so nice for shareholders (and employees...).<br>

Maybe Fuji is showing some different strategy?</p>

 

<p>This has always been a never ending debate, but I do think that gear can make a better photographer, even (may be especially) starting from low-level. But not at all in terms of image quality or upper end specifications; I just think that, at amateur level, each of us has his sweet point camera. I did take photos with Canon and Voigtlander film cameras, as well as with digital equipment, and I know at least 99% of my photos could have been taken with the same success with any of them. Nonetheless, I think my photography (I told you I'm speaking of low level...), years ago, improved going from my dear Canon FD to a Panasonic LX-1, even if I've no doubt IQ was lower. Simply, I started looking at a small 2D screen which help me remind the difference between the perception and feeling from a full immersion view and the small 2D image I'd produce, simply I started making more photos and experiments, having immediate feedback, and this allowed me to interiorize a few useful technique. And I'm sure that if I had an heavy full frame DSLR rather than my handy E-PL1 I would simply give up shooting.<br>

Quoting Leslie: "I'm not debating that a camera can't change the photog, just that it doesn't make the shooter better": different photog means different photos. And a different may be a better one...<br>

And quoting: Louis: "Not a single thing, no camera, lens,or feature ever made me more creative, more willing to get out of bed before sunrise": I've always been willing to get out of bed before sunrise, and I've often done that (a healing broken ankle remind me of my last sunset - full moon - sunrise mountain excursion...). But without a 'proper' camera, may be I would not even attempt to record that feelings.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>I hope this will not cause too much pain in the audience, but I'll just let you know that Ferrania/Solaris gave up any interest in photography market. After more than a decade of deep troubles the company itself died (it already went down from a maximum of 3400 to around 200 employees) and in 2010 restarted as a photovoltaic modules related business. Hopefully former employees will join the new activities, but there is no chance at all to restart film production (even the buildings are being destroyed to be subsituted by something more suited to the new activity).<br /> Sorry for the bad news...</p>

<p>Just a thought... Since the groom is worried about his acne (although probably with no real reason), I wonder if he would be happy to know that a photo of it is being seen and studied by a worldwide audience...</p>

<p>8000 images on film means over 200 film rolls. That is, in a year 25*200 = 5000 rolls, i.e. something between 25.000 and 50.000$, I suppose. Not that cheap, too...<br>

Having said this, I agree that at high volume digital storage still has a cost and require maintenance.</p>

<p>In my humble opinion, it's in principle (philosophically, let's say) flawed the comparison between scanned film and digital capture.<br /> Scanned film, in fact, is nothing else that the digital capture of a film image of the real scene. Why should it be better than a straight digital capture of the real scene, even if film had infinite resolution? Only because the scanner, with much less constraint on size, available light performances, and with application limited to static subjects, will be easier and cheaper to build than a camera system of the same performances. <br /> But that become a comparison between two different digital captures, not between film and digital (and with fast improvement in digital technology, for any given year on camera capture will be as good as one year older scanner image, probably).<br /> A fair and more significant comparison would be between prints, assuming a fully analogic printing process on the film side. Or even better, it's just up to you if you like the best a digital print or a slide projection...</p>

<p> </p>

<p>I think there's no general rule about the amount of 'allowed' tweaking for either digital or film capture (I suppose B&W is already a significant tweak with respect to the real world image, and I can't understand why manipulating chemical reactions should be more 'natural' than digital processing), just follow your feelings. But, actually, I suppose that when and if you find out that most of your photos goes through significant digital post-processing, you'd better simply switch to straight digital capture.</p>

<p>I might be wrong, but so far I remember a large number of complains from people and even reviewers about possible plastic failures, but very few if any actual failure reports, despite the facts that 80% of DSLR sales are probably at entry level point and Internet tends to amplify negative comments. I suspect most people could like metal just for its feeling (which by the way can be a good enough reason, especially if you do this for hobby), but would not trade off lightness and price for this.<br>

PS My old car ('67 opel kadett) was all metal, solidly built in Germany, all mechanical, no electronics. It needed some repair at least twice a year. My current Opel Astra (2000) is full of plastics and electronic gadgets. It has not required any repair yet. And I'm a mechanical engineer...</p>

<p>The most classical and remunerating footpath is by far the coastal one, I think. If you don't mind a longer walk, you can start from Levanto and go up to Portovenere, adding even some more variety to the natural and 'urban' landscape (Punta Mesco promontory, Portovenere). Vernazza with its tower, the sight of western side of Manarola up on his rocks, and the narrow streets of Riomaggiore are probably the most loved subjects. You might come back by boat, thus adding the sea view. Be prepared to great crowd: try to avoid sundays, or start walking early.<br>

You also have a higher trail running through the hillside (Alta via delle 5 terre), but I would not suggest it as a first choice.<br>

By the way, the village of first photo in this thread is Portovenere, which is very close but is not one of the 5 terre.</p>

<p>I really loved my older Vito B (w/o rangefinder) inherited from my mother. Rugged, reliable, it allowed me to make the photo I loved the best... Color skopar lens seems actually highly rated, but used price are reasonably low. I'm thinking about buying a non-woring one for spare parts, since mine is out of service having lost the locking lever of the bottom plate.<br /> <img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/194698-lg.jpg" alt="" /><br>

Myvatn Lake, 1985, Voigtlander Vito B</p>

<p>Actually, I think that the original question has an obvious answer.<br>

As far as image quality is concerned, if you use the same sensor technology and same pixel density (i.e. same square millimiter per pixel, thus resulting in a 1.6*1.6=2.56 pixel ratio), the cropped photo from full frame is exactly the same photo taken by the smaller camera.<br>

If pixel density is different, it's not a matter of crop factor, but the well known trade off of resolution vs. noise and dynamic range. As Bob pointed out, crop camera usually yields higher pixel density and more resolution.<br>

If sensor technology is different, that's another matter and has nothing to do with crop factors.<br>

Nothing fancier than this.</p>

I do not think any new model, even if well designed and carefully priced, could turn Leica into a big player. They used to have three main source of pride:

(1) excellent lens quality, which immediately translated into excellent image quality

(2) excellent life-lasting body reliability

(3) smaller dimension and unobstruniveness with respect to SLR.

Furthermore,

(4) RF use involves a wholly different workflow from SLR, which may be considered either an advantage or a disadvantage.

Thus, as Ben O'Bryan and Robert Prendergast just pointed out, Leica has a real problem. In the digital world, at least one half of the image quality (roughly speaking) is due to sensor and electronics. In such field Leica has neither a long standing tradition nor the kind of money required for huge R&D activities, and thus there is no reason to think they can be better than anybody else. This means that the lens quality advantage (1) could no longer be enough to get the best image quality.

Furthermore, in any electronic industry profits are always related to continuous upgrades. Thus, advantage (2), (human)life-long reliability, is of little use assuming a 3-5 years (camera)lifespan. Advantage (4), smaller dimension and unobstruniveness, looks really weak, and will become weaker and weaker, if anyone thinks about the size of entry-level DSLR or the possiblity offered by concepts like Micro Four Thirds. Advantage (4), RF experience, is always there for those who loves it, but fifty years history has proved that these are a small niche, even if often highly qualified. Epson experience, and the lack of any other commercial alternative, is quite a definitive proof of that.

Do not forget that official Leica financial reports show that in 2007-8 nearly one half of the camera sale value come from rebadget Panasonic, and during the first term of 2008 sales were reduced from 44 to 27 millions euro due to "reduced sales of the M system and of digital compact cameras, resulting from delays in the introduction of new products". Could Leica and/or Leica customers afford a continuous upgrade of M8 pro level cameras?

Thus, prices that in another thread were superficially judged 'insane', limited editions and appeal to boutique luxury buyers and all the like are simply necessary to keep the brand alive, and technology development rate (full frame or anything else) will always be extremely slow. Do not forget that Leica may often suffer from financial troubles, but is the only surviving German camera maker, so their CEO probably are not as silly or blind as someone believes: simply they have little or no alternatives. Leica could never offer 'affordable' prices or edge cutting electronic technology, simply because they need to redistribute increasing R&D costs among a shrinking number of customer.

Kevin, I forgot to say that the camera is a cheap digicam (Fuji, if I remember), one of those funny looking toy in the shape of an eye...

And here a photo of the still blade, just for comparison.

Kevin,

I'm quite sure that my friend is not able to manipulate any photograph in any way... And she sent me them the very evening she came back from the trip. So, that's not an explanation. BTW, I'm attaching the second photo of the same propeller. The ghost images are actually deriving from the propeller blade, since in the first one you can even see the yellow color on blade tip.<div></div>

I've just seen a curious effect on this photo of a moving propeller.

The photo was taken by a friend of mine with a cheap Fuji snapshot

camera. A series of parallel ghost images of the blade do appear.

I'm simply wondering which could be the reason... Note that the ghost

image appear BEHIND the nacelle, thus don't seem the a product of

plane window glass.

 

http://www.photo.net/photo/3398557

 

Some time aliasing effect, or anyone has some idea?