Monochrom 246 and Leica SL in New Mexico

John,

That is part of the charm of my original Monochrom: pretty clean files but not perfect.

The files from the SL and M-246 do really look kinda perfect.

I still shoot lots of film BTW.

Cal

Vince your a very fine photographer but perfection can be a bit boring. Perfection results in a loss of character IMO. No offense intended.
 
Vince, you're images are really wonderful. I don't much care which cam brought them to fruition. We might have to vote you to "Honorary New Mexican".

I didn't see the SW corner of the state among your travels. Perhaps that's next. Deming, Hidalgo county (near Cloverdale, last verified sighting of jaguar in the U.S). Animas and the Chiricahua Range-AZ border. Lordsburg (near last U.S. sighting of Aplomado Falcon), City of Rocks, Silver City is worth the visit, the Gila NF (stop at the Catacombs), even Reserve (infamous, perhaps you know why) and the remainder of the Mogollon Rim.

I also wandered the state of NM, but with an old Nikon FE2 and Ektachrome; and I doubt I ever exhibited the eye you have shown us with the images above.
 
Sorry I introduced the notion of "too clean." My bad. Why don't we drop that subject and return to enjoying Vince photos and discussing his observations.

John
 
Vince, you're images are really wonderful. I don't much care which cam brought them to fruition. We might have to vote you to "Honorary New Mexican".

I didn't see the SW corner of the state among your travels. Perhaps that's next. Deming, Hidalgo county (near Cloverdale, last verified sighting of jaguar in the U.S). Animas and the Chiricahua Range-AZ border. Lordsburg (near last U.S. sighting of Aplomado Falcon), City of Rocks, Silver City is worth the visit, the Gila NF (stop at the Catacombs), even Reserve (infamous, perhaps you know why) and the remainder of the Mogollon Rim.

I also wandered the state of NM, but with an old Nikon FE2 and Ektachrome; and I doubt I ever exhibited the eye you have shown us with the images above.

I've been to the SW part of the state a couple of times -- Lordsburg is a personal favourite. Silver City, Glenwood, Reserve (aka Reverse!), even Mogollon (will not repeat that experience!) all the way up to Gallup. Last year was Cuba, Farmington, Chama, Taos, Angel Fire, Springer, Las Vegas, Roswell, Alamogordo, Hope, Mountainair, and a bunch of other places I can't even remember.

I just was in 'The Big Empty' for a couple of days, and can't wait to go back. Really beautiful, and the people are great (like the rest of New Mexico of course!).
 
Vince your a very fine photographer but perfection can be a bit boring. Perfection results in a loss of character IMO. No offense intended.

For me the nice thing about having 'clean' files is that if I want to 'dirty' them up a bit, I can always do that - either in post, or I can just shoot at a higher ISO and using ND filters. Does not matter one way or the other to me.

And 'perfection' and 'character' are certainly in the eye of the beholder, particularly in print form. But I definitely hear you.
 
For me the nice thing about having 'clean' files is that if I want to 'dirty' them up a bit, I can always do that - either in post, or I can just shoot at a higher ISO and using ND filters. Does not matter one way or the other to me.

And 'perfection' and 'character' are certainly in the eye of the beholder.

I'm certainly not being critical of your work. You did some excellent images.

Adding grain and dirtying them up just looks different. It really comes down to personal taste.

A couple of years ago I was in the mood to buy an a MM and backed out after comparing the MM to film. They simply look different. Tonal distribution is different and output in print form is different. I just couldn't warm up to the look. I guess that's mostly a function of shooting film for sixty years. Had I grown up in the digital age I suspect I'd be perfectly happy with digital.

Don't get me wrong, 99% of my commercial work is digital but all of my personal work is film.

Again, very nice images.
 
I too did the transition from film to digital (I've only been at the game for 38 years, so a mere kid!), and had about 23 solid years in the darkroom (both b+w and colour, plus a lot of platinum-palladium in the later years). Try as I might, the film 'workflow' just doesn't mesh well with my current digital workflow, which, like you, I use commercially. It just seemed logical for me to integrate my personal workflow with my commercial workflow, and I'm much happier for it.

Sad to say, but I sold my last film camera a couple of months ago (my lovely black Alpa 9d with a Macro-Switar lens). I am often tempted when I see a film camera for sale that I like (and there are many!), but then I think back to my failed attempts to rekindle that part of my photographic life, and I just move on. Likely a weakness on my part - what do they say, the spirit is willing, but....?

BTW I used the Monochrom all day today, and reinforced why I love RF's so much. This is going to be a tough choice -- how I wish I could have both!

Photos to come....
 
Vince,
Setting aside any technical analysis about the character of files and cameras, a lot of these images are outstanding in their conception and execution. Do keep at this project. This place seems to have a strong resonance with you.
 
Honestly you could've taken any of those photos with just about any digital camera/lens combo. I do like the one of Carol though, very Vince.
 
Holy moly. Really like the image of Perry (bootsmith?). Really like it. I think it just has a MF look to it. Very 3-dimensional at least.
 
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