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June 2018

29 Jun

Posted at 09:38h in Blog, Dick's Rant by

Are we allowed to use our cameras for as long as we want to? Or are we required by law to turn them in and get new ones? If we are, what is the legal time we can have them? Sound like a Facebook troll question? Well, this is still not a forum and I'm not writing this from under the bridge, so you can relax - but it is a pretty good question. Like all debates it has several answers - and some of them might be relevant for you. a. You should use your old equipment until it cannot be used any more. This is a fine and frugal answer for some - and it has echoes in the past. The users of Kodak 116, 616, 828, and 126 films might well have done just this - used their cameras until Kodak pulled the pin on them. The ingenious and hardy may still be using them - adapted to other media or using respooled film. If they do, whatever they achieve is a golden mark on their character sheet - they...

28 Jun

Posted at 07:54h in Blog, Dick's Rant by

Every year since we got these Op/Tech accessories into the shop we've been making a point of telling people about them. Because every single year winter has come around and photographers have gone out into the rain with their extremely expensive equipment. Most of them have not started out with that intention - they've googled the weather and looked at the little diagram on the BOM site and ignored the bit where it says the probability of rain is 124%. " She'll be right - I'll be fine " and the extremely expensive gear goes into the not-very-water-resistant camera bag and off they go. And it's all good when they get there and get out away from the car and into the spot with no shelter at all...

26 Jun

Posted at 08:54h in Blog, Dick's Rant by

I'm going to have a good Sunday - the one coming up on the 1st of July. First, it's Dominion Day in Canada and even here in Perth we get to drink Molsons and eat butter tarts, eh? And for those of us from Calgary, we get to bag Edmonton. Normally doesn't get better than that. But it does. At 6:00 PM that Sunday I'm going to repair to Shoot photography ( full of Molsons and tarts ) to hear the British photographer Sam Harris speak on his photographic experiences from London to the bush. You may have seen the advertisement for the talk on your CE email news feed or on posters at the shop. He's had extensive press and commecial experience there and here. It's not going to be dear - $ 49 - so you might want to ring up the shop this week and make a booking - it may get crowded out otherwise. Words , pictures, anecdotes, equipment ideas, techniques...

26 Jun

Posted at 07:56h in Blog, Dick's Rant by

I'm not one for watching murder mysteries on television - I like mine in book form written by Mike Hammer or Agatha Christie. I'll occasionally delve into the Sherlock Holmes era as well, but wherever the story is set, I have one common experience - I fail to see the clues. Of course, that's what I'm supposed to do to keep the suspense up until the end, and I play along and am amazed on cue in the end. Any novel that has lost the last three pages is a well of frustration. Well...

25 Jun

Posted at 09:21h in Blog, Dick's Rant by

Now will be the time to plan: a. Getting away with the kids. b. Getting away from the kids. Whichever appeals to you, you'll find that you will be pursued by modern life all the while - specifically modern life on the mobile phone. Whether your day will be devoted to calling your stockbroker, calling the au pair, or calling the emergency services, you'll find that the batteries on the wonderful new phone you bought will go flat very fast. You'll flatten them even faster if you are going to zombie around looking for Japanese electronic pocket monsters. And once you are beyond the mains electricity system those flat batteries put you in danger of having to look up and see trees and sky. Camera Electronic can protect you from this with the Sirix Digital Solar Power Bank. It contains a Lithium Polymer battery with 5000 mAh capacity that pumps out the correct voltage to mobile devices. It can draw power from other sources if you're impatient, but the big deal is that it has a solar panel on the front that can charge it up all day...

22 Jun

Posted at 09:20h in Blog, Dick's Rant by

If you've been tempted to buy one of the Fujifilm X-100 series cameras over the last few years - the X-100, the X-100S, the T-100T, or the current X-100F, you may have thought that you were going to get the full digital experience. Well, I gotta tell you that they have left a few things out of the cameras. Here's what you'll be missing out on: a. Sticky rubber coverings that swell up and detach from the body casting. I was never able to destroy the covering of the original X-100 in five years of ownership and I don't think I could budge the current stuff  either. If you want to make it look scuffy and grungy you'll have to use a wood chisel. b. Stylish internet app bluetooth brainwave controls. Fujifilm decided to let it all hang out - you change the ISO, shutter speed, and aperture with old-fashioned turning dials with click stops. You press a shutter button that looks like a shutter button. It is under your finger, rather than hiding coyly. It's like they just don't want to...

19 Jun

Posted at 08:35h in Blog, Dick's Rant by

I was delighted with the Tamron Tap-in Console when I opened the box in the studio. I don't own a DSLR or a Tamron SP lens, but  the look of this accessory is reward enough - it's like having an electronic hockey puck with a USB interface, eh? For the people who use the higher end Nikon or Canon DSLR bodies and want to pair them with compatible Tamron lenses, this "hockey puck" acts as an interface to do a number of things: Put in firmware updates that may be issued by Tamron. Put in correction factors for individual lenses in regard to auto focusing at three separate distances. You have to determine the best correction numbers by separate test but once achieved you can lock them in via Tamron website commands. Put in auto-focus limiting modifications if you want to change the range of this. Decide whether you'll need MF and optimise the focus ring operation. Optimise how the stabilisation system of the lens acts according to your own needs. These are valuable things to control - but you'll have to...