Life>Camera>Action

D70s field report

After shooting almost 300 images since taking delivery on my new D70s, in all types of lighting conditions (full sun to streetlight after dark), I can say (with confidence) that there is not much the thing can't do.  I believe that the sensor in the camera is more sensitive to ambient light and colors than the human eye can see.  Also, the sensor sees the contrast of a given scene closer to the human eye than film ever could without a lot of processing.  Just being able to quickly adjust ISO speeds is reason enough to own one.  I haven't yet experimented with the auto ISO feature but the auto white balance is very accurate, auto focus is lightning quick as is the aptly named instant power up. 

I had the pleasure of meeting Clyde Butcher last weekend at E-Fest in Sarasota.  Clyde is to Florida landscapes what Ansel Adams was to the American West.  Simply amazing, razor sharp, greytone images by lugging a heavey view camera and wooden tripod into the swamps, waterways, and bayous of Florida, giving new appreciation as to just how beautiful a flat landscape can be when you really take time and look. (almost always requires getting out of your car and spending time in the heat and humidity)  If you are up for it, the scenery is breathtaking.

My New Camera

After much deliberation (and general pussy-footing around on the issue of film vs. digital), I am now the proud owner of a brand spanking new Nikon d70-s.  I can now count myself among the growing masses that get to experience the instant gratification of seeing an image of what I just took appear on the monitor a split second after I squeezed off the shot.  I went for the D-70 primarily because of budgetary concerns and the fact that it has quickly established it's place in the market by being just a damn good camera for the money.  The new "s" version is even better with some firmware tweaks (also available for current D70 owners), a larger LCD monitor, new menu design, and improved focus performance in certain applications. (read about all this and more at www.dpreview.com ).  Plus, I can use all my F-mount Nikkor lenses.

"In photography, creation is a quick business — an instant, a gush, a response — putting  the camera up to the eye's line of fire, snatching with that economical little box whatever it was that surprised you, catching it in midair, without tricks, without letting it get away. You make a painting at the same time that you take a photo."

Henri Cartier-Bresson

photographers mission statement

to make appear what has become invisible

to find beauty in the ordinary

to give sight to the blind

"what the eye can't see, the heart can't feel

Explorations

"In setting out to explore, we begin where we are, placing one foot in front of the other, moving from the familiar, into the less familiar, into the foreign, and finally into the altogether unknown. Exploration is an act of faith; discovery is by nature unpredictable.... Journeys of exploration come in many shapes: the broad, meandering loop; the straightforward there-and-back again roundtrip; the one-way journey, a migration to a a new and yet undiscovered homeland.  But no matter what our final destination is (and whether or not we anticipated it) we arrive there changed by the journey itself (and by the act of describing, questioning, and analyzing it) in ways we could not have imagined on the day of starting out."

Thank you Carolyn Ross for the above thoughts expressed on page one of your wonderful anthology "Writing Nature- An Ecological Reader for Writers."