thank you so much for that bunch of really meaningful and interesting info about the situation nowadays considering cameras and engineering.
But before I reply let me please express all my apologies for letting you wait so long. The last few weeks have been a real run of research. It was awful and it was beautiful too. But now I return, and what do I see? No further comments on this image? Again, what does this forum represent? Some kind of realisation of the dreams of limited minds? While we have tones of comments about the images of "natural born artists" that don't have a clue about a camera, we see that such images, like this, receive not even negative messages? What is that? What more will I have to see in this forum? Any ignorant comes here and gets glorified, and at the same time people that are willing to work and upload such images, like this one, are getting simply neglected??? What can I say? What can I say any more?
I try to calm down again! ;-) About the T90 again, one could also say: It was designed with the photographer in mind, much like many other good cameras that were the result of a kind of engineering that unfortunatley gets rarer and rarer in our days. You see, the buying public doesnt't seem to have the own mind anymore, Madan. If the producer says that some kind of adventurous way to setup the camera *is* good, then almost everybody runs behinds that and is willing to celebrate the "progress". It reminds me of the usual Disneyland of politics. ;-)
For my needs, for the time being, it is very important to have a direct way to see what the camera sees in an uncomplicated way. And the T90 does that quite well. Shift the button and you're done. I don't really know if I would move on to digital, at least as long as there are still more than enough film processing possibilities around here. But I also know that this will be necessary some day. Well, I can only hope that I get some of that direct and sincere control of what I am doing, the way the T90 allows me to do now. Andre Denis wrote me some very interesting things about his new Nikon D200, which seems to be quite the kind of camera I would go for.
Anyway, I completely agree with you. It's a matter of personal choise and already available equipment. But as an overall rule, it should be the photographer that decides, and not the "generally accepted gusto", as propagated by companies.
Let me tell you one thing, T-90 was one of the most innovative cameras of modern world, and in fact, later all Canon autofocus camera i.e. EOS (Electro Optical Series) are inspired by T-90. The kind of control it has got is astounding. However, my favourite Canon FD camera was F1n. Later I switched to Canon EOS 100, another brilliant camera. I am a mechanical engineer, and like good engineered machines. F1 was one like that. (It is better than Nikon F3 any day).
I am using 400D for quite some time, and I find it too small to use. It is a less costly camera, but definitely not a cheap one. Since you need to change digital camera with time like a computer processor, and unless you are a hard core pro, I find no point in going over a costlier cameras. I am searching a dream camera, like this. There will be 4 modes, M, P, A, and T. Not so many ‘other’ modes, which I never use. Faster transfer of data. Reliable while handling highlights. Dust proof.
In any modern cameras, there so many controls that the manual is nearly 1 inch thick, and we don’t read that at all. I hope someone like Olympus, Nikon, Canon or Pentax will make a machine with my desire.
Surprisingly in Japan, lot of people are still using film cameras, and I even saw a few Canon AE1 and Contax!! (i.e. nearly 3 decade old).
Calcutta you get films, or you can buy films from outside, but finding good lab or chemicals are difficult. In fact my stainless steel developing tanks are properly stored, so that after 30/40 years I can show people, that, this was a film developing device!
If you want to go for a digital SLR, you can fix among Canon 400D, Pentax K1000D and Nikon D40x. after using so many cameras over last 20 years, I am now absolutely convinced that all cameras made by Nikon, Canon and Pentax within the same range are all same and produce same kind of result. It is just a matter of personal choice and the accessories you have.
I also think that companies like Olympus and Pentax are focusing on serious amateur and Pro Art photographers where as Nikon and Canon are focusing on speed for Wildlife and Sports photographers.
Why isn't a normal digital camera good in handling highlights? I didn't know that. Isn't there any possibility to correct that?
Anyway, sad to read that it is so hard to go for film photography in Calcutta. It seems that the digital age has hit the place for good, ey? It's still quite easy to do film photography around here, for which I am very glad too.
The T90 is quite an underhyped camera. Considering its quality it really didn't had the luck of the A-1. But it is just fun to work with it. A very straight, very "sincere" camera.
What about the 400D? I know very little about and I only find the gereral features in the web, but no real place to read in detail about its capabilities. Any website with more info about that - perhaps the manual as PDF?
Thanx for the comment, I have also seen this, infact a normal digital camera is not quite good in handling highlights. i envy you that you are still using T 90. I neither get good quality black and white chemicals in calcutta nor colour chemicals. Also, printing papers are not available in most of the grades and surfaces.
A very good timing for a portrait somewhere in the streets. I find the very natural approach to be the best possible for this really strong portrait. The light balance was quite succesful for giving it a good contrast, and the details only needed just a tiny bit more sharpness on his face. Talking about details and sharpness, his skin seems a tiny bit "fuzzy" in the highlights, but this is not the case in the shadows. I wonder why that happened - overexposure? Anyway, adding the very good separation form the background by using a shallow DoF was another good thing to do.
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{K:127263} 5/16/2008