幾張實驗作品

最近認識了幾位同在灣區的攝影同好，由於年紀相近、背景相仿，所以有機會也會去吃吃飯、聊聊攝影上的看法跟見解。
其中有一次，我們約到Sunnyvale downtown的火車站拍些東西。我想大概是因為第一次去夜拍吧，所以拍不多。不過還是有幾張我蠻喜歡的作品，跟大家分享。
1. Cold speed

2. All alone

3. Underneath

Contax AX

最近又進了一部Contax的經典機身-Contax AX. 這個機身被稱為是相機工藝的經典也不為過，因為他大概是唯一一台用底片位置來對焦的相機。一般有用過相機的人都應該記得對焦的時候，鏡頭會有對焦的動作，這通常需要鏡頭上面有一個馬達或是鏡頭環上面有馬達來驅動。遇到手動對焦的鏡頭就不行了。而這台機身神奇的地方就是，任何手動鏡，只要你裝的上去，都可以成為自動對焦。
這在當時，對於擁有Contax手動鏡的客戶，是多大的一個福音阿！
如今，事過境遷，底片已退出主流，鏡頭自動對焦也成為一個很普遍的功能，這樣的一個底片對焦機身也就成為拍賣網站上的常客。不過品像好的還是不多見。我很幸運標到這台品像不錯且有盒的機身。美中不足的一點是沒有說明書，對於這樣一台幾乎是專業級的機身，沒有說明書是有點難用。不過值得慶幸的是操作一般功能不是什麼大問題。只有一些像重複曝光、捲片等等設定可能真的還是要找到說明書才比較容易使用。

Longs drug sucks!!!

Recently, I’ve been trying to find a good & cheap film developer around my place. I first started from Costco. They do somewhat okay job and they are probably the cheapest one you can find in the local area. However, its scan service is pretty pricey. My colleague recommended me Longs drug, saying that they did a very good job scanning his film and didn’t scratch his film.
After visiting one of their stores, I found that they have so called “Premium process," which they send out to Fuji processing center. I first tried dropping one roll of color slide. I believe they send it out for development because there is no way they can do it in house. However, it took more than one week to come back (they claimed it should only take 4days!) and it was mounted!! Crap! When did I tell you to mount them? Although the quality is fine, their service is still pretty suspicious.
Three days ago, I dropped another negative film there and that was the beginning of the nightmare. The prints came out so bad! They are full of scratches and dusts! It is very rare that you can see scratches and dusts in 4×6″ prints! It is just unbelievable! What’s even worse it that the prints are totally out of focus! U gonna be kidding me!

What the X are those dusts in the sky! They are not birds or something!

This is what it came out from my scanner! I believe you can tell the difference!

After this, I think I will never come back to Longs drug again, at least not the one near my place!
If you happen to live near by, don’t waste your money there!

Contax T2

A little bit history:
Contax, a brand name that fascinates numerous people in photography with it superb optics and classical designs. This company was originated from Germany way back to 1932 and then purchased by Kyocera from Japan in 1983. T-series compact cameras were introduced by Kyocera in order to compete with other Japanese companies. T2 was introduced in 1986 and was replaced by T3 in 1988. Although it had only been produced for 2 years, its excellent performance and solid quality wins everyone’s respect.

Contax T2 is probably still the most intuitive P&S camera for advanced functions. Most of the P&S camera, because of its compact design, the advanced functions are usually hidden into several layers of menu. For example, you might need to press several button in order to turn off the flashlight for Leica Minilux, not to mention fixing the aperture. In T2, aperture adjustment, flashlight, exposure compensation, and even manual focus can easily be dialed or switched. It is awesome!

As shown in the pictures, its aperture, manual focus and exposure compensation are all in a flick. It helps a lot when you are snap-shooting. You don’t want to spend 30 seconds digging into the menu in order to change the aperture. For T2, less than 1 second is all you need. Kudo!

Image quality is overall excellent. Although it is not as sharp as its successor, T3, but it is definitely sharp enough to kick some SLR system’s ass. Sometimes I feel that T3 is way too sharp and not as “real" as T2.
The only complaint I have so far is its focusing system. I think it is a bit slow and not very accurate when your object is within 1.5 m away. I think maybe that is also why its closest focus range is only 0.7 m, which restrict the creativity a lot!
Let’s take a look at some of the pictures I took with this awesome camera.



The negative ones are scanned by myself. I got a feeling that I didn’t adjust the color very well so that the color is not as saturated as the prints from store. Let’s look at some more slides I took recently:




These slides represent what this camera performance really is! The color is absolutely faithful and pretty! The detail and real perspective give you feelings of virtual reality! I just love it!