Coolpix A

From one of the video interviews with Anders Petersen:


Moderator: You must be a man that always carries a camera with you…

Petersen: Yes (showing me his camera). Contax T3, 35 mm lens, very good lens, sharp in the corners. I made 2 meters prints and they were sharp in the corners. (The camera is loaded with Kodak TX 400). Always 400 ISO. All my work in the past 12 years has been done with this camera. I have used another one, too. It is Ricoh GR1s, with 28 mm lens, it’s more wide [lens], but I prefer 35 mm lens.
 
I'd have to sell something to buy one of these. One of them would be the 18mm lens for my X-Pro1... which I'm not too enamored with and I think I can use this camera in place of. Pretty much takes up the same space in the bag.
 
dcsang said:
I also wonder though - why do people "need"/want VR or IS in a wide angle lens?

I could understand if this was an 85mm f1.4 on a full frame sensor but at, say, f3.5 or f4 on a 28mm you're basically getting everything in focus anyway.

The image quality (while this is not the ONLY factor in choosing any camera) and noise is good at ISO1600 and, I will make a guess, likely at ISO3200 as well. So unless you "need" to shoot at ISO200 in low low low light, I'm not sure I get the reasoning for VR/IS.

Maybe I'm missing something on that because I have always questioned why it is needed in wide/ultra wide angle lenses.

Cheers,
Dave
Click to expand...

Unlike many of the folks here, street shooting is very far from what I had in mind; I would like something as compact as a Coolpix A (or similar cam) to be able to shoot in conditions that I use my DSLR for (except high-speed action), and I agree it's not for everyone; at the moment the G1X is probably closest. My reply below is specifically about why VR can be extremely useful on any lens, WA or tele, and is unrelated to video.

I do most of my shooting while on vacation, and places I like to visit include caves and museums. Flash is generally worse than useless in a cave, and the cramped, dark, wet, slippery conditions make any kind of support system unusable and/or dangerous. Like cave formations, museum exhibits don't move.

I'm not talking about art museums, though I've taken some fun shots in some of these places; I'm more a fan of space hardware and militaria (planes and missiles) so the usual "buy a better photo at the gift shop" doesn't really apply since I'm often interested in technical details. In some cave systems the LV drops to around 3 or less, which looks plenty bright enough until you try to shoot it at a reasonable ISO. VR would allow shooting at ISO 800 instead of 3200 or higher, and enables you to decide whether to trade-off DOF for noise and vice-versa, and the battery drain from VR is truly negligible.

High-res digital sensors are very unforgiving when it comes to DOF, so stuff that looks like it would have all been in focus if shot on film can be clearly OOF on digital even stopped down. For example see this shot, where the cars only a couple of meters in the background are obviously blurred at 24mm, f/5.6, 1/50s, ISO 320; apologies for the file size but the 800 x 533 "large" size on pbase hides what I'm trying to show:

http://www.pbase.com/smcleod965/image/147330343/original.jpg

Here are some example galleries of the low-light stuff I enjoy shooting:

http://www.pbase.com/smcleod965/luray_caverns&page=all

http://www.pbase.com/smcleod965/wombeyan_caves&page=all

http://www.pbase.com/smcleod965/air_and_space_museum&page=all

Regards,
Scott
 
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Hmmm.. I don't know.. the more I see stuff the more I think this camera is pretty cool - I did a bad thing today and went in to my local with an SD card to play with it a bit. That lens/sensor combo is pretty ridiculously good. (just my uneducated opinion mind you):

ISO3200 @ f2.8 Center weighted:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/the_nexus/8641787326/sizes/k/
(Warning: Image May Cause Illness 😀 😀 😀 😀 😀)

Cheers,
Dave
 
had a chance to quickly snap a handful of photos with a display Nikon A, these are ISO1600 JPGs. i have ordered one, in silver - will have it next week. i don't like the X100/X100s in operation, to big IMO for a "compact"; that's what i have a DSLR for.

in operation the 'A' is slick, REAL slick. the exp compensation works a treat & AF is more than fast enough.

tumblr_ml48obJAC61qbxd4po1_r1_1280.jpg

tumblr_ml48obJAC61qbxd4po2_r1_1280.jpg

tumblr_ml48obJAC61qbxd4po3_r1_1280.jpg
 
Paddy C said:
That's a very bad thing. Then you made it doubly bad by involving us! 😉
Click to expand...

Well.. I think I'm practically sold on the camera.

The funny thing is - I was ADAMANTLY against it when it was announced.

So what changed? The feel in the hand of the camera, the ridiculous image quality and the fact that it's pocketable.

Yes I can take photos with my Samsung Galaxy SII phone but not like this and there's a lot more control in the Nikon.

Now how do I justify $1200 after tax..... hmmmmm 🙄🙄

Dave
 
I should have never walked into the store.. honestly.. mind you; I'm pretty pleased - ISO3200 looks really good and ISO6400 in the night time looks awesome in B&W.. this will go down as likely the camera I least expected to appeal to me but in the end it did..

Cheers,
Dave
 
As time has past.. I have come to conclude it us really a nice camera Nikon has come up w/..kind of in the tradition of the 28ti.

I like how compact it is. But alas I have never been that comfortable w/ a 28 fov. If this had been a 38-40 perspective, I would be all over it, even w/o a evf.. so long as i could put an external ovf on it and i had a way of knowing when i had focus lock.. But it would have most likely made it thicker.

Enjoy your new camera. Lets c those pictures 😀

Gary
 
All of these are at ISO6400 -- First, night time - Aperture priority - ignore the subject matter - as these are strictly test photos to see how this thing handles:
8644720576_49c0116ee0_b.jpg


Now one with the SB700 flash attached:
8644718382_fb74fd9a7e_b.jpg


And one more in dirty light:
8643621003_e96f311c3b_b.jpg


All of these are from the RAW files and the one in the dark is the one I manipulated the least - the others have slight manipulation done to them with a "20" on the Luminance Noise Reduction in Lightroom. Full size versions are on my Flickr

Cheers,
Dave
 
dcsang said:
All of these are at ISO6400 -- First, night time - Aperture priority - ignore the subject matter - as these are strictly test photos to see how this thing handles:
8644720576_49c0116ee0_b.jpg

Cheers,
Dave
Click to expand...

That was quick buy.. I was thinking u were going to hold out until the weekend. 😛

Ignore the subject... Why???.. One of my favorite breeds along w/ bulldogs, mastiffs and French bulldogs.

Looks good...

Gary
 
The ISO 3200 is good - I knew that - but I wanted to see just what the ISO6400 was like and it's not half bad - I would use it for B&W only but it's decent. This is a, in my opinion, 3 stop jump on the GRD III - I never had the IV so I don't know what it would have been like.

Cheers,
Dave
 
From my time w/ x100 given the type of pictures I shoot.. For me, f2 lens, good at 1600 is all I really need, anything over that is a plus.

Seeing some of Keith's shots, I think his rule is more like 3200 😀 those are some pretty dark locations his jobs are at..

Gary
 
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