Photography

Canon EOS 40D + Chinon 55mm f/1.4 lens.

You can't read too much about photography and secondhand book shops abound with useful material. Despite the coming of the digital revolutuion, many of the old lessons hold good. Photographed with a Canon EOS 40D (since sold) and a Chinon 55mm f/1.4 screw-thread lens from the 1970s era of M42 cameras and lenses. Mounted on the Canon by way of a cheap lens adapter.

Avebury stone circle. Nikon D2Xs + Nikon 75-150mm f/3.5 series E zoom lens on a Nikon TC-16A teleconverter.

Bath, England, August, 2010. Nikon D50 with a 28-80mm f/3.3-5.6 G Nikkor lens.

AF Nikkor 50mm f/1.4D lens on a Nikon D50.

The Cloisters at Lacock Abbey, Wiltshire. AF Nikkor 50mm f/1.4D lens on a Nikon D50.

Nikon D2Xs + Tamron SP AF 17-50mm f/2.8 XR Di II LD Aspherical (IF) lens.

The first Zenit-E models were produced in the KMZ plant in 1965. Over 8 million were manufactured. The Kodak Instamatic 204 was made in the UK between 1966 and 1968. Of course it was cheaper than the Soviet Zenit, but the results were often terrible. The Zenit was a single-lens reflex camera based on the Zorki rangefinder body. The Zorki line of rangefinder cameras was originally a direct Leica copy. Therefore, Zenit = Leica. (Maybe). The Zenit pentaprism is small, thus what you see through the viewfinder is only about two-thirds of what will be recorded on the film. Nonetheless it is vastly superior to a point-and-shoot camera with film in a cartridge lacking a proper pressure plate to keep it flat and even. Many Zenit cameras were supplied with a Helios-44 lens of 58mm focal length and a maximum aperture of f/2. This lens was a Soviet copy of the Carl Zeiss Biotar lens and had distinctive bokeh characteristics. So Helios = Zeiss. (Possibly). Photograph made with a Nikon D700 + a Micro-Nikkor 55mm f/3.5 AI lens.

Canon EOS 40D + Chinon 55mm f/1.4 lens.

Canon EOS 40D + Canon EF 100-300mm f/4.5-5.6 USM lens at 195mm. f/11; 400 ISO.

Viewed from the inside. With modern cameras, one click and you're finished. Fox Talbot would have set his camera up on a handy mantel shelf opposite to the window and the exposure would have been several minutes.

Myrtle is on her second year BTEC combined dressmaking and photography qualification. She uses a Toyota sewing machine and a Nikon D50 digital camera. Starsign: Libra. Weight: One stone. Favourite colour: Blue. Ambition: To meet and photograph Vladimir Putin.

The cover of a photography magazine photographed with a Nikon D700 and a Nikkor-O.C Auto 35mm f/2 lens. I have shied away from getting a Nikkor AF 35mm f/2 since reading of oil getting on the aperture blades. Furthermore, Bjørn Rørslett says that the AF version has a much simpler optical formula where centre sharpness is great but corner quality isn't outstanding. www.naturfotograf.com/lens_wide.html Similarly, Thom Hogan is critical of the 35/2 AF Nikkor's performance on the corners: www.bythom.com/Nikkor-35mm-D-lensreview.htm In 2011 Nikon introduced a 35mm f/1.4 G AF-S Nikkor lens which looks nice but currently costs around £1,400. So I turned my attention to finding an old 35mm f/2 Nikkor-O which had been factory AI’d and would therefore be safe to use on a modern digital Nikon camera whilst providing decent functionality. Thomas Pindelski pindelski.org/Photography/2012/05/05/nikkor-o-35mm-f2-lens/ reckons this lens is fully the equal of any Leitz or Leica 35mm Summicron and adds, ‘there is one huge difference compared to the Leica optic. The latter will run you $3,200 new and not much less used.’ I was lucky to obtain the later ‘C’ version with multicoating which keeps flare at bay. The contrast this lens provides is quite remarkable. When 35mm film dominated photography, many fixed lens film cameras ('compact' cameras) had 35mm lenses. They were very popular for family holidays and general purpose photography. On full-frame you can photograph all sorts of things with a focal length of 35mm. What's more, 35mm lenses are compact in size and light in weight, and provide wonderful bokeh.

Garry Winogrand said, "All things are photographable". He considered that photography was not about the thing being photographed, it was about how that thing looked photographed. I find that attitude refreshing. Tea is also refreshing. Photographed with a Nikon D50 and Nikon 28-80mm f/3.3-5.6 G lens.

'Photography takes an instant out of time, altering life by holding it still.' Dorothea Lange

Advertising, 1969. This was a campaign for 'Dralon' ties. Found in "Photographis '69" - the international annual of advertising photography - I first photographed part of the display with a Canon EOS 40D and 18-55mm kit lens. Subsequently I took a picture of the preview screen on the Canon using a Nikon D700 and an AF Nikkor 28-105mm f3.5-4.5D zoom lens. I have given the resulting image the title 'Degraded' because of the 'photocopy of a photocopy' treatment, which I might be tempted to extend to 'photocopy of a photocopy of a photocopy' level to see how much the picture degrades at each stage. Looking at the image of the apprehensive woman whose wrists are tied together, possibly some people would conclude that that sort of advertising is also degraded.

1969.

Carl Zeiss Jena Tessar 50mm f/2.8 lens on a Canon EOS 40D digital camera. The portrait on this page of the book is by Evelyn Hofer, and is entitled 'Portrait in Windowlight'. It was made in 1969.