Sony RX1 User Report

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As per my previous posts I am not a technical reviewer, more an avid user of new and cool technology, and the Sony RX1 in my view is both.

As an owner of numerous cameras and camera systems there was no real need for me to buy the RX1. But after dropping my M9 in Auckland harbour and loading the Sony A99 and lenses on my Rocket III each weekend I pined for something a little more compact.

Looked at the Fuji range (XP1, XE1 and X100S), Olympus OMD, Sony NEX and even the SIgma DP range but they all had one problem in my mind, they are not Full Frame! Once you use FF it is hard to go back to a crop sensor, just doesn’t feel right and doesn’t look right to me. Control of DOF is everything in my quest for the perfect frame.

The the RX1 appears on the scene, but $NZ4000? Without a EVF! How can that be? After using it for a week, and with some clear head space riding back from Mahurangi last weekend I think I got the pricing straight in my head.

The RX1 pretty much has all the functionality of the Sony A99 which costs around the same price here in NZ as the RX1 (NZ$3700) for the body alone. The same sensor as the A99, 24MP full-frame (24x36mm) CMOS sensor. Add to that a stellar Carl Zeiss Sonnar T* 2/35 to the package, this alone would be north of NZ$2500, and in a package can can fit easily into a winter jacket pocket, then the price appears to me to be a steal.

When I had my M9 I was never much of a ‘lens changer’. 90% of the time I had a 28 Summicron glued to the front, the balance would be a 50mm Summicron, so the fact that the RX1 has a fixed lens doesn’t really bother me. Would I prefer it to be 28mm? Sure but 35mm means I take a couple of steps back and then I have a similar view to a 28mm focal length anyway and this lens is as good or better than any of my Leica lenses. There is no perfect camera!

Fixed lens cameras also mean that the lens and sensor can be coupled in a way not possible for interchangeable lens camera systems. This has to help the end result in my mind.

The RX1 needs an EVF, or OVF if you prefer, but needs an external view finder to get the most out of it. I love the EVF because what you see is what you get. Sony EVF technology is superb in my view and that is the way I went. N$750 is a an investment though but if you want a RX1 then it is the price you need to pay.

The flexibility the RX1 offers amateur enthusiasts like me is incredible. Whenever I leave home I always leave with one digital and 1 film option. If the RX1 is the digital option then the bag I leave with can be a lot more compact than if I leave with A99. This helps the back a lot:)

My favorite kit is a RX1 + my Linhof 612 and this all fits in a Crumpler $6 million dollar home. Brilliant! Rx1 meter is so good I also can leave my light meter at home and use RX1 spot function for metering with the Linhof.

The price seems to upset most reviewers that I have seen. My way of looking at this is a little different. Leica was the only option if you wanted a portable full frame camera system and the RX1 is NZ$6000 cheaper in a body to body comparison. If you add the EVF it then is NZ$5250 cheaper. If you add the price of a Leica 35 Summicron at NZ$4000 things get a little silly:) Would I prefer the Leica M240 if the price were similar? Very hard question to answer because if the M240 was similar in price to RX1 I probably would have both:)

But as things stand I would rather have the Sony RX1, incredible FF sensor and lens package, with AF and all modern capabilities in a package 2/3rds the size of the M240 and the $5250 change thank you. I love the Leica system but the RX1 is a no brainer in my mind.

Photos on the post are from my ride up to Mahurangi region just north of Auckland and south of Warkworth.

Sydneytown!

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Last week my wife and I went to Australia for a day of business meetings. I have never been one to travel somewhere without being able to at least spend a day of leisure. So we added a day and I brought my kit.

My wife is not to interested in taking photos. Her logic is of a Swiss nature, that my photos are better than hers so why would she bother taking any at all. After all I have all the gear and the biggest camera she will carry around is a Fuji X10 or her iPhone. So the best way for her and I to be able to spend time together is to find local scenic walks when ever we visit somewhere. So rather than go shopping we decided to take a bus to the Spit bridge and do the Spit Bridge to Manly walk. Depending on what site you read online, it is about 10kms, well appointed and very scenic. We went around 8am after coffee and breakfast at Charlie Lovett. Great coffee, if you are in Sydney try them out they are great and soon to be in NZ if I can concentrate on work rather than photo blogs:).

Sydney is a City of 5 million so traffic wasn’t great so allow time to get there.

The walk was all that it was advertised as. Traditional Aussie bush, then through very affluent suburbs, coastal walks through the rocks, throw in a few hills, it had it all. There are great views of the Sydney Heads, City views and especially good Panorama views of Manly Bay and surrounds.

For gear I decided if I couldn’t fit it in my Kata 2n1 then it wasn’t coming. So Sony SLT-A99, Zeiss 15/2.8 Zf.2 (modded to fit Sony A Mount), PC28/2.8 Super Angulon, a little Minolta 50/1.7 and my MeFOTO tripod.

After a kilometre or so I realised that there weren’t to many opportunities to shoot anything with dramatic foreground interest so I swapped out the Zeiss 15mm with the PC28/2.8SA and decided that I would shoot Panoramas with the shift lens. Any of you that have read my earlier post on this lens know how good it is.

So I could keep the bag light I didn’t bring any filters so I bracketed each shot +/- 2 stops combined each bracket in Nik HDR Pro and then stitched in Photoshop. I nice and easy workflow and as long as you pick a semi-realistic HDR setting in HDR Pro the results are always to my liking.

Once we got to Manly we sampled my wife’s favorite vice, Gelato @ Gelatissimo. After walking 10kms in 28c temperatures who was I to argue.

Anyway some sample photos below.

Sydney Heads

Manly Bay below.

Another from Manly Bay.

It really is a nice walk. Keep an eye out because I have just bought a Linhof Technorama 612 and will post thoughts and samples soon.

Waitangi Day, 2013

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Waitangi Day New Zealand, February 6th each year, is always an unusual day for me. Unlike 4th of July in the USA, or Australia day for our western neighbours it isn’t a day that inspires great thoughts of patriotism for me. It really is just another holiday for most people I know.

This is probably because it commemorates the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi which effectively ended the Maori wars with the British invaders. Not the inception of a new country or signing of the Declaration of Independence. So it is always to me a non-event and more than anything a document that divides a population and focuses attention on the past, rather than bringing us together, so we can live in the present and work toward a brighter future.

Anyway enough of that, the great thing about W.Day for me is that it is in February and in most instances the weather is great. So as usual on holidays, when I am home, I got up early and went to find a nice spot to check out the rising sun.

Devonport offers a great view back to the CBD and also takes in the sun rising in the east. I love 3 to 1 Panoramas and as mentioned in my last post the Sony A99 + PC28/2.8 Super Angulon are my go to kit for these types of shots.

So while it is not the 4th of July or Australia Day, it was still a great day for photography. I even managed to get a round of golf in later in the day.

A few photos below. I also had my Rolleiflex 3.5f loaded with FP4 and will upload a few from that roll once they are scanned.

Using Leica R PC28 F2.8 SA for 3 to 1 Panoramas on my Sony A99SLT

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After recently exiting my Leica digital platform (dropped M9 in the harbour) and replacing it with the superb Sony A99SLT and 3 Carl Zeiss zooms, I wondered how I could use my Leica R PC28/2.8 SA? After spending numerous hours reading through countless forums it became apparent that using PC/Tilt/Shift lenses on non legacy platforms is a question often asked.

A few years back when I left Canon to go the digital rangefinder route with the M9, I owned the Canon 24TSE and the 90TSE and both those lenses were superb and were the only two I ended up missing from the Canon platform. I used them extensively for shooting panoramas. It seems if you don’t use the Canon system there aren’t too many options available now. Nikon’s aren’t well-regarded, there is an old Carl Zeiss option, a couple of Olympus OM’s, the delayed Samyang and the Schneider PC28/2.8 of which I have the Leica R variant.

I thought this post might help others who don’t use the Canon system to see what my experience is with this lens on the Sony platform shooting panoramas. I am not a reviewer and this isn’t a review but just my experience and a few photos.

The Leica R bayonet mount obviously is incompatible with the Sony A mount, so after searching through many forums I identified and then purchased a Leitax adaptor from David from Leitax.com and on his recommendation a M42c-L1 chip from James Lao.

It was a very easy install because if I can do it then a chimpanzee can. Just make sure you have a quality philips screw driver.

The lens feels great on the camera and the chip from James Lao means all of the main functions like Steady Shot, focus confirmation etc. are useable. The camera has aperture set at F1.4 and you adjust aperture manually on the lens.

The A99 EVF is awesome for using this manual focus type of lens because what you see in the EVF is what you get. Have read with interest how many people wouldn’t look at A99 because it has EVF rather than OVF, can’t see the problem myself. As you can see with my example shots I shoot a lot in low light and I feel EVF works better for focusing than a standard OVF.

I have always used a light meter with my Leica M9 because you need a consistent exposure over the three photos or they won’t stitch properly and I felt light meter was easiest way to achieve that with the M9. With the Sony I just set it to manual, select F11 on the lens and adjust shutter speed to what I like on EVF. Couldn’t be simpler.

The other great function is the magnified focus view on the rear of the camera. Push the button, select area you wish to magnify, check focus and the push shutter. Superb. The articulated screen is also very handy when you can’t get behind the camera.

One function I haven’t tried yet is the AF range button. This could also be something I might use with pano shooting.

This lens appears to me to be super sharp, as you would expect from a Leica product. I understand that it is actually a Schnieder lens but Leica wouldn’t put their name to a lens that doesn’t meet their standards. While researching this lens I read that Leica were allowed to pick the best lens from each batch, not sure that is true or just somebody justifying the fact he/she paid more for the Leica branded example.

Anyway enough waffling, here are some early shots.

Bayswater @ Dawn

Bayswater Wharf & Fisherman

Lorne Street, Auckland

Te Karo Bay, Coromandel Peninsula, NZ

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One of the great things about having a holiday home on a peninsula is that you are never far away from a little bay that you have never seen or photographed before.

Te Karo Bay fits into the mould perfectly and was only 27kms from my house in Pauanui.
Being an early riser means my current fixation with sunrise photography is it not really a stretch for me to rise at 5am for a 6am sunrise. What makes it easier though is a little App I purchased called TPE for Android. TPE gives you the time and direction of sunrise and sunsets superimposed over maps so you can see whether the sunrise will be affected by any hills, islands or whatever. There are many mores functions, to many to list here but I certainly recommend the basic functions if you are looking for the perfect sunrise. There is nothing worse than getting to a location just to see that you are blocked out by some badly placed hill.
TPE also allows you look scroll through the maps looking for potential places of interest and then once you have identified something drop a pin there to see what time and in what direction the sun will rise. (It takes into account seasons, daylight saving times and has all same functions for the Moon as well)
This is how I found Te Karo Bay. It is at the end of Sailors Grave Road, on the right as you climb to the top of the hill, heading north out of Tairua. (There is an actual memorial sailors grave on the hill over looking the beach) A very nice beach with a tidy car park and well maintained stairs and tracks.

This was my initial setup as I waited for the sun to rise. A nice little stream running towards the sunrise. Campers had left the bucket and spade in middle of shot.

I wasn’t alone on the beach. There was an Asian family of fisherman. Their children looked a little despondent being up at that hour.

The rocks I felt were very photogenic.

A long exposure shot. Looks very surreal with sun rising to left of shot.

Te Karo Bay is really worth a visit if you are in the area. There were a number of surfers camping in the car park when I arrived, so I would assume it is a decent Surf Beach. Not sure they were to happy when I arrived on the Rocket III at 5.30am.

Beginning of summer 2012-13

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Summer holidays 2012-13

Our Summer holiday hasn’t started too well with the weather this year. The back-end of a recent cyclone in Fiji means we have more rain than we would like. Is it just me but how come the weatherman always seems to be 100% accurate when predicting crappy weather in summer?

Things have changed for me photographically recently. Managed to trip over my two big feet, knock my tripod, M9 + 28 Summicron into the Auckland Harbour, below Harbour bridge at Northcote Point. After sweating bullets for a couple of weeks NZI paid out. Have to say thanks to NZI because I have had a bit of an ‘unco’ year and they have been great.

During the two-week downtime I made the decision to go back to the ‘dark side’ of DSLR style camera for my digital work and decided on the new full-frame Sony A99 with the wonderful Carl Zeiss 16-35/2.8, 24-70/2.8 and the Sony 70-200/2.8 zooms. Makes sense when 90% of what I shoot is landscape related and while Leica M9 is a stellar street shooter there are a numerous concessions to endure shooting landscapes. Well enough words here are a few early examples with Sony A99:

Sunrise over Murrays Bay. Lived in Auckland for 48 years and I think this was the first time I had been here. It won’t be the last.

This is the Long Exposure version. The A99 is a darling for LE with the articulated screen. Also all three lenses have the same filter size. Well thought out.

When the rain is coming down then long exposure photography seems to be the only options. After an incredibly wet and muddy walk we reached the falls at Wharekirauponga.

Our first day of sun. Beautiful lunch with Michelle for her birthday in Whitianga, back for 9 holes, smoked chicken on BBQ and then down to Pauanui beach for sunset. You can see the beginnings of todays storm on right of picture.

Spectacular clouds & colours.

And finally a tribute to my trusty Leica M9. This is the last photo taken after I rescued the SD card. The M9 experience taught me a lot about what I want out of my photographic journey. Goodbye old friend:(

Port Waikato, August 2012

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Saturday 25th August was a superb winter’s day here in NZ. Gorgeous sunny day and around 18-20c which is warm for winter. Day didn’t start to well though because I slept in. Decided to go for a ride (Triumph Rocket III) to Port Waikato, which according to Google Maps is 87kms from my home in Auckland CBD.

Port Waikato is a landmark because it is where NZ’s longest river, The Waikato River, reaches the coast and empties out into the Tasman Sea. Being on NZ’s west coast the beaches often have black sand and craggy rocky cliff’s and dunes. Great photography subjects.

Sunset Beach in front of Cafe.

Because I slept in I missed the sunrise and had to contend with mid morning sun rather than the more desirable early morning sun. That aside it was a great ride down, the last 30kms from Tuakau Bridge was perfect big bike roads. Nice cambered corners and no traffic.

With me I had my Fuji GF670, which I have just got back after 6 months away, and I wanted to see how well it worked with Velvia.

Sunset Beach from the rocks.

And on the way back I stopped in Maraetai Bay.

And then in the Dunes this family fishing.

Was a cool place to visit. The café at Sunset Beach, think it was called the Cheeky Pipi had great food and an excellent coffee. All in all a place everyone should see.

See some B&W images below. These were shot with Rolleiflex 3.5F + Tri-X

fotoflo

Too many old cameras, not enough time

Sony RX1 User Report

Sydneytown!

Waitangi Day, 2013

Using Leica R PC28 F2.8 SA for 3 to 1 Panoramas on my Sony A99SLT

Te Karo Bay, Coromandel Peninsula, NZ

Beginning of summer 2012-13

Port Waikato, August 2012

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