I got me self a GRD!

[noimmunity]

G(reat)R(easons)D(ude)

G(reat)R(easons)D(ude)

Congratulations! That's a great price for a great camera. Not exactly a P&S at all. One of the really fun things about it, besides the total manual control , the sharp lens , and the pocketable size, is the fact that you also have to accept its limitations and learn to use them--which you are clearly doing and doing in an enjoyable way, both for yourself and for viewers!

I bought mine new in Hong Kong for $625 and thought that was a bargain. After that I finally convinced myself that I could justify the cost of film and some definitive lenses.

Your record of Chongqing conveys, quite unusually, an inimitable aesthetic and a concern or love for the common. undoubtedly the GRD will be another useful and ultimately quirky human tool in your gifted hands!

-jon 小強

 

[ywenz]

Nice Avo! I'm visiting China for 2.5 weeks at the end of the year I'm thinking of bringing JUST my GRD!

Hey.. what did you need to use to use the GRD's battery charger? Just a plug adapter?

I'm lovin' this guy's GRD work.. http://www.flickr.com/photos/8364202@N08/

Looks like I need to upgrade my firmware to get the square crop option.

 

[shadowfox]

IMHO, in a digital world depth is hard to say why it does or doesn't occur. I think some of what you are looking for might be because of the settings of the camera or post processing. Increasing the contrast might mess up depth, no? The lens looks wonderful so perhaps I am not understanding what you mean by depth and it being digitial.

Help me understand.

B2 (;->

Bill,

In my mind, composition and timing-wise, those pictures are excellent, typical Avotius stuff.

But to me (and I'm certain that I'm not the only one), digital pictures tend to be "flatter" than film unless you're using the close-focus/macro settings. Nothing to do with the lens quality, although big max. aperture certainly does help. It's the sensor size and as you said, in-camera post-processing.

I'm just saying that some of the pictures (especially the first ones) exhibit the typical characteristic I see in digital pictures. Some call it sterile, I call it "too faithful rendition of the real world" 😀

Sorry Avotius, not trying to critique your pictures, just clarifying what I wrote.

 

[ywenz]

I'm just saying that some of the pictures (especially the first ones) exhibit the typical characteristic I see in digital pictures. Some call it sterile, I call it "too faithful rendition of the real world" 😀

Or characteristics of a 35mm film image shot at small aperture..

 

[sebastel]

arrrrgh!
from my own experience, i can only tell, this camera is no good.
you can only take pictures with it.
no "ahhhhh" "ohhhhhh" "great camera" comments.
no "when will my pic be in the papers?"
no grrrls jumping into the field of view.

no, it's no good. and expensive, too.

🙂
周模愉快
s.

 

[gns]

So, Avotius.
What's with all the Robert Frank pictures pinned to the wall? Guess it's related to your post from the other day, no? What's going on there? Those aren't originals, are they?

Gary

 

[Avotius]

So, Avotius.
What's with all the Robert Frank pictures pinned to the wall? Guess it's related to your post from the other day, no? What's going on there? Those aren't originals, are they?

Gary

Nope, my friend is a robert frank fan and printed off a bunch of his photos he found online to stick on his wall next to his. Ya know....inspiration.

Avotius, I'm a big fan of your pictures, but I have to agree with Bill up there. There is a certain lack of depth that your film pictures had.

It's not that these are bad pictures, they are great, but it is... well, digital 🙂

I agree, its digital...but ya know....my favorite film processor in town, not to mention the only decent film processor....recently stopped doing film. I have to make the choice of shooting more digital or take my film to another town to be done up. Its alright though, I will keep up the film, in fact there are some bessa/zeiss planar color shots coming soon.

Those are freakin good hey, I really appreciate your reviews on lenses and cameras. I've been eyeing off a GRd for ages now. You may have pushed me over the edge.

Its a great one, keep a look out for deals as its discontinued or wait for the grd2 like everyone else seems to be doing. I thought about waiting but then again think of all the good photos I would miss.

Very nice, Avotius.

Are these *all* shot at ISO 1600?

No, I will label them

Hey.. what did you need to use to use the GRD's battery charger? Just a plug adapter?

My GRD's batter charger thing...if you look on the back it has the information and stuff, look for the part that says the input, it should say 110v-240v. They use 240 here so as long as it says that you can charge it here no problem. The basic two pronged wall plug works just about anywhere here so no problem.

Sorry Avotius, not trying to critique your pictures, just clarifying what I wrote.

Film isnt digital, digital isnt film, no offense taken. I do like the film look better but what ya gona do? Photography is all about sacrifices. Sacrifices to the camera size, sacrifices to the image quality, sacrifices to the wife....whatever.

 

[Avotius]

More photos, I was at the street market today. After 500 frames in a few days with the camera im convinced its great. Sure noise could be less, but what ya gona do. All the shots below were taken with the snap mode, it works great. One of the advantages of having a small CCD is that 4.0 is more then enough to shoot street scenes in snap.

 

[ywenz]

sweet! do you shoot in Raw or JPEG?

I've found that there is less noise @ high ISO when you shoot with the in-camera B&W mode versus shooting in color and then converting to B&W..

Just processed a few pics from the trip to the farm.

 

[Avotius]

very cool indeed. I have found that because of the random pattern of the noise and the way noise just melts together with black and white it indeed is nicer to shoot this camera in bw mode. I just jack contrast all the way up as that is my preferred look. Today I took some images to the printers to see how they come out, unfortunately im not set up at home to print photos, soon I hope, but until then just keep my fingers crossed that the images stand up in print.

I have shot a few photos in raw but the raw write speed its pretty pokey, I already think the jpg write speed is a little poky (compared to my 20d) so ya...

 

[gns]

If you shoot in B+W mode, can you set contrast or sharpening settings?
Its seems from the menu, that you can set 2 custimized settings for color jpegs, but in B&W, are you stuck with the defaults?

Gary

 

[principe azul]

Some nice shots here.

gns,

Yes. This feature came with one of the more recent firmware updates:

http://www.ricoh.com/r_dc/download/firmware/grd/win.html

edit ¦ ...but only this one customised setting for b/w, AFAIK...

 

[Terao]

Yep, the most recent firmware allowed you to set B&W "film" settings and also colour bracket.

I'm just off out to use up a roll of Neopan 400 in my GR1V 🙂

 

[fishric]

Avotius,
I bought my GRD recently to take advantage of the price drop before they vanish off the shelves.
I'm very pleased with it and have just updated the firmware to 2.31.
This allows me to set up sharpening and contrast in B&W. More usefully, for me, I can adjust auto bracketing between .3 or .5.
My flkr link below leads to my GRD slideshow, if you care to take a look.
Regards, Richard F.

 

[ywenz]

fish: I really like this shot.. http://www.flickr.com/photos/78955290@N00/1418054922/in/set-72157601887621457/

you pulled out some great range out of the GRD image.. did you shoot raw and played around with the fill and recover settings?

 

[Avotius]

forgive my blindness but where can I find my firmware version? Its probably up to date but couldnt hurt to look.

 

[fishric]

ywenz, Glad you like the pic, I don't yet have the software for raw, I shoot fine jpegs at the lowest iso, usually in colour and then de-saturate in Ps.2, (adust color/colorize, and then adjust the top two sliders to give a hint of sepia)
One day I'll get Ps.5 and try shooting raw.
Avotius, If you click on Ian's link above and scroll down a little you'll find instructions on how to check your firmware.
Good luck,
Richard F.

 

[Avotius]

Just a little update. I have been working with this camera for a while now. A few comments:

Sometimes the lens does not come out all the way when I turn the camera on, its rather annoying sometimes.

Many times the camera does not turn on at all. Im convinced its a battery contact problem, poping it out and back in seems to help most of the time, sometimes I need to pop it in and out a few times to get it working.

The charger and battery dont like each other too much. After sticking the battery in after a minute or two the charger shuts off. Another contact issue. Sticking something behind the battery to wedge it further into the charger works but is not very brilliant.

I refuse to open that USB rubber door thing after the first time I did, its poooooor quality. I have no doubt that opening it too many times would end up in a door that did not close right.

I dont shoot raw, its too slow. JPG's look good from the camera though and more then suffice for what I use it for.

JPG's printed to 24 inches seriously lacked detail. Mosaic patterns started to show a bit, nothing huge, but obviously not up to par with 35mm film or the sort.

Color response of this camera can be called very conservative, even tweaking with the settings its pretty conservative. This camera likes to make blue very saturated though.

Black and white mode is still how I usually shoot the camera, works great I think.

Snap mode is brilliant, the responce of this little point and shoot is great when you use snap mode, not that the auto focus is slow, its great, and very accurate, but snap mode takes that split second the auto focus needs and throws it out the door. Awsome.

The LCD screen isnt great, I have a plastic protective cover thing on it, that helps. Try to view screen straight on.

I wonder how many of these problems were solved with the GRD2