270 degrees Kontax

[ruben]

Yesterday I become somewhat frustrated with my Kievs, for not being able to focus fast enough a very nice elder who was walking towards me, while talking with his cellular. "Moment I am being photograped" he said to the one at the other side of the line, and upon being some half a meter from me he told me "Thank you".

Yes, gentlemen from the Flinstone's era are still out there, not only those shooting film at RFF.

So I went frustrated for not being able to focus at the first time, and not being able to re-wind and refocus at the closest distance, when he told me thank you with his broadest smile. Although my instincts, if just to make myself feel better, where ok. I tryied.

Therefore I started to fiddle with the idea of making a trial with my OM gear, including that nice Winder 2. And this is what happened some moments ago, midnight in Israel.

I opened my home door, leading to a second one built by thin columns, like a garden fence, and white painted. Beyond there, there is absolute darkness as background.

I picked an OM with lumi-micron bright screen and Zuiko 50 f/1.8 and was absolutely unable to focus at all any column of the white fence. Then I picked my Kiev, and it was a piece of cake due to the double yellow image. I will not say that had I made a real shot I would had been award winning sharp, but the difference was overwhelming.

Then I went to check another question I wanted to check since some time ago. From 0,9 meter to infinity, the kiev rotates 270 degrees, not to speak about the small wheel multiplying this rotation per 4. How many degrees does the Zuiko 50 f1.8 rotates for the same distance ? (prepare your parachute): Just 90 degrees. Or 1/3 of the basic Kontax rotation. Fine.

Now, from 1,5 meter to infinity, the rotation to the Kontax is close to 180 degrees. What's the amplitude of the Zuiko for the same distance ? (prepare your auxiliary parachute): Between 45 and 30 degrees by my eye estimation. We are talking here about the most used distances, and the great Zuiko hardly matches the rotation of a compact 40mm rangefinder, like the Oly RC if you want.

What happened to me that I was not able to focus this nice elder ?
As you may remember I recommended some weeks ago to felt mark the Kiev distance scale at the 3 meter line and at the 1,5 meter line, and be pre-set at the distance scale at one of those lines, according to the situation, for easy juxtaposition and therefore fast focusing. Since then I have had wonderfull results with this way.

But when I decided to shoot the gentleman I was at the 3 meter line, a distance he crossed and was closing the gap to my position quickly. I was wrongly pre-setted at the distance scale. If I had been at the 1,5 meter line I could track him with the focusing wheel from the 3 meters when I decided to shoot, up to the slightly less than 1 meter when he told me "thank you". Ok, next time

Now a question. What AF camera can do the job accurately, without shutter lag, firing at 3 frames per second, without missing the focus - and about how much money are we speaking ?

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[cmedin]

The 10D I had had no issues tracking moving vehicles at a fair clip so I'd imagine a pedestrian wouldn't be too much of a challenge. 🙂

 

[gb hill]

What I love about the CV lenses on my Bessa R is the ability to hyper-focus with these lenses. Especially the 35/2.5

 

[oftheherd]

Perhaps you could change you method of photography just a little bit. Set your lens to a distance you believe is where you want to be taking your photos. Check the f/stop you will need and look at what distances you can shoot at. Then wait for your subjects (and yourself) to be at that distance when you trip the shutter. Know if you can get in another shotfrom your knowledge of the hyperfocal distance. You jmight even want to shoot three times, when the subject enters the hyperfocal distance, at the point of focus, and at the near point still in the hyperfocal distance.

You may be wasting too much time trying to focus instead of composing and shooting. Hope that all makes sense. Now granted, if your Kiev doesn't have a wind crank (I am too new to Kievs to know if any even do) instead of having to turn the shutter cocking/wind knob, you may be constrainted to two or just one photo. At least you will have one.

 

[ruben]

Oh Ruben dear friend. Don't tell us that you're thinking of going autofocus, please.

No Pitxu, my point was the contrary. Plus something else.

A digital AF mini system, starting from a PAIR of bodies Canon 10D, has a lot to offer, and will go by very gross estimation around two and half grands. No doubt in such a case we will have MUCH more than we have with a pair of Kievs.

The point is that if we concentrate in the very essential functions, we will be paying too much for too less. Against it, the Kontax venue is a whole "way of life" with its own rules.

On the other hand the case with which I opened the thread enlightens very strongly a point half sleeping in my mind: After you have produced this or that way an accurate Kontax, there is still ahead the challenge of becomming very dexterous in its manipulation. Like any pro, with any camera.

Using the 3m and 1,5m felt marked lines, I have progressed a lot in a single month. But a lot of practice is still ahaed.

Cheers,
Ruben

PS
I don't remember any RFF member around consistenly using the Kievs for day to day street photography. I am trying to say out there there is no dexterous Kontax user whispering me some tips, another issue I have been undirectly complaining for a long time.

 

[rxmd]

Hi Ruben,

I think I know what you feel. I've decided to make more use of the SLR in 2008 because I think I've been underappreciating some of the images I've been getting from it.

And hanging around on RFF too much is a brainwash all of its own. 🙂 There's nothing inherently bad about SLRs. If they enable you to take a picture that other cameras don't, they've done their job. Never mind if they have a mirror or if they're digital.

What AF camera can do the job accurately, without shutter lag, firing at 3 frames per second, without missing the focus - and about how much money are we speaking ?

AF speed is nowadays mainly a function of the lens rather than the camera, since the general trend is towards lenses with their AF motors built in.

If you don't want to spend a lot of money, the main problem is getting something with a useful field of view of about 50mm equivalent. You might think of trying the Sigma 30/1.4 lens, which is fast and offers a fast AF motor; in Germany it sells for about 230 to 250 EUR (eBay, in a shop it would be slightly more). If you want to stick with primes by the manufacturer of your body, you usually have a tradeoff between speed and AF speed on one hand, price and size on the other. For example, a Canon 35/2 costs about 180 EUR over here; a 35/1.4 which has a faster AF motor built in costs about 900 EUR. (However in your situation I think the 35/2 would still be up to it.) A Pentax 40/2.8 Pancake should be in the 250 EUR ballpark, too, if I remember correctly; it's nicely compact, but gives you 60mm field of view which might be narrow.

Body-related you can really get whatever body you like as long as you're aware that you're taking a decision for a camera system. Canon 10D's are pretty cheap nowadays and decent bodies, and in the 6 megapixel ballpark there are several interesting offers from Pentax, too (from the Samsung GX-1S which was available for $400 or so at Amazon recently, to the Pentax K100D). I don't know much about digital Nikons.

The decision between bodies is really a quasi-religious topic. There are the usual tradeoffs between popularity, compatibility with more third-party lenses, better functionality with specific legacy lenses, body size, body price etc. Ask ten people and you will get twenty opinions, especially on a place like RFF where people are opinionated anyway; if people can argue for years on whether the M6 or the MP finder is superior, you get the idea of how they will talk about DSLRs. I would decide based on sympathy; take a look through a couple of DSLR finders, hold the cameras in your hand and try them out. You personally will have the advantage at least that you won't find the finders small and squinty, because you're used to a Kiev 🙂

I don't remember any RFF member around consistenly using the Kievs for day to day street photography.

I guess Massimiliano/darkkavenger did. He certainly did when I met him in Prague.

Philipp

 

[ruben]

.......A digital AF mini system, starting from a PAIR of bodies Canon 10D, has a lot to offer, and will go by very gross estimation around two and half grands. No doubt in such a case we will have MUCH more than we have with a pair of Kievs.

The point is that if we concentrate in the very essential functions, we will be paying too much for too less.
.

No comments ?

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

Hi Pitxu,
Provided the helical thread (see KSS) of your Kiev is smooth, the 270 degrees rotation can be a blessing from heaven.

To make it such, you have to mark with a black felt pen the 3 meter line and the 1,5 meter line. Put your Kiev on a table with the 50mm lens mounted and follow me.

The Kontax focusing becomes problematic when we don't see the second image of the yellow patch, or when this second image is far from the main image. Then we become crazy and start rotating the lens rather wildly.

But the contrary happens when both images to superimpose are rather close one to the other. Then focusing becomes a piece of cake, fast as hell.

Now the question is how to pre-set our camera so that the two images will be rather close one to the other in every situation ?

This is what the two abovementioned markings will solve for you. The 3 meter line mark will give you two close images for all the range between infinity and 1,5 meter aprox.

The 1,5 meter felt mark will give you two close images for all the range from 3 meters up to 0,9 meter.

In this way, while you are walking with your Kiev, f/stop and speed pre-setted, according to the subject you will fastly jumping, before you raise your camera to eye level between these two clearly seen marks.

In my specific case, most of the times I am on the 3 meter line. This system works wonderfull. The case detailed in my opening thread was an exception.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[nicholas]

What AF camera can do the job accurately, without shutter lag, firing at 3 frames per second, without missing the focus - and about how much money are we speaking ?

Ruben, Look into a Contax G2 with Zeiss 45mm lens and after a week for familiarity you'll be shooting 3 frames a second for the length of the roll of film in the camera and I'm sure you'll get 90% or more in focus. And don't listen to the.. "oh it's an auto focus" bull. You want the picture, get it any way you can.

Cost? My guess is $600 in mint condition on the big bay. The lens? the 45mm Zeiss Planar is one of the finest "normal" lens ever made for 35mm cameras, bar none.
nicholas

 

[ruben]

Ruben. Where exactly do you put your mark ? on the lens barrel or on the mount ?
Also, do you think this methode could be simplified by having just one mark around 2.5 meters?

The mark should be put a) on the small outer border of the lens mount, b) on the line of the distance scale, c) on the perpendicular extension of this line at the protruding helical [the cylinder going outwards as you close focus], and d) on top of the upper fixed bayonet "leaf" (I am short of the precise name of this part

The purpose of this marking concerns the first stage, the stage of presetting the camera before we raise it to eye level. We want a clearly marked way enabling us to be ready to focus, to prepare ourselves for easy focusing when the camera will be at eye level.

Now, why two marks instead of a single one ? This concerns the second and main stage of our focusing action when the camera is at eye level. The whole trick I am selling for free, the essence of the idea, the most important of all, is that if we raise our Kontax to eye level and find two images of our subject rationally close one to the other - then ultrafast focusing becomes a piece of cake.

On the contrary, if the two images are either far one from the other, or we have no second image at all, due to the gap between our subject distance and the position of our distance scale - then we go wild, crazy, nervous and will never be able to catch quick shots.

If tomorrow morning you pre-set your distance scale to 3m, you will notice that the secondary image is rationally close to the primary one, both for subjects as far as infinity and as close as 1,5 meter. Notice too, while your camera is at eye level, that upon just starting moving the lens you will quickly reckonize the direction of rotation. In a fraction of a second you will move both directions and in another fraction of second you will reckognize the direction towards juxtaposition of both images at the yellow patch.

The same will happen for the 1.5 meter line, allowing you to dance from 3 meters to 0.9

But in my judgement, if you go for a single marking, at some middle point, instead of two markings, the primary and secondary images will be too too far one from the other, up to the point of being hard to reckognize, forcing you to find where the hell the secondary image has gone, and thus delaying your action.

But, of course, my experience is my own, responding to my needs, capacity, eyes, etc. and if you find that you do better with a single mark, then go ahead. We are not interpreting the Gospels here ! Do what you find good for you and leave anything else behind.

Here I should mention again that our very very knowledgeable member VinceC, based on the same purpose of finding the two images close one to the other when he raises the camera at eye level, uses a different method of pre setting. He menthally asesses the distance and turns the lens accordingly, and then fine tune his guess.

This approach doesnt work for me by now because I cannot read the numbers on the distance scale, due to my vision, and I have not yet enough experience to memorize the equivalents of the distance scale according to the small handle position. I am still in the college, where Vince teaches.

With more street Kontax hours, the day will came in which I will be able to instantaneously distinguish at first glace which is the primary and which is the secondary image, and also in which direction I should accordingly rotate the focusing wheel. By now let's fight with archs and arrows.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

Hi Nicholas,

I definitely agree with your sentence that You want the picture, get it any way you can. .

I have been interested once about the Contax G, but at the time I was discouraged by a very authoritative-for-me friend, who argued that the G has two problems for what I look for. a) Bad viefinder b) Noisy operation. Price is within the horizon, via selling much of my own.

In some threads I checked this and owners of the G were not good enough advocates of their cameras.

Nevertheless, whatever you have to say on these precise points, I am all ears.


Cheers,
Ruben.

 

[ruben]

This all seems like a terrible lot of trouble to make a camera do what it's appears not good at doing.

Hi stemistic,

First, I am not sure I understand your twist & shake phrase. But in case I do, and what I understand appears to be what you intended to say, with all due respect, it seems to me I happen to disagree.

The only things I miss a bit in my Kievs is AE and faster winding. I want very few things from a camera, but these few things to be at high quality and performance. I don't need an MP4 built in.

I would like to know, to see myself, how Cappa and other people of the good Contax times operated their cameras. I am sure it would be fascinating, not for their speed, but for their way. We have lost contact with that generation of the 40's and 50's when the Kontaxes where the main trend, and we were just born or programed to be born.

As much as I persist to use this camera in the streets for fast shooting, it makes more and more sense.

I think I have mentioned it in the opening post, yesterday night I almost get a heart attack upon realizing the uncapability of the OM with lumi-micron screen to focus in real darkness, and the easyness with which it was done with my Kiev. The same Kontaxex world wide known for their dark viewfinders !

I think those folks at Zeiss Ikon were smarter than what we grant them, and we still have to discover many things we don't know due to the generations issue I mentioned here..

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

Hi cmedin and Philipp,
For two bodies and 3 primes around the Canon 10D, we are talking about roughly 1600 Euro, or over u$2000.

This leaves me as a syphatetic expectator. Yet, since I am a neighbour of the Flinstones, could you tell me what these cameras are in terms of ISO 3200 and mechanism noise ? I am curious.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

Capa used Contax (and Nikon) cameras because that was what was available. I'm sure if he had had a 1D Mk III available when he stormed the beaches, he would have appreciated having 2,000 exposures on tap and 10fps and used that.

You have said that already some time ago, and I am not arguing with you on that.

Just try to get my point, which is not that Kievs are more advanced than digital dSLRs. Now if you try to convince me to move to the most advanced gear, I will answer that first I would like to see myself making pictures like those of Cappa, otherwise anyone is invited to fund the gear for me.

What I am saying about the Kontaxes, is that there is no one left around to teach us how to smartly use a Kontax, while I do believe, for this reason, there may be there more than what we see.

Farshteisht ?

Ruben

 

[nicholas]

G has two problems for what I look for. a) Bad viefinder b) Noisy operation. Price is within the horizon, via selling much of my own.

In some threads I checked this and owners of the G were not good enough advocates of their cameras.

Nevertheless, whatever you have to say on these precise points, I am all ears.


1. Bad viewfinder. What could possibly be bad about the G finder when you are trying to live with the finder on the Kiev? They are light years apart. Dim light means nothing to the G as long as you can see and place the brackets where you want them. Do that and you are on the money. Remember the G's finder is a variable telescope and it magnifies or widens according to the lens attached. There aren't a bunch of outlines to clutter the scene. Perfect? Of course not but I haven't ever missed a photo because of the finder, maybe for many other reasons.

2. Noisy operation. Some perceive the noise as loud because the motors are right next to one's ear. Out front, 3 feet from the camera it almost doesn't exist. And, by the way, that noise just focused the lens, fired the shutter and wound the film in well under a half of a second. Hold the shutter button down and 4 frames fly by in a second. No motorized camera that I'm aware of is quieter.

I've had Leica M's in the past, wonderful machines! But walk the streets with a Leica and do the same with a G2 and the difference is ridiculess. It's simply not a match, "bad finder" and "noisy shutter" wouldn't even cross your mind.

nicholas

 

[ruben]

Thank you Nicholas, I will try to put my hands on a G and get a first hand impression.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

BTW, about the Kontaxes, although before started using them on a daily basis, the viewfinder lack of well finnished borders, looked to me problematic, as well as the small pipehole through which you look.

Somehow I became absolutely used to it, as well as to the lack of parallax correcting lines.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[rxmd]

Hi Ruben,

Hi cmedin and Philipp,
For two bodies and 3 primes around the Canon 10D, we are talking about roughly 1600 Euro, or over u$2000.

This leaves me as a syphatetic expectator.

It's actually a little cheaper than that; on eBay USA, 10D bodies are available for $380 Buy-it-now. That's slightly less than half of your sum for the bodies. I'm not sure what primes you were interested in, but if you go with a basic, but functional setup you could go with a 50/1.8 ($75), a 35/2 ($250) and a 24/2.8 ($300, all current eBay USA Buy-it-now somewhere). That would be the equivalent, more or less, of a 35-50-85 setup on 35mm, would cost $1400 and would be pretty decent already.

Of course you can always spend more to get slightly faster lenses, or to get more quiet USM focussing motors which allow better manual focusing as well. If I were to jump into the EOS system today and would need to get a set of three decent primes, I would get a 50/1.4 ($300), 28/1.8 ($400) and 20/2.8 ($400). All of these are fast, have fast and quiet focussing motors, allow decent manual focusing, and will work on full-frame and film bodies. So with that and two EOS 10Ds you'd spend something like $1850, and you'd have a very decent setup. And since you now have an SLR which has no focusing problems with long lenses, you can expand into portraiture and get a 85/1.8 ($350) as well.

Yet, since I am a neighbour of the Flinstones, could you tell me what these cameras are in terms of ISO 3200 and mechanism noise ? I am curious.

Well, you do get mirror slap with any SLR and it is certainly no Kiev noisewise, but it isn't too terrible either in my opinion. Then again, street shooting takes place in the street by definition and the street is a noisy place. Noise is partly a function of the lens (depending on where the motor is). I am not shooting DSLRs regularly but noise would be no deterrent. ISO 3200 with the 10D is not particularly impressive. It will do, maybe even better than some of the newer models with more megapixels, but if you're about high ISO values the Pentaxes are probably better buys. Then again, you won't be using zooms, but fast(ish) primes, so you gain at least one to two stops in lens speed and won't be needing ISO 3200 all that often.

Philipp

 

[ruben]

Hi Philipp,
Including your price reduction I am still a symphatetic expectator at the stadium.
Nevertheless, in principle, it sounds to me somewhat anachronistic to pay such amounts of money and left with a mirror slap, or loose the Kiev silence. I think you may be doing street photography occasionally. Had you concentrated on street photography and its diverse variable situations, the silent operation of the camera is a factor of primary importance.
Thanks for your encyclopedic knowledge.

Cheers,
Ruben

Hi Ruben,

It's actually a little cheaper than that; on eBay USA, 10D bodies are available for $380 Buy-it-now. That's slightly less than half of your sum for the bodies. I'm not sure what primes you were interested in, but if you go with a basic, but functional setup you could go with a 50/1.8 ($75), a 35/2 ($250) and a 24/2.8 ($300, all current eBay USA Buy-it-now somewhere). That would be the equivalent, more or less, of a 35-50-85 setup on 35mm, would cost $1400 and would be pretty decent already.

Of course you can always spend more to get slightly faster lenses, or to get more quiet USM focussing motors which allow better manual focusing as well. If I were to jump into the EOS system today and would need to get a set of three decent primes, I would get a 50/1.4 ($300), 28/1.8 ($400) and 20/2.8 ($400). All of these are fast, have fast and quiet focussing motors, allow decent manual focusing, and will work on full-frame and film bodies. So with that and two EOS 10Ds you'd spend something like $1850, and you'd have a very decent setup. And since you now have an SLR which has no focusing problems with long lenses, you can expand into portraiture and get a 85/1.8 ($350) as well.


Well, you do get mirror slap with any SLR and it is certainly no Kiev noisewise, but it isn't too terrible either in my opinion. Then again, street shooting takes place in the street by definition and the street is a noisy place. Noise is partly a function of the lens (depending on where the motor is). I am not shooting DSLRs regularly but noise would be no deterrent. ISO 3200 with the 10D is not particularly impressive. It will do, maybe even better than some of the newer models with more megapixels, but if you're about high ISO values the Pentaxes are probably better buys. Then again, you won't be using zooms, but fast(ish) primes, so you gain at least one to two stops in lens speed and won't be needing ISO 3200 all that often.

Philipp

 

[ruben]

Street shooting for my list of photo-ops, is not just shooting at noisy streets. It includes buses, where you shoot at stops due to traffic slowing down, it includes very close subjects standing at the street near you, people seating at isolated places, and a plethora of situations I am short to describe.

For me, silence in a camera is a great asset. But this is just me, and a few other folks.

Cheers,
Ruben