Something new, something old.

Just a few days apart came my two new cameras and man-o-man are they different from each other.

 

 

First, since I do a lot of photography of people who are not used to being photographed the smaller my gear is the less intimidating the gear is to my subjects. The D200 was the first small Nikon DSLR to be pro quality so I’ve been happily using them for the last 2 years. But I must say that I’m thrilled, thrilled!, by my new Nikon D700. When the D3 hit the scene with a thunderous sound everyone took notice. I knew that Nikon would eventually release a “full frame” DSLR but when they did it would not be a Me TOO! That pretty much made Canon and everyone else head back to the lab to work up something that was competitive. Well, I knew that they would soon release a baby version kind of as they did with the D200 to the D2x: essentially the same chip but a bit slower and much smaller. Well the D700 is just that: the guts of the D3 in a small body but with the built in flash so that I can control my SB-800’s without any additional units. Whoo-Hoo!

 

This also means that I can go back to my favorite wide lenses that were rendered less than themselves due to the DX chip and it’s 1.5x crop factor. Thus my favorite lens, the AF-D 24mm f/2.8, shown, is out of the mothballs and will get back in regular use. This also means that my “Secret Weapon” the legendary AF-D 28mm f/1.4 is useful again! Yeah!

 

Now I rarely need an ISO greater than 400 but I gotta tell you - the ability to have ISO6400 that looks better than the ISO800 of my D200 means that I have a whole new world of photographic possibilities in marginal to nearly no light.

 

Next as I’ve mentioned in a prior post I’ve been shooting a project on not only film, yes it’s true, but on a 6x6 twin lens. It’s a series of portraits of local chefs that I really like. Since I’m such a foodie it’s like getting to photograph your favorite sports stars any way that you want. But I wanted the images to be rather timeless looking, not look like all the punch color digital capture images that you see and none of the guys are standing at the stove holding a whisk. So I shot it on 6x6 B&W film.

 

Well that camera, a Seagull 104, broke and wasn’t worth fixing. That was replaced with this darling Yashica Mat-124G which is as old or older than I am. Luckily the Seagull broke at the end of the first leg of my project so it didn’t get in the way of my work.  I pitched the story and the editor I had in mind loved the images from my 6x6. Yeah! I’m looking forward to using the Mat to finish the project and lots of other things in the future. Oh I must say that these cameras are so very nice and are going for a song these days. Get one if even as a lovely paperweight/conversation piece.

 

Sorry about getting geeky on ya but when I get new tools that open up new ways of seeing. Well … I get pretty excited.

Comments

[Rosh]

The ability to shoot at higher iso with quality results really does open up new worlds. My 5D has been amazing at 1600. I can only imagine 6400.

Rosh