EVF versus OVF

There are countless debates on the technological advantages of the electronic viewfinder over the optical, so I’m not here to extend such conversation. Who am I to talk about the intricacies of specs anyways?

But while I also find the EVF an inevitable evolution of camera tech, I think the OVF is still worthwhile in the current landscape of photography.

I’ve been switching back and forth from mirrorless cameras to DSLRs, and vice versa. All the times I’ve convinced myself that it was the speed of operation and reliability of a SLR that was forcing me to keep shooting one. But now I think I had it all wrong.

You see, it’s just a different experience shooting through an EVF in comparison to an OVF. At least for me.

ノハナの無料フォトブックを注文してみた

３年前から趣味でカメラを持ち始め、今まで色々な景色を撮ってきました。

いつか写真集を出してみたいと思う僕は、毎日写真撮り続けています。

ノハナの無料でつくれるフォトブックが超オススメすぎるので紹介する | YUTOLOG

とりあえず、今回はYUTOさんにおすすめいただいて、フォトブックを作ってみました。

フォトブックの内容は、この数年間に中井で撮った写真です。

完成品、こちらです。

無料なのに、想像以上のクオリティーに驚いてました。

どうぞご覧ください。

Cherry Blossom Memories.

最後一年的春天就要到了。

加油。

初春

晩熟

A portra state of mind

2015.4 Ayase

Nikon F3HP + NIKKOR 50mm f/1.4 AI

Sundown. Embracing a new self.

写真から

音楽が聞こえたらいいな

君は今

どんな曲聞いてるの

デジタル編

我對隨身相機完全沒有抗拒力

I'm a sucker for compact cameras.

不管是數碼相機還是膠片相機，隨身相機在我的器材庫中總有它們的一席之地。

我深愛著我最近兩個月每天塞口袋裏面的GR。但是我想也是時候在隨身家族裏加入新朋友了。

這臺Olympus XA是我的下一個收藏品。

雖然也不算是什麼稀有物，但是相信我應該會很珍惜它。我一直在找一個比我的Konica C35和Canon Canonet QL17 G-III更小的手動對焦隨身相機，而這臺XA正是我選擇的答案。

Olympus把35mm的小廣角鏡頭配合F2.8的光圈做到這麼小的機身裏面，實在很難得。據說這裡面的鏡片裏面還有一枚是螢石鏡片，不知道是不是真的。

Love for GR

It has been over 3 months since I bought the Ricoh GR and GR1S, and unlike most other cameras I have owned, it's really been a no-regret kind of relationship between me and the GR.

I don't think I need to elaborate more on the cameras themselves. They are the GR. What makes them special, I believe, are the innate simplicity and utilitarian design that's inherited all the way from film to the digial age.

The only gripe I have with the digital GR is not that it doesn't have a full-frame sensor, because I'm actually fine with it having an APS-C sized sensor if it means to limit the size and weight of the body. I find it funny, using my GR and GR1S alongside each other very often, that I can sometimes hit the OVF-less digital GR in my face because I thought I needed to look into the viewfinder like when I use the GR1S.

That's it. I have no other complaints.

「ＧＲを超えるものはＧＲしかない。」

クセカメ購入

そう、ハッセルを手放してPentacon Six TL買っちゃいました ^^

ファーストインプレッションは？

ハッセルよりファインダー小さくて暗い！

でも軽いさは抜群だ。中判の高性能と３５ミリ判の一眼レフに近い利便性をバランス良く両立させているのが特徴だ。

今はCarl Zeiss Jena Biometar 80mm F2.8使ってます。

このレンズの描写は暖かみのある、スッキリ系だ。色乗りがいいし、ボケ味も綺麗だし、逆光撮影にも強い。

以前ハッセルでよく使ったCarl Zeiss C Planar 80mm f/2.8と比べて、やっぱりこっちの方がちょっと甘い。同じツァイスなのに、ビオメターは後期のプラナーと比べるとかなり性格は異なる印象だ。

それじゃ、また。

Zeiss and T*

Zeiss's T* coating is well known in the photography community to be highly effective in dealing with flaring and ghosting in backlit situations, but come to think of it, is this really true?

I'm certainly not a Zeiss-guru per se, but I've had various Zeiss lenses come and go in my kit. I've always thought of the T* coating as just an advertising gimmick, but this might just be me. This notion of mine comes from experiences shooting against the sun and getting lens flare and ghosting on my pictures that I normally don't get on, let's say, pictures shot from my Nikkkor lenses. (Not to say I don't like flaring and ghosting here, though.)

I've come a long way from shooting T-coated Zeiss Opton-Sonnar 50mm F1.5 to lenses that are more recent like the Sonnar 35mm F2 on the RX1/RX1R and other Sony-Zeiss lenses on my A7's, and I do recognize significant improvements that Zeiss has made in the digital era. However, I really don't get the hype whenever something's being advertised to have been coated with Zeiss T*.

Lens coating technology is getting so good these days that I might just be nitpicking here. These Zeiss lenses are certainly better (in an objective way of thinking) than those super vintage lenses that tend to produce low-contrast and foggy images. 

So is it better than the past? Hell yeah, but this doesn't say much though.

Should people give into the hype of T* marketing? Yeah... Probably not.

Thoughts on the Lomo LC-Wide

I have to admit upfront that when I first heard the word "lomo", I have in my mind cross-processed, heavy-vignetted, ultra-saturated pictures. I hate those things, and the LC-Wide did not change my mind about cheap-ass filters that I can get just as easily on my phone. However, this camera showed me that it's not just about the look that gave Lomography such a cult-following.

Let me explain.

I'm not going to call this little camera a beauty, because let's be honest, it NOT PRETTY, like AT ALL. The Lomo LC-Wide resonates with me more like a toy, but I'm not going as far as to calling it a toy camera, just to show some respect. (Quite frankly, I don't believe Lomography themselves consider what they make toy cameras.)

The LC-Wide is an interesting little film camera. It has a 17mm Minigon ultra wide angle lens on it, which I think is totally amazing. Do you guys realize what an ultra wide like this would cost as a stand alone lens on any given mount?

I bought the LC-Wide at a bargain price of under 30,000 Yen, and I haven't regretted this purchase one bit. The Minigon lens on it is contrasty and vignettes strongly just like how I have speculated, but quite surprisingly I actually like this little camera. Don't get me wrong, though, I'm not saying I like the so-called "Lomo effect" that I can get from this camera, I'm purely talking about the joy of using the LC-Wide.

溫柔、無味的6x6 | Yashica Mat-124G

這是我的第一台中畫幅6x6相機，也是我的第一台TLR。以前在用Pentax 6x7的時候，因為機身太過笨重，對自己來說也沒有其他太多吸引人的外觀特色，除了外拍使用上實在沒太多興趣帶出門。但是這台Yashica Mat-124G改變了我對中畫幅相機的看法和使用方式。

1970年生產的Yashica Mat-124G其實在時代上已經是接近TLR成熟期的一款型號了，也是Yashica最後一台TLR，於1989年才正式停產。它有內置測光功能、支持220底片、而且價格低廉，使用上也沒有太多的quirk。它的誕生是在Yashica於1972年與Carl Zeiss合作之前，也與1983被Kyocera收購之前還有一段時間，算是Yashica作為獨立公司的全盛時期下所開發的一款TLR。

相機結構

Yashica Mat-124G是一款6x6比例的中畫幅膠片相機。顧名思義，拍出來的照片是正方形的。特別適合上傳instagram。 （不）

它除了可以用120底片，也能用220底片，但是我從買到現在只拍過120，還未拍過220。切換這兩種也十分容易，底片倉有個小桿子，撥一下就能提示自己了。

裝底片、過片、回捲等動作也十分簡潔明了。對於在這之前從來沒用過TLR的我，我覺得算是很好用的一款相機。 Youtube的視頻有好幾個，看一下大概就能知道使用方式了，我也就不再多說。

它的測光錶我當做是壞的。本身精度並不高，用替代品的話電壓也會不太對。我買了一個Voigtlander的VC Meter來替代。不過YashicaMat-124G的熱靴很滑，讓我移動的時候常常讓掛在上面的測光錶掉落，很不方便。

Yashinon鏡頭

成像方面，它有著一顆Yashinon 80mm f/3.5的鏡頭。結構應該是Tessar type，不過實際用過應該都知道它和很多有名的那些鏡頭不在一個級別上面。當然，我沒用過Rolleiflex或者Mamiya的6x6膠片相機和鏡頭，我只知道這顆Yashinon的表現並不是那麼討喜。

它很清淡，反差很低，全開的時候偏軟調。逆光的時候顏色會顯得更淡雅，可能是鍍膜扛不住強光的原因吧。不過我個人是蠻喜歡它逆光時的成像的，眩光和鬼影是一道道的彩虹色。

Carl Zeiss 加持，口袋裡的二當家，Kyocera Contax T2

Contax T2用了快一年了，愛恨交織，但是幾乎每天帶著。 X100T在身邊的時候，T2使用的機率雖然大大減少了，但是想毫不在意地snap的時候還是會用用。

買T2的契機，其實是因為之前過手了幾台35mm畫幅的底片相機，包括Nikon FE2、F3HP甚至是自動化的F100，讓我覺得帶在身上挺重的，還不如帶我的X100T出門。所以去年年中左右物色了幾台自己想買的隨身相機。第一眼就看上了Ricoh GR1/S/V和Contax T2/3這兩個系列的相機。一點是因為焦距自己足夠喜歡，另一點就是覺得夠有個性、夠好玩。

1年下來拍的最多的底片是Portra 400還有Ultra Max，最近一個月才轉拍Fuji 400H跟Neopan 100 Acros。如果帶著120畫幅相機，就會拿T2跟120相機用一樣的底片（120 acros / 135 acros etc.）混著拍。不拍大家常用的Ilford卷或者Tri-X的原因是想和X-Pro2的Acros模式好好的比較。這個以後我也會另外寫點東西，對比真假Acros。 （Spoiler alert：Fuji真心不愧是做膠片的）

去中古店看的時候手裡把T2拿起來，其實覺得T2還蠻大的，直覺比以前用過的Fujifilm Klasse還大，但其實手感還蠻好的，並不算特別重，屬於能夠一隻手拿起來對焦拍照的相機。

我對握持感的要求也不低，T2算是剛剛好達到標準線吧。雖然沒有突出的手柄部分，但是整體的titanium外殼加上手柄部分的一點橡膠讓相機不會很滑手。本身重量的平衡感也很到位，算是可以隨拍的相機，在我心目中就大大地加分了。

手感、操作性

因為T3超出預算、Nikon的XXTi系列始終看不上眼、Ricoh的28m​​m視角還是不太習慣，就決定買了Contax T2，剛到手沒多久，我和朋友借了一台GR1V一起拍了一星期左右的時間。說實話，GR1V的手感實在是太舒服了。又輕又小，是真正的口袋機器，而T2大概屬於能勉強塞進牛仔褲的隨身相機。如果牛仔褲稍微緊身一點，還會讓人覺得奇葩，寬鬆一點又讓人覺得邋遢，所以我一般都把T2放到外套、夾克的口袋裡面。

Nostalgia | Shooting in Digital & Film

Danish photographer Thorsten von Overgaard once said in his video “A Life with Leica”, that “When I have something, where it’s timeless. It could be 1950, 1930, it could be 2004, and nobody can really tell, and it doesn’t really matter. That’s a good photograph.”

I believe there is always something that all of us can have a soft-spot for, in our nostalgic human nature. Whether it is a retro artifact or a treasured memory, something that is considered ‘old’ in today’s technological advancements can still be timeless to our hearts. And I believe this is exactly why many of us photo enthusiasts still dedicate ourselves to shooting film every now and then in this digital age.

I’m not a film-only shooter by any means, nor am I a film-centric shooter. I own a Nikon F3 and a Contax T2, and that’s about it for me. Every once a while I grab one of these cameras and load a roll of Ilford or Portra into them, but I do it for mostly the sake of enjoyment of slowing down my photography and not worrying about reviewing every shot after pressing the shutter button.

After a year into my Nikon F3 especially, I’ve found that not only have I learned to capture scenes with the atmosphere-exposure balance I have imagined, but I’ve also fell for the lure of the ‘fimilc look’: the natural grain, the controlled contrast, and the subtle fade. Now in my digital works I try to mimic the colors and tones of my film photographs. Not that I want to trick people to believe I don’t use digital, but I have a lust for that (not to sound too cliché here) timeless look.