I have been busy for some months deconstructing a large video/recording studio (40x40 feet and three levels), so I have done less photography. In general, I have been taking a rest from keeping up with all that is going on in the digital photo world. I do check out 3-4 photo sites a day, so I am not totally out of touch. I just have not been participating much. However, my time away from keeping-up has been really helpful, so I thought I would share these thoughts:
What if a bomb went off and we didn’t even know it? That’s the way I feel about modern digital photography in the last few years. We have reached a plateau and its time, at least for me, to just be a photographer once again and not so much a gear-hound.
I think it was the (approximately) two years I spent studying and waiting for the advent of the Hasselblad X1D and the Fujifilm GFX to arrive and then the time to use them. In the process I also went through the Pentax K3, K1, and two copies of the Sony A7R2 and then the A7R3 too. I won’t even count the lenses I bought and checked out. That’s mostly a separate issue, aside from the dearth of really fine lenses for the Pentax DSLRs, which was no fun at all.
When the Nikon D850 finally showed up, late for my party anyway, it was amazingly good and quickly satisfied my medium-format mirrorless curiosity and lust. Poof! It vanished. I learned that MF had its own warts was not really THAT interesting and, after all, I was a photographer first and a gearhead second... mostly. That was a lesson worth learning right there.
For one, I am exhausted after those two years (and six camera bodies) that I went through. I also further confirmed that I am, above all, a lens lover and that Nikon just manages to sell me the best bodies for my work. None of the other bodies I tried even came close. It could just be habit, but I am willing to change my habits to fit a great camera, but I didn’t find any (other than the Nikon D850) for my kind of work in those years.
And I am also increasingly not tempted by less-than-superior lenses. And Nikon has (in the last few years) produced too many not-so-great lenses and just a few good ones that would interest me. However, many of their best are telephotos and I shoot close-up, so they are wasted on me even if I wanted to afford them.
I hate to think of all the recent Nikon lenses that I bought and sent back based on reviews by fans. I guess I just see things differently. Some of the lenses I bought were at best “good,” but for my work they just were not THAT good, IMO. Instead, most of my money went to Zeiss and to older lenses, especially large-format and enlarger lenses from Nikon that ARE great, like the APO-El Nikkor 105mm f/5.6, and others.
So, as I see the fallout of the recent digital photography explosion in the last few years is still spreading, yet much of it now results in a big yawn from me. And it occurs to me that I have enough lenses, scores of them, even after selling a LOT of fine lenses that I just did not use. I decided that I’m not going to be a museum. LOL.
Do I see anything out there I want? No, not really. I am intrigued by the continual perfecting of the Fuji GFX system and am (once-in-a-while) tempted to re-up my interest in that, but it’s not likely. My Nikon D850 is too satisfying just now and the silent electronic front-curtain shutter mode, which I use for focus-stacking, is what I always have been looking for, even if I didn’t know it.
Well, there is one thing I would like. I am waiting for someone to bring an Otus-quality macro-lens to the Nikon mount. I would buy that in a minute. Other than that, I’ve reverted to photography once again and resigned my interest in new equipment, at least until something incredible appears.
Well, to be contrary, I did just (two-minutes ago) buy two Voigtlander ultra-wide lenses in M39 Leica format, the Voigtlander Ultra-Wide 12mm Aspherical Heliar f/5.6 and the Voigtlander Super-Wide Aspherical 15mm f/4.5, so I guess I am not totally immune from NAS, but I’m getting there.
Photo with the Nikon D850, the APO-El Nikkor f/5.6 and the Cambo Mini-Actus.
