On May 27, 2004, at 10:41 AM, Haller, Thomas wrote:
Hi all you crazany PDML folks! :-)
Just a quick note from an old Pentax lover, who acquired a C*n*n 10D and
wonders if he will ever use his Pentax film equipment again.
I have a bag of Pentax MX cameras and a bunch of "M" lenses that I used to
use to take pictures. I used to shoot a lot of film, more than most, because
I love getting the exposure just right, and for whatever reasons (including
perhaps my incompetence) that meant bracketing "wildly" on every shot to
make sure I got the shadow details I wanted or didn't blow out some
highlights. Then I would send the film off to be developed and scanned onto
PhotoCDs. This usually took two weeks to a month. And the color balance on
the scanned images was always _way_ off, and would take a long time (I want
to say "hours" but I'm sure that's just how it felt) to correct the color in
Photoshop. And even then, when you are bracketing wildly it's hard to get
the "exact moment" captured!
But then my brother lent me his 10D, with a couple of lenses. The first
weekend after receiving the set-up (and after reading the owner's manual a
couple of times while I waited for a nice day) I went out to my backyard and
took some pictures of flowers and butterflies. I used the review feature and
histogram, and noticed my first attempts weren't focused and were
over-exposed. So I switched to the center focus spot (which is all I think
I'll ever use) and "dial-ed up" a stop and half of exposure compensation. My
next few shots were exposed and focused beautifully and I could start paying
much more attention to composition. And I could capture more "exact moment"
shots like catching those darn butterflies with their wings open!
When I had enough pictures I liked, I walked back into the house, plugged
the camera into my Mac and downloaded the RAW files as easily as files from
a floppy. (Since then, I use an even faster Firewire card reader, but it
shorted out and caught on fire itself last weekend so I'm back to plugging
in the camera for now! :-) I used the Canon File Viewer to convert the RAW
files into TIFFs, and edited them in Photoshop, doing a bit of color
correction because of my Epson printer (which prints a bit red) and using
the "local contrast enhancement" and "unsharp mask" techniques I've learned
online to sharpen up the images a little. Then a little cropping with my
tasteful eye and I'm ready to print onto superb Epson papers up to 13"x19"
on my Epson 2200.
So now I get big, beautiful, sharp, "perfectly" exposed color prints (well,
close to perfect, and I usually only print up to 12"x16" to make the matting
and framing cheap) within minutes (or hours) of taking the picture. I don't
"waste" 4/5ths of my film bracketing. I get an immediate review of the
pictures taken, enabling me to check focus, exposure and composition. And a
much higher percentage of the pictures are coming out "keepers", with many
better than any pictures I've ever taken before (focused properly, better
exposure, better composition).
Lately I have even been able to do manual focusing in the viewfinder, which
is no-where near as bright and clear as the MX, but with practice I can now
focus manually which is still necessary to get the focus where _I_ want it
sometimes. With the more expensive lenses it's easy too, just grab the ring
and focus, no switches to change and forget.
Sorry this was so long, the point was the question I find myself asking myself, "Will I ever use my film cameras again?
- ThomasH
