More photos from my Yashica Mat 124
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First dirty photos from my Yashica Mat 124
After the develop machine broke down at my local photo shop I had to wait some more days for the first results. The first strips of negatives are now in my hands (three more to come from the lab) and I put them on a Epson Perfection V750 for a first dirty scan and some retouching. After fiddling around with the interface of the Epson software I got some nice results to show here on my blog. I did not spent too much time with post processing and other stuff. I will dive deeper into this later. My favorite photo is the woman that is going up the stairs. Due to the less sensitive Ektar film I had a longer exposure time and the subject has some fine motion blur at the fast moving feet. The overall details and colors of the image are awesome. I love the square format on this scene. The first image was a long exposure. I metered the light inside the new Elbphilharmonie building in Hamburg and put the camera down behind a window inside the ticket shop. You see the main f...
Is Instagram dead for real photographers?
Eric Kim just deleted his Instagram account ( here ) and you experience that the amount of SPAM, advertising and selfie addiction has reached a new peak in the last months. There are also individuals who collect followers like other people flowers at the central park at spring (by having just 10 crappy photos with hundreds of likes online). I use Instagram to follow hand selected photographers to see their work and get some inspiration. I give a fuck about hundreds of likes but I am happy when certain people I know comment or like my images. It is more like an always changing exhibition that is carefully curated by me. Back in the days where Instawhatever never had existed! Sometimes I also think about deleting my account. There are so many companies, corporate bloggers and other social media experts who ruin the whole thing. They use bots to like your stuff and tell you that your photos are awesome because they want to be followed back. It's the same thing with Facebook an...
Go film, because it's cool?
Back in the days I was a little film shooter. But nowadays I love the convenience of digital photography without waiting for lab results etc. But why going just into one direction? I don't think that film is outdated. It is a completely different medium with it's own characteristics and pros and cons and if you start with medium format you can achieve superb results without paying ten to thirty grand for a digital medium format system. Just buy a TLR or a Pentax 67 and start medium! I recently bought a Yashica Mat 124 6x6 camera to start with medium format. I've tried out some films and I am still waiting for the results back from the lab. I always wanted to own a TLR because I love the way you shot with it. It is a full manual way of shooting. Everything needs to be set by you. The square format is a different way of looking at a scene and you need to be careful to hold the camera right to get everything straight the way you want it. It slows you a bit down and makes...
Use your talent to say "thank you"
You love photography? Then share it with other people for free. Not every job should get paid. Just imagine you are sitting in a nice cafe and enjoy a good cup full of liquid gold. Maybe you can do the owner of the cafe a favor in taking a portrait of the staff or creating shots of the interior and load it up to your Instagram account (or share it directly with the owner). Just ask them and give something back for free. Owner of "Gang und Gäbe" Café in Munich This is great for many reasons: You give something back for free without expecting something in return. You learn more about people and their life. Maybe one day you want to share your art via magazines or exhibitions and those people will help you with that. Had a nice chat about his coffee project after showing him the photo. So don't be afraid and think about what you can give, instead of what you can take. This will lead to new connections and adventures. Trust me! Cheers, Nils
Are you looking for perfection?
Than let me tell you a little story about Kraftwerk (the German band). I saw a documentary about electronic music back in the days. They talked about how mechanic and lifeless music from a sequencer sounded until bands like Kraftwerk used systems to add some random delay to the perfection to make the whole thing sound more life like. Can you tell me why we degrade the information of an image by raising the contrast, convert it to black and white or adding grain to it? Maybe we are doing it because life is not what we would file under perfection. But the circle of life is perfectly imperfect. An example: there are thousands of beautiful sunflowers where you can find the golden ratio and the Fibonacci numbers in every detail of every flower, but they don't look the same. Even in a field full of sunflowers you won't find two flowers who exactly like each other. Not one. (Or think of the ice crystals to make it more spooky). So what are you looking for in photography? Perfec...
Do I really need a Fuji GFX medium format camera?
A good question. Let us put the price beside and pretend you have enough money to buy every Fuji camera out there. Would you buy the GFX? It has a resolution of 50 megapixels and you can do different shots with a different depth of field and less noise etc. I know that there are some reasons to gain more resolution when it comes to product photography or fashion photography. But keep in mind that you can archive medium format like results for many occasions by using today's panorama algorithms. 35mm f8.0 / 50 megapixels by combining two images free hand - works even with street shots Just think out of the box. Aim your camera at a subject and think about the possibilities in post production. The next image was taken in London at the Barbican Centre (a nice socialist looking urban landscape) and I had my 35mm attached to my XPRO2. A wide angle lens was not at hand and I wanted more resolution so I can crop the images and print it on a larger scale. Barbican Centre London ...
Got my X100F back from Fuji repair
As I reported some days ago I had a serious problem with my new X100F. The AF switch was broken and the camera could not be set to AF-S via the switch on the left side. The camera is now repaired and works fine again. There is only one minor thing that bothers me a bit. Back in the days Fuji pulled my camera via UPS for free and now you have to send the camera in on your own bill (except you are a pro how owns more than two cameras). I think that this is okay if your camera is older than two years, but my camera was freshly bought and near mint. The guy I phoned with at Fuji repair was not really cooperative and I had to add another amount of money (delivery with insurance) to the pile of money I've spent on the camera. Sad but true. I don't think that this is the right way to treat customers who bought a premium product. UPDATE 17/05/12: My camera has a new problem now. The silver cell that keeps the settings when you change the battery is now dead. After one to thr...