For the one person that couldn't as...
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NYC – Kamil Needs Some Help
Do “Real” Photographers Still Shoot Film?
Not many – but this one does – or did for an amazing documentary piece on MediaStorm. I have sung the praises of MediaStorm.org in at least one post regarding presentation of your images. I have always been a big fan of fantastic journalism, a fast disappearing art. If you have not checked out MediaStorm yet you really should. The stories are not only compelling but so are the images and presentation. I believe this is the real future of journalism, amazing stuff. Heck I even taught myself Final Cut after seeing MediaStorm a few years ago. If you don’t want to go that far make due with iMovie for a bit – the ’09 version is perfectly capable of producing fantastic product with a little bit of effort.
Moving on you can check the story out here. There are a couple things to think about if you take a look at the piece that I linked. If you ever think there is nothing to photograph close to home let this be an inspiration. Now this guy (Danny Wilcox Frazier) spent a long, long time creating this and it shows but I will bet there are a thousand things for you to start work on in your neck of the woods – just make sure it’s important to you.
Another thing that became obvious as I watched the epilogue and interview at the end with Frazier, namely the camera he chose to shoot with. It appears to be a Leica M6 or M7 which means he shot this on film. To tell you the truth I don’t know if I would choose to use my Leica gear for a project like this but I just might. Why? Well, the Nikon D3 is a fantastic machine when coupled with my 28-70 AFS but it’s just too stinking big and intrusive. That thing scares the crap out of all but the most jaded and professional models. The D700 even with a smaller prime would still be a completely different dynamic than the Leica. Where does that leave me? I could buy an M8 if I wanted to spend the cash but that would cause all of my lenses to become virtually obsolete, at least at the wider and normal end of the spectrum. I could go with a Canon G9 or one of the competitors but that would leave me with are really small sensor that bugs the crap out of me when using the maximum apertures afforded in terms of DOF aesthetics. I guess I would probably go with either my Leica or my D700 with smallish lenses.
Just something to think about. God I wish someone like Cosina would make an M-mount full size sensor compact camera that made any kind of monetary sense. Maybe even Nikon hey how about the D700 sensor in an RF body and a couple of really nice F-mount primes from Zeiss? How come my Leica “full frame” F1.4 lenses are sooooooo much smaller than my SLR lenses? Even the primes? Damn It! I guess I am back to shooting the Leica for stuff like this, the new micro 4-3 cameras just do not cut it.
I definitely would use Aperture to organize, keyword, caption, and edit.
RB
Since I lack pro photography experience, I want to understand your post above. In other words, the holy grail for journalistic photography is to have a camera that looks like an amateur job but delivers professional results?
I’ve only been serious about photography for the past few years, but if size and portability were key factors in designing a journalism-type camera, why have all the pro bodies gotten physically larger from both Canon and Nikon? Surely the outcry for performance and portability is not a recent trend among journalism pros. I can’t see Canon and Nikon simply ignoring a market segment driven by professional photographers, but this appears to be the case.
The D700 without grip doesn’t look too much bigger than the original Nikon F. Nikon seems to be ignoring potential in the D300/D700 by not offering at least a few small, fast primes as you point out. It may weigh more physically, but I guess that could be offset by not having to carry rolls of film and keep up with what has been shot and what hasn’t.
Thanks also for your brief but direct comments about the new 4-3 cameras.
Jason,
I really do not know if there is such thing as the holy grail of cameras – what I can say is that if I were doing an assignment like the one I highlighted I would probably not want to use my big giant pro body with my big giant pro zoom lenses.
I personally miss having something really small and unobtrusive that can produce fantastic quality (technically and aesthetically) in low light. In other situations focal length flexibility, speed, and being able to make a lot of shots in a hurry is better. I think I mentioned that the D700 and a smallish prime might be the best answer but I would bet people would kill to buy a reasonably priced full frame sensor RF sized camera with M-mount lenses or there about.
RB