Olympus PEN E-PL8 - Part Two

Here is a touching story about a camera - the new Olympus E-PL8 - and how it made all the gardening that I didn't do worthwhile.

The last post about this camera extolled the folding geometry of the LCD screen - how it not only can lay out like an airline food table, but also fold up at a 45º angle and then down under the camera body for selfies.

I will assume that people have all tried that by now and have discovered the truth about their self portraits...something is wrong. They are not nearly as good looking in the finished file as in the bathroom mirror. This is not a fault of the camera, nor of the person modelling for it. It is a defining characteristic of all portraits that are sketched, painted, or photographed - they are good for the most part but there is always something wrong with the mouth...

Well, moving on past the pit of self-realisation, we can take the camera out into the garden. Western Australia in springtime is one big garden - everything that needs to bloom when there is a little water left in the ground does so now, because it knows that the place is going to dry up in a couple of months. It's bloom and pollinate now or never.

As a result, the wildflowers go mad out in the bush...as do many of the tour companies and horticultural photographers. There are bus, 4WD, and car trips everywhere to see the fields in colour. Some enthusiasts take massive macro rigs, extra lights, artificial screens for backdrops, sun shades, and big botany books. I tend to think that the ones who go out with a camera like the Olympus E-PL8 and an umbrella do the best. They can move through bush areas with minimal fuss and carry their gear far further afield. And look at the results:

Note: the flowers seen here are wild. In as much as I have not pruned, weeded, sprayed, trimmed, or fertilised anything, what you see is what decided to develop itself. The roses might have had a little help from the wife, but the orange vine flowers are volunteers at the studio and manage their own affairs. I am grateful.

All images JPEG straight out of camera and the camera straight out of the box. All factory settings. No adjustments - I'm a tourist - what would I know? I'm a blooming fool...

All images JPEG, straight out of the camera, with no alteration of the dials from the factory default. It is pure point and shoot straight out of the box - as our target tourist might do. The focusing was done by the camera by the simple action of pointing to the subject on the LCD screen - fast focus and snap for the exposure. The vine flowers are in shade and the roses are in cloudy bright.

See the Olympus PEN E-PL8 on the Camera Electronic website
230 Stirling St, Perth
2/324 Murray St, Perth

The Photographer's Holiday

They used to joke about Busman's holidays...when they would drive a charabanc to the seaside. Those of you who are old enough to have someone else's teeth know what a charabanc is but don't tell the youngsters...

The photographers in the population also have this sort of experience, though to be fair they do bring it on themselves. No-one NEEDS to go to Bali or Belgium with a camera but everyone I know does. And if they are shooters at home they are shooters over there. Of course the landscape is different and the people are different and the experiences are different, but the pictures in many cases, are the blessed same.

If you are a portrait shooter here I'll bet you shoot portraits there. Even if it is they are just the "native dressed in colourful costume" stuff they'll be of people and the people will actually have some visible personality. Of course if the place you've gone to has a native culture of chasing photographers down the street with machetes the portraits may have a surreptitious nature to them.

If you are a "Canal Rocks At Sunset" sort here you'll be perched on some foreign shore at sunset as well. It's the same sun, and very nearly the same water and rocks, but you'll be out with the tripod and the wide-angle nevertheless. A harmless pursuit, and at least is is less likely that you will be chased while doing it.

Of course the wild animal photographer who has used up all the kangaroo and emu shots that they can think of will have a much wider scope for their interest in Kruger National Park or Banff. Bless them, they'll take Wimberley heads, ultra-long lenses, hides, rides, and native guides and come back with spectacular animal pictures that are very nearly as good as those found in books at the library. The animals take no harm from the activity and the native guides get a steady income and a lot of amusement from the tourists. It is all good.

The soggy photographers - the underwaterists - are also in this category. There are things roiling in the deep that are not in the local deep so they go to where they are.  I have been assured that it is all safe and predictable and cozy and I think this is a crock. Underwater is dank, dangerous, and exciting, and we should all applaud those who do it and survive.

Macro workers? Well since the extent of clear vision in their world is about 5mm, you might not think that they could get much out of travelling all over the world. Nevertheless, like the animal people and the fish people, the bug and flower people can find things elsewhere that they cannot get at home and they do go looking for them. I suspect that the dedicated ones can take as much kit as the wildlife shooters, but in smaller form - lights, brackets, tripods, odd lenses, etc.

Sports? Well a stadium here is a stadium there, and you'll get what you get pretty much the same everywhere. Different teams or athletes and the spectacle of the sport.

And the studio shooters? We get to go to exotic places and leave the mono blocks and the fill cards at home. We can buy postcards of the picturesque scenery and spend our time on a chair in the shade with a novel and a drink. Occasionally we get the camera and take a picture...

Of a busman.

The Balancing Act - Or Why The Screen Swings Out

Over the last few years the swinging LCD screen has become popular. Like other forms of swinging it has its hazards - my wife discovered this with a video camera that featured a screen that swivelled out to the side. When she rounded a corner suddenly with the camera and the screen hit the wall...it proved an expensive replacement job. Not the fault of the camera, but if it had not been out there it would not have hit the wall.

The ones that do not swing to the side are a bit less fraught - the Fujifilm. Olympus, Panasonic, and Sony companies have all made models of compact and mirror-less cameras that have an articulated screen that drops down or folds up in a straight line.

Those of you who do studio work, macro, wildflowers or food photography with a camera that does not feature one of these screens are shortchanging yourselves - this feature lets you look at what you are getting without doing contortions. You can even do selfies with accuracy - and with the added advantage that as you take them you can see just how bad a duckface makes you look.

If you do not have one on your camera it is time to change.

Tiny Little Movements For Great Big Success - Velbon Macro Slider

Old gunnery officers from the Ruritanian Navy will immediately recognise the piece of apparatus shown in the heading image:  a Skoda M 320 recovery mechanism for  the main battery of the SZENT LUDWITZCH. The ironclad may be gone but we saved her guns.

Or not, as the case may be. It might be a Velbon Macro Slider for close-up and product photography. The resemblance is uncanny.

As a macro slider it allows the careful worker to move a camera and lens fore and aft, and left and right with extreme precision. The shallow depth of field and the tiny field of vision encountered in the macro world demands the utmost care in positioning - otherwise things are just not in focus. If you try to move on a conventional tripod or studio stand the crudity of the adjustment defeats the whole thing.

You'll still need a tripod - and a good one too - and a good three-way or ball head to mount the slider. The Cullmann range has enough variety to suit most systems. I am afraid that ye canna change the laws 'o physics, Captain...and you cannot expect to sling an effective, steady macro rig on a tiny travel tripod. Choose a sensibly large size for this and accept the fact that when you need to do professional work you have to carry professional weight - even out in the field looking for wildflowers.

This also applies for studio workers who need to do product shots with great precision - publications can be extremely fussy about where the objects in the images are positioned and the difference for small subjects can be great. Use the Velbon macro slider to dodge sided to side as need be and the job becomes a breeze.

Panasonic Get the Shape Right -You Get The Right Images

 You hear me bang on all the time around here about the ergonomics of the cameras and lenses that we sell - sometimes I am less than complementary about the design shape that the manufacturers settle upon. It is a subjective thing - I judge the camera form by what my own hands can hold - by what my own fingers can reach. I have just been reaching for he Panasonic GX7 and I advise some of you to do so too.

It's a micro 4/3 camera like the Olympus. The two manufacturers may be rivals but their lenses can fit each other's cameras to a "tee". The Panasonic is slightly soberer-looking - most of it is black with only a small steel ring trim.

Leaving the external appearance aside, it was the grip and the control position that won me. The battery compartment has been angles and the resultant grip shape that just suited my hand. The knot of control wheels that cluster at the NE corner of the camera are exactly in the right position with enough of a detent to them to keep in the settings you choose.

The viewfinder at the NW corner is adjustable for diopter and angle and features the eye   sensor that shuts off the main screen when you put your eye to it.

If you need a waist level finder for discrete street photography or wildflower and nature photography you just slide the screen out flat. Need a fill flash? Poke the flash button and up pops the small flash.

This is a system camera with access to a wide range of lenses with superb optical characteristics. They are none of them arm-breakers. Micro 4/3 equipment is economical in size, weight, and price. 

Thoroughly recommended.