Can A Kontax Become A Fast Street Shooter ?

[ruben]

I have no idea whom this question may concern. But it certainly concerns me.

If to judge upon several threads we have been having along time and recently, about how to do this or that, most owners seem to regard their Kontax as a "take your time" camera.

I think the "take your time" approach is quite controversial. During my times of freelancing, at my local areas of conflict, I have been very close to the most sofisticated professionals, also in terms of gear. I have seen some of them metering with hand held meters amidst clouds of gas, flying people and dust, although bearing the most modern cameras. I have seem some of them with manual Leicas too. Cappa took the Contaxes to WWII.

Therefore let me lead a "counter-attack" : what has made the Kontax, a "take your time" camera in our minds ?

In my opinion this is due to two factors: first it is our gear mind guilt only. In spite of everything else, the lack of automation twists our elevated minds like in the most beginner of beginners.

The second factor is more related to the outside world. We have lost live contact with oldtimer Kontax users enabling us to know how to make the most of these breeds, under conditions of war, or stress, or peacefull but fast street photography.

Not everything in street photography is fast shooting, and who else than we ourselves know it best. But a lot of it, it is.

Hence the need to know how to focus a Kontax held in vertical position, or how to minimize the use of hand held meters when time is short. Or the need of obtaining a white dome average exposure, less than perfect.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

Capa took Contaxes and Leicas and Nikon rangefinders into war because that's what was available. Had he had access t 10fps motor driven cameras, I suspect he would have been using those.

I do agree here. But we are not done with the question yet. Many of us know that even today a lot of young and older photographers tour areas of conflict with manual Leicas.

And as I impliyed, many of the 10fps pros still use the hand held meter, and disregard the machine gunning in favour of the single shot. Thats' a fact I invite you to comfirm or denny.

I myself do agree with you that better having the 10fps and use it as you like than not having the option. Yet it doesn't eliminate the Kontax from the race, in the same terms as the Leica has not dyied from fast shooting areas, or use.

We have to take note I am refering time and again to war photography because in terms of fast shooting, street shooting is very much alike. The war photographer too has to sell his pictures and have them well composed in fraction of seconds.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[VinceC]

If you know the camera, it's not slow to use. People who own many different cameras and often switch between them will be slowed down. But if it's your main camera, there's nothing really slow about it.

The comment about people spending too much time metering is correct. An unmetered camera forces you to learn more about light. Older photographers with no other options generally learned how to work with light, not just how to meter it.

I'm extremely fast and accurate with my unmetered Nikon RFs, and that includes not using a handheld meter with them. I get slowed way down when I pick up an automated camera ... My office has given me a Nikon D80 for work. Its controls are unfamiliar, in unaccustomed places. I don't know what assumptions it's making when it automates something. Most of the viewfinder information is a mystery to me. I've been having fun putting on my old manual-focus AI'd lenses from the 1960s and shooting it on unmetered manual mode. Setting the shutter speed is still clumsy, but it's otherwise a quick, easy camera to use when mounting a 40-year-old lens.

 

[Harry Lime]

Capa took Contaxes and Leicas and Nikon rangefinders into war because that's what was available. Had he had access t 10fps motor driven cameras, I suspect he would have been using those.

Capa chose the Contax over the Leica, because of the combined viewfinder / focus patch. It allowed him to work faster. The other reason was the 1.5/50 Sonnar, which was the best standard lens in the world for a solid 20-25 years.

Capa would have loved digital photography, because images can be transmitted from the field via satellite phone and CF cards allow you to capture hundreds or thousands of images without having to lug around a suitcase of film. He was very aware of TV killing photojournalism after the war and actually considered the idea of setting up a moving picture division within Magnum.

 

[ClaremontPhoto]

There's no need to meter every few seconds. Once you have the camera set up for the light you can ignore the meter, unless and until a big black cloud arrives.

 

[VinceC]

In the World War II era, the Contax was the faster camera to use, with features we now take for granted -- shutter speeds all on one dial; focus patch in the main viewfinder window instead of a separate window; bayonet-mount interchangeable lenses; larger rewind knob to speed up rewinding; opening (removable actually) back that allows fast, positive positioning of the film leader into the take-up spool. The focus wheel that most find weird today allows for one-handed shooting ... you set up the exposure, then can shoot one-handed while using your other hand for holding yourself secure.

 

[ruben]

If you know the camera, it's not slow to use. People who own many different cameras and often switch between them will be slowed down. But if it's your main camera, there's nothing really slow about it.
.

Great point here. And I would like to enhance it.

I have nothing against hi-tech automated cameras, but when fast shooting is the issue you have no middle way: either you are used to full auto in whatever you have, or you are trained in full manual.

Because all what is in the middle stands in your way. There is nothing inferior in full manual, as the human brain can deliver, provided it has been trained beforehand.

Know your camera, great point Vince.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

......
I'm amazed at how some guys don't seem to meter, shoot from the hip and develop without a timer.
But they get results !

There is something here.

As we master more and more technology we are afraid of laging behind. But we lag behind nevertheless. We loose much of our brain capacity on behalf of automatization. It is a trade off which I don't suggest to oppose it, but it will not be bad if we would be rather selective and more councious of what we are doing.

Thus for example since there are handy calculation computers I forget more and more the basic rules of multiplying or dividing. We get lazy. And worse than that we forget to be selective in the use of technology. We leave more and more grounds to the "auto".

Nevertheless, it remains a simple exercise of self training our brains. The option is still in our wish. We can auto-focus and wait for the camera to react, or we can manual focus faster, provided we are trained.

This is the place where our Kontaxes live and breath. It is a simple issue of training.

With the Kontax I have left the light metering to both my brain and meter, using the meter when my brains ask me to, or when the time and circumstances allow it. And I use my intuition when there is not time available. I think this is the correct formula for me.

Until some years ago, one of my relatives was using a non distance metering camera, allowing for precise adjustment, using his own capacity for guessing distances. His interest in photography is rather low, but still you ask him what is the distance from here to there and he will tell you quite accurately.

I think the whole point of this thread is to remind ourselves we still have brains to use, and not only GAS to fill.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[brachal]

Capa wasn't the only one using the Contax. I have a book of Life magazine photography from WW2. The first section has pictures of some of the men who took pictures for Life. Every one of them who is holding a camera is holding a Contax.

The only thing I find slow about using a Kiev is the reloading. I'm sure it would go faster if I practiced more with that camera. I've done some street shooting with it at local parades, and the only thing that I have trouble with is reloading, while trying to keep up with the parade. Practice.

I think the ability to fire off 5 frames a second, onto a digi-card capable of holding a couple of hundred images is what makes a manual camera seem so "slow." Why wait? Why make sure each push of the shutter counts, when you can blaze away like that? It's like the difference between a machine gunner and a black-powder hunter.

 

[Dogman]

You probably already know this, but...

Metering is not the only thing that slows you down. Constantly focusing to try and keep the subject at maximum sharpness will guarantee missing pictures. Kiev/Contax lenses require a lot of turning to get to sharp focus and that will really slow down the process.

I've seen a photo of HCB with the rangefinder patch of his Leica taped over. He was known to usually zone focus the camera and let depth of field carry the focus. If the photo is good enough, a little bit out-of-focus won't hurt. Cartier-Bresson's photos were always "good enough".

When I carry a Kiev, I generally set the lens at the hyperfocal distance for the aperture in use. The Kiev's DOF markings have to be taken with a grain of salt. They are very optimistic, so I use mark for the next wider f-stop as my hyperfocal distance guide. I also use an old Leitz 5cm auxilary brightline finder with 50mm lenses. It's a 1:1 finder and a lot easier to use quickly than the standard Kiev finder.

 

[ruben]

..........The only thing I find slow about using a Kiev is the reloading......

That's true. And that's why by now I am measuring if I can do with the Kievs 4am.

In order to obtain a good level of focusing I had to work them hard and replace several parts of the ranging mechanism with parts from older and better Kievs. I have not definitive answer regarding the strength of other parts along time, and weather they will be replaceable.

Of course that when I talk about the Kontaxes I talk taking into account the needs of a good aficionado, and not beyond.

I guess former Contax users solved the issue of quick unload and reload just by having a second body ready, like the old Brittish infantry shooting with two lines of soldiers One at a time.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[Dogman]

Capa shot the entire D-Day invasion with two Contax cameras, two 50mm lenses and two rolls of 36-exposure film. He shot some Rollei stuff on the ships, but the beach photos were done on a total of 72 exposures. That's confidence.

 

[brachal]

Hey bill, the black powder shooter has to think and make the shot count.
I'll repeat what Ansel Adams thought that "if photographic images were more difficult to make, then the quality of the results would be higher"

My point exactly.
If you think black powder is something, I know a guy who bow hunts without a blind/stand. If he can't stalk well enough to put an arrow into a deer, he figures the deer deserves to win.

 

[brachal]

In order to obtain a good level of focusing I had to work them hard and replace several parts of the ranging mechanism with parts from older and better Kievs. I have not definitive answer regarding the strength of other parts along time, and weather they will be replaceable.

Ruben,

When I use my Kiev for street work, it's almost always with the Jupiter-12 at f/11 or f/16. DOF!

 

[ruben]

Ruben,

When I use my Kiev for street work, it's almost always with the Jupiter-12 at f/11 or f/16. DOF!

You guys with your DOF stuff speak a foreign language to me. First you need sun, then you need the subject be facing the sun otherwise the subject is making his own shadow, and then you cross the street to the shadow side and your DOF smiles from afar: bye bye

Yet it is possible you photograph sunlit buildings instead of mooving people and then you leave the f/11 frozen and just lower the speed. I really don't know what are you speaking about.

DOF for me is just one among several presets, a resting starting point for the camera, which most of the times will have to be changed with the first subject not waiting to byte where the fisherman is comfortably seated for.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

Neither I.

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[ruben]

Then why don't you have any dof???

You tell me what DOF you have in a sunlit day, using Iso 200, at the shadow side to the street. I am very curious. My experience tells me f/4 at 1/250. So where is the DOF of a 35mm lens at f/4 ?

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[brachal]

You guys with your DOF stuff speak a foreign language to me. First you need sun, then you need the subject be facing the sun otherwise the subject is making his own shadow, and then you cross the street to the shadow side and your DOF smiles from afar: bye bye

Yet it is possible you photograph buildings instead of mooving people and then you leave the f/11 frozen and just lower the speed. I really don't know what are you speaking about.

Cheers,
Ruben

You do need reasonable light, that's true. What I'm saying doesn't apply to buildings. The building isn't going anywhere, so what's the hurry?

If I'm in a daylight situation, and I'm shooting something like a street parade with rapidly moving people (we do this every Sunday in New Orleans) -- I know I'm not likely to be shooting anything at infinity. So I'll set the shutter to whatever supports f/11 or f/16. At f/16 the J12 will focus from about 10 meters to about 1.6. All I have to worry about is framing and winding. If the light changes, or if the subject moves into shadow, I adjust the shutter. It doesn't work for everything, and sometimes I screw up the exposure. I'm not a very good photographer, but I'm trying. The attached images were captured this way using the J12 and Kiev 2a.

 

[ruben]

1/250 is the minimum acceptable for a walking person, walking towards you and not perpendicularily to you. 1/500 will be the best, although it will leave you too wide an aperture for shadows.

With 1/250 you can "diggest" a face sudden movement of a still person close to you. 1/250 is for me the rule of thumb.

And take into account that many times you yourself will be moving your camera rather fastly, provoking your own movement within the film.

Yet Bill, I have to admit I use the standard focal length rather than 35mm. BTW nice pics - do you remember the speed you used ?

Cheers,
Ruben

 

[le vrai rdu]

In my opinion, i make photo to evocate, not to show reality that why I shot as much as possible at wide aperture, because I don't need details everywhere, just on the subject. of course that mean that you won't be able to shoot everything you want, but i don't really care, you cannot always shoot, that's all. Sometimes blur can also give you an atmosphère , specialy at night.

I don't think it is so hard to focus with a kiev/contax if you use le focusing ring on the lense and you prepare the focusing by evaluating the distance and set it on the lens. If you have prepare the aperture, the focus and the speed you just need 1 or 2 seconds to frame , focus and shoot.

Of course, contax/kiev is not as good as a voigt/kiev because the finder only frame for 50 mm and not from about 30 to 75 on a bessa R for example but on the other hand it is very silent compared to a bessa R

so in my opinion contax/kiev is a very good street camera if you cannot afford many money in a RF with a big and wide viewfinder

concerning the speed, at 1/25 it is okay, at 1/10 you have to be quiet but it is still easy