• Home
  • Blog
  • Gallery
  • Music
  • STORE
  • About
  • Contact

Archive for Camera

The Megapixel Thief (Part 2)

January 3, 20106 CommentsPhoto Gear

Out there on the mean streets of photography, it's a digital world. So what possible good can come from shooting with a 50 year old Yashica-Mat Twin Lens Reflex medium format camera? How about 50 megapixel scans, square negatives, and a classic "analog" look? Dive into this article to discover all the techniques, benefits and eccentricities inherent in Twin Lens Reflex (TLR) photography.

Read The Article

The Megapixel Thief (Part 1)

January 2, 2010No commentPhoto Gear

Common wisdom tells us that "the bigger the sensor, the better the image." Micro Four Thirds (MFT) cameras, though 3 times the price, have a sensor 9 times larger than a point-and-shoot. Great value! The sensor on a full-frame "35 mm" digital camera is 4 times larger than MFT and, coincidentally, costs approximately 4 times as much. Unfortunately, should you wish to shoot digital medium format, you'll run head first into the Law of Diminishing Returns, where a sensor only 1.5 times larger than 35mm currently costs about 7 times as much. Ouch. This article discusses my decision to go "medium format" in a decidedly analog way — by purchasing a 50 year old Yashica-Mat Twin Lens Reflex camera for less than $100. Read along with my tongue-in-cheek logic, and see if you won't end up scouring eBay for your own medium format film camera.

Read The Article

The ‘Match Technical’ Advantage

October 29, 20093 CommentsPhoto Gear

Last year, the Leica rangefinder replaced the SLR as my 'go to' camera for reportage, street, documentary, candid, travel, and just plain 'fun' photography. It changed the way I approach these subjects, and made me a better photographer for it. I took to the Leica instantly — coming to grips with its myriad quirks, methodologies, and differences quite easily. Strangely, in spite of the ease with which I was able to mentally grasp the M8, I had no such luck physically. Frankly, the Leica M8 was a hard camera to hold. Gripping it in one hand was a pain — both figuratively and literally. After several months of walking around town squeezing the heck out of the Leica, I finally caved to my internal wimp. I ordered a "Thumbs Up" device from Match Technical. This article discusses my experiences with several Match Technical products — all designed to improve the usability of Leica rangefinders. Included in the review are the "Thumbs Up," the "E-Clypse" eye magnifier, the "Bip" mini soft release, and the "Coder Kit" for coding Leica lenses.

Read The Article

Alaskan Cruise Photo Gear Guide

August 18, 20098 CommentsPhoto Gear

Have you ever hunted through a photography forum for answers to such questions as, "What lens should I take on my Alaskan cruise?" or, "Should I bring a tripod on my Alaskan cruise?" If those forums left you with more questions than answers, I suggest you grab a cup of coffee, click on this link, and get reading. It contains a wealth of statistical information about both lens and camera usage, plenty of analysis comparing different stabilization techniques, and a cornucopia of discussion about all the photographic flotsam and jetsam that you might not even have considered taking aboard. Even if you're not planning an Alaskan cruise, this article might just make you want to take one.

Read The Article

Geeking Out with a 50 ‘Cron

July 17, 20092 CommentsPhoto Gear

There are geeks and then there are photo geeks. In the old days, geeks worked in carnivals and were oddly entertaining folks who swallowed swords, hammered spikes into their nostrils, and decapitated chickens and snakes without benefit of a cleaver. The photo geek, by contrast, is not nearly so riveting. In fact, photo geeks are downright dull. They photograph things like test charts and brick walls, and talk about spherical aberrations and aperture diffraction rather than composition, light, and shadow. In general, I tend to avoid partaking in the nerdier aspects of photo geekiness. But ever since I began sharing M-mount lenses between the Leica M8 and the Panasonic DMC-G1, I've been consciously aware that they perform quite differently on the two cameras. Because of the way I use these lenses, I'm not actually bothered by this — but readers of this blog feel otherwise, and they asked me to write specifically about the differences between these cameras when using M-mount lenses. This article discusses one such lens — a 1991 Leica v5 50mm f/2 Summicron — and the performance differences one sees when mounting it on a Panasonic DMC-G1 vs. a Leica M8.

Read The Article

The M8ing Ritual (Part 3)

June 11, 20095 CommentsPhoto Gear

In this third and final entry into my "working" review of the Leica M8, I discuss image fidelity. Specifically, I discuss the obvious visual benefits of shooting a camera without an anti-aliasing filter. I take Leica to task for recording 12-bits of data, but downsampling the RAW files to 8-bit. I conclude with a discussion about rangefinder shooting, and how the Leica M8 and a Micro Four Thirds camera make a potently dynamic duo for reportage.

Read The Article

The M8ing Ritual (Part 2)

June 1, 20091 commentPhoto Gear

In Part Two of my report on the Leica M8, I discuss such things as the camera's ergonomics, its shutter noise, and whether or not it succeeds in making me "invisible" on the streets. Granted, they're not the normal topics one discusses when reviewing a camera. But there's nothing "normal" about the unique requirements of a street photographer, either.

Read The Article

The M8ing Ritual (Part 1)

May 25, 2009No commentPhoto Gear

With my street photography proclivities showing no sign of waning, this article finds me continuing my quest for the "perfect" camera. Earlier this year, I opted for a hybrid approach — mounting rangefinder lenses on a Panasonic DMC-G1 MFT body. The experience was reasonably successful. In fact, it was so much better than my previous attempts to coerce either an SLR or a small "enthusiast" camera into reportage duty, that I soon realized I had to go "all in." And by "all in," I mean "a Leica M8." This article discusses my decision process, and how I came to actually possess an affordable one.

Read The Article

Like a Leica (Addendum)

February 22, 200917 CommentsPhoto Gear

A month after publishing my impressions of the Panasonic DMC-G1 and its ability to adapt M-series lenses, I revisited some of the issues in this article. Paramount among them was a manufacturing issue with the original Novoflex M-to-MFT adapter, which caused many of the focussing problems discussed in earlier articles.

Read The Article

Like a Leica (Part 5)

January 25, 20091 commentPhoto Gear

My discussion of the Panasonic DMC-G1 was originally a four part review. But the fourth post was so long that some people had trouble downloading it. So, I've split Part 4 in half, creating this new "Part 5." It contains my conclusions about the G1's "street" shooting abilities and a (scant) few images.

Read The Article

Like a Leica (Part 4)

January 25, 2009No commentPhoto Gear

The nitty gritty. The dirt. The details. Everything you want to know about using the Panasonic Micro Four Thirds DMC-G1 as a "street" camera in a single post... well, OK, "two" posts. The article was so long, it got sectioned into a separate Part 5. Dive in. Enjoy.

Read The Article

Like a Leica (Part 3)

January 22, 20091 commentPhoto Gear

After rejecting an SLR, a portable "enthusiast" camera, and a rangefinder film camera, I'm left with only one alternative — micro four thirds. In this article, I discuss the allure of the MFT format and my decision to go there.

Read The Article
  • 1
  • 2
  • Next »
Next Page »

CATEGORIES

SEARCH SITE

SUBSCRIBE

Receive new post announcements via Email

LATEST POSTS

Dredging the Tide Pools

Drift

The One-Percenters

The Gutter

EXORCISM 07

AGO-a-Go-Go

© 2025 ULTRAsomething
Articles | About | Privacy Policy | Donate | Contact
Manage Cookie Consent
ULTRAsomething uses plugins (which use cookies) to organize and optimize the site. It's kinda how blogs work.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
Preferences
{title} {title} {title}