This is Jeff Greer's Typepad Profile.
Join Typepad and start following Jeff Greer's activity
Jeff Greer
A photographer and seeker, on my better days
Recent Activity
When digital SLRs came around, I sold my medium format gear. That was back in 2002. I've lost count of how many digital SLRs and mirrorless cameras have come and gone since. This summer I got a wild hair (I really don't know where the urge came from) to look at film cameras again. I ended up getting a Mamiya 645 Pro TL kit off eBay from Jack's Camera in Indiana. I dug out my Sekonic light meter and gave the Mamiya a spin. All the good memories came back: the large viewfinder, taking time to see before clicking the shutter (those frames are precious).
When these cameras were new, I could never quite afford Mamiyas, to say nothing of accessories. Now, at used prices, I have an RZ67 Pro II in addition to the 645 and each with several lenses. I am seeing differently again, something I lost in all those years with the smaller digital cameras. I'm quite happy back with 120 film.
'Mamiya For Sale' Part II (Or, the Perfect Camera)
Here's what I bought with the proceeds from the sale of the Mamiya 7II yesterday—it's on its way from Japan: Ebay seller's photos I saw it for sale yesterday priced at $1,649, and I figured yeah, I would trade my Mamiya for that. (The camera shows up relatively often but this lens is genui...
Yes, the photographer of that tintype is Victoria Will and the darkroom processing is by Josh Wool. See http://joshwool.tumblr.com/post/75670551256/phillip-seymour-hoffman-park-city-utah-4x5
The Last Photographs of Hoffman
I've thought a lot over the years about why certain things seem "reasonable" to humans, musing on some of the possible reasons why. War, for instance, seems not only sensible but inevitable, whereas it has always seemed outlandish and appalling to me, the furthest thing from "reasonable." My sma...
I see the D800 has a 1.2 crop mode in addition to a DX crop. A 1.2 with your 28 would get you 33.6 mm.
Why a 28?
[Con't. from the last post] ...So anyway, speaking of my abnormal fondness for primes over zooms and my healthy but not norm...er, average brain, I think I owe some of you an explanation. Or at least that small subset of you who might be curious. If you're not one of those, you have my permissio...
The monument is still closed due to last year's earthquake.
Random Excellence: Matthew Girard
Matthew Girard of the engineering firm Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates took this vertiginous fisheye photograph from the top of the Washington monument in Washington, D.C. last fall, as his firm was repairing damage to the monument sustained in an earthquake a year ago. Tourists can see a sim...
I bought a Fire one weekend when I suddenly needed an electronic photo portfolio device. Given the price, it does a good job but one characteristic about it annoys me: Posterization in images with sections of subtle gradation (such as a seamless studio background) using the supplied Gallery application. Note that in most images you would never see this. Contrast and color saturation are also a bit higher than I would prefer. My Fire serves other uses such as an e-Reader, portable web browser and email device, MP3 player and movie player so I find it quite handy for the money. Just wish it didn't posterize so much on some of my photos.
Jeff
Kindle Fire
Amazon's Deal of the Day today is a refurbished Kindle Fire for only $139. I have an earlier Kindle (B&W only, which kinda fits), but the full-color Fire should be better for things like photography magazines and instructional books, for a lot less than the price of a current iPad. I've never ...
I like.
So Here's an Idea...
...And I'd love to know what you think. How about we do a purely democratic Print Offer, planned for, say, next Summer? Here's what popped into my mind. People could propose pictures for consideration—their own, or (with permission) someone else's. I'd pick ten or twelve that I thought were good...
I'm not much for Photoshop plug-ins but Nik's Silver Efex Pro 2 is one I use often and is my sole method for b/w conversions. It comes with a good set of starting profiles that you can then tweak and save as your own. I didn't even read a manual or look at a tutorial to use it. I just started fiddling with the settings.
Time to Scramble Again
Not a great job from the photographer. Just a good enough job...under the circumstances. Hard to believe it's that time of year again. Remember my post last year about last-minute senior portraits? This year, Zander's ex-girlfriend (and still friend) Kirsten Rollefson came by needing a portrai...
This reminded me of Material World: A Global Family Portrait, a 1995 photo book showing families the world over in front their abodes with all their possessions displayed about them.
Random Excellence: James Mollison
Eight-year-old Ahkohxet lives with his tribe in the Amazon basin in Brazil. Photos by James Mollison. This project (there is a small selection with this short article on Yahoo! and a more extensive one here) reminds me of that project a few years ago showing families around the world with the ...
My limit used to $1200 but usually my comfort zone is much lower, with the exception of the D700 that I bought years ago. Thankfully, my current set of Nikon mount lenses suit me well so I often don't hear the siren call of a new lens. A $1500 lens better fit me like a glove and wash my car. A $2000 lens is simply a bridge too far.
There are also a few viable alternatives. I don't mind manual focus and consider my Rokinon (Samyang) 85mm 1.4 to be a bargain. I'm so pleased with it that I'm looking at Samyang's 35mm 1.4.
Then there is my 'small' Micro Four Thirds camera which can use excellent and usually reasonably priced MFT lenses and all manner of used or inexpensive alternate mount lenses.
How Much Would You Spend?
Just wondering...do you have any sort of inbuilt limit for how much you'll spend on a major photography purchase, such as a camera, lens, or printer? I recently got the idea to buy a new lens (this one) because I was fascinated by what I could detect of its performance from online samples. I eve...
Unvarnished info for the want-to-be model:
http://modelbitch.blogspot.com/
Open Mike: Educate the Editor
I often say that TOP isn't a forum, and I seldom just throw out plain unadorned discussion-leading questions for the sake of eliciting answers. But no one knows everything about anything, of course, and right now I have a question that I think readers in the know could educate me about more quic...
How I would love to try this lens or its rumored Nikon competition but my bank account will have none of it. Seems like overnight all the great lenses are hovering at the $2000 mark.
Guess I'll make do with my Zeiss ZF 35mm f/2 which is quite wonderful.
Carl Zeiss Distagon T* 35mm f/1.4 for Nikon and Canon
Carl Zeiss has announced a new fast 35mm for the first quarter of 2011. The Distagon T* 35mm ƒ/1.4 is a premium manual-focus 11-element lens. It will be available in ZE (Canon EF) mount and ZF.2 (Nikon F mount, chipped). The new lens weighs 29/30 oz. and is 4.7/4.8 inches long (variances depen...
Jeff Greer has shared their blog jeffgreer
Jun 13, 2010
Jeff Greer is now following The Typepad Team
Mar 15, 2010
Subscribe to Jeff Greer’s Recent Activity