RED Komodo to start limited shipping soon for $6k
- Thread starter ahalpert
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I hear you. We have both platforms in the house. My wife Suzy is a master portrait artist and prefers her iMacs. I've built my own PC's for several decades, but the engineering and CAD apps my work required only run on PC's, so I am platform agnostic. I'm a firm believer in picking the software first, then the platform to run it.
Suzy recently bought a new iMac to replace her first gen Intel version that is EOL as far as Apple is concerned. Not compatible with the latest OSX versions and no longer secure online. I have an older MOTU Ultralite firewire audio interface that has been sitting in its box since my current laptop doesn't support it. So we repurposed her old iMac into a dedicated audio workstation using it. Hate to see perfectly good high performance hardware go to waste.
I run Macdrive 10 Pro on my PC since the Bolex writes its disk files in Mac format. We can seamlessly interoperate the two platforms.
Marketing and branding are obviously essential tools in this consumer society. Many of us could not make much of a living without them. But if you exercise critical thinking skills, you are immune to the emotional manipulations, both negative and positive. Nothing illustrates this better than the anger and polarization from all the propaganda spewed on both sides in the current political environment, most of which has little to do with rational reality.
I've always found it hard to understand why Red in particular generates such strong emotional responses in both directions when it is not even a mass market product and not marketed that way.
They do have this kind of David v Goliath warrior industrial design aesthetic, but that is neither here nor there.
It either meets your professional/creative needs or it doesn't.
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John Brawley
Well-known member
I think you just made my point. And sorry again for derailing this thread....
You'd never take that kind of photo with a Leica M. They just aren't built for that sniper-style of photojournalism. A rangefinder's sweet spot is when your subjects are much closer to you, and it creates a different kind of engagement. THAT'S the point, not how well styled or pretty they are. They are a different process for making images, one that I find creates a totally different way for the photographer to approach the image itself...It's about the intent and how that changes the way YOU WORK as a photographer.
Are you a part of the picture or are you subjectively away observing it unseen from afar...?
From an interview with Magnum photographer Bruce Gilden who's signature street photography style is in your face... (and by the way, Capa in case you didn't know, one of the most revered combat photographers who was mostly a rangefinder shooter)
"I read something that you said -- you were riffing on Capa’s famous quote “If your pictures aren’t good enough, you aren’t close enough” -- and your version was, “The older I get, the closer I get.” Do you think you’re close enough, or do you have the ambition to get even closer?
Well, I don’t know, only time will tell. Those things come in increments. I get close because I try to get close to the soul of the people in my pictures, but it also might be because I don’t respect people who use a telephoto lens and take a picture from across the street. That’s what I mean about ‘you have to be sneaky to get the picture’.
My old photographs I would say were like stage sets: the viewer looks at it and it’s like looking at something on the stage, from outside. Whereas now, I put the viewer at the centre. He becomes part of the picture. And these portraits are even closer. They’re as close as I’ve been. The only way I could get closer is if I become abstract in my photography."
This is what M's are good at. Not shooting on 400mm lenses shots of people who don't know they';re being photographed. Again, I'm not talking about the design, the branding, the cool styling. I think you're projecting a lot of that on them as a status symbol and because of their idiotic special editions.
I think the difference here is that, unlike Rolex (who do the same thing by manipulating the market to make their prices high), this is still a world class professional tool. It's allure as a status symbol comes after the fact they are serious about making high performing cameras and lenses in an eco system that has more than 60 years of continuity and some of the most iconic images of the past 100 years pf photography. It's had the same lens mount since 1953 !! Same lens mount. The same focussing action. They're up to Version 5 I think in the 50mm summicron lens. All those lenses work on pretty much all those versions of the M.
Rolex are too, to some degree about their history, but they are designed to be worn, they intrinsically are a fashion item. I mean it's like saying a 25K Rolex made with gold is the Kravitz version, while the same model can be had for less than half the price. You're paying for gold as a decorative and fashion item. There's nothing that it adds to the core utility of the watch itself.
Having worked with some Australia special forces soldiers, they all wore Rolex watches as well as a G shock. When I asked, they basically said, it's a great way to barter your way out of trouble if you need to win someone's help in a hostile place. Not because they're great time keepers.....
You'll notice most film era combat photographers will have rangefinders AND SLR's. The SLR for the far away stuff, the rangefinder for the close stuff...
I have an Olympus camera that can shoot 60 FPS RAW for about 3 seconds, super fast to AF and it's great, till you get home with 5000 photos to sort though (real number) after a day on set. A busy day on my Leica M would be 150 photos....I've tried to make the Olympus camera manual focus, single shot, manual exposure. It's just intrinsically not the same experience. That's why I keep harping on about it. You have to try it and try to do it well to really understand what changes.
Ha.
Don't start me on Contax my friend.
In the film days, pre digital, I was a Contax shooter. Not the G's, but I had the SLR Contax cameras. While everyone fawned over the Nikon F4 or Canon EOS 1, I saved a ridiculous amount of money for me at the time to buy an Contax RTS III. It is truly an underrated camera.
A pressure plate made of ceramic. Because it's flatter than what they could make steel in those days (and Key Kyocera owned Contax and they were the ceramic masters)
Not only was the ceramic pressure plate supposed to be the flattest ever made, it had a VACUUM PUMP on the back with little holes that literally SUCKED the film flat to the preassure plate for every shot. Even at the very high for those days 5 FPS it could shoot.
100% viewfinder coverage (most SLR's are high 90's), one of a few cameras in 1990 with a 1/8000 top shutter speed, only camera that told you how many exposures you shot (and therefore had left) in the EVF...
And of course, it was the flagship camera for those shooting the Zeiss Contax lenses...the same lenses we all covert today for motion shooting on these boards. I still have my original Zeiss Contax lenses from back then. If you love those Contax lenses, this was THE camera they were designed to marry with...
Motor drive was built in, it could run on regular AA batteries when everyone else was going to impossible in most stores to find 2CR5's OR it could run on a 2CR5 with an ingenious battery compartment.
I paid something like $8000 aussie dollars for that thing. You can get good ones for about $450 on ebay today. (they do have a fatal flaw though that seems to show up with time, the LCD's screens inside the EVF seem to often "bleed")
Anyway, I like Contax
The G / G2's were good, though I never owned one. I tried one out. I think those that have used them a lot would say that the unique hybrid rangefinder base was a bit on the small side (for focus accuracy) and was frustratingly slow to use and the there wasn't the same depth of lens options....which make sense...they only existed for a production run of about 13 years... They were also developed as Contax itself was in major decline so they never really finished building that system before they failed to keep up in the tech race.
JB
ahalpert
Major Contributor
I can't disagree with a thing you said, John. And yes, there are some things a rangefinder can do best and some things it can't. Shooting close is not the only way to shoot. Variety is the spice of life.
The ad depicted a Leica SLR (they don't just make rangefinders!) It annoyed me that they stole Nikon's thunder with that historical inaccuracy. It was a great ad, though.
The final frame:
The ad depicted a Leica SLR (they don't just make rangefinders!) It annoyed me that they stole Nikon's thunder with that historical inaccuracy. It was a great ad, though.
The final frame:
John Brawley
Well-known member
It's intriguing. Because we were talking about branding, and really, Leica don't do "advertising". You mentioned this film which I hadn't seen so I looked it up.
It's a strange piece, a kind of 5 min ode to conflict photography and very much Leica branded.
But then a bit more googling find that Leica have come out and dis-owned the advert.
It seems like a local ad agency in Brazil made the film, but without the sanction or permission of Leica HQ in Germany. And to be honest it's hard to see how they would have approved it with such a basic error as claiming an iconic image to have been photographed on a Leica when it's so easily verifiable that it's not.
It feels more like a spec advert that the Leica Brazil office approved and released without getting anyone else permission and checking with their corporate higher ups.
As I said it was weird to me, because I've never seen a "leica" advert. They're kind of anti-advertising really. They more typically sponsor photographers themselves or exhibitions.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...distances-itself-from-tiananmen-square-advert
https://www.adweek.com/brand-market...en-square-tank-man-ad-after-chinese-backlash/
JB
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AndreeOnline
Veteran
I think the difference here is that, unlike Leica (who mostly sell bookshelf cameras at inflated prices to doctors and lawyers), this is still a world class certified chronometer worn on the wrist, hand made at exacting standards embodying and upholding values and traditions for well over a 100 years, and has remained an icon with one of the world's most recognised brands since its inception.
See what I did there? Good talk.
G
Guest
Guest
Could you guys imagine doing video this way?
https://vimeo.com/296476568
The insane amount of resolution of wet plat on a 5x7” is incredible enough, here they have a 5x7ft piece glass.
More about the photographer:
https://www.ianruhter.com/
https://vimeo.com/296476568
The insane amount of resolution of wet plat on a 5x7” is incredible enough, here they have a 5x7ft piece glass.
More about the photographer:
https://www.ianruhter.com/
ahalpert
Major Contributor
You may be right and certainly seem to know more about Leica's advertising than I do. (And I don't really care about the ad - it's just another example of emotional manipulation.)
But Leica disowned the ad only after it got them banned from Chinese social media.
"However, the ad agency that made the film, F/Nazca Saatchi & Saatchi, has a relationship with Leica dating back years and taking in several award-winning short films in a similar vein to the most recent one. One of the ad’s directors told the website Leica Rumours that they had been working on it for more than a year."
It's really sad to me that the very ideals that Tank Man and the photographers who captured him risked their lives for are crushed under the weight of market power and profit-seeking. Massive irony that they made an ad celebrating the Tank Man photo and then disavowed it to curry favor with the regime he opposed.
Run&Gun
Veteran
Look at Marriot knuckling under to China the other year. The only thing that matters to these corporations is money. They couldn't care less about any of these "causes" until/unless/if they can make money off of them or if distancing themselves publicly from something will do the same.
ahalpert
Major Contributor
South Park got banned in China for their recent hilarious episode "Band in China" in which Randy strangles Winnie the Pooh so the CCP will let him sell cannabis in China: https://southpark.cc.com/full-episodes/s23e02-band-in-china
Then they tweeted: "Like the NBA, we welcome the Chinese censors into our homes and into our hearts. We too love money more than freedom and democracy. Xi doesn't look like Winnie the Pooh at all. Tune into our 300th episode this Wednesday at 10! Long live the great Communist Party of China. May the autumn's sorghum harvest be bountiful. We good now China?"
Then they tweeted: "Like the NBA, we welcome the Chinese censors into our homes and into our hearts. We too love money more than freedom and democracy. Xi doesn't look like Winnie the Pooh at all. Tune into our 300th episode this Wednesday at 10! Long live the great Communist Party of China. May the autumn's sorghum harvest be bountiful. We good now China?"
puredrifting
Major Contributor
Anything that debases and humiliates the CCP receives a hearty thumbs up from me! I've never been a South Park fan but this makes me want to watch more of Trey and Matts work.
Mitch Gross
Veteran
I caution that this thread is beginning to stray into political territory. Back to fancy watches and designer cameras?
G
Guest
Guest
Lovely, Razz.
Thanks!
You think CCP is bad? CCCP was a lot worse.
ahalpert
Major Contributor
These are nice
Thanks. The intimacy of S16mm/1" video format is ideal for this kind of shooting IMO.
I’ll keep this relevant to the topic (Komodo) after a few lines…
John, we share a love of Contax. I had two RS3s and loved them. Amazingly one of them developed a weird fault: the back got incredibly hot, too hot to touch. Maybe a short somewhere. Got it fixed and it was fine afterwards. Later I bought a Contax 645. That was the one piece of equipment I truly loved. Phenomenal lenses and a joy to use. At various times I have owned/used Bronica 645s and 6x7s (plural), Rollei 6006, 6008 and 66, several Mamiyas, several Hasselblads including digital, and a Fuji GW690III, but the Contax was always my favourite. (Yes, I was a gear freak in my younger days, always looking for something better, fortunately cured now I’m in my dotage.)
I would like to find out how the 645 lenses look on my next video camera, if physically possible. If the KOMODO will take them then that would be very interesting combination.
There, that gets us nicely back on topic.
John, we share a love of Contax. I had two RS3s and loved them. Amazingly one of them developed a weird fault: the back got incredibly hot, too hot to touch. Maybe a short somewhere. Got it fixed and it was fine afterwards. Later I bought a Contax 645. That was the one piece of equipment I truly loved. Phenomenal lenses and a joy to use. At various times I have owned/used Bronica 645s and 6x7s (plural), Rollei 6006, 6008 and 66, several Mamiyas, several Hasselblads including digital, and a Fuji GW690III, but the Contax was always my favourite. (Yes, I was a gear freak in my younger days, always looking for something better, fortunately cured now I’m in my dotage.)
I would like to find out how the 645 lenses look on my next video camera, if physically possible. If the KOMODO will take them then that would be very interesting combination.
There, that gets us nicely back on topic.
ahalpert
Major Contributor
Stewhem, have you seen the focal reducers that shrink a 645 lens image onto a full frame camera? 0.7x focal length reduction, below is the one that adapts to RF (and I'm sure that mount adapters without optics are available, too)
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/prod...8JJkDSXqYxRWHRoC-zkQAvD_BwE&lsft=BI:514&smp=y
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/prod...8JJkDSXqYxRWHRoC-zkQAvD_BwE&lsft=BI:514&smp=y