London Street Photography with the GXR

I did not post that many street photography pictures with the 28mm A12 GXR module. So, since I went after work to see the London Street Photography exhibition at the Museum of London,I thought today is a good time to post a small series.
It was also a good day for photography and I got a lot of pictures I like out of it.

While I am still working on my A12 28mm review, this is to show that it is indeed very usable for street photography.

Just Blossoms

GXR A12 28mm, f2.8, 1/48, ISO 400, RAW

MG

GXR A12 28mm, f5.0, 1/97, ISO 200, RAW

X

GXR A12 28mm, f2.5, 1/143, ISO 1600, RAW 1:1

Signs

GXR A12 28mm, f5.0, 1/270, ISO 400, RAW

Showing the Way

GXR A12 28mm, f5.0, 1/1620, ISO 200, RAW

Dark Shadows Around

GXR A12 28mm, f2.8, 1/1230, ISO 200, RAW 4:3

Watching the Sunset Together

GXR A12 28mm, f4.0, 1/270, ISO 200, RAW

Thanks for everyone who voted in the poll, it looks like the A12 28mm module made it with a huge margin, as I kind of expected. I will start working on the review and will post it as soon as it's done.

Focus on Imaging 2011

LC1, f2.4, 1/160, ISO 200, RAW, 90mm

The latest Focus in Birmingham did not present much new and was pretty boring compared with previous years.
Maybe it was manufacturers not releasing any new products during the show or maybe it was lack of interest from my part in anything but the Fuji X100.

Since Photokina in September last year I could not wait to see a working X100 and I am sure I was not alone. This was the main reason to go all the way to Birmingham for me this time around. Unlike a few years ago when I was excited about the Sigma DP1, the Fuji X100 did not disappoint.

Ever since Fuji stole the spotlight at Photokina with the X100 people have been constantly talking about it and have been analyzing and scrutinizing every piece of information released. In recent weeks there have been more and more sample images released so the excitement was very high. The expectations of some people were so high that no camera can realistically fulfill them so some people are bound to be slightly disappointed.

So let me say that while I think the Fuji X100 is one of the best looking cameras and I will end up buying one just for that point alone even though it has a few problems. Some can be fixed in firmware and some will need to be changed in the X200 but overall it's great to see that Fuji has let the right people design a camera and has made one of the best enthusiast cameras you can currently find. Let's hope this inspires more manufacturers (Panasonic I look at you here) to pay more attention to design and controls on cameras, so far it seems only Ricoh, Leica and now Fuji have figured it out, I could also include Epson with the RD1 here but this was a one off like the Panasonic LC1.

Feed the Dog

GF1, f0.95, 1/50, ISO 400, JPG b&w, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

Paths

GF1, f0.95, 1/4000, ISO 100, JPG b&w, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

Took this while out for a walk in Greenwich park and really like the result. This is a picture that I could only get with the Nokton due to it's character when shooting at f0.95.

Skull

GXR P10, f7.7, 1/45, ISO 200, RAW, 300mm

Opposite

GF1, f1.8, 1/2000, ISO 100, JPG b&w (Canon f1.8 50mm FD)

After the last weeks of miserable weather we did get some nice sunshine today, so I took a few pictures during lunch. This is my favorite and it works best if you view it bigger.

Ricoh GXR Review - GXR System, Body & Controls

How do you review a system camera that is not one camera but many or no camera at all? And more important how do you explain the system to other people if even the manufacturer did not do a very good job at explaining it?

These and other reasons (main other one being time) were what kept me from writing my Ricoh GXR review sooner.

Since this is more than a simple camera review I decided to approach it slightly different but without making it any less extensive than my other reviews.
So to start off I tought the best would be to look at what the GXR system is and try to explain it first before moving on to the body and modules.
There will be no comparisons done for the GXR review, instead each unit will stand on it's own. Don't worry though, I will post comparisons between the GXR modules and and other cameras but these will be done separate.

So without further ado let's go to the first part and look at what the GXR system is and at the build and controls.

Back Tomorrow

Hi to all and thanks for your patience!

Thanks for everyone who has participated in my polls.

These are the results of what you like to see more of:

Photos - 73%
Reviews - 57%
Comparisons - 42%
Articles - 34%
News - 7%

In light of these results and to make up for the long absence I will start it off my daily posts in style with a long, long overdue review tomorrow. For today, I have decided to just post a selection of 5 pictures I like best from the past weeks.
In addition you will get more pictures, more reviews and more comparisons in the coming weeks and months.

I hope you like the new layout changes, any comments or suggestions please let me know.
 

Quick Update

You might have notices some subtle changes on my blog over the past days or might notice a few things being rearranged.
Since I used up my free photo hosting on Picasa and even managed to fill up my Dropbox galleries, I went back to look at alternatives and see what best to do without having to pay too much for hosting and also looking to keep this blog ad free.

Now, I went through a few changes in my mind and also tried out a few things about which direction to go to and even considered of starting a new blog altogether.

The good news is I have made my decision and instead of creating yet another new blog, I have decided to consolidate everything onto one single blog and this will be this blog here.

For this I will need a few more days to move everything over from my Wordpress blog here and also create the necesssary pages and clean up the links. Once this is done I will have to sort my picture hosting out before re-launching this blog with all the new features. So things you can look forward to will be more reviews, more articles and I want to write more about my travels.

There will be no advertising on my blog but if you want to support my blog do buy my books (or book for now but more will come). I might also look into creating some affiliate links to help pay for my picture hosing.

Regarding the picture hosting, one question from me is if you actually look at the Dropbox galleries (since I have no stats or visibility of this) or if it would be fine without them? I will put a voting option so I can see what people want.

First Floor

My blog got 3 years old on the 21st without me noticing. On this occasion a big thank you for all my readers, I hope you enjoy the pictures and my writing when I get round these days to write something.

Council House

iPhone 4, f2.4, ISO 80, JPG, Hipstamatic App

Just having some fun with the iPhone camera and the Hipstamatic app.

Holyhead - Day 2

I had selected 5 pictures for today but I ran out of disk space on Picasa and now need to devcide if I want to pay them or pay Flickr instead.

So to see more pictures head over to my Dropbox gallery.

Holyhead - Day 1

The first day in Holyhead was all about hiking over the mountain all the way to the South Stack lighthouse to take pictures. After much deliberation I decided to take the GXR with 28mm A12 module but instead of taking the 50mm A12 module alongside I went for the GF1 with the 50mm Nokton lens to see how it fares when used for landscapes.
Both cameras did an excellent job and especially the Nokton realy impressed me when shooting wide open, you do get vignetting and soft corners but it gives a very unique look to the pictures and almost a tilt-shift effect. I took some of my best landscape shots out of this and especially the 3rd picture is my favorite from the trip but you do need to see it fullsize to spot the boat.

If you want to see more pictures from Holyhead go to my Dropbox gallery here.

Going Up the Steps

GXR A12, f13, 1/217, ISO 200, JPG, 28mm

Running Past

GXR A12, f2.8, 1/20, ISO 400, RAW, 28mm

17:55

GXR A12, f3.2, 1/45, ISO 800, RAW, 28mm

Follow the Path

GXR A12, f11, 1/203, ISO 200, RAW 1:1, 28mm

Over There

GXR A12, f2.8, 1/30, ISO 1600, RAW, 28mm

White, Blue and Red

GF1, f0.95, 1/400, ISO 100, JPG, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

Drawing

GF1, f0.95, 1/40, ISO 320, JPG b&w, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

Dark Clouds Passing

GF1, f1.4, 1/250, ISO 100, RAW 16:9, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

A Good Book and a Pint

GF1, f0.95, 1/80, ISO 640, JPG b&w, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

I only had the Nokton for a week and did not even have that much time to go out and take pictures with it but I can't see myself going back to the 20mm Panasonic lens after using it.
The character of the Nokton is just so much better than the 20mm lens that it makes a huge difference for me. I guess it shows where optical quality comes in to play instead of just fixing stuff in software. The pictures are just not the same, no mater how much Panasonic and Olymous try to fix in software, it's not the sharpness nor the technical quality, it's the character that suffers and pictures look technically perfect but flat and boring with software corrected lenses.

Seeing Double

GF1, f0.95, 1/160, ISO 640, JPG b&w, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

The Nokton is a fantastic lens and gives a very film-like quality to pictures, especially if you set the camera to b&w. I just love the character of this lens and aside from my Leica f2.8 28mm R mount lens this is my favorite lens for the GF1 and shows that opptical quality beats software corrections anytime.
But not just the quality is fantastic also the bright aperture allows for very fast shutter speeds at low ISO even in very dark conditions.

The only problem is at times to nail the focus and although I did not do it in this picture I still like it best from today.

Light Trails

GXR A12, f10, 5 sec., ISO 200, JPG, 28mm

This picture is not all that great but while reviewing it, it did give me an idea for another picture I will try to take.

Chimneys

GF1, f0.95, 1/80, ISO 800, JPG, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

Street Photography at f0.95

Having a new lens is always great, each lens has it's own character and feel to it so it's almost like getting a new camera with each lens puchase.
The weather was great today and I decided to go for a walk around Greenwich to take some pictures and see how an f0.95 lens peforms wide open for street photography. I really like the feel of the lens and the smooth manual focus but struggle with the limited movement from 2m to infinity, especially when guessing the distance and not looking at the screen like in the last 3 pictures in this series.

I have decided to post a small series just to show what can be done on a first outing with this lens, aside from the first 2 pictures all were taken and focused from the hip without using the LCD screen but the last one has been heavily cropped.

Closeup at f0.95

GF1, f0.95, 1/30, ISO 200, JPG, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

It was tempting to post some street shots or low light hots I took with the lens but after my complaint that the Nokton does not allow for enough finetuning of the focus between 2m and infinity while offering very good close up focusing abilities.
To test this, I decided to actually take a picture and it does indeed a very good job at it and allows for precise focusing. This picture is focused at the closest distance or 17cm.

Drumming

GF1, f0.95, 1/80, ISO 800, JPG b&w, 50mm (Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 25mm)

Happy New Year to everyone!

As a nice new year's present I decided to get myself the Voigtländer Nokton f0.95 lens for m4/3, I found it for a very good price on Amazon.fr and could not resist. Amazon is excellent and very fast with the shipping so it meant I already got my lens last night but it was to late for some serious shooting.

Although it was busy in he office I did go out at lunch for some shooting and when I met with friends in the evening it was a perfect opportunity to really test the lens.
It is fantastic and allows for very fast shutter speeds at low ISO, something not possible with the other lenses but at the same time it has a much better quality and look.
While I like that it focuses very close and is almost usable as a macro lens (this is the lens Ricoh should have put on the 50mm A12 module), I am not at all happy with the little distance you can move the focus ring to go from 2m to infinity since it does not allow to be fast or precise and it does not have enough DOF that you don't have to care about accurate focus after 2m. Other than that it's a fantastic lens and feels really good although it is heavy.

So far I would say this is the best quality lens for m4/3, does not need software corrections, is built out of metal and has a proper MF ring around the lens.