The Financial Year Camera

With the new financial year rapidly approaching we are all staring down the barrel of the Law...the law that states that if the departmental budget is not spent by the end of June you get less money next year

As the calender ticks over we come up with implausible schemes to stock up on copier paper or send fact-finding missions to Bavaria. It all gets desperate and we are wheeling trolley's out of Officeworks stacked with anything we can grab. Well, this year we can short-circuit this...we can win outright at the start.

We'll just grab this titanium Leica M-P kit and gleefully clap on one of the lenses. We can choose the 50mm or 28mm focal length, depending on whether we want to just take a picture of of the accountant or his whole family.

We'll be sure to point out the fact that the titanium construction of the body makes it 3 ounces lighter and that the lenses are especially anodised to have the same shade as the body. And let him see the fitted titanium-finish back lens cap.

Mentioning that there are only 333 of these in the world...and if we are really ambitious, buying up all the rest in Australia...we'll then tell his wife that we're surprised that she doesn't have one by now. Is there a money problem? Oh dear...

I think we will do it right. Looking into the Leica Boutique we'll equip ourselves with a fashion bag as well. And a spare battery.

After all, 'tis the season to be frugal. And the price can only go up later...

Gimmee One'A Dem - Part Five -The Hot Wash-Up

Okay, your friend has come with you into the shop - or perhaps it is the other way round. You may have the whole fam damily in there as well, and that can make for distraction and pressure - better to just keep it to two customers and one sales person. Note: the sales person does not have to be the owner of the shop. The staff are perfectly qualified to help, teach, and bargain, and you gain nothing by waiting for the boss. In fact, you lose time...and if you are not careful you lose standing in the eyes of your mate. Word to the wise...

Assume the best. A comfortable day, room to move, and the sales assistant has had coffee. Let your friend see the three kits on the counter in front of them. If the kits are matched as to lens capability and other general specifications, you can move to the next most important measurement: what does it feel like when they pick it up? This is the point at which the buyer is as expert as the sales assistant or the mentor...because they can feel what feels right or wrong for themselves.

It may be a matter as simple as the weight. Or as complex as the shape of the body grip. Few of these small-frame cameras have a grip big enough to take a full western man's hand with all four fingers engaged. You inevitably have one curled around the bottom of the grip. The other hand can hold the body if you do not have the screen swung out, or at least rest on the zoom ring of the lens. Thankfully, all three have on/off switches that re easy to access and shutter buttons that fall easily under the forefinger. The Nikon has the best two-pressure grip, if you are an old Enfield shooter. ( and less recoil...).

The eyepieces are similar, and as most modern cameras include a dioptre adjustment, they can be quickly brought o the individual's needs. The nose clearance is different for all three, so get your mate to try that out. Funny thing to mention, but noses are individual items...

Are they all reliable? Yes. Is one more reliable than the rest? No. Does it make a scrap of difference in which Asian country the camera or lens was made? Probably not - they have all passed through the cattle race of the Australian importer and that is who you would deal with for any issues.  They are all three reliable, and what is better, that means you are off the hook as far as your mate is concerned.

Some final thoughts: Why did you and the shop hit upon selling a DSLR kit to your mate instead of a compact camera or a mirror-less camera or a waterproof camera?

Well, partly because that is what they asked for...and there is no commercial sense in refusing to sell someone a hamburger when they ask for a hamburger...

Partly because it is the sort of purchase that can grow to greater things in the future. It's happened before. The entry-level buyer goes off and has a whale of a time and comes back and starts to haunt the internet, camera clubs, and shops. The initial little camera purchase becomes a a five-camera system with more long lenses than NASA. More and more gear is sold - more and more new things are tried - and it all ends either in a AIPP fellowship or a messy divorce. Either way our accountant is comfortable.

Partly because to give a person a smaller camera - waterproof or not - is to encourage sandy beach-side disaster. As much as we may want them to carefully ensure that there are no sand grains in the rubber seal or near the extendable lens system, we know what is going to happen. Every summer brings a crop of crunchy cameras back to the shop. The DSLR commands more respect from the user and promotes a bit more caution. Of course when they come in asking for a tiny action camera you can throw caution to the winds and look out the health insurance...

Gimmee One'a Dem - Part Four - The Nikon D3400 Kit

When we ask people to go out and use mirror-less camera systems on the basis of small size and weight we are sometimes forgetting that if you choose wisely, you can get both small size and light weight in a DSLR. The trick, as with this Nikon D3400, is to choose an entry-level camera kit.

Frankly, My Dear, I do occasionally give a damn...particularly if I am hauling my metal-bodied mirror-less with a big-aperture zoom. The weight that I thought I was saving creeps back and my neck knows it at the end of the day. Custom straps help, but I still look at the littler Nikons with envy.

This is one of the new Nikons that feature the simple connection to mobile phones and tablets. Oh, I know that there are any number of mirror-less and DSLR cameras that do have WiFi, but the Nikon system is particularly easy to use. You pair up your phone or tablet with the camera once and it stays that way ever after. Older readers like myself who dread having to perform computer science every time they want to link a picture find this to be a blessing.

Okay, there is also another feature in this kit combo - the lens is a retractable one that allows you to store the front barrel back into the zoom ring when you are not taking pictures. The camera won't shoot until you extend the lens and tells you so in a notice on the back screen.. The screen isnt' a swinging one, and that may very well be a good thing.

Note that people used to using both hands to hold and control a camera may find the two-side configuration of the Nikon cameras a boon. There are still a fair number of pokey buttons on the right hand side but they could move four of the most heavily-used ones to the left  and clear the way somewhat.

One minus feature for the travellers will be the charger system that Nikon have included. The other two make similar-sized charger blocks with a standard figure-eight kettle cord connection to the mains electricity. Nikon have opted to make an adapter that clips onto the charger block easily ...to convert the two-blade Japanese plug to the Australian three-blade...but be aware that it does not unclip and pack away as easily. It's a space-user in the luggage.

No other downsides, however, and even the plastic lens mount with the rather exposed contact buttons is no problem as long as it is kept on the body. The lens is fast to deploy, focuses well, and is sharp.

Indeed , the performance of all three of the kit lenses is such as to bring into question whether an amateur user need change to other optics. In the price range and given the profile of the users, these kit lenses are superb value. The right job means that they pay for themselves within a hundred shots - and who amongst us us not prepared to shoot a hundred shots.

Gimmee One'a Dem - Part Three - The Pentax K-70

Your mate who is buying their first DSLR as a kit camera may have heard of the Pentax name some years ago in the film era. It was hard to find a camera club, school, or group of enthusiasts in which a Pentax 35mm camera was not in use. That may have eased off a little in recent years - and I am not going to fire up speculation about why - but there is no reason why you should not set your friend out to look at the Pentax K-70 kit.

Note that the pictures of the cameras this week show the boxes they come in. Not just to make use of the designer's art - this is to give the purchaser some idea of the size of the packaging that these kits require. You'll see that the Canon and Pentax offerings come in one box while the Nikon camera is separated from the lens. Makes no difference? Well, consider how much extra trouble it would be to haul that camera box through the airport, airplane, customs, hotel, etc if you were required to take it with you everywhere on your holiday...

Hint: If you buy the camera kit here in Perth a week before you go on the airplane you DON'T have to take the blessed boxes with you. More space for duty free.

Okay, back to the camera body. It seems heavier than the Canon, though the lens is just as light. The mounting of the lens requires more force and makes more whizz-click noises but once it is on you need do no more. Remember that we encouraged you to get your mate to leave it undisturbed for the duration of the trip to avoid dust leakage into the mirror box.

The Pentax is also a swing-screen camera and as such does not put any control buttons down the left-hand side of the back. Some find this a help - some not. No southpaws are really catered for by the camera makers anyway so maybe it is just academic. The physical size of the Pentax and the shape of the hand hold mean that you do get a solid grip on the camera.

As your mate's mentor you are going to faced with a challenge - there are a lot of control options in the menu of a Pentax that are highlighted with interesting descriptions. They are tempting and will beckon to those who are attracted to bright colours. Once onto that pathway, your friend may customise their way to the point where the camera thinks that it is Salvador Dali and starts to make art instead of images. Teach them about the "reset " button that returns it to the factory formula and show them how to get out of trouble.

 Note that with the Pentax as well as any other camera, you are going to have to remind them to charge the battery and insert a memory card - and make sure that the memory card does not have the lock slider pushed down. If it does, the camera will neither format the card nor take a picture. You might think it is broken straight out of the box but the truth is it is just waiting for a sensible command from you. ( Don't ask me how I know this... ). Battery charging is about 90 minutes for these cameras so you can also do your mate a favour if you tell them to get an extra battery..

An electrical aside...the Canon, Pentax, and Nikon batteries for this week's cameras are all about the same size and weight. The casual user who looks at their images on the back screen or uses a lot of Live View might get  250-300 shots from a charge. At least all the cameras have a positive on/off switch and are unlikely to be left discharging the battery when they are put back in the case.

The other danger that the novice runs is the wonderful feature that Pentax put on the LHS of the camera - a dedicated RAW button that means you can crank in a RAW shot in the middle of a JPEG series. This is great for you but may lead to frustration for your friend if they hit it unknowingly. At the least sign of a developing photo enthusiasm, of course, you can turn them on to RAW processing, but be ready to have them change their image editing program if it cannot keep up.

Okay, be prepared to sort a lot of things out photographically when they get back from Thailand or Bali but hope that the automatic setting will have been in operation most of the time.

You have the backup of Camera Electronic and the Pentax importers if you buy it here and remember that they really do back their warranties.

Gimmee One'a Dem - Part Two - The Canon 700D Kit

The One'a Dem series this week will showcase cameras that may be recommended to your mate with safety.

I shall leave the manufacturer's representatives and fan-boy geeks to point out long lists of differences and advantages in their own favourite equipment in an attempt to gain superiority. The commonalities will be:

a. Small - frame cameras. Your mate is a tourist with a family.

b. Moderate 18-55 mm zooms.

c. Automated operation. Your mate is not a great reader of instruction books

d. Actual availability. In-shop now. Your mate can have the camera before he gets on the Boeing.

e. Affordable pricing. We need to leave spare cash for Bintang tee shirts and Jack Daniels at the duty-free.

 

Today's kit is the Canon 700D. A bit bigger physically than the other cameras, and somewhat lighter. Of course, all three cameras have plastic-mount lenses of light construction, but if they are prepared to leave them on the mounts and not wear out the bayonet, the optics should actually do a very good job. The resolution, distortion, AF speed, and CA may not be up to the standard of the L series lens but then neither is it going to be heavy nor expensive. Horses for courses.

The body opens up at the back to swing the LCD screen to the left. A good thing if they are going to shoot with the thing over their head, but a danger if it is going to be taken off on a door jamb. As a mate, you would be wise to get them to reverse the screen and tuck it into the camera back to start with. Disregard the action-photo advertisement where everyone has an screen swung out.

 

Intelligent auto answers most of the novice's needs and you can tell them not to put it off that until they are well into their photography. The machine opens with JPEG, sRGB, and a number of other standard and inoffensive factory settings, so get them to leave well enough alone for now. Do help them to set the clock and calendar so that they can search for photos later on the computer.

 

The factory settings for the video will also be safe enough for when they bring the results back but be warned that you will be expected to sit through an hour of the mates at the BBQ. If you want to distract them, explain the pictorial symbols on the mode dial and let them do macro and portraits.

All cynicism aside, you will be sending someone out with a very sophisticated machine that can grow with them if they take a continued interest. The 18 megapixel sensor is plenty for the camera and the ISO sensitivity goes way higher than most people can use. If this venture proves a success, there is an entire mountain of Canon glass available for this body. If you use Canon, your mate can borrow yours...

Do explain the optical stabilisation routine to your mate, but be conservative. Better that they should steady themselves just in case and with the added help of the OS the images will look good. You might be able to hand-hold 1/2 second on the topmast of a sailing ship in a storm, but that's why you are an icon.

Gimmee One'a Dem - Part One - The Maaaaaate in the Business

I like to think that the people who read this weblog column are astute professionals and keen amateurs. Enthusiasts in art and science - renaissance men and women who can turn their minds and hands to any task. Experts, in short.

Unfortunately, the readers will also be seen as experts by some of their friends who are not as well versed in photography. They may be seen as a resource to be exploited when it comes time to choose a camera. Sort of a walking CHOICE magazine. Someone who can do the hard yards of thinking and make sure that their mate gets something fabulously good for hardly any money at all.

Maaaaaate....

It's not as much fun as you might think. You may indeed be an iconic international superstar ambassador with a string of awards stapled to your CV, but if you put your mate onto a piece of equipment that becomes a disappointment, your name moves from Mentor to Mud. Here's a series this week that will help you maintain your standing in the studio and the saloon bar.

Firstly, be realistic. Is the mate asking you for good advice or bad advice?  That's not as enigmatic as you might think. Some people want you to tell them what to buy because they want to use the goods. Some want advice because they just want to spend money - and will never make pictures. Some just ask to trap you into an argument. You can succeed with the first, and have a good time. The latter two classes of mate will just cause grief.

Secondly, be realistic again - but this time assess whether your mate has the intelligence to succeed with a digital camera. Be as cynical as you please, but keep the answer to yourself. If you send someone out to operate the NIMITZ and they are really only suited to a ten-foot tinnie and a pair of oars, no-one is going to be happy. It's true to say that you never can tell - some people have blossomed into technical geniuses when confronted with the control panel of a modern DSLR, but it is always good to leave a chance open to an automatic escape. Remember that Kodak got rich with the Instamatic camera and poor with the digital...

Thirdly, be fair. You are not the press agent for the camera shop ( I am! ). You are not the shop's management nor the accountant. You are not authorised to offer your mate a great deal on something the shop sells unless you actually own the place...and it is unfair on your part to drag someone in through the front door on the inference that you have the power to compel the owner to discount goods. When it comes to money you cannot be a mate in more than one direction at a time.

You might have wondered about the first part of the title - well, for the purposes of the next few articles, we are going to imagine that your mate is one of the people with little experience of photography...but that they have a need for a " good camera " and enough money to purchase it. We are going to further assume that they have a family, hobby interests, and are going to travel. And that they want you to recommend a surefire winner of a camera kit for them so that they can go to the holiday island/city/mountain top/fiord and bring back winner shots.

We're not going to assume that they read instruction books or internet sites before they buy or use the camera. I mean, why would they? They've got you...

Maaaaaate...

Kit Without Being Kitsch - the Fujifilm 18-55 lens

Sometimes you look out over the vast heaving sea of camera lenses and all you can see to the horizon is...kit lenses. Whether they are attached to Canon, Nikon, Olympus, Sony, or Fujifilm digital cameras*, they are there in serried ranks - ready to head out to take the initial shots.

People sometimes think of them as stop-gap measures...lenses that you use until you can purchase something bigger and longer and faster and more expensive...training-wheel lenses, if you will. Well, as a camera shop we would never discourage you from buying more lenses, but we can let you into a litle secret at the outset...kit lenses are very good.

It's percentages really - you can say that, for an average shooter, the camera set at factory defaults and on an automatic setting will deliver the picture they want about 85% of the time. It's the same for the kit lens - Average Joe or Average Jane will get what they need 85% of the time with the kit lens - particualrly if it is an 18-55mm focal range for an APS-C camera.

Of course as they advance in knowledge and skill, they become Excellent Joe and Excellent Jane and find they need wider, faster, longer, closer, etc in their lenses. And they can expect to pay more money and we can expect to take it. Isn't nature wonderful? But there is still a solid foundation of goodness in that kit lens.

The 18-55mm f:2.8-4 R LM OIS lens from Fujifilm can be clapped onto a new X-T2, X-Pro2, X-E2s, X-T10...or any of their older cousins...and for the most part stay clapped on there. It would be a very hard choice to beat for family pictures, casual portraits, landscape trips, holidays, car shots, pet shots, and product shots.

I could do a great wedding with one - I use flash for weddings - and the people who use the higher ISO settings on the newer cameras could do pretty much as well. The facility of not having to change lenses between shots would be priceless. For the techno-geeks out there who point out the inherently higher distortion percentages of any zoom lens vs any prime lens my answer would be: " When was the last time you saw a bride who was made up of right angles? ".

The OIS is the key to most of what this baby can do on the run. Lots of camera systems now have some form of stability aid - some are in the lenses and some in the bodies. This one goes with the Fujifilm idea of having it in the lens - whatever type, the effect is to allow you to use two shutter speeds slower than you could normally hold without paying a picture penalty. It won't take the place of a tripods for some work but it'll get you closer to that decision line than before.

As a trip lens it would be perfect if you were going to do urban and semi-rural pictures. I'd not hesitate to use it as the ONLY lens for a European or North American tour if I was not out in the bear-and-mountain-goat belt. Everything else would be well within the reward zone. Note: for wildlife you need longer lenses and for little life you need the Fujifilm 60mm macro lens. But you knew that already.

The one clincher for a kit lens is the price - they are often significantly less expensive than the exotic lenses in any manufacturer's range. Combine that with their utility and you've got a combo that you can't really beat! They're easy to pickup...( groan...)

*No, Virginia, you can't attach the same lens to all the cameras. At least not without a hammer and bad language...

One Day With Ken Duncan OAM...

And that one day is going to be Friday, the 7th of October. He's going to be at the Pan Pacific Hotel - 207 Adelaide Terrace, holding a one-day seminar to help Western Australians understand their digital cameras and - to paraphrase his own advertising - to make something very simple out of something that might have seemed hard work.

Ken's a landscape person - Oh, Boy, is he a landscape person - and the landscapes he has captured are the wide views of Australia. Limited edition prints, published books, calendars, cards, DVD's, and even jigsaw puzzles. He is an honourable jigsaw maker - he gives you ALL the pieces in the box...

Well, he's coming to Perth to present a seminar that will help nearly anyone who takes pictures. Really - anyone from pro to amateur to family snapper. The main poster for his seminar lists the topics and there is a good mix of what you need to know and what you need to do - and also the candid inclusion of what you DON'T need to worry about. Bless us, thus is just what the Camera Electronic sales staff and management want to see - a man who loves photography as much as we do.

Well, he's got some good backup - makers of the famed Lumix range of digital cameras and lenses, Panasonic are the event partner and we're going to be the exclusive retail partner. We stock Panasonic here at Camera Electronic and we know how good they are for taking landscapes - that's one at the top of the column taken on a Panasonic Lumix GX-7 with a 20mm lens. Some people have said it looks a little like Japan...

Well, more good news from Panasonic - one person at the seminar will win a Panasonic camera valued at $1099. And there will be more free give-aways - goodies, discount vouchers, tools and tutorials.

You won't starve or parch either - morning tea, lunch, and afternoon tea are included in the $249.75 seminar fee. Please don't ask me where the 75¢ comes into it because I have no idea...

But goodies aside, what you REALLY want to get is what you really will get - Ken's expert advice on what to buy, what to set, what to look for in a picture, and how to capture it. It doesn't need to be award-winning landscape panoramas like he does - it can be people, places, events, and objects just as easily...and easily is just how Ken wants you to do it. Come along and be charmed and instructed all at once.

The link to go to to book for this day is: https://www.trybooking.com/BookingEventSummary.aspx?eid=200588

If you key in CAMELEC as you are checking out you can get a 10% discount off the ticket price.

Now, go and do two things - go book that ticket and then google up Ken Duncan OAM and press the "images" button on your browser...

WOW, Sir! Those are really some pictures! Wouldn't you like to find out how he made them look so good?

7th of October is the day to find out...

Panasonic G Series Welcomes A New Camera

Every day people present to our counter looking for smaller and lighter camera alternatives for their travel photos - we duly recommend the various options and try to talk them through their plans and needs.

Panasonic have realised that this is a burgeoning market - their G series mirror-less cameras have always combined sophisticated electronics with small size. Now there is a new model that looks to be a good choice for he raveller or home photographer.

"Home Photographer " sounds patronising but really isn't - we all need something that can take pictures in our home, of our home life. Mobile phones don't do justice to our families when we use them as the primary image-capturing device. Somewhere down the line we and our subjects are going to be sorry we opted for the phone shot when we try to get a good large print of irreplaceable people.

Well - think mirror-less, and specifically think Panasonic Lumix G7. Pop on a Lumix G Vario 14-140 lens on it and a good fast card into the slot and go for it.

The good fast card is because his camera records video in the 4K mode...and sometime in the future you'll be able to get home video replay gear that will show you the beauty of this. It is the newest and best of video.

The files that come off the micro 4/3 sensor will also be among the best that this format yields. There is an extensive range of automatic, art, and helper programs in addition to the PASM so you will never be lost for an appropriate look. Or an inappropriate one, if you are an inveterate button-pusher...

Best of all, it is light. Even the most paranoid traveller - the one who measures out their toothpaste into number of teeth times number of days away to save weight on the plane - will be able to pack this and some spare batteries and memory for their trip. And they needn't shoot everything in jpeg to save the weight of the pixels - this camera does raw at the same weight as jpeg.

In-store now and light as a feather.

When I Were Young We Were Too Poor To ...

When  I was young we were too poor to own a digital camera. The late 1940's were a hard time in the Rocky mountains and all we had to record life was stretched deer hides and ochre dug from the creek bank. In retrospect it was not too bad, because you could get packs of really good A3+ deer hide cheaply...

Okay, that was a lie. We had a Kodak camera. As it happened my parents owned an 8mm Kodak magazine cine camera and a projector and Kodak Canada would process 50 ft reels of Kodachrome movies and post them back to you within a fortnight. The results are still with me and the colour has not faded. When I care to project it my mother and father are alive again and I am 1 year old in the bath.

Valuable? To you, no. To me, priceless. To my daughter a link to the past. Much hilarity over the bathtub film...

When next you're doing your sums for yourself and wonder whether you ought to spend a few more dollars on a digital camera or an extra memory card...remember that someone will want to see what you look like one day. It might be a long - term investment, but it does pay off handsomely.

PS: We have good waterproof Nikon  and Olympus cameras in case the bath splashes.

PPS: We were too poor to own memes too...

Read The Newspaper

I normally do not tell you to go off and read another publication - because like all writers I want your undivided attention. And love and respect and money, etc, etc. If you are running low on any of these default to the money...

But, there are exceptions.

Please read the West Australian newspaper carefully for our Camera Electronic advertisement next Monday morning. I have just written the copy for that advertisement and taken a product shot to illustrate it. The picture looks pleasant and the writing is clear...and the price for the camera shown is absolutely sensational.

I think there are a lot of people who are going to be extremely pleased with this deal - for a lot of reasons - and I would advise you to motivate yourselves into the shop when it appears - or ring in with credit card details - to take advantage of it.

If someone gives you Father's Day money, bring it in. If they give you socks and jocks, sell them and bring in the money...