That bloody bloke David ‘bloody’ Boloker — it’s all his fault! He’s got me riled up again about photography.
I put my trusty ol’ Pentax programA to rest in its nice aluminium attache case a few years ago and poured my creative juices into lyrics, music and, eventually, blogging and podcasting.
But the ol’ bugger is on his way back to these fine Australian shores at some stage before Santa pays me a visit, and he’s dead keen on landscape photography (as am I).
So I’ve rescued the Pentax from the back of the kitty litter cupboard, wiped off the skeletal remains of small children who came to party at one birthday party or another and whose parents forgot to collect them, and discovered–to my horror–that the battery still works and there’s a roll of Tri-X in the barrel.
But Boloker (and many of my arty-farty friends like my wonderfully talented mates Steve McCawley, Strop and Conrad) have been waxing lyrical about digital SLRs and how they allow you to bracket to your heart’s content without worrying about reducing the world’s supply of silver. That, and the fact that you can print A3 sized prints without having to scan anything first. Plus you can jiggery-pokery in Photoshop to replicate that selenium toning to the black and white portraits and artistic shots of beaten-up old wood.
Okay, okay. I accept that the time might be drawing nigh where one needs to contemplate selling something near and dear (one of the children, my Juno106, my cd collection) to pay for a digital SLR body (as distinct from buying one’s avatar a damn gorgeous body in Second Life for less than US$3).
At least I can keep my 24mm and 50mm KA-mount lenses if I buy a Pentax dslr, if I read the reviews correctly…
But I’ve been reading in my rss feeds all about the joys of film and 50mm lenses, which are no longer 50mm lenses in the digital world.
Check out these gorgeous photos for proof that the ol’ programA and/or the ubiquitous 50mm lens can take a mean photo:
 Pentax program/A |
 Pentax program/A |
 Pentax program/A
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 The sublimely talented Gary Roth and a 50mm lens |
Gary Roth on the forgotten 50mm lens (which I have long held is the most powerful lens in the pantheon of slr lenses).
Also worth checking out is the sublime Digital Photography School:
(larger version of this wonderful family portrait)
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Many millennia ago, when I was based up in Malaysia for the Royal Australian Air Force, I half-seriously contemplated approaching a publisher and Kodak with an idea for a book. ‘Around the World with a 50mm Lens’, to prove that you don’t need a fantastic number of cumbersome lenses to create breath-taking moments in film.
Like many of those ideas we dismiss at the time as being ‘stupid’, I wish I had actually had the courage to follow through with it.
Currently listening to: James Asher – Zen Connection 1: From The East – Spice Souk
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