Show us yer cameras

[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

Just curious about what camera kit you fellas are using.

I've got
an Olympus OM10


a Minolta X-300


a Canon Sureshot AF-7


an old disc camera (anyone remember those?) - a Halina Disc 328, which recently resurfaced in my house and which still works!


A Fuji Finepix P&S digital camera, which I hardly ever use.

A Nikon D3100, which I love cause you don't have to fork out a small fortune for 35mm film, but which just doesn't feel the same as a film camera.

What camera kit are you chaps using?

Paul

[Ian Jane Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Ian Jane]

I have my old Minolta 35mm kicking around somewhere but I almost always shoot with my Nikon D40. It's a few years old now but it's never let me down and while more Megapixels is always a good thing, I'm happy with the quality. At work I use a D3000 and if I had money to burn, I'd probably upgrade to something like that.

[Shawn Francis Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Shawn Francis]

Won a GoPro but don't have the money to get an SD card for it, so it remains untested.

[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

I'd love to get my hands on the Fujifilm X100. Has anyone used one of those yet?

[Ian Jane Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Ian Jane]

I officially want a Nikon D4. This article is pretty neat.

Very, very intrigued by the touted low light capabilities.

Now I just need the $5995.00 that it costs.

[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

I officially want a Nikon D4. This article is pretty neat.

Very, very intrigued by the touted low light capabilities.

Now I just need the $5995.00 that it costs.

That is pretty impressive, Ian. The Fuji X series cameras are all supposed to have very good low-light capabilities, and the X10 and X-Pro are pretty discreet too (the silver finish on the X100 makes it stand out somewhat), so they're handy if you fancy doing some street photography in the evening or on a night out. (the almost silent leaf shutter helps too.) I haven't used the X100 or X-Pro yet myself, but I bought an X10 about a month or so ago, and I can attest to the fact that it works nicely in low-light situations. To be honest, since I bought it the X10 has been with me just about everywhere.

Given unlimited funds, I'd love to invest in the X-Pro but I may save my pennies and invest in the X100, just for that APS-C sensor (the X10 has a slightly smaller 2/3" sensor) and the hybrid viewfinder. But even despite the small(er) sensor, the X10 is a great little 'walkaround' camera. All of these images have been taken with the X10 with no post-processing.

This is an image I took of a very old painting in a local pub, which it is rumoured is at the centre of some supposed hauntings (at least, the room is said to be haunted - if you believe in such things - and the painting is claimed to have something to do with those hauntings):


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Some flowers on the seafront:


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Here's an image I took at my son's Christening. The slow shutter speed gives it an ethereal quality that I like very much.


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[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

Some more with the X10. One of the things I love about this camera is that it's not 'threatening' like a DSLR - you can get shots that you'd never get with a big DSLR, like the shot below of the guy at the 'pay and display' machine.

[Ian Jane Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Ian Jane]

So the X-10 is a point and shoot then? You've definitely captured some great images with it. The black and white stuff looks nice and crisp - great shots!

[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

So the X-10 is a point and shoot then? You've definitely captured some great images with it. The black and white stuff looks nice and crisp - great shots!

Yep, it's basically a 'premium' point-and-shoot/compact, with the option of full manual control. The slightly larger sensor (2/3") sets it aside from other compacts though. However, it's not a substitute for a DSLR but rather it compliments it nicely: the X10 is handy to take places you wouldn't or couldn't take your DSLR, or just to slip into your coat pocket when you're out and about with the family. The images it produces are roughly comparable to those produced on a crop-sensor DSLR, and I'd say that in many cases you'd be hard pushed to tell the difference between an image shot on the X10 and one shot on a crop-sensor DSLR - the main difference comes in depth-of-field, with the 2/3" sensor struggling to produce the shallow depth-of-field that you can get with a DSLR.

On the other hand, the X100 is a different beast entirely: its sensor is the same size as that in a crop-sensor DSLR. It's limited by a 35mm lens, but to be honest my 35mm prime is the most used lens I have for my DSLR - so I don't consider the X100's fixed 35mm lens much of a 'limitation'. (By way of contrast, my Olympus OM10 always had either a 24mm or a 135mm lens, whilst my Minolta X300 had its 50mm prime permanently attached.) Both the X10 and the X100 look like old film rangefinders, which is a bonus when you're out and about as, if you're doing a spot of street photography, people seem either not to notice or care that you're taking their picture - whilst if you're waving a big DSLR about, people tend to shy away from the camera or look very displeased. Today I took some great street shots with my X10 at a local air show that I doubt I would have been able to get with my DSLR.

The X-Pro is more in competition with the Leica M9s of this world. I'd love an X-Pro but it would mean buying into a whole new system, and I'd have a hard time justifying that to the missus ;)

[Ian Jane Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Ian Jane]

I hear ya, hence my sticking with my D40 for now - these are expensive toys!

I think it's only a matter of time before the point and shoots and DSLRs sort of become one. Point and shoots really have come a long way in the last two years or so. I look at the image quality on my old Samsung and it's bad even in comparison to the crappy little Coolpix we have at work for general use.

[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

I think it's only a matter of time before the point and shoots and DSLRs sort of become one. Point and shoots really have come a long way in the last two years or so.

Definitely. I think the new breed of mirrorless compacts are changing the market considerably. They're not for me, as I need a more traditional viewfinder, but they're certainly a sea change in design and, I guess, functionality.

Btw, here's how to advertise a camera. This is the (bizarre and slightly unsettling) Japanese commercial for the X10:

Only in Japan, eh!

The Japanese Moriyami/Nobuyoshi-influenced X100 commercial was just as bizarre.

[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

That X100 commercial must be watched at least once, by the way. It's glorious!

[Ian Jane Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Ian Jane]

Those are pretty nuts. Japan is awesome.

[Dom D Spoon! Find all posts View Profile Close Dom D]

Just got one of these:



A Canon 7D. Would have liked a full frame camera but at the price I got the 7D should do the job. At the same I also bought a set of studio strobes and a huge 6x3 Metre background kit for studio work. I'm not really a camera guy and I'm going to have to put in some hours learning how to use all this but I've spent way too much on stills photographers over the last few years and it's well past time I got decent gear. Should be fun anyway.

[Jonny Ptooff! Find all posts View Profile Close Jonny]

I have a Fuji X10



Here's my Flickr page with my favourite X10 pics...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonnyredman/