Many thanks to Iain Farrell for including me in his recent podcast. Episode 8. That’s good luck in some countries. Love talking about photography, life, successes, and failures. And I love pushing my strange views on as many people as possible. I also happen to be a prime lens guy, so this well within my comfort zone. Thanks Iain!
More about this show:
A camera is just a tool but spend enough time with photographers and you’ll see them go misty eyed when they talk about their first camera or a small fast prime that they had in their youth. Prime Lenses is a series of interviews with photographers talking about their photography by way of three lenses that mean a lot to them. These can be interchangeable, attached to a camera, integrated into a gadget, I’m interested in the sometimes complex relationship we have with the tools we choose, why they can mean so much and how they make us feel.
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There’s something to be said about haptics. My Pentax SMC Takumar 55/1.8 is a wonderful lump of 1960s metal and glass that conveys to me the joy of photography.
Author
Whatever makes you happy = good. And whatever gets you out to make pictures.
I still have, and use, the very first ‘proper’ camera that I owned. Along with it I bought a standard 50mm 1.8, a 28mm 2.8, and a short telephoto. This was a Nikkor 105mm 2.5 (non AI) which was secondhand and at least 10yrs old). It was BUILT and utterly flawless in every way. Very very few lenses that I have owned since then come close to the quality of that one. Sadly we parted company, courtesy of an opportunist thief. He/she knew not of what they had. Sold on to feed a habit.. and stealing mine.
Author
That lens is legendary.
Dan Milnor is “A force of nature”!! Great interview for sure and what I got out of it is use what you have! Wear it out! It doesn’t matter….again great stories Dan.
Author
Nothing better than wearing it out, repairing it and repeating the process.
I love my little Fujicron f2 lenses on my XPro3. I have the 23mm and 35mm. Small, light, quiet, weather sealed, and they take great images.
Author
I had those as well. Nice items.
I prefer prime lenses of moderately wide focal length (28mm to 40mm), but I often additionally bring a 20mm. What I like about primes: 1) they can be small and unobtrusive; wielding a “big gun” zoom can cause you trouble in urban areas. 2) they eliminate a variable from the process (continuously variable focal length), this helps me concentrate on the picture. 3) I always work in terms of series of pictures – using primes enforces a consistent perspective which makes sequencing easier.
It’s a pity that most prime lenses in my system of choice (Nikon Z) are huge, heavy and ungainly. Moreover, they don’t give you a proper distance scale for zone focussing. For these reasons, I don’t have any native lenses, but use adapted M-mount primes from Cosina/Voigtländer. They are small, light, and reasonably sharp for my purposes.
Author
Try the 40mm f/2. Small, light, super fast and sharp.
What a great podcast!! Everybody should listen to all the available episodes!! 😁
Author
Yes, Mr. Famous…
Hey Dan – I wanted to say thanks. I printed my first real book thanks to your…evangelism. And I’m hooked.
But I also wanted to share the following to your readers:
I got the book and was extremely pleased with the print quality, but not the binding. The pages looked almost perforated and some were actually starting to detach from the binding. I opened a support ticket on the Blurb website. FOUR MINUTES LATER, I had a reply and a email confirmation for a free replacement copy.
That’s how you do it, friends. That’s how you earn a customer for life.
Author
Wow. The beauty and the beast. We have always been pretty darn good when it comes to reprints. Glad you got it remedied.