“The Best Camera”

There are always articles and blogs trying to determine which camera is the best camera. I have even succumbed to this temptation a few times but I confess that when its all done and said I am a firm believer that the best camera is the one you have with you when you need or want to take a picture.

You can have the world’s most expensive camera with the highest resolution and “super-duper” lenses but if its not there when you need or want to take the picture it is less than useless. For this reason I have long advocated for compact and dare I say, point & shoot cameras.

Naturally being an image quality kind of guy I want something that will produce a decent image and I want to be able to override the “Auto” functions and take things into my own hands when the situation demands it. For all those reasons I carry a Nikon Coolpix P-300 with me and that is what I used for the photograph above.

This picture above of me and my new grandson John Michael, was taken by my wife the day after he was born using the little Nikon set on “P” (program) mode with the ISO manually set to 3200 to allow the shot to be taken in a poorly lit hospital room without having to resort to using the built in flash.

Had I used a DSLR or a 35mm SLR the image quality would have been much better but the convenience of the diminutive Nikon point & shoot allowed me to carry it around throughout a lengthy labor and delivery and have it with me at just the right moment.

For more on this amazing little camera see the link to my blog post on it below.

http://istillshootfilmtooalso.blogspot.com/2011/10/perfect-digital-camera-part-2.html

Nikon has released a number of later models of this same camera (like the P-310 & P-330) with bigger, higher resolution sensors and more features but I am still happily shooting the original one I bought back in 2011.

Going for that Vintage Look

The vintage photograph look is all the rage today. That’s probably why Instagram is such a big draw with its various filters and effects making cell phone cameras produce photos that look like something from the early 20^th century.

Its actually a simple matter however, to produce real vintage images by using a real vintage camera, any number of which can be had from thrift stores or garage sales for little or nothing.

The photograph above was made with a Kodak Duaflex IV on Kodak Tri-X black & white film. The light leaks are authentic (no special effects needed) and to be expected from a 60+ year old camera. I used the “warmfly” setting in Picasa to add the sepia coloration because it brings out the gray tones better but the image is otherwise just as it came out of the camera.

Most folks think these old film cameras are obsolete and that you can no longer get film for them but that simply isn’t true. You cannot walk into your local camera store or drug store and get it. That’s true, but you can order both film and processing for almost any of the old film stocks online.

I personally use The Film Photography Project store ( http://filmphotographyproject.com/store ) for buying most of my film and The Darkroom (https://thedarkroom.com/ ) for most of my film processing. These are not the only sources available but are the ones I like and use the most.

Walmart and Target as well as some Walgreens, CVS and other such local stores still sell some film (usually just 35mm and some instant film) and some even offer processing, either in store or sent out.  There are even a few local camera stores carrying film in some areas.

Having hit an all-time low a few years ago, film photography is now growing again. It will never be what it once was because digital photography has pretty much taken over but there is a growing host of young and old film photography hobbyists enjoying once again or learning for the first time the joy of film photography.

Gotta Love that Pinhole!

There is something really special about pinhole photographs. The one above was a 1 second exposure taken on Kodal Ektar 100 (ISO) film with a Holga Pinhole Camera on the lawn of the Louisiana State Capital building on a bright Memorial Day. The lawn was decorated with 11,214 flags in memory of 11,214 Louisiana natives who have given their life for their country over the years.

In retrospect, maybe I should have used the Holga WPC (wide pinhole camera). I might have gotten a much more dramatic wide angle shot maybe with the entire building but as it is, this one, with its infinite depth of field and the flags waving gently in the breeze evokes a feeling that somehow seems consistent with the time and scene portrayed.

The truth is, even with the naked eye it was a little overwhelming. The image leads the viewer to think that the flags go on forever as indeed they did – right up to the Capital steps. So many have given so much. The image forces us to stop and ponder for a moment, the stories represented by each of those flags.

Pinhole Portraits

There is something truly unique about portraits made on film with a pinhole camera. There is of course, the infinite depth of field and special distortions associated with pinhole photography. More importantly however, because long exposures are required there is the special confluence of spatial and temporal factors that come together for a single moment in time and pause for the sake of a photograph.

I have wanted to do pinhole portraits for a while. The image above is my first real attempt at it and I am pleased with the results. This was shot with the Holga pinhole camera on Kodak Ektar 100 color film. The exposure was 45 seconds.

For 45 seconds the photographer (me), the subject, and the camera all agreed to stop and wait while the light painted a picture on the film emulsion. The rest of the world carried on as normal but right here in front of the camera we all paused as if for a moment of prayer and waited 45 seconds for the light to do its work.

This is one of the really cool things about film (or photographic paper etc.). It’s a chemical thing. Each emulsion allows this process to occur over time in a unique way that cannot quite be duplicated by digital sensors, at least not yet.

Kodak Duaflex IV Rides Again!

In my last blog I spoke at length about 620 film and cameras in general and the Kodak Duaflex IV in particular, as a tribute to “620 Day” (June 20th) and noted that this was the day every year when some folks (including me) dedicated themselves to shooting with the now (nearly) obsolete film format.

I also talked about how these 620 box cameras provide huge negatives and resulted in photographs that have a unique look and are absolutely beautiful. As you can see the image above shot on re-spooled Kodak Tri-X 120 black and white film supports that claim pretty well.

This photograph is uncropped and pretty much right out of the camera. I straightened it slightly because it was “cocked” a little but otherwise what you see here is the rich black & white image provided by the Kodak Tri-X film.

Tri-X has been my favorite black & white film stock for over 40 years. Known for its “white whites” and “black blacks” it still manages to rival other black & white film emulsions in producing a full range of gray tones to result in of the most striking monochromatic images.  

No doubt, a super high resolution scan of the image above would produce a sharper image but that would kind of defeat the whole point of this exercise. Kodak produced “tons” of relatively inexpensive 620 cameras like the Duaflex for amateur photographers and family snap shots. They were never intended to be used for so called “serious photography” but the amazing thing is they routinely produce some truly beautiful images.

This Kodak Duaflex model, the “IV” was discontinued in 1960 so it is at least 55 years old and performed beautifully with this first roll (for me) except for a few minor light leaks that showed up on a couple frames. Some folks think this just adds to the “unique character” of the photograph. Personally I would be happier without them but can’t complain if the seals leak a little after 55 years of use and now that I know about it, I can easily fix it.

Happy 620 Day !

June 20^th, otherwise known among certain circles as “620 Day,” is the one day each when some of us (who can remember) have an excellent excuse (as if we needed one) to dedicate ourselves to enjoying the pleasures of shooting 620 film on any one of literally millions of excellent classic cameras designed for this specific film format.

The one I chose to shoot this year is the Kodak Duaflex IV pictured above. I picked up this very nice little camera for only a few bucks at Goodwill. It has a single shutter speed estimated to be about 1/30^th of a second but offers three apertures, f8, f11, & f16 and has a zone focus dial. Considerably more complex than a simple box camera it looks and works like a twin lens reflex camera (TLR) although not nearly as sophisticated as a true TLR.

The 620 film format was introduced by Kodak in 1931 as an alternative to the 120 film format and probably intended to help them capture more market share by using this “proprietary” film format in all their subsequent medium format “roll film cameras.” Kodak stopped making cameras for the very popular 120 film format and started making only 620 film cameras. Although used mainly by Kodak cameras, it became very popular and remained in production until 1995 when it was discontinued. The 620 format is essentially the same film as the 120 format film but on a thinner and narrower all-metal spool. 120 film was rolled onto a wooden spool at the time.

In the battle of the medium format films, 120 eventually won out and remains “The” medium format film today but only after 620 had a very successful 60+ year run at it. Dedicated mainly to simple box cameras and a few noteworthy exceptions that were designed for the professional or serious amateur photographer, this film is now only available from the Film Photography Project, Blue Moon Camera and perhaps a few others as re-spooled or otherwise modified 120 film. That is, 120 film that has been re-spooled onto 620 film spools or had the 120 spool modified to fit 620 film cameras.

The Film Photography Project (FPP) actually has brand new 620 film spools manufactured and uses them to re-spool their 120 film onto them for resale as 620 film. They currently offer nearly two dozen film stocks available for sale in the online FPP store. They also sell the 620 film spools for those who want to re-spool their own film. All profit from FPP sales goes to support the FPP’s mission to promote traditional film photography. You can check them out at http://filmphotographyproject.com/

While images from 620 film cameras are frequently not quite up to par with images from 120 film cameras it is not because of the film. Most 620 film cameras are simple box cameras and do not have high quality optics but a similar camera using 120 film will yield exactly the same kind of results. Still, like the 127 and 828 cameras used for millions of family snapshots over several generations these 620 box cameras provide photographs that have a unique look and are absolutely beautiful.

Next week I will have the film back from this little 620 gem and will be able to let you know how the pictures came out. If experience is any guide I’m betting they will be excellent indeed.

Holga HPL-P (Pinhole) for Pentax DSLR?

I explained what this gadget is in my last blog post (essentially a pinhole mounted in a plastic Pentax K-Mount lens barrel instead of an actual lens which can be used on Pentax SLR’s & DSLR’s) and noted that it was actually designed to be used with a Pentax crop frame (APS-C) DSLR sensor rather than a full frame or 35mm DSLR or film camera.

In the image above I used a Pentax istDL DSLR and we see that the image fills the frame completely. There is some slight vignetting but what we have here is pretty typical of pinholes in general unlike the severe effect seen in my last post in the picture shot with a 35mm SLR.

This image was shot at ISO 800 using a ½ second shutter speed and the same estimated f133 aperture. In post processing I brightened it up and tweaked the color balance a little. I also had to go in and remove the black spots that resulted from dust on the sensor.

Apparently this is a common problem when using pinholes on digital cameras.  Since the pinhole has an infinite depth of field and renders everything in focus from the sensor itself to infinity even the dust on the sensor shows up in the image. This isn’t a problem with a lens because the depth of field of the lens does not include the sensor.

The results here using a crop frame DSLR are a little better than with the 35mm camera noted in my last blog post but I am still a bit disappointed in the overall performance of this little gadget.  Nothing I have done with it so far comes close to the image quality of any of my other pinholes. Even the little Home-made 35mm cardboard pinhole camera creates better images.

Well, I am still on the quest for a better (than my little cardboard) 35mm pinhole camera so my next experiment may just have to be to make my own pinhole, mount it in a body cap and see how that works on one of my SLR’s. Stay tuned!