raytoei@gmail.com
Veteran
Hi. I feel that I should at least say thanks and introduce myself, especially since i find myself participating more and more in these forums.
I am a newbie in photography, three months ago I really thought Canon was a printer company that sold cameras
My first serious camera coincided with Formula One in Singapore, a 2nd hand Canon 40d, after that I started to read and learn and have not looked back since. I do mainly film cameras, and almost always B&W. I feel that this is a niche I can learn and slowly pick the skills up.
As is a happy problem with most photography hobbyists, I have too many equiptment. With film cameras going cheap, I find it affordable to buy and collect film cameras. I have 9 camera at home, 2 more in local shops for general cleaning and another two more are in the mail, a Olympus 35 SP (with a faulty meter) and a Minolta Hi-Matic 9 with a fast 1.7 45mm Rokkor lens. I bought the 35 SP for $20 and I won the Hi-Matic 9 for $15.50 before shipping and handling to Singapore. Of course, the SP (and Minolta) could really be a dud but at $20 USD I am taking a calculated bet (do a check on ebay and find out how much are Olympus 35 SP going these days!). As for the Hi-Matic 9, I chose it over the popular Hi-Matic 7 simply because the Hi-Matic 7 has reached cultish status (read: expensive).
Except for the Olympus Trip and Leica C3 (and the Canon 40D), all my gear are manual and they are mechanical too, ie. they do not depend on batteries to work. For metering I use a simply slide rule to match guesstimated EV with Aperture & Shutterspeed. Actually with film getting scarce and machine-wash C41 films sold in singapore at ISO 400, it isn't too hard to figure out the exposures if we just narrow it to ISO 400. Black and Whilte films (XP-2 or BW400CN) are quite forgiving to incorrect exposures. So as a rule of thumb, indoors are usually 1/30s and f/2.8 for bright lights, normal lights makes it 1/30s and f/2 (see my two Dome Cafe shots here and here). But sometimes our eyes deceive us, my Morton's Restaurant shots (at Mandarin Oriental Singapore) came out horribly wrong. I have since put in a Kodak 3200 ISO film on my (hold your breath) Olympus Trip and shot a roll last week. At low light, the Oly Trip reverts to 1/30s which is fine by me, then the only thing I play with is the aperture to control the exposure. This non-standard film will take a week to process at Fujifilm at Peninsula Plaza Singapore. This makes my Oly Trip a low-light shooter. I hope that with a faster 1.7 lens, my SP or Minolta will be a more versatile night shooter. I know nothing much about flash, it is on my to-learn list, in the mean time I will use fast lens in ambient light.
I shoot about 2 - 3 rolls of film a week, as a "student" (in photography), I am happy if one or 2 shots come out great. I hope that the law of statistics will favor me, ie. shoot enough rolls and I will soon have a good collection of memorable photos.
I will end this long-winded post with one of my favorite picture.
I was testing my IIIF and Hektor 135/4.5 lens. Everybody snubs the Hektor, but at $50 on ebay, it was a no brainer for me. My problem was how to get the framelines on my IIIf, I bought a Helios viewfinder from Alex Photos but it came only with a WIde (35mm) and Narrow (100mm) framelines, in this photo I actually focused on the face in the centre, but I am glad it turned out better from the side.
This is a picture of my girl on a swing. Hope you enjoy!
cheer!
raytoei
I am a newbie in photography, three months ago I really thought Canon was a printer company that sold cameras
As is a happy problem with most photography hobbyists, I have too many equiptment. With film cameras going cheap, I find it affordable to buy and collect film cameras. I have 9 camera at home, 2 more in local shops for general cleaning and another two more are in the mail, a Olympus 35 SP (with a faulty meter) and a Minolta Hi-Matic 9 with a fast 1.7 45mm Rokkor lens. I bought the 35 SP for $20 and I won the Hi-Matic 9 for $15.50 before shipping and handling to Singapore. Of course, the SP (and Minolta) could really be a dud but at $20 USD I am taking a calculated bet (do a check on ebay and find out how much are Olympus 35 SP going these days!). As for the Hi-Matic 9, I chose it over the popular Hi-Matic 7 simply because the Hi-Matic 7 has reached cultish status (read: expensive).
Except for the Olympus Trip and Leica C3 (and the Canon 40D), all my gear are manual and they are mechanical too, ie. they do not depend on batteries to work. For metering I use a simply slide rule to match guesstimated EV with Aperture & Shutterspeed. Actually with film getting scarce and machine-wash C41 films sold in singapore at ISO 400, it isn't too hard to figure out the exposures if we just narrow it to ISO 400. Black and Whilte films (XP-2 or BW400CN) are quite forgiving to incorrect exposures. So as a rule of thumb, indoors are usually 1/30s and f/2.8 for bright lights, normal lights makes it 1/30s and f/2 (see my two Dome Cafe shots here and here). But sometimes our eyes deceive us, my Morton's Restaurant shots (at Mandarin Oriental Singapore) came out horribly wrong. I have since put in a Kodak 3200 ISO film on my (hold your breath) Olympus Trip and shot a roll last week. At low light, the Oly Trip reverts to 1/30s which is fine by me, then the only thing I play with is the aperture to control the exposure. This non-standard film will take a week to process at Fujifilm at Peninsula Plaza Singapore. This makes my Oly Trip a low-light shooter. I hope that with a faster 1.7 lens, my SP or Minolta will be a more versatile night shooter. I know nothing much about flash, it is on my to-learn list, in the mean time I will use fast lens in ambient light.
I shoot about 2 - 3 rolls of film a week, as a "student" (in photography), I am happy if one or 2 shots come out great. I hope that the law of statistics will favor me, ie. shoot enough rolls and I will soon have a good collection of memorable photos.
I will end this long-winded post with one of my favorite picture.
I was testing my IIIF and Hektor 135/4.5 lens. Everybody snubs the Hektor, but at $50 on ebay, it was a no brainer for me. My problem was how to get the framelines on my IIIf, I bought a Helios viewfinder from Alex Photos but it came only with a WIde (35mm) and Narrow (100mm) framelines, in this photo I actually focused on the face in the centre, but I am glad it turned out better from the side.
This is a picture of my girl on a swing. Hope you enjoy!
cheer!
raytoei
