quoting Gordon's thoughtful posting:
Or just two cameras. A small rangefinder for wide to normal (or short
tele), and an SLR for normal to tele. I don't think that is too much to
carry, perhaps with four lenses. Having used rangefinder cameras of
various film formats and sizes, I find that I usually want normal to short
tele lenses for these, so I guess my needs could be met by current
offerings.
endquote:
Multiple cameras, what I call "mix and match" to get the best out of each
format, is the only thing that works for me too. But my lens use is
strange ;-) I have gotten into the habit of carrying my panoramic veriwide
100 for 18mm equiv. on 35mm panoramic 6x10cm shots 'cuz it is book sized
and compact and only 2 lbs. For shooting birds around the lake, I'm using
35mm with 500mm T-mount (unscrews in half for carrying compactly). This is
for a lakeside walkabout I do alot, so missed shots will come around
again. I usually have a normal lens with me too, for light weight and low
cost speed lens.
When I am shooting cityscapes, I find very wide angles handy, adding a
superwide hassy or 14mm for nikon etc. I experimented with a hassy ELM and
250mm lens with radio control for remote telephotography of birds, but too
much hassle and time consuming. But these 250mm lenses on 'blad and kowa
6/66 do very well at the local wild parks and zoo with the tamer and
bigger critters there ;-)
So I guess the good news is that I have an excuse for having all this
stuff, because what I like to photograph varys a lot, and I make up the
kit I need to match. But that does make it very hard to conceive a single
camera kit that would match my needs, esp. when traveling light. As you
noted, it is easy to crop out needed shots with the veriwide 100 panoramic
from 6x10cm- film area, and there aren't many wider angle non-swing lenses
on MF cameras ;-) The hassy SWC/M is a nice travel camera too, but a lot
of $$, and not near as wide (24mm equiv. horiz. on 35mm vs. 18mm on
veriwide 100). But the biogon hassy can be used at any speed even wide
open, while the veriwide wants to be shot at f/16 for best results ;-)
=====
yes on other good points short focusing limitations on the MF RFs
too. I did manage to get an excellent buy on the 135mm for koni omega
RO200 6x7cm RF, which has the best close focusing distance of the bunch.
Paradoxically, it was only made for a few years, and so is rarer and
pricey as the wedding types favoring KO kits use it a lot for portraits
This is also a reason I am promoting third party lenses, specifically the
Kiron/Vivitar Series I early lenses on my website (medfmt.8k.com/third)
because those lenses, while heavier than modern optics, had great close
focusing distances, esp. the telephotos and longer zooms. Ditto many prime
lenses offer superior close focusing distances (e.g., 28mm f/2.8) over the
settings for many zooms (e.g., 28-300mm ;-), a difference of inches vs ft!
bronica rf645?
Hard to predict what will happen with Tamron/Bronica's future offerings;
the problem with dropping the RF645 is that they have lots of $$ invested
in brand new tooling and lens/camera R&D. They aren't recouping it with
the kinds of discounts they are giving out; as I noted in another thread,
B&H had a $450 mfgers rebate on the basic camera kit, dropping it to just
over $1,100 US$. Will Bronica end up a casualty of the medium format
market fall in the digital era? I do think they could and should have
followed the Tamron/UK approach of trying to make your camera body work
with your lens, but probably the profitability vs. cost of that approach
was problematic, esp. with owners underserved by local support services?
For a company that primarily makes their money on lenses, Tamron/Bronica
has not put the $$ into Bronica lens development that I had hoped. As I
noted in reviewing the GS1 6x7 SLR, it is a great camera for many users,
but the lack of many lens offerings and high cost of existing lenses vs.
competitors like Mamiya RZ67 have made it less of a success in the market
than it deserves (see GS1 case study
http://medfmt.8k.com/mf/system.html )
This is a dicey time for MF mfgers; a market demand shortfall of major
proportions, rapid change in the digital end, lack of large low cost
digital chips (16MP and esp. 32MP and 64 MP) for digital MF cameras to
respond to the 35mm challenges etc. and huge costs in R&D for modern AF
MF cameras of uncertain sales potentials, as well as strong entrenched
competitors with deep pockets vs. innovative mfgers with thinner $$
backing. Should be a great case study for business schools in a few years
;-)
grins bobm
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