Film AND Digital. Back to basics.

[redimp]

Hey everyone.

So I'm in a middle of a dilemma here and I really need some help. I did not find a better place to post this so hopefully this thread would fit here.

For around 7 years now I am shooting with a Porst CR7 (fujica ax5 rebranded) with 50mm 1.2 funinon. It wis kind of an unstable hobby for me – sometimes I did not touch camera for months, sometimes burned through dozens of rolls per quarter. Recently my GAS came back and I bought myself an XA and a T2 and I understood that I want photography to take a bigger part in my life.

So I decided to take my hobby to a different level and go to a photo school. It's actually an academy, it's in a different country, so everything is pretty serious. Yay!

But when I am thinking about what I want to learn and about how I want to shoot and what kind of results do I want to get I understand that I will seriously have to stress several points like composition, working with models, working in darkroom, and most important one – to learn how to cease the moment and stop loosing shots.

For these reasons my current gear does not quite fit. Fujica is a beautiful camera, but I am slightly tired of meter missing exposure once in a while and me missing focus when shooting wide open and not having time to "hair-focus".

So I've decided that I want to choose a system, sell my current gear and stick to that system.

Here is where I am completely lost and need help. Here are the best case scenario gimmicks that I want:

1. One set of lens (~30, ~50, ~80). I really love the lens on my T2 and my Pentacon Six, both are Zeiss (different Zeiss but still), so I really, really want to use Zeiss lens.

2. Autofocus. This is one of the reasons I want to part with my current gear – I want to think about capturing an image, not about focusing.

3. Two bodies to fit that set of lens – one film and one digital.

4. Both bodies have to have meter, obviously have full manual mode, aperture AND shutter priority.

Now, this leads me to think Contax. I can get a set of those nice Zeiss lens or maybe get a zoom to cover a part of focals, get a cheap yet top-notch film body, but when it goes to digital – there is a problem. Contax has just one DSLR, it is full-frame, it is from 2002 which made me think is should be dirt cheap by now, but I checked e-site, and it's around 2 grand. So it bites. Hard.

There are more obvious choices – Canon and Nikon, right? No Zeiss, but other than that they seem to fit. But for some reason after all these years of shooting film with one camera and looking at people changing 2-3 bodies in the same period made me not like those two systems at all. Maybe I am stupid, but I just don't want to buy those cameras at all (I mean just DSLRs, film SLRs look pretty nice to me).

There is also Pentax but I know so little about it that I cannot even think of a particular bodies or lenses that I would like to buy.

And there is also an option of buying whatever I want from the film era, and using those lenses via adapters on a mirrorless body. I have no idea how hard the focusing would be, no idea of how flexible those cameras are in terms of available shooting modes.

So I guess this is it. Oh and of course money is an issue. I am from Ukraine and because of all the russia thing our currency has a very little value now.

Anyways, I will appreciate all the advice. Thanks.

 

[jloden]

I know you briefly mentioned your disinterest in Nikon/Canon, but my first suggestion would be Nikon given your requirements... a Nikon F6 for example can shoot the same lenses as any modern Nikon FX body, with all the modern features including flash support. To the best of my knowledge all of the following can carry over from a modern DSLR Nikon to the F6, just off the top of my head:

* Aperture control for G lenses w/out aperture rings
* Autofocus
* VR, if the lens supports it
* Metering TTL
* Auto modes (Aperture priority etc.)
* TTL flash and Auto FP/HSS flash sync if you need it, e.g. for outdoor portraits

That means you can buy a film and a digital body for one set of lenses and retain all the essential features without dealing with adapters, workarounds, or hacks.

Otherwise my other suggestion, if your focus is on film first I would pick your film body & lenses based on features and adapt to a mirrorless camera such as the Sony A7 series. I've shot Panasonic, Olympus, Fuji, and Sony mirrorless bodies over the years and adapted lenses can be manually focused very well on a modern mirrorless camera with focus peaking and magnification. If you can live without AF on the digital side, that can work very well. (I personally use M lenses on my M6 and an A7 for digital).

Plus, if you go the mirrorless route you can always adapt the lenses in manual focus mode and eventually later pick up native AF lenses for the mirrorless system if you find yourself shooting more digital.

 

[moreorless]

Its the modern DSLR handling you don't like one suggestion I would make is looking at a Nikon system with the Df and an F4 + older AF lenses with the aperture ring. Both bodies are autofocus(albeit the F4 only with a central point and probably not lighting fast) and operate via top mounted dials similar to Contax.

 

[Bille]

So I guess this is it. Oh and of course money is an issue. I am from Ukraine and because of all the russia thing our currency has a very little value now.

Anyways, I will appreciate all the advice. Thanks.

The Contax N Digital is rare and out of service with a very limited lens selection. If you want AF in Zeiss branded optics, SONY is your option. If you want to use Contax Zeiss (non N) manual lenses, CANON EOS is your option.

Btw Zeiss Jena had nothing to do with the west german Contax Zeiss.

 

[MikeDimit]

Well. Start from 42mm. Soviet Zenitar is one of a lens. And you could find it easy in Kiev 🙂. Then think of Praktica - they all had 42mm mount. And Carl Zeiss lens were made in DDR 🙂. Then think of Canon EF mount. You could have both SLR and DSLR bodies and one set of lens. And you could buy a 42mm to EF flunge or even 39mm to EF and use DDR lens on that bodies or old leica if you hit jackpot on lotary. That is the cheapest set in your case.

 

[Paul Jenkin]

Firstly, well done for "seizing the day" and appreciating that it's not essential to choose one medium at the expense of another. I've been shooting film since very early 1970s and I would hate to be without a film camera. In fact, most of my output is film. Secondly, well done for not being dismissive of digital. There are a lot of things that digital allows that film cannot - such as shooting 100 ISO and 6400 ISO on consecutive frames.

I'm in a similar place to yourself and all I can recommend is that you don't paint yourself into a corner by insisting on having Zeiss lenses in film and digital kits. Nice as Zeiss is (and I use it in my Hasselblads) it isn't the be-all and end-all.

I have a Nikon F6/D800 combo and share 14-24/f2.8, 28-70/f2.8, 70-200/f2.8, 50/f1.4 and 105/f2 DC between them. This may not be within budget but there are much cheaper alternatives. Tokina's ATX-Pro lenses are excellent, some of Sigma's lenses, too. A decent F5 (or F100) and an older D700 will cost a lot less. You could always get a DX camera (D300, D7000, etc) cheaper still and get a DX wide lens in addition to what else you buy.

These are only suggestions, of course. Canon, Sony / Minolta, Pentax, etc all offer options. You could even build two entirely separate non-connected systems. That would probably be cheapest of all - especially with the low prices for which you can pick up top quality film kit.

Whatever you do, enjoy your photography - especially if, like so many of us, it's going to be your lifelong favourite hobby - or even your profession.

 

[Fixcinater]

Canon 5D (whichever one you can afford/like the files from the best, some people still prefer the original over the later versions)
Canon EOS 3 for film
Sigma 50/1.4 (I haven't seen the Art in person but the EX DG HSM is fantastic
Canon 100/2
Whatever wide you like the looks of

Controls between those two will be quite similar and once set up, you can have them basically working exactly the same. There's no mode dial on the EOS 3 but with a bit of practice it's easy to switch back and forth between the two.

If you decide you want Zeiss glass, you can get it in Canon EOS mount. You can also experiment with pretty much every Nikon lens made on a Canon camera, as well as Pentax and Olympus and others. Much more flexible with old glass than Nikon or Pentax are.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

My Canon 50L works well on film Rebel, was amazing and EOS 3 and does the job well on 5D.

 

[redimp]

I am currently being torn between two choices – film Contax body and A7 for digital with no autofocus, and Canon system with autofocus lens on both digital and film.

No idea which film Cotax system I like better – G or N. Does anyone know if photography academies have preferences for what cameras they students use in terms of SLR/Rangefinder?

I could imagine they should stress on SLRs for beginners, since you see through the lens, etc, but since I already tasted that cake, I'd like to try RFs too.

 

[Ronald M]

Digital Leica and use film or digital.

Nikon is the best cost effective for one set of lenses and 2 bodies. Once you learn digital WELL, you may sell the film camera.

 

[Pioneer]

If you decide to take the Nikon route then the F6 has software that can give you the EXIF data on all the photographs you have taken on film. It then combines the EXIF data with the photos when they are scanned. I enjoy it enough that I am almost ready to trade my digital Leica for a digital FX Nikon.

 

[Contarama]

Pentax will soon release a FF K mount. With M42 adapter there are a ton of possibilties with this option.

 

[Capt. E]

Good to hear Pentax will soon release a FF K mount. I have a K-3 and enjoy it very much. The plus with Pentax is you can use ANY lens they have ever made, especially the SMC-A line and the early FA autofocus lenses. The K-3 is a 24 mp camera, so I will guess the new FF should be in the 35 mp area. Moving into digital for the first time, I would not consider anything that does not support RAW with less than 24 mp images. That cuts out most of the older cameras. Pentax is also less expensive than the equivalent Nikon, Canon, Sony, Fuji cameras. They also have a fine line of primes. The image data will be recorded automatically, date, exposure, lens used. The Pentax K-3 uses 2 cards. I use them to have both a RAW image and a JPG with each shot.

 

[Capt. E]

I would consult the school on what equipment they expect you to have before buying anything.

Also, is there a camera that is both film and digital? Perhaps a Hasselblad or Pentax 645?