It isn’t often I find myself in the learning chair when it comes to photography. Always open minded however, knowing there is room to improve, has kept me smoldering about the pursuit itself. Due to my employment and thirty plus year history as a photographer, I also know where the bar is set when it comes to the professional space. I know a full-time professional photographer who made images of the Sangre de Christo mountains for a piece that ran here in New Mexico. I know the photographer personally and know he’s been good for a long while, but I know this guy named Jimmy Chin and know when it comes to photography in the mountains, well, there are varying levels of skill. Both are valid, but one is superior to the other. (I know that the Sangres are not the Himalaya.) You can’t substitute for time and access.
The image here makes me happy, but overall it’s an average image.
This image isn’t just about the coyote and the beautiful landscape. This image is about memory. My memory. It’s about being with my wife and a friend, and it’s about being the only people in the space. It’s about Northern New Mexico and how this place makes me feel. And it’s even about things like the clothing I’m wearing and how I came to possess this clothing. (Gifted by co-founder of AG23, which also brings back great memories.)
This image was made with a 100-400mm lens, a contraption that is entirely new to me. I’ve never liked zoom lenses, even going back to 1993 when I first left Nikon for Canon and their flawless autofocus, and yes, zoom lenses. I gained something in the transaction, and the zooms worked for my journalistic life, but I also knew they forced me into making a certain kind of image. I knew, even back then, that for the most part, I’m a fixed lens guy. Until now.
First and foremost, this lens is fun. This lens allows me to make an entire range of picture I’ve never made. Heck, a range of picture I never even thought about making. Historically, I would have taken a short lens on a hike like this. At this moment, this means the Nikon Zf and 40mm, or a Fuji XH of some sort and 33mm 1.4. Both good systems. Perhaps I can blame birds for this new, mind-opening take on photography kit. The zoom allows me to further explore this style of image, and I’m loving it.
My plans over the next few months are changing on a daily basis. Seriously. I have Blurb events across the US, a workshop in Spain, further European plans and then Japan in September. There is also a return to a major birding event, as well as work trips to Seattle. Or, I might not do ANY of these things. On the surface you might think, “Well, that would suck if you can’t make those trips,” and you would be correct when we are talking the workshops in Spain and Japan. But if they don’t fill, which is always a possibility, then the trips won’t happen.
But here is how I adapt to these fluctuations.
I have a new project percolating here in New Mexico. This project is specific to the state. Just here and nowhere else. If I do this correctly, this project will force me to not only use every existing talent I have, but will also force this old dog to learn new tricks. One of these tricks is learning to use long zooms. I’m one of those oddballs fixated on end results, so the idea isn’t to focus on the zoom, no pun intended, but rather to focus on the style of image that emerges. And for what I need to do, I can’t find a way around needing a lens like this. So, having said this, the chessboard of kit pieces is in major overhaul mode, once again. I know what I need, mostly, and certain pieces will be sold to accommodate new acquisitions.
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I’m struggling a bit myself. I can currently get exactly what I paid for my Fuji X100V four years ago and apply it to a Leica Q. Can’t afford nor do I want the Q3 and the huge file sizes.
Author
I like the Leica a lot. But the Nikon has won me over.
“… This image is about memory. My memory… “ I would postulate that it is even more the emotion attached to the memory that makes an image resonate. I am no Jimmy Chin so there’s no comparison. And when I watched “Meru” at some point I remembered overcoming my fear of heights when rappelling down a 300ft rock face for the first time. But what made the real connection for me were the emotions: the sheer terror of being the last one to descend, leaning back over the edge then, somewhere on the way down the sheer joy in discovering my fear of heights was gone and I was actually enjoying myself. Sure, without the memory there would be less of a connection, but once the memory came it was the emotions that really made it sing.
Just me, one person, one opinion, and all that…
In the unlikely event that you find yourself with five idle minutes while in Seattle, let me know and I’d love to take the opportunity to see you in the real for one of those minutes and to personally thank you for being so generous with your knowledge, experience and yes, even your sense of humor, so freely online.
Author
Repelling scares the shit out of me. I never liked it. Climbing was great, but the rap down was fearful. Seattle is looking like June!
“A lot of people are afraid of heights. Not me, I’m afraid of widths.” – Steven Wright Sometimes a simple reframe might help. Or not.
You have my email address and if you write me directly you can have my phone number as well. I’m pretty flexible so if your schedule allows and I know when and where I can probably be wherever you might be in Seattle.
Author
Steven Wright is SO good. I will be in Seattle, if all goes as planned, in mid June.
Bought myself in the M4/3 crop Olympus camera system which has 2016 sensor tech in 2018. The disgusting thing about digital photography is the appetite for so called better and longer material never fades away. I never shot a decent jpg of a bird so far. So I decided 2018 will be the endpoint. Never a new digi cam or lens again. 24mm-400mm equivalent zooms and a 35mmf1.2 for low light situations are sufficient for al but hunting birds in a camouflage hide out @ 100m distance.The cam will do it’s work for what it’s worth. In French it is: point final. I’m happy with that. Takes the pressure from the cooker.
All I wanted or needed was my D700. One day, the mirror froze and the Nikon-handler folks in Spain told me that Nikon no longer supplied parts for old cameras. I am now back to my earlier D200. Sadly, until I get a second long-awaited op on my right eye, I have to use my iPhone Mini 13. It is both blessing and curse in one instrument. I guess that once the eye’s fixed, I’ll just stick with the D200 until either it or I end up on the dump. I no longer print, and so it’s largely academic whether I have a full-frame body or not. On the other hand, if the iPhone dies on me, then perhaps a new one with a longer lens available may replace the Nikon still standing… Really, I just like looking at pictures, and if they are mine, that’s nice, but they can be anybody else’s, just as long as I like ‘em.
Zooms: I never owned one when I was working. Later, I bought a Nikkor 24mm – 70mm (I think it was f2.8) after I retired and I couldn’t get rid of it fast enough. It was huge, and heavy. It wasn’t much good, either.
“This image isn’t just about the coyote and the beautiful landscape. This image is about memory. My memory. It’s about being with my wife and a friend, and it’s about being the only people in the space.”
To me this is exactly what photography is and should be about for most people.
Oh, and I just sold my 100-400 last week. It didn’t get enough use.
Those photos are incredible.
Author
Thank you. They sure were fun to make.
Like Reiner (above), I bought an Olympus Pen F with the 17mm lens. And a Panasonic 100-400mm lens, which is what I really wanted. This after spending nine years learning what a zoom lens could do with a Sony HX1, which was, and is still a great long-zoom camera and with which we got some great shots. It just didn’t have quite enough reach.
There’s been a learning curve with the Pen F and long lens for me, especially since my tremors have worsened over the years. But much of what I shoot is really more bird documentation answering the question later of “what bird was that?” Still, I try to get the best photos I can. “Real” bird photographers probably laugh and think I’m nuts with that combination, but it’s been fun and a great learning experience. Would I like to have an OM-1 with the new 150-400 PRO? You betcha! Am I going to drop $8k or $10k to do it? Not likely.
Author
Those are such cool cameras. Had a student in Albania last year who was a master with that system!
I’ve spent my whole career shooting the ubiquitous 24-70 and 70-200. Zooms are essential if you can’t ‘zoom with your feet’ which in my work, was almost all the time. It’s very difficult to ‘feel’ the lens when you’re using zooms, as they obviously change constantly. I’ve now pretty much wrapped up my paid photography and have chosen to only use three primes, partly for the weight and partly because I want a change, and I can use what I like. I’ve also decided to use older camera bodies (Nikon D3X and Fuji XT-2) because I like the more gritty feel of an older sensor.
Author
Yes, I have the 20-35mm which went to become everyone’s 16-35mm, and the 70-200. A news photogs best friends. But at heart, prime time all the way.