Tune-Up Time With Manfrotto

How many of us get a tool kit with our new digital cameras these days? In the old film days it was common for the box containing the SLR or rangefinder camera to have a complete tool pouch including a stilson wrench, set of spanners, lens brace, film jack, and a bottle of optical antiseptic. In the case of some Kodak cameras you got a 8-round clip of .30-06 ball ammunition and a toothbrush.

I think we are being done - nowadays you're lucky to get a battery charger and a squidgy little lens cloth with some. Even the instruction manuals are on a CD...or are a web address.

Well, all that having been said, it is refreshing to see that Manfrotto, the famous Italian tripod and lighting accessory manufacturer, has realised that users of their equipment still like to be able to maintain the goods. Their recent carbon-fibre monopod model is a...well... a model of a good product. It works and will keep on working.

The monopod idea is brilliant for anyone who is toting heavy cameras or lenses and needs some relief from the weight. I spend 4 hours shooting dancers on WA Day with a long zoom and a heavy little camera. The Manfrotto monopod I use - an early cousin of this one - takes all the weight out of my arms and puts it down, while not occupying a big triangular patch of floor. Makes the difference between an easy job and a arm breaker.

Well, like some older Manfrotto CF tripods, this one has three lever claps to adjust the sections. Far faster than screwing the sections together like some cheaper monopods. As they are acting on springs, there will come a time when they grow weaker, and need to be adjusted. This is where Manfrotto have been smart - they moulded a plastic box spanner onto a grip and clipped it to the shaft of the monopod.

If the weather changes or the equipment ages, you just tighten up as you go.

Brilliant. Combine it with the Manfrotto 234 or 234RC tilt top and you've got the smartest quick support in town.

One Of The Dishes On The Buffet - Tokina

When we get a big-name camera we sometimes get a big name complex...and we cannot see beyond that name.

Members of camera clubs throughout the state are familiar with this as discussions of Nikon versus Canon versus Sony versus Flapoflex start up during the coffee breaks. The opinions expressed range from youthful enthusiasm to senile folly but fortunately there are few fist fights over the subject. Fair amount of snarling, but...

It can be the same with the lenses for the cameras. The big-name enthusiasts argue with each other and in the process sometimes fail to remember that there are other players in the game - and some of them are stars. Sigma, Tamron, and Tokina come to mind...and we're going to consider the latter brand.

I can make a personal judgment of this brand of lenses - I own one. It was purchased when I ran Nikon cameras and I was so taken with what it does that I retained it when I switched systems. It is the constant workhorse of the Little Studio and for good reason; it has a focal length and focus range that is unavailable in other brands , and it is very well made. For interest - you are looking at the illustrations on this column through it - the Tokina 35mm f:2.8 Macro.

But back to the lens in the heading image. Tokina AT-X 70-200mm f:4 PRO FX VCM-S. That's the usual advertising alphabet soup to tell you that it has a big enough image circle to work on all Nikon cameras, an image stabilising mechanism inside, and no aperture ring. You'll see that readily from the upright image, but what will not be evident until you handle the lens will be the weight of it and the solidity of the barrel. The secret lies in the fact that Tokina use metal barrels for their lenses.

The operation of the focus and zoom ring are as smooth as you could ever want. The focusing is internal so there is no pumping of the front element.

In every respect this is a first-class medium zoom lens that deserves your consideration along with the others in the class. The price is likely to be very attractive. I know the 35mm Macro was certainly so.

One other note: Made in Japan.

The Long Lens Inside - The Saga Of The Fujifilm Continues

If you read most of the photographic press that deals with interchangeable lenses for DSLR and mirror-less cameras you'll see much the same recommendations about choices. It's not conspiracy - it's sensible agreement. Being photographers we are free to be neither sensible nor agreeable - and sometimes it pays off big-time.

The books all talk about long lenses being the sensible choice for motor sports, surfing, field sports, wildlife, and aircraft photography. I've not gone in for a great deal of these subjects, but when I have the advice was good. You need long focal lengths to bring in lions and Tiger Moths - you also need bright light. Anything less is going to be a failure.

Oh yes? Well what if you get an assignment to take pictures at a Halloween dance show in Fremantle -at the Fly By Night hall on High street. That's a picture from the mezzanine balcony at the head of the column. Great place to prop up during a performance as you are in no-one's way, but a long way from the stage...Note: The establishing shot is a Fujifilm 18mm f:2.

Enter the Camera Electronic Rental Department and the 100-400mm Fujinon zoom lens - the big boy in their lineup. Widest aperture is f: 4.5-5.6 but it has a dynamite optical stabilization circuit inside and an extremely smooth focus. The support shoe and rotating ring are also super-professional.

I bolted the lens onto a Manfrotto 234 monopod tilting head and in turn supported that with my Manfrotto carbon fibre monopod. Sitting on a chair up there in the gods at the Fly meant that I was stable and the lens was too. I could even grip the monopod with my knees if I needed to busy my hands elsewhere and the whole assembly stayed upright. I love tripods in the studio but am starting to love the manfrotto monopod more when I am out an about - so much less hassle but still great stability.

Okay, it's dark in there, and the stage lights are good but still not the same as sunlight. ISO up to 6400 on a Fujifilm E-X2 is as high as you want to go, but fortunately it was high enough to work. Really fast dancers blurred, but slower ones came in well. And the transition from landscape to portrait orientation couldn't have been smoother - I just kept the lock knob turned off and rotated at will all night long.

The job was a lot of fun - Halloween brings out the theatre in people and if they are good actors, singers, and dancers to start with it is all that much better under stage lighting.

Note: If you've got a job that needs long coverage think about talking to the Camera Electronic Rental Department. They've got faster lenses for other systems as well, or if you would like to try the latest and best from Fujifilm, ask to see the X-T2 with this lens. You could even add a teleconverter to push it out to 600mm.

Performers, Nina, Richell, and Jenier. Thank you for a great night, ladies.

The Game's Nearly Afoot, Watson - With The Olympus Long Lens

 

NOTE TO READERS: THE ELECTRICITY HAS BEEN OFF ALL DAY DUE TO SHORTS OVER THE LINE. IF IT IS STILL OUT IN YOUR SUBURB, DON'T BOTHER TO READ THIS MESSAGE...ALL BACK ON HERE AT THE EDITORIAL OFFICE...

Well nearly a foot. 11.81 inches to be precise...

That's the focal length of this Olympus 300mm f:4 IS PRO lens - I didn't actually measure the thing from front to back. It is one of the longer choices that one can make for the Micro 4/3 system. Olympus and Panasonic users with a desire to pull in long distance images are the market.

 

You? Do you shoot sports? Cars? Surfing? Aircraft? Large wildlife? Birds? Well step up to professional qaulity and take this lens away.

 

But wait - there's more. As I found out a week ago in the dim reaches of the Fly By Night theatre in Fremantle, theatre shooting can also be done with this sort of camer and lens. Boost your ISO, put the thing on a monopod, and blaze away. The 300mm is more than long enough for most theatres.

 

But wait - there's more. As I discovered when I pulled the focusing ring backwards on the mount, this is a long lens with a rearkably short minimum focuss distance - just under 1.4 metres. Any object seen at this close distance under the magnification that his focal length gives will be pretty large on the sensor. Remember that in terms of the old 35mm film geometry, this is a 600mm lens!

Depth of field will be shallow under these criteria, but that is optics.

The heading image is just bcause it is a lovely piece of glass to look at. The lens hood is attached to the lens and just slides forward into position.

Note the feature of a " industry-standard " profiled mount on the tripod support foot. I used a similar idea for mounting a zoom lens on a monopod and it is the height of convenience and elegance.

Sirui For The Club Person - Part Three

Far be it from this column to suggest that photographers go armed in public - that sort of behaviour gets you into trouble with the magistrates, and rightly so. Still, it can be a comfort when taking pictures at a family Christmas party or a wedding to carry a stout club with a metal end. You never can tell when the festivities will hot up and it is best to be prepared.

Sirui have released a dandy mace...I mean a very good photographic monopod...to help bring calm and steadiness back to your pictures. The P 326 is made in China where they understand this sort of thing and it is just the thing for most situations.

You'll see from the illustrations that it is made of carbon fibre - and in itself is not a heavy item. 400g. The thing will extend to 154 cm so you can get your camera up to eye level easily, and when folded down is a compact 38cm. The collar at the top is well-finished metal. Should be easy to wipe clean...

Use it whenever you need to steady the camera short of complete immobility - for that you still need a tripod. This is ideal for sports or theatre coverage. At a car show you can set the camera going on self timer and hoist it up above the crowd level for down shots.

The piece-of-carpet-tile or CD disc advice ( thank you, John ) we gave for landscape photographers applies equally with a monopod, plus if you are covering footy or a car race with a heavy rig, it prevents you screwing yourself into the ground. People who submit freelance pictures to publications will get screwed enough without having to pick their lenses out of the mud...

I see that there is also a light carabiner clip and plastic compass included with the monopod. If you are intending to use them to navigate your way through the desert or climb Bluff Knoll I would also suggest an EPIRB and a series of good excuses for when they find you. Send us a picture.

Action Stations - Flank Speed - Part Three

Now that we have gone through the normal, sensible, mundane action camera mounts, we get to the  special stuff. The mounts that they won't sell to minors. The mounts that you need a note from and MD, an MP, and a JP to purchase...

A. The Hand-Wrist-Arm-Leg mount. GoPro The Strap. This is the sort of thing that the Mississippi prisons department straps onto the road gangs when their chains are in the shop for service. Either that or this is the mount for use in all-in wrestling. No matter which end is up you can still attach a camera to it.

B. The Sportsman. GoPro Sportsman Mount. If you absolutely have a need to attach an action camera to a rifle, a bow, or a fishing rod, this is the squeeze clamp that will do it. I have no idea what you will do with the resultant footage. No, don't tell me.

C. The Chomp - GoPole (in store only). No, I am not making that up. That is what it says on the box. It is a rubber mouth guard with an action camera mount attached to it. You fix the camera on it, start it up, and grip it between your teeth. Part of me wants to see what happens next, and part of me - the bit that used to be a dentist - wants to look away. To be fair it does have rubber grippy pads inset into the main body to give a firmer grip, and it is probably washable. 

Nevertheless, I should not advise sharing it with other enthusiasts...

I suppose this is a way of getting coverage without fixing the camera to a helmet, but the possibilities for injury are mind-boggling. I am sorry to say I can see this being tried out on a football field.

D. The Rig - GoPole (in store only). This is actually very good. It is a lightweight versatile video rig that has provision for two action cameras on the bottom level, two monitors or lights on the top, and three shoe mounts as well. There are tow sturdy handles and they are drilled for starter switches or cable releases. It would have application far beyond the action camera for sport and press work. I am looking at it seriously for this sort of thing. There are other video cages out there, but this one is light enough and cheap enough to actually be useful.

 

See the GoPole range on the Camera Electronic webstore here

See the GoPro range on the Camera Electronic webstore here

Action Stations - Man The Cameras - Part One (GoPole)

I suppose in today's social climate that should really read "Human The Cameras", but I am hoping that we can get through the post before the flood of protest closes down the weblog page. Here goes.

The action camera craze burst upon the photographic scene like a bombshell a few years ago. Perhaps we should say- in view of what people do with them - that it burst like a ligament or a medical benefits claim. However you look at it, it has been successful in capturing the imaginations of the public. More and more of the little cameras record more and more of the world.

The makers of the original  action cameras were smart designers - they came up with a mounting system that was light, stable, and easy to attach. They went further - they made it universal. This had not been done in the design field since the 1/4" tripod screw socket supplanted the 3/8" socket in most modern cameras. It far outstripped the teams who devised different lens mounts for the SLR and rangefinder cameras of the film era - and who have given them on as legacy to their digital descendants.

The makers of the first action cams may have been serving themselves with their desire for standardisation but they ended up serving their customers and their competitors, and they served them right.

As a result, there are more variations of mount for the action cams than you can shake a crutch at. Bikes, helmets, wrists, foreheads, chests, poles, tripods, car windows, etc, etc...After three years I thought that they had run out of places to stick their cameras. I was wrong.

A. GoPole Grenade Grip. Good if you need to assault a trench by throwing your action camera at the enemy. I should imaging that if they get around to filming " Storm Of Steel" or " All Quiet On The Western Front " yet again, this is exactly what they will do.

B. GoPole Bobber. For the diving enthusiast who will be filming in the surf and expects to get turned over like the washing in the Kelvinator - and is going to need to let go of the camera to save them self. The camera should have enough buoyancy to ride up through the surf and be carried inshore to be dashed to pieces on the rocks.

C. GoPole Reach (14-40 inch extension pole). A little like the Grenade, this has just a little more length to allow you to lift the camera up above the crowd at the fist fight to capture the action. These are available in several lengths and some even have adjustable extensions in case you are behind tall people and you are not...

D. The Control Grip (in store only). Some of the action cameras can be controlled - unlike their users - by remote means. There are little boxes that send out radio signals to the camera. This grip is one of the extendable ones that also provides a waterproof housing for the controller. 

I'm afraid that I have to admit that I see the camera on the end of this grip rising up out of the water like a submarine periscope and looking around. But then I saw all the Pink Panther and Revenge Of The Nerds movies when they were fresh...

Da dum dadum, dadum, dadum, dadum , dadum dadum, da daaaaaaa...You can hum that all day if you wish.

See the full GoPole range on the Camera Electronic webstore.

We Finally Get To It - With The Big Fujifilm Lens

I have been experimenting for the last few months with long lenses attached to my Fujifilm X cameras by means of adapters. The tests were encouraging as long as there were suitable subjects some distance away. Yet I had never gotten to grips with the long zoom made by Fujifilm themselves - now was the time.

Each manufacturer presents their material in a different way - some go for simple cases to protect their lenses and some go for quite elaborate hard cases. Fujifilm has packed the XF 100-400mm  f:4.5-5.6 RLM OIS WR lens in a sturdy box, a cardboard cradle, and a cloth wrapping...I should advise investigating a Lowepro or Promaster Lens case before venturing out into the field - the lens is superbly finished and it would be a shame to nick it up unnecessarily.

Well, it is certainly big in comparison to the other Fujifilm lenses, but small when you consider the optics of full-frame DSLRs. This would be a great deal easier to haul on long wildlife trips - even with the substantial lens hood attached it is manageable. That's a standard-sized business card there in the zoom picture.

The lens is fitted with the usual controls - dealing with the stabilising system, zoom ring, zoom ring lock, and Automatic or manual aperture. There is one additional control switch that limits the focusing travel if you are only going to play with distant subjects.

The tripod foot is quite neat but substantial.

The surprises on the lens hood come in two forms; there is a button to release the hood gently, and there is s sliding panel on the underside. This is not the cover for the waist-gunner's position, though it looks like it - it is hatch to let you reach inside and turn polarising filters to best effect. Note from the shot of the inside of the lens hood that Fujifilm have even gone to the effort of ribbing it for flare reduction - a neat finishing touch.

But what of the operations? No more fumbling with a manual focus ring with this one - and no more hastily turning a manual aperture ring to stop down just before exposure. Oh sure, you can do it...but you lessen your chances of getting a really sharp shot, really fast. Adapters are all very well, but they are still adapters. It was a sheer pleasure to point and shoot in single-frame and watch it snap into focus.

Here are some shots taken in the open air - no polariser to darken skies. The camera body was the Fujifilm X-E2 with the latest firmware update and I can honestly say the autofocus speed was as good as I could expect. There is always a fuss about this function in sports shooting from the point of view that it is not as fast as a DSLR. Well, it's a lot faster than winding it manually, and not noisy while in operation.

I should still resort to focus trapping at a motor race to ensure that I was giving the mechanism the best opportunity to perform sharply on high-speed vehicles like this one...

Oh, how I wish The RAAF would save enough money to buy jet fuel and have an air show at PEARCE. I would be willing to sponsor a gallon of avgas myself.

Longing For A Sigma Long Lens...

I rarely need to use a really long lens. Studio work for the most part is short/standard work with a few turns of the zoom lens for head and shoulders portraits. But I am sorely tempted when I see the new lens lines from Sigma.

Of course right now their lenses only fit my camera via a third-party adapter, but the world turns and I cannot say when the licensing and legal side of it will change - and I'll see a Sigma lens for my camera mount. Until then I can use an adapter to do my test shooting. I miss out on AF and automated aperture, but I can still take good shots.

The camera in the Little Studio today was the Sigma 150mm - 600mm f: 5-6.3 DG Sports lens. It's been with us for a few months but is a thoroughly modern design. Starting from the outside in, here's what you get from Sigma:

Sturdy box full of sturdy packaging.

Sigma's rectangular padded lens case.

With attached shoulder strap. You'll need it.

A padded wrap-around lens hood cover.

A lens hood that rides backwards on the barrel.

150mm closed.

600mm open.

Lock mechanism for the zoom. locks at 150mm, 250mm, 400,mm, and 600mm to prevent lens creep. One less worry for the action shooter.

Extensive multi-setting optical stabilisation mechanism inside. All customisable.

A set of big lug attachment loops at the sides of the lens. Needed - the lens is heavy and you should not rely solely on the strap lugs of your camera.

A big foot with three tripod attachment points. I would definitely use two of them at a time.

The proof of the pudding was in the shooting. Handicapped as I was by the lack of AF on my Fujifilm X-Pro1, I could still use the RayQual adapter to actuate the aperture and do my focusing in manual.

The sample pics were done at 3200 ISO to give a high shutter speed. Don't growl at the grain. It is art, and the Singapore jet was climbing at a pretty rapid rate a long way away from the studio's back yard. The subject proved hard to track but the camera responded well whenever it was on target.

 This is definitely a cannon of emplacement - it is the sort of lens that needs to be on a tripod with some sort of a Wimberly gimbal to allow it to track moving objects. Surf shooters, racetrack shooters, sports shooters will all welcome it. Wild animal shooters as well, if they are prepared to lug it into the bush.

It was superbly finished and performed well. I wish there had been more airplanes closer in to try it on.

Shop the lens online or in-store - 230 Stirling St, Perth.