My X-T2 is now a very expensive paper weight. Honest. That’s what I’m using it for now. a paper weight. I was hit by a wave while shooting the coast in South Carolina. This isn’t the first time I’ve been hit by salt water, but unfortunately, I had the rear display panel extended so sand and salt water made it’s way into the motherboard. Since I also have the X-H1 and the X-T1, I’m not too worried, but I really did use the X-T2!
Now what? Well I’m not sure. I was planning on selling some bodies and lenses and getting the Fuji GFX-R medium format and the 32-64mm lens. I just can’t pull the trigger on spending almost 6,000.00. I think I’ll wait until Fuji has one of their epic sales before I spend that kind of money.
So, for now I’m working with the X-H1 and my lenses; I really don’t use the X-T1 any more so no backup for me.
Well I’m headed out once again. Since late April, I’ve been on the road more than at home. And, it’s no different Thanksgiving weekend. I’m headed to Charleston, South Carolina to shoot and have some fun while I’m there. For this trip I’m only packing my Fuji X-T2. For lenses I’m taking the Fuji 16-55 2.8 for the classic landscapes, the 50-140 2.8, my fabulous 18-55 2.8-4.0 to use when walking around town, and at the last minute I threw in the Zeiss 12mm 2.8/Touit. I was actually taking some photos of the Zeiss in order to put it on eBay but decided last minute to take it with me one last time — I just wanted to give it one more shot (pun intended) before I list it for sale. I’m leaving behind all the primes including my prized 16mm 1.4, plus my other 1.4 primes. I’m also packing my Mavic Pro Platinum for some aerials, some spare drone and seven camera batteries plus some filters. All of this fits in my Amazon Basic camera backpack which I have to say that for a whopping 39.95US has been used now over five years, and it’s still amazing! Out of my twelve camera bags, it’s the bag that always hits the road with me. The bag has a ton of room, plus a laptop pocket that holds my 15″ MacBook – but on this trip only my 11″ MacBook Air is traveling with me in order to keep it light(er).
In addition to the Amazon backpack I’m also packing a small, lightweight Lowepro which holds my camera body with grip (if I choose to carry it) and lens, plus an extra lens and my batteries. It literally weighs ounces and I can fold it up and stick it in the outside pocket of my backpack or store it in my luggage.
So, I’ll be off now… Take care. Have a fantastic Thanksgiving holiday for those of you that celebrate it.
On my way to the office this morning my car was rear-ended by the guy behind me, who was hit by someone behind him. So, my car be totaled. that’s the bad news. The good news is I had my car flat bedded to my mechanics shop where, while he worked on it to make it safe, and drive-able, I photographed one of his new additions. It’s a rusting hulk (soon to be restored) 1952 Ford Firetruck! That’s the good news.
While waiting for my car I spent over an hour photographing this thing of beauty. It was raining, misty, and the lighting gave the faded red paint, and the rust a soft, warm patina that is hard to duplicate.
Here is the first image I looked at tonight. It’s with the X-T2, 35mm 1.4, handheld. Processed the raw as a Classic Chrome, then I processed it in the FANTASTIC Acros film simulation. I am so taken back by the image quality of the camera in general, and then the Acros is like the cherry on top!!
Little bit of humor here. Ok. Maybe not. I’ve said it before both here, and elsewhere these man bags such as the Billinghams, and the other fancy bags do have a place in the workplace, but not in the field. Quite frankly I never seen any of these hipsters who carry these fancy uncreased bags around cosmopolitan town even going out into the field in their tight-ass pants, and loafers. Oh. Sorry, ranting again. Give me a break guys. Buying a camera bag, a lousy camera bag for $300 dollars and up, to put it down in dirt and mud, and snow, or wet sand and saltwater? No. Not for me. And I doubt any of these fancy bag toters do either. Many just want to look cool as they slowly extricate their fancy cameras out of the well-oiled bags to take that selfie, or the foodie shot, then Oh so cool, slide the camera in for another week of storage. Give me a break.
Now, here in the photo is a true working bag. This bag cost me $29.95. It’s canvas. Cloth. Period. Inside is a 3 velcro pocket Jill-E insert for $10.00. See all that gear? That’s what I packed yesterday for a short day hike into a bamboo forest. It has SIX (6) pockets just on the OUTSIDE!
I’ve included some images here so you can see what can be accomplished with minimal gear. Oh, BTW, all of these images, and many more are already for sale on Shutterstock as of 5:00am Sunday morning. Yeah. I’m fast and the X-T1 files, couples with the amazing lenses don’t require a lot of post.
So, if you want to look like a coffee-shop dwelling Brooklyn broke hipster who shoots food, and selfies, go ahead and get yourself a Billingham, or “billingmuch” as I call them, if you want to make yourself useful get yourself a real bag. Try the think tank series. Either that, or get the hell out of my way as I make my images.
Thank you. Rant over. I’ve now taken cover and am ready for the rebuttals as to how great these expensive bags are other than for image enhancement, like botox…
23mm, Velvia F8.0
12mm 2.8 Zeiss touit @ F9.0
Zeiss 12mm F2.8 @ F5.6
35mm 1.4 @ F2.5
18-55 Zoom @ F8.0
16mm F1.4 @ F11
Gear in Cheap Amazon Canvas Bag. Taken with Nikon D800e
Even the Sirui Tripod and ball head fits inside the canvas bag. Sling the bag over my body and off I go
Everything goes IN the bag. Including the Small Sirui Travel Tripod. This was while I was cleaning gear to put it all away
I parked in my reserved spot, picked up my bag, slung it over my shoulder and headed to the office. And then it hit me like a ton of bricks! The X-T1 and several lenses are so light I hardly feel it!
In the mornings when I leave home I usually have over my shoulder a Fossil leather bag – In it I keep my Macbook Air, my yogurt for lunch, and some basic file folders. In itself the Fossil bag is rather lightweight. I’ve had it since 2007 and it is still an amazing piece of luggage that I proudly use in my daily life. Every now and then I’ll stick a Jill-E insert in the bag and carry my X-T1 with me.
Today, I packed a small $30.00 bag I found on Amazon. It’s called the Lowepro Exchange Messenger for dSLR kit and essentials. Here’s the link. I bought this wonderful bag in July of 2013 when a very good friend of mine and I took a three day tour around coastal Maine; he carried his two Leica’s and assorted lenses in this bag. After seeing how light it was, and the fact I was able to store it flat pretty much anywhere I decided to purchase one right there and then and so I did.
Today I’ll be away from home for a couple of days but had to go into the office first; Instead of my Fossil leather bag I instead packed my LowePro. In the bag I loaded up my X-T1, the 18-55 lens, the 16mm F1.4 lens, the 23mm 1.4 lens, the Fuji EF-42 Flash with four batteries, and an extra two Fuji batteries for the camera, and my lunch. The bag has very deep pockets, one has a zipper for additional security; normally, that would be where I store my SD wallet but since the X-T1 is packing a 32G card that allows for over 700 jpeg+raws I didn’t bother bringing any more along.
When I arrived at the office and picked up the bag out of my car with the always present Macbook Air I had to do a double-check to make sure I packed what I needed! It was that light. I remember the days pre-Fuji when I carried my Nikon D800 or D700, plus Nikon glass — or better (or worse) yet when I carried my Mamiya 645AFD medium format! Heck, going back a bit further my old RB67. Now that was a beast. I actually smiled as I walked down the Philadelphia streets to my office. It absolutely does makes a huge difference carrying a smaller mirrorless camera. I don’t care if it is a Fuji, Sony, Olympus — whatever floats your boat, just try one! I do not miss my dSLR’s or MF at all! Since I haven’t printed larger thant 24″x 20″ I haven’t needed more megapixels. If I did, I can always work some photoshop magic though I try very hard to stay out of PS. CORRECTED – SEE LAST TWO PARAGRAPHS ADDED AFTER THIS WAS PUBLISHED!
With that being said I am awaiting the arrival of the X-T2. As I am a travel, and stock photographer the 24mp sensor keeps me ahead of the curve and my images relevant when a clients wants a bit extra oomph. Usually we can show them that 16.3mp is more than enough but at times, they are rather adamant about larger files. If it were not for that I wouldn’t be upgrading at all! With regards to the rumors here of a potential Fuji medium format camera my first questions are not resolution or megapixels but how big is it going to be? What is the weight of the system? How about lens weight? I am now totally spoiled by the compactness, and the image quality coming from my Fuji system and I would not go back, ever, to a Nikon or any other brand.
So, when I leave my office later this afternoon and head south for a couple of days I’ll still be grinning like a Cheshire cat!
I was going to end this post here then FedEx came in. I sent out an image to be printed a while back and I just received it! It’s a 30 x 20″ print of an image that was processed from a RAF file into a 95mb TIFF in Lightroom. I thought about processing it in Iridient which I own but decided i would process it in the same app that I use for 99% of all my editing work.
Here, I’ve laid it across our conference room table in order to flatten it somewhat. But I have to say it looks amazing! I can COUNT the grains of sand, and you can as well just from these two iPhone images! This is 30″ x 20″ and I think I can go up to 40″ plus so that will be the next round of tests. I performed this print test to see how far I can push 16.3 megapixels. I have to say, these results are truly amazing. I’ve taken my glasses off and pressed my nose and eyes very close and it’s well, trust me: amazing!
in this image, taken with the X-T1 and the Unbelievable 16mm 1.4 you can count the grains of sand flowing as the water ebbs, under the shell, and throughout the image. It’s that clear here even though I used an iPhone for these two
This is probably the last image for a few days as tomorrow morning at dawn I board a boat from Key West bound for the dry tortugas. I will be completely off-line until late, late Friday evening when we return. Hopefully, I’ll bring back a few good images.
Well as scary as it looks this is going to be my home for two nights on my forthcoming stock trip. The location I’m headed to is only reachable by boat. There are zero facilities, including cell, emergency, fresh water, etc. Everything must be brought in, and taken out. Now, I haven’t been “camping” since summer of 1980 when I was living in Alaska that I camped at Mt McKinley (soon to be Denali). This is gonna be interesting to say the least. My biggest fear is getting that huge 3-man tent back into that tiny silver and round thing sitting at the entrance to the tent. I have a feeling this tent may not be making a return trip… We’ll see.
Future Sleeping Quarters. iPhone Image late last night
So I may be going to Alaska next summer for a couple of weeks. I lived in Alaska for four years so I kinda know what there but I’m sure there have been many, many changes. So I’m in google, and I click on the first link that catches my attention.
Up pops the page. And low and behold I INSTANTLY recognize my image of Mt McKinley!!! How strange was that?!
I remember exactly where we were, who was driving, the camera, lens and film combination.
Here is a screen shot as I thought it too odd not to post it:
Mt. McKinley, From Route 1 Southbound from Fairbanks. Springtime. Minolta X-G7, motor winder, Minolta-Rokkor 135 F2.8 lens, Kodachrome 64 Slide film, Canon Polarizer
Adventures with the Fuji X System 