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flashover said:
it's not driving with an automatic...it's more like pointing!
What is Rangefinder Photography to You?
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it's not driving with an automatic...it's more like pointing!
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For me there are several aspects why 35mm RF.
I agree with driving a stick, it’s a combination of control and wanting to think about all aspects. (Unfortunately I must share my car with my wife who hates to think when driving.) While I feel comfortable enough driving just about anything (big fire trucks, ambulances, R-5s, Scion XAs) I do prefer it when I have a stick, a clutch and some meaningful gauges (no idiot lights please). I do have to say that a good SLR (e.g. F2AS, OM-1) give me the same feeling, so it’s not just control and thinking.
There also is a size thing. Perhaps its maturity, senility, pent up brain farts, but carry size matters. About 18 years ago I gave up on carrying a big SLR bag (two bodies, five lenses, two flashes, a motor, battery pack, gets me tired just thinking of it) in favor of a medium sized RF bag (one body, three lenses, one flash and some times a motor). I still feel that there is less to worry about with parts breaking. While it has never happened with SLR, more parts to me equate to more chance for something jam or break.
Somewhat size related, somewhat noise related is the ability to blend in. When I carry my RF, I seem to blend in the crowd, be it at a bar, a Halloween Parade, a wedding or walking down the street. Even as small and quite as an OM-1 is, it’s not the same, closer than my F2AS, but not a Leica M6. An RF does not seem as threatening to people.
B2 (;->
I agree with driving a stick, it’s a combination of control and wanting to think about all aspects. (Unfortunately I must share my car with my wife who hates to think when driving.) While I feel comfortable enough driving just about anything (big fire trucks, ambulances, R-5s, Scion XAs) I do prefer it when I have a stick, a clutch and some meaningful gauges (no idiot lights please). I do have to say that a good SLR (e.g. F2AS, OM-1) give me the same feeling, so it’s not just control and thinking.
There also is a size thing. Perhaps its maturity, senility, pent up brain farts, but carry size matters. About 18 years ago I gave up on carrying a big SLR bag (two bodies, five lenses, two flashes, a motor, battery pack, gets me tired just thinking of it) in favor of a medium sized RF bag (one body, three lenses, one flash and some times a motor). I still feel that there is less to worry about with parts breaking. While it has never happened with SLR, more parts to me equate to more chance for something jam or break.
Somewhat size related, somewhat noise related is the ability to blend in. When I carry my RF, I seem to blend in the crowd, be it at a bar, a Halloween Parade, a wedding or walking down the street. Even as small and quite as an OM-1 is, it’s not the same, closer than my F2AS, but not a Leica M6. An RF does not seem as threatening to people.
B2 (;->
canonetc
canonetc
I like RF because it makes me feel I am creating something with my hands as well as the eye. I like the idea of being able to shoot even if the battery dies. I like the compactness and quiet-ness of the camera. Most of my heroes used them, so that's a plus too. I think RF keeps me more connected somehow to original photography. With an RF, if I make a good photo, I know exactly why, and if I screw up, I know exactly why as well. The RF gives me the sense of creative freedom without limitations. The only limits are my own.
Cheers,
Chris
Cheers,
Chris
Goodyear
Happy-snap ninja
I've been thinking about this recently.
Bizarrely, I think I take 'better' pictures with my RF gear than with my SLRs (film or digital). 'Better' as in, I think so anyway.
This bugs me a little, because I reckon if it was more than luck then the tool shouldn't matter.
But then I forget about it, because I shoot for fun, and that's sufficient. And I have more fun with RFs - the way of working suits me better. There is definitely the tactile pleasure for me of nice mechanical gear.
So.. fun. That'd be it for me.
As for the M8... Sure, if I could afford it. Having recently returned to Belfast, I've yet to find anywhere I can walk into and buy any of the film I like. There is a Calumet, but that's in an industrial estate I've ye to find. The M8 would solve that problem.
But then, we're moving to a house where I will at last have space for a darkroom! 😀
Bizarrely, I think I take 'better' pictures with my RF gear than with my SLRs (film or digital). 'Better' as in, I think so anyway.
This bugs me a little, because I reckon if it was more than luck then the tool shouldn't matter.
But then I forget about it, because I shoot for fun, and that's sufficient. And I have more fun with RFs - the way of working suits me better. There is definitely the tactile pleasure for me of nice mechanical gear.
So.. fun. That'd be it for me.
As for the M8... Sure, if I could afford it. Having recently returned to Belfast, I've yet to find anywhere I can walk into and buy any of the film I like. There is a Calumet, but that's in an industrial estate I've ye to find. The M8 would solve that problem.
But then, we're moving to a house where I will at last have space for a darkroom! 😀
raid
Dad Photographer
I takes me switching back and forth between SLR and rangefinder cameras to better feel which is better for which situations. Today, I am using a 55mm micro SLR lens, allowing me close-ups I cannot get with my rangefinder equipment. Then again, theNikon F2 weighs a ton, and I miss the Bessa T for it lightness.
raid
Dad Photographer
I have never used a rangefinder camera in any of my low light photos of New Orleans. Maybe I could have done better with a rangefinder camera ...? I can still try now.
Raid
Raid
S
Skinny McGee
Guest
3..............
mfunnell
Shaken, so blurred
Well, for me, its something new and different to try. I'd been reading about rangefinders for a while (started off by reading Sean Reid's articles on the Luminous Landscape, then branching out) and trying to figure out what all the fuss was about. Some of my reading led me to believe that this particular emperor may be skimpily clad.
Way too much fuss about the inherently smaller and lighter nature of rangefinders (my OM-4T is about the same size as a Leica M - a little shorter, narrower through the body except for the mirror box and a deal lighter) and their higher standard of manufacture (maybe with Leicas, but they don't seem much better built than my Olympus, if any). The virtues of all-manual everything? I can do that, or not, with an MF SLR too, or I can switch off AF on an AF SLR (and with varying success can do that with a dSLR if I should want to). Quality of optics? Maybe the ability to do non-retrofocus designs, I guess, but it seems pretty marginal to me (not being much of a wide-angle shooter). Otherwise, well, people seem pretty enamoured of Leica R lenses, for example, and they seem to work on SLRs! (Non-Leica ones as well, for that matter). If you spend enough money you can get plenty of high-quality glass to suit plenty of non-RF cameras. Film vs digital - a non-issue, as others have pointed out. There are film and digital RF and non-RF cameras. (Although there are few enough digital rangefinders, and they're expensive.) The virtues of having fewer options and controls? What, so I don't feel so bad if I don't use them? Please.
No, the only two things that prompted me to look into rangefinder cameras were Sean Reid's observations on the differences when composing with a rangefinder (everything in focus in the viewfinder, exclude based on aperture - rather than the reverse with an SLR; different framing due to seeing things inside and outside the frame with RF) and Stephen Gandy's observations on the greater accuracy of RF manual focusing in certain focal length ranges (versus MF SLRs; coupled with my own difficulty manually focusing AF SLRs when I've needed to do that).
So, I've been using my RF for a week now and I've found (so far) that these observations seem to be correct, at least for me. I've seen the results from 3 rolls of film so far (with 3 more in for processing). In both the act of taking the shots and the results I've seen back, I am composing differently with the RF than I have been with SLRs. And this is not just confirming my preconceptions based on the above reading: I'm composing differently from the way I expected to be composing differently, if that makes any sense! I've also found a much higher percentage of shots focused correctly than when I've manually focused hand-held with an SLR - even when shooting an unfamiliar RF system wide open in difficult conditions.
I'm taking different shots from those (I think) I would have taken if using an SLR (MF, AF or dSLR) in similar circumstances. I've intermixed shooting in similar circumstances with the RF and my dSLR and have found that I'm "natually" taking different types of shots with the rangefinder. If nothing else, this has made me think on my photography some more, and opened me up to new ways of seeing things and doing things. That, alone, is worth the price of admission.
...Mike
P.S. Now I just have to get used to the logistics of shooting film in this day and age, which is way different from when I gave that all away for digital-only.
Way too much fuss about the inherently smaller and lighter nature of rangefinders (my OM-4T is about the same size as a Leica M - a little shorter, narrower through the body except for the mirror box and a deal lighter) and their higher standard of manufacture (maybe with Leicas, but they don't seem much better built than my Olympus, if any). The virtues of all-manual everything? I can do that, or not, with an MF SLR too, or I can switch off AF on an AF SLR (and with varying success can do that with a dSLR if I should want to). Quality of optics? Maybe the ability to do non-retrofocus designs, I guess, but it seems pretty marginal to me (not being much of a wide-angle shooter). Otherwise, well, people seem pretty enamoured of Leica R lenses, for example, and they seem to work on SLRs! (Non-Leica ones as well, for that matter). If you spend enough money you can get plenty of high-quality glass to suit plenty of non-RF cameras. Film vs digital - a non-issue, as others have pointed out. There are film and digital RF and non-RF cameras. (Although there are few enough digital rangefinders, and they're expensive.) The virtues of having fewer options and controls? What, so I don't feel so bad if I don't use them? Please.
No, the only two things that prompted me to look into rangefinder cameras were Sean Reid's observations on the differences when composing with a rangefinder (everything in focus in the viewfinder, exclude based on aperture - rather than the reverse with an SLR; different framing due to seeing things inside and outside the frame with RF) and Stephen Gandy's observations on the greater accuracy of RF manual focusing in certain focal length ranges (versus MF SLRs; coupled with my own difficulty manually focusing AF SLRs when I've needed to do that).
So, I've been using my RF for a week now and I've found (so far) that these observations seem to be correct, at least for me. I've seen the results from 3 rolls of film so far (with 3 more in for processing). In both the act of taking the shots and the results I've seen back, I am composing differently with the RF than I have been with SLRs. And this is not just confirming my preconceptions based on the above reading: I'm composing differently from the way I expected to be composing differently, if that makes any sense! I've also found a much higher percentage of shots focused correctly than when I've manually focused hand-held with an SLR - even when shooting an unfamiliar RF system wide open in difficult conditions.
I'm taking different shots from those (I think) I would have taken if using an SLR (MF, AF or dSLR) in similar circumstances. I've intermixed shooting in similar circumstances with the RF and my dSLR and have found that I'm "natually" taking different types of shots with the rangefinder. If nothing else, this has made me think on my photography some more, and opened me up to new ways of seeing things and doing things. That, alone, is worth the price of admission.
...Mike
P.S. Now I just have to get used to the logistics of shooting film in this day and age, which is way different from when I gave that all away for digital-only.
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