Lensbaby Step Up/Shade, Tiffen Haze 2A, Nikon ML-L3

Today I received the Lensbaby 37-52mm Step Up/Shade, Tiffen Haze 2A filter, and Nikon ML-L3.

Read more >




Size Doesn’t Matter

Canon FD 35-105mm f/3.5 vs. Nikon 16-85mm f/3.5-5.6

I decided to do a side-by-side comparison of my two equivalent standard zooms, the Canon and the NIKKOR.

Read more >




Getting Back to Basics

Before the lens came the aperture. The very first camera, the camera obscura or “dark box”, is nothing more than an aperture on one side of a light-tight box. The camera doesn’t get much more basic than that. Hence, my fascination for pinhole photography. If you can take a compelling photograph with a pinhole camera, you can take a picture with just about anything.

Color photo taken with a homemade pinhole camera on 4x5 film

Pinhole Photography really makes you think about the image you’re capturing, not the equipment you’re capturing it with. There’s only one setting to master; time. But there’s so much to be learned—patience! With time and patience, you can capture an image using a box with a hole in it. With time, patience and thought, you can create a photograph.

Being a completely different medium than film, digital photography requires almost no time and patience to capture an image. But to create a digital photograph, you need just as much if not more thought. The good news is once you get to know your equipment, the thought goes into the making of the photograph, and not the process of capturing the image.

Color photo taken with a Nikon D90 and Lensbaby Composer/Pinhole optic.

Pinhole photography lends itself well to the digital medium. It requires just as much time, patience and thought as its film-based counterpart, but affords more potential for free experimentation. The experience gained can then be applied to capturing pinhole images on film, with a much greater resolution.

I find the softness of pinhole photos intriguing. To me, they’re not exactly out of focus; they’re out of time. Because they can depict extended periods of time in a single frame, they seem to come from a different dimension. Even sharp pinhole photos taken in large format with an optimally-sized aperture have a quality I cannot quite describe.

So, now that I have a digital camera with an interchangeable lens that I can replace with a pinhole, I can become truly prolific in my pinhole work. With no reciprocity failure, the exposure time has been substantially shortened. With no color shifts, color pinhole photography becomes much more feasible. Under the right conditions, I can even do it handheld. The need to compare it with its film counterpart will no doubt resurrect my interest in 4x5 pinhole.

But, I will need a remote cable release (which is now wireless, of course) so there’s another thing to order.

Looking Back: Lensless Polaroid Photography

During the quest for my next lens, I Unearthed my 4x5 pinhole camera, and came across this pinhole photo, captured on Polaroid 4x5 B&W film. My partner has been instrumental in providing me with a vast outdoor studio of endless treasures to capture. And the lighting is so good. This is one of them.

4x5 Polaroid Pinhole Photo

When you think about it, Polaroid was the predecessor of digital. It solved so many of the same problems. It was great for pinhole work, because the quality of the professional film was so good, and you could see your results almost instantly. The experience with exposure translated to film, so once you nailed it with your Polaroid, you simply swapped out the back and captured the image on an equivalent speed negative film. But in and of themselves, the Polaroids were so good, they would merit their own genre: 4x5 Polaroid Pinhole. This image is over ten years old and still looks as good as the day it was captured.

Sadly, this film is out of production for now. I say for now, because the resurrection of Polaroid is inevitable, but what will come of it in the form of film types has yet to be seen. As I write, new film and cameras are in the works.

There’s always Fuji instant film, so I’m not going to toss my Polaroid 545i back just yet. But last I checked, no B&W. Yes, I could shoot color, and convert to B&W the same as I do when shooting digital B&W. But if I’m going to do that, it seems I might as well just shoot B&W negative film.

It’s more about the fact that you produce a single, original, print. It truly is one of a kind.

My initial plan to resurrect my 4x5 pinhole work is to use the D90 to gauge exposure, then shoot 4x5 B&W negative film, which I can process myself. A pinhole body cap made to match the 4x5’s focal length and some math to compensate for reciprocity should make this feasible.

Color’s not out of the question, but I think I’ll leave that up to the D90. The resolution won’t be as good as 4x5, and there’s a physical limit to how wide a view I can get before the mirror strikes the back of the pinhole cap. But the color will be stunning.

Didymium Crocuses

Dydimium Crocuses

Took this shortly after receiving my Dydimium filter. The whole idea that the two natural elements, praseodymium and neodymium, combine to make this filter seemed sort of spiritual. For me, that set it apart from other filters, making it seem worthwhile to pursue.

Read more >




My Third Lens…For Real

For my third lens, I was looking for something that would work with both the N80 and D90 bodies, and I do need a “normal” focal length for the N80. My original plan was the AF-S NIKKOR 50mm f/1.4G. On the N80, it would be a wonderfully fast normal lens. But on the D90, it would be a wonderfully fast portrait lens. Such is the advantage of the DX format.

Now the Lensbaby Composer, being around 50mm, would technically be a normal lens on the N80, with no vignetting, and makes a nice portrait lens on the D90. But, it’s fully manual, and on a Nikon body that means no metering. Not a problem for the D90, since the “Review” mode lets you see the captured image, and the histogram shows your exposure. Potentially a problem for the N80 however. At the very least it means lugging around my Minolta Autometer IV F.

The AF-S NIKKOR 50mm f/1.4 will be around for a while, and the Voigtländer Ultron 40mm really made an impression on me. Since it will prove slightly more useful on the D90, I didn’t want to take a chance on it becoming unavailable, so it won out over the NIKKOR.

It arrived today, and is simply stunning. On the N80, it’s a little wider than 50mm, never a bad thing in my opinion. It’s 1-2/3 stop faster than the 16-85mm zoom, and all-metal, not than I’m at all opposed to the high quality polycarbonate of the newer NIKKOR lenses.

Voigtländer Ultron 40mm f/2.0 SL II

On the D90, it’s a little long, but not appreciably so; it’s only 7-1/2mm longer than a “normal” 35mm lens would be, but a whole 15mm shorter than the 50mm NIKKOR. It has the familiar feel of silky-smooth manual focus, which is better than ever thanks to the electronic focus confirmation. Gone is the uncertainty of split-image/microprism/matte screen focusing. It’s a faster way of manually focusing. Unless I’m shooting sports, I’m equally happy with autofocus, or this electronically-confirmed manual focus lens.

It’s also ideal for infrared work on the D90, being faster and having a real focusing scale (it’s also nice to have a hyperfocal scale again.) With 52mm filter threads, I can use the R72 filter I’ve been using on the P5100, plus the many other 52mm filters I’ve collected over the years. The NIKKOR 50mm requires 58mm filters.

But wait, there’s more. It comes with a very compact domed metal hood, into which screws an included 39mm coated close-up lens, which gives me nice mid-range macro capability.

Voigtländer Ultron 40mm with domed hood and close-up lens installed

There are two other lenses in the SL-II series as well. One is the Voigtländer Nokton 58mm f/1.4 SL-II, which at 87mm would also make an ideal portrait lens on the D90. The other is the 20mm f/3.5 Color Skopar SL-II, which would make a nice 30mm wide lens on the D90. Although it’s in the range of my 16-85mm f/3.5, and not appreciably faster, I’m sure it would be sharper and is certainly more compact. But, there will be many lenses ahead of that purchase.

I did not remove the Ultron 40mm from my D90 for about two weeks.