I’ve been head down in non photographic work – that’s why I haven’t been writing on photography that much. 2011 is coming to an end, it’s been a good year, photographically, for me. I got myself an Olympus E-620 to replace my E-330 that failed. And some months later, the E-PL1. I also shot a few rolls of film on my old Minolta X-700 and my new-old SRT-101.
I haven’t gone through everything I’ve shot on my hard disk, but I thought a few shots from flickr would be nice to review.
Above is film shot with real light leaked right edge. The patina of warm browns and hazy unsharpness is a lovely memory of that day’s shooting.
Women’s shoes have attracted my interest in previous years, but this year showed a resurgence of the thick heeled platforms from my Uni days. Of course, if they are in gold, they are super scrumptious.
Paul was kind enough to invite us on his maintenance checks for the Puffing Billy railway. It was a wet day and we were a little exposed to the elements sitting on the side of NWV-1. This was taken with the very special 7-14mm Super High Grade Zuiko Digital ultra wide angle lens. A really sharp scenic lens as long as one remembers to stop down to f/8 to avoid over shallow depth of field.
I saw these Nonya Ladies at the Malaysian Festival in Melbourne. Their sarung-kebaya garb with kerosang reminds me so much of what mum used to wear in her younger days.
I see this some evenings and never tire of its beauty.
Revised and updated: December 2011
The individual camera brands have personalities - bear that in mind when you are befuddled by tables and comparison matrices of blow by blow feature lists.
Canon produces the most cameras worldwide. Pros shooting Olympics, Getty Images, in war zones, in sports, use them. They have a full range of product from small compact point and shoots to the big DSLRs with honking big, white, expensive "L" lenses. If you are a pro or wanna be a pro or want people to think you are a pro, it seems like one of two brands to embrace. If you want the safety and conservatism of being part of a large tribe, this is the brand for you. Regardless of whether you bought a hundred dollar Canon camera, you can say - "I use this brand, hey!"
But, as in all well run and structured religions, let it be known that Canon has circles - the pros, the wannabes, the want-to-be-known-as, the nerd shooter and the family shooter. And so, you will be offered competent cameras and lenses. Doesn't mean that your $200 lens is the equivalent of an "L" lens worth ten times more. It isn't.
Canon DSLR bodies have bulk and volume. At the low priced end, they can feel hollow (less dense). At the lower end too, I find the right hand grip a little odd, my hands don’t curl around the grip comfortably. But that’s me. The menus seem to use more icons and less words.
Canon changed their lens mount some time back, the old one was called FD and the current one is called EF / EF-S. Of course FD lens owners were not happy but that was some time ago. Canon bodies don’t have an internal AF focus assist lamp – so in dim light, the built-in flash blinks in a beserk manner to light up the near subject.
Canon does put attention to their non DSLR compacts and bridge cameras. They have some individuality and features. There are firmware hacks (CHDK) to enable features that are not normally available in these cameras.
Nikon has the next largest market share. I confess to having a soft spot for them but I was let down by the first Nikon I ever owned, a Nikon 775 compact 3x digital zoom camera. Nikon does have a range of non DSLR compacts and bridge cameras but mostly the passion to make them stand out isn’t the same as Canon.
Now, the Nikon DSLRs go head to head against the Canon DSLRs and are used by pro photographers. Their lenses are good too, however, Nikon stove pipe lenses are black not white. Lowest range Nikon DSLR bodies do not have an AF motor in the body (for old lenses) and cheaper bodies are said not to meter the scene with old lenses in a convenient way – a sign of product differentiation. This is at odds with the pride that the Nikon physical mount has changed little and old, old lenses fit new, new bodies.
I like the Nikon DSLR grip, even the cheapest ones, and the cheap bodies feel dense and compact. The feel of solidity and denseness is a Nikon design ownership aesthetic.
Either brand will do if you are into the "I belong to heap big tribe" attitude.
Sony is the next DSLR brand to discuss. Originally, the DSLR factory was Minolta but Minolta got sued heavily by Honeywell over a bun fight about who invented Auto Focussing and amongst other things, Minolta merged with Konica and then the merged entity lost interest in high risk, low returns camera market, so sold to Sony.
Sony DSLRs of course have very strong innovative features - Sweep Pano, Automatic HDR, Translucent Mirrors and so on. Mirrorless. And with Sony's money bags, they can afford to launch several similar models at the same time and multiple lines of cameras - Full Frame, classic APS-C with mirrors, translucent mirrored SLTs and mirrorless NEX. They can afford to overlap market segments – compete with themselves. And ally with Carl Zeiss (lenses).
Pentax has been a reliable, middle performer brand. They have moments of brilliance. They make good, respectable bodies. Their range of single focal length lenses / pancakes are famous. They’re cost effective. Competent. And now they come in scores of shades and colours. They have a long history of being “there”. Unfortunately, it’s hard being a small company. Hoya bought Pentax and then sold Pentax to Ricoh.
Olympus is a maverick. Has been, Will be. Somehow Y. Maitani has retired but the legacy of his boldness is still in the company’s culture. They are the essence of the Japanese bento box – delicately made, well presented. Small. Because they don’t have a large tribe in tow, they have to be and are agile. Risk takers – again, if you are that size, you take the risk or become lost in the herd of tribesmen from other tribes. Who else would come out with a Mirrorless Interchangeable Lens Camera first? Who would take the decision to voluntarily retire the bulk of their DSLR line ahead of time? Their last and remaining DSLR model is the E-5. They are fully focussed on designing and making their PEN series of interchangeable lens mirrorless cameras.
However, the management has been in disgrace – they have carried out all kinds of financial and management misdeeds. We hope the company makes it.
Panasonic and Sony are rivals in the TV and appliance space. In the photography space, Sony has the lead but Panasonic is not weak. Panasonic have established credibility in the compact and bridge categories. They have allied with Leitz (Leica) as Sony has allied with Carl Zeiss.
In the DSLR space, Panasonic allied with Olympus but were quickly dissatisfied with progress in that category in terms of sales achievement. Panasonic are more comfortable in a category where there is more electronics than mechanicals so they jumped into the Micro Four Thirds mirrorless category with Olympus as collaborators.
I’m not tuned into Photoshop although it is the de facto standard amongst post processing peers, the photo industry and graphic artists. I’ve sat in front of Photoshop several tines and then the MEGO syndrome hits me (My Eyes Glaze Over). Yes, there are certainly video tutorials, magazines, books dedicated to teaching and tutoring Photoshop techniques as befits a de facto, popularly recognised tool – we speak of Photoshopping in the same verb sense as Xeroxing.
I find though, I get on with Picasa (even though it is said to strip .icc profiles from processed JPEGs), Olympus Viewer 2, PAINT.NET and lately Corel Paintshop Pro X4.
The 8bf Photoshop effects Plugin though is another matter. Because Photoshop has become so popular, there are a host of free, then inexpensive, then expensive Photoshop plugins that have been published. Since I have been checking their compatibility with other programs, this article will detail some programs and how they can use the 8bf plugin.
Even though you might be running Windows 7 / 64 bit and some fancy hardware and software, some of the plugins require the following:
You can get both from PSPUG. Both should be in your Windows SYSTEM folder. PUPUG also host many 8BF plugins as well.
PAINT.NET is a free editor. To use 8BF plugins, it needs PSFilterShim. After unzipping it, put it in the EFFECTS sub-folder where PAINT.NET is installed. Put the 8BF files in the same folder or sub-folders of the EFFECTS folder
PSP does not need assistance to use 8BF plugins. Put these plugins in the LANGUAGE\EN\PLUGINS subfolder where PSPX4 is installed. You can nominate a different folder for plugins by changing the setting in PSPX4 settings.
Helicon Filter is a RAW processor – much less publicised than Lightroom, Raw Therapee or Silkypix. Helicon Filter has a Plug-Ins sub folder – put the 8bf files there.
Installation of 8bf files in Irfanview is detailed at namesuppressed
Installation of 8bf files in XnView is detailed here.
Installation of 8bf files in Photo-Brush is explained in the help.
