Alphatracks

About a month ago, when speculation of when the Sony A100 would be available was running high, I mentioned that Amazon.com listed the availability as August 1.  A check this morning (July 31) reveals that Amazon is listing the Alpha A100 as in stock, ready for shipping, Choose overnight delivery and you can have the camera in your hands August 1. I see that Wolf Camera and Ritz Camera are also showing the A100 “In Stock.”

Meanwhile, Amazon has a link on their home page touting a “price drop” on the Canon Digital Rebel XT. Let’s see…the Sony Alpha started to become readily available and suddenly the street price of Canon’s entry level dSLR falls to a body only price of 699.00.  Coincidence? I think not. (The list price is still said to be $1,400, but even Steven King doesn’t write better fiction that that.)

Meanwhile Pentax has quietly slipped it’s new K100D into the line-up, a 6.1MP camera offered at a list price of $699. When the discounters start trying to move these dSLRs, it is not inconceivable that the street price will be below $500.00 by the end of the year.

In the face of these pricing realities — and with the next “affordable” SLR from Nikon due in less than two weeks — how long before the A100 sees it’s first discount?

technorati tags:Sony Alpha, Canon, Pentax, Nikon

Tweet This Post

So much for Nikon’s count down to the unveiling of their next new model. A site called the Daily Tech has posted photos of the new 10MP Nikon D80 due out in a few weeks.

Last week, in a post I called Nikon ups the ante, I mentioned that Nikon was following Sony’s lead by using a Flash presentation to tease viewers with subtle clues about the upcoming “affordable” 10MP camera. Now Nikon of Europe has spoiled the unveiling by simply posting a series of photos of the new camera. The Daily Tech has republished those images on their site.

The actual specs and features set of the new dSLR are still unknown, but Nikon has already revealed that the D80 will have a 10.2MP sensor — which most observers speculate will be the same sensor used in the Sony Alpha. In fact, the photos of the D80 bear a strong resemblance to a certain 10MP dSLR that is often reported on in these pages.

Although the purpose of this site is to report on Sony and Minolta SLRs, the Nikon D80 is relevant because it obviously competes heads up with the Sony A100. Nikon has not leaked what it considers affordable, but the price of the D80 may affect the price of the A100 in the near future.

Up until now, the Alpha A100 could bask in the sunshine of being the newest dSLR around and being the lowest price 10MP SLR as well. The D80 now becomes the next new thing — and if it is priced right, it may steal the A100’s thunder in the price category as well.

Now, we’ll have to wait and see how Sony responds to the Nikon’s new 10MP challenger.

Until nest time, stay focused! — Tom
DailyTech – Nikon D80 D-SLR Images Leaked

technorati tags:Sony Alpha, A100, Nikon

Tweet This Post

Reader David R. Lemieux sent a comment that he was disappointed with his brand new Sony A100. Here are David’s remarks:

“Had my Sony A100 since 7/18 (Direct from SonyStyle). Have been VERY DISAPPOINTED by pictures compared to my Maxxum 5D. Noise in ISO 400+ (ISO 400 = ISO 1600 on the Maxxum 5d). Exposures have been 50/50, about the same as the 5D. Dusk and low-light pictures are SUPERIOR on the 5D….anyone else having this problem?”

Ouch! It isn’t much fun to to drop some serious cash on a new camera, only to find that it doesn’t perform as well as your old one!

I want to look at this concern in detail. While I like the A100, I’m not going to sugar-coat it’s weakness or pretend they aren’t there. Every camera has weak areas, including those that cost far more than the A100. How big of a problem those weak areas turn out to be, ultimately depends on your shooting style and subjects.

David’s comment indicates his A100 doesn’t perform as well in “dusk or low-light” conditions. Thus it appears that David is shooting available light, evening and night shots. Hmmm… That is exactly where you would expect to see more noise, particularly with higher ISO settings.

But David said his Konica-Minolta 5D exhibited less noise in these situations. That is to be expected, as a 6MP sensor will typically produce less nose than a 10MP sensor of the same physical size. The more pixels you pack into a sensor, the smaller the pixels have to be, unless you enlarge the sensor itself. Since the A100 and the 5D have similar size sensors, the pixels on the A100 sensor have to be smaller. Smaller pixels tend to display greater noise. That is a fact of life.

But shouldn’t images from a 10MP camera be superior then those from a 6MP camera? Usually they will be, although you might be hard pressed to see a difference in smaller print sizes. As you enlarge the image, the 10MP image will typically maintain sharpness and quality long after the 6MP image starts to fall apart. In smaller sized images, however, you might have great difficulty picking which image came from which camera.

When you start delving into areas of low-light and/or higher ISO settings, the smaller pixels of the 10MP camera will start to produce more noise. Thus shooting outdoors in sunlight or studio shots with some sort of external light, the 10MP camera should produce a better image, particularly as you enlarge it beyond 8X10 or so. When shooting long exposures on a tripod or hand-held available light shots, the 10MP sensor may just produce more noise than the 6MP sensor.

It’s a trade off — better enlargements against more noise in dim-light, higher ISO situations. By choosing a 10MP sensor, Sony has produced a camera that should produce great enlargements under normal light and studio conditions.
Dim light images with a boosted ISO may suffer however.

But wait a minute. Sony isn’t the only camera maker with a 10MP sensor. Just how well does the A100 stack up against some of the other 10MP units when it comes to noise? Not only are there many 10MP SLR to choose from, the same Sony 10.2MP sensor is used by other camera manufacturers.

If the A100 produces roughly the same amount of noise as the other 10MP SLRs, then the noise David is seeing is just the nature of the beast. If, however, other 10MP cameras — especially those using the same sensor — produce less noise at a given ISO setting, then Sony needs to address the problem.

This post shouldn’t be taken as a slam against the A100. I still think it is an excellent camera for the money. In reading the reviews, it seems that almost all the mainstream press gives the A100 high marks overall. However, several reviews have mentioned that noise is pronounced at higher ISO settings.

There is an excellent and informative image comparison of the Sony A100, the Canon 350D, the Nikon S200 and the Sony R1 at imagelabs.com. The link takes you to the noise comparison page, but there are also comparisons of many other image attributes.

This is what Dave Etchells at imaging-resource.com had to say about noise in the A100:

NEWS! – Sony DSLR-A100 sample photos available!

Here is a CNET Editors Review that specifically discuses noise, as well.

Sony Alpha SLR-A100 image quality.

I’ve found several other A100 reviews that mention A100 noise. However, none of the reviewers seemed to think the noise was enough of a problem to prevent them from recommending the camera. All digital cameras produce some noise. From the images I have examined, the A100 produces excellent quality when shooting at ISO under 400. If you push the ISO above 400 on the A100, it appears that you will encounter noise. Is that a problem? If you often use an ISO setting above 400, you’ll have to take the noise into consideration. If on the other hand, you usually use an ISO of 400 or less – in sunlight or studio conditions — you may not even notice the noise.

I intend to pursue this further. From the samples I have seen, I don’t think the noise would trouble me all that much. I’m afraid that remarks about the noise of the A100 may unfairly tarnish the camera’s reputation. At the same time, this is a high level dSLR. If the noise is too objectionable, Sony needs to take care of the matter.

We’ll talk more about noise next time. Until then, stay focused! – Tom
Here is an excellent explanation of digital camera noise from www.cambridgeincolour.com:

Digital Camera Image Noise: Concept and Types

technorati tags:Sony Alpha, digital noise, A100, DSLR

Tweet This Post

Well the results of the first poll are in — although the response was less than what I would have liked. Out of over 500 visitors during the last week, a mere 11 voted — something like .022 of one percent. That is pretty pitiful. Maybe a lot of visitors simply came via RSS feed and didn’t actually view the sidebar where the poll is installed. Still… that’s a pretty slim margin.

The question was “Will you buy an Alpha A100?”

Of those who voted, 5 (45%) said they had already pre-ordered an A100.

3 (27 %) said they were waiting for the price to come down.

Of the remaining three votes, there was 1 each for buying a Nikon, buying another SLR brand and sticking with a film SLR.

Interestingly, no one indicated they were waiting for the Pro Sony model or switching to Canon.

Of course with such a small sampling, the numbers don’t mean much. In addition, since Alphatracks is aimed toward those highly interested in Sony Alpha and Minolta dSLRs, I would expect that most people would be intending to purchase an Alpha at some point.
I’ll post the next poll later today. Hopefully, there will be a better response.

– Tom

technorati tags:Sony Alpha

Tweet This Post

A while back, I wrote about the Rokkor Files — an excellent site about manual focus Minolta cameras. While there is a wealth of good information on the site, there was one page that troubled me. Site owner Antony Hands offered an in-depth preview of the Seagull D55 — a new digital camera built with Minolta’s manual focus lens mount. Thus, anyone with a stockpile of Rokkor X lenses would have an upgrade path into the digital universe. Sound the trumpets or something.

There was just one problem — there is no Seagull D55 planned. It was all an elaborate April Fools day hoax.

It is a really, really well done hoax, however. There are photos of the prototype, complete specs of the proposed dSLR and a review of how Seagull came to build a new manual focus dSLR.

I have to admit, I was taken in for the first part of the article. It was entirely plausible, since the Chinese Seagull camera company had produced several film SLRs with the Minolta MD manual focus mount. There are thousands of excellent Minolta MD lenses out there, many of which you can pickup for a song on ebay. The idea that a Chinese company might just offer a dSLR that could take advantage of all those MD lenses makes a certain kind of sense. A manual focus dSLR? Why not?

As I continued through the detailed review, I stated to get the idea that something was fishy. I switched to another browser tab and googled Seagull camera. I found several references, but no mention of any D55. I returned to the Rokkor Files, already suspecting the worst. I clicked on the supposed distributor link at the bottom of the link and immediately got the “Aprils Fools” message.

So I was had. But only for a short while. It was amusing, but it bothered me that it was too good of a hoax. I suspected that a lot of people might read the article, but never click on the link that informed them it was a joke. They might go away thinking that the Seagull D55 might appear in the near future.

Antony Hands isn’t the first blogger to plan an elaborate April Fool’s Day prank. Even the more traditional media outlets sometimes engage in this sort of thing. Many years ago, a major computer magazine published a tech tip claiming that you could improve the data transfer speed of your hard drive by disassembling it and spraying the platter with Lemon Pledge. It was, of course, a April Fool’s day prank. I wasn’t fooled, because I knew that you needed a Class A clean room to safely open a hard drive. The magazine, however gave no indication that it was a prank — readers just had to figure it out from the April issue date. No doubt most people did, but it bothered me that some people might just take the article at face value. Would someone really be naive enough to take apart their hard drive and coat the platter with Lemon Pledge? The magazine in question was highly valued for their excellent technical advise and at that time most people were fairly unsophisticated about computer technology. I’m fairly certain that somewhere, someone acted on the magazine’s advise and destroyed a perfectly-good hard drive and all it’s data. Probably more than one someone.

So I wasn’t totally comfortable with the Rokkor Files prank. Some people would be so taken in by the hoax that it might affect their purchasing decisions. When I mentioned the Rokkor Files in my earlier post, I made a point of warning readers to check the date the story about the Seagull D55 was filed. I didn’t want to spoil Antony’s hard work, but I didn’t people going off thinking that Seagull was actually developing a camera that would support their lens collection.

I had pretty much forgotten about the mythical Seagull D55 until today, when I checked my server logs. I had recently been visited several times by someone who had been searching on Google for the Seagull D55. Since I had posted my somewhat cryptic warning on Alphatracks, gogglebot had indexed that term and sent several readers to my blog. Curious, I opened a new Google search and typed “Seagull D55″. I got several pages of results.

Some of these were well-known sites that apparently used the Rokkor Files story as the source for their own news story. There were also numerous posts to forums and discussion groups as people eagerly speculated when the D55 would be available.

I can’t fault people for falling for this story. It was plausible, the images and specifications looked real and the April Fool punch line was fairly obscure. Still some of these web sites should have done some homework before jumping on the story.

For the last time. There is no Seagull D55. It is a myth.

Of course, the fact that this hoax has spread so far on the web does indicate that there is lots of interest in using older Rokkor X lenses on a dSLR. There is a rare adapter that will allow you to use MD lenses on a Minolta AF lens mount — which would include the Sony A100. These show up on ebay now an then — but they usually end up selling for a couple hundred dollars. The Rokkor Files also has an in depth article about a real solution for using MD lenses on a digital camera. A company called Cameraquest offers an adapter that will mate Minolta MD lenses to an Olympus four-thirds dSLR, such as the E300. This isn’t hoax, but it isn’t inexpensive since you need a fairly recent Olympus dSLR and the Cameraquest adapter. Still if you absolutely need a digital option for your manual focus Minolta lenses, this might be the best option. I intend to look into this more fully in a future post.

Of course if someone at Seagull is paying attention to all that traffic clamoring for the non-existent D55, they would be smart to produce such an animal. If Seagull — or any other manufacturer were to provide an affordable dSLR that accepts Rokkor MD lenses — it is apparent they wouldn’t have to search very far for customers.

Until next time, stay focused! — Tom

Rokkor Files – Seagull D55

Rokkor Files Cameraquest adapter page

technorati tags:Minolta, Hoax, Rokkor, MD lenses, Seagull D55

Tweet This Post

I received a nice e-mail from Steve Sanders over at Steve’s Digicams. I have been reading through the material on Steve’s site for a number of years. It is definitely one of the first places I go to read reviews on digital cameras and accessories. If you haven’t been to the site, you’ll find a smorgasbord of information about cameras, scanners, batteries, flashes and more — all examined to the finest detail.

In his, e-mail, Steve alerted to me to the fact that Nikon has just posted a teaser on an all new, inexpensive 10MP dSLR on their website. Much like Sony did with the A100, Nikon is using a Flash presentation that hides most of the details about the new camera. There is a countdown timer in the window that indicates how many days are left until the new camera is introduced. Steve uses the term inexpensive — the Nikon presentation uses the term affordable. While I don’t have a list price for the new Nikon entry, I have to believe it will be under a grand — just to compete head-up with Sony.

A few posts back, I speculated that the A100 might be Sony’s low-end dSLR — with future models offering more features. I said then that Nikon’s replacement for the D50 would either have to have more features or have a much lower price than the A100.

So Nikon is now set to introduce an affordable 10MP model. How will this affect the Sony A100 sales and pricing? At this point in time, point, Sony offers a 10MP camera with a lower list price than either Nikon or Canon’s 6 and 8 MP models. Of course seller discounts allowed users to buy those same cameras at much lower costs than the Alpha — but once the Sony pipeline is full of product, most observers expect to see deep discounts on the A100 as well.

So Sony had the advantage of having a camera priced lower than the major competitors models, but offering better features and mega pixels. If Nikon introduces it’s new model with a lower list price, Sony’s advantage goes out the window. Even if Nikon simply matches Sony’s $999.00 list price for camera with lens package, Sony may still be a disadvantage because the Nikon brand carries so much weight in the still camera arena.

This could force Sony to lower the list price of the A100. Not immediately — just as users have had to wait for production Alphas to arrive at the market, it is doubtful that the new Nikon will suddenly be readily available. Still the threat is there . If the new Nikon steals too much thunder from the Alpha, and Sony will have to move to counteract it — either with an overall price reduction, a dealer price reduction that allows resellers to discount the A100 even further or through rebates.
Of course there is another factor to consider here. Canon — the 300 pound gorilla in the camera wars — isn’t likely to sit back and allow Nikon and Sony to eat into Canon’s market share. Canon has already announced the Digital Rebel is soon to be replaced with a new model. What do you want to bet it’s price and feature set will be designed to compete directly against the Alpha and the new Nikon offering?

Isn’t this a great time to be a digital SLR user! I can’t wait to see what the next six months will bring.
Until next time, stay focused! — Tom

Link to the Nikon countdown preview:
Nikon affordable 10MP SLR preview

technorati tags:Nikon

Tweet This Post

Pat Weitzel sent a link to his gallery of images taken with his brand new Sony A100. Not a pre-release prototype, but an actual production Sony Alpha A100. Pat had pre-ordered the camera and it arrived yesterday: July 20.

The color looks good and on one of the flower closeups (DSC00049) you can see what appears to be the gossamer thread of a spider’s web. You’ll have to view the image at the 3872 X 2592 pixel size to see it. Even with a broad-band connection, it takes a while to load at the size, but you can see the strands of the web. Zoom in to see the inside of the flower at image DSC00042 as well.

From information on his blog, I gather Pat lives somewhere in the Cleveland, Ohio area — which means, as of July 20th, US shooters who pre-ordered are starting to get their hands on the A100. That’s great news, as it means Sony has sufficient stock to ship the A100 to the USA well before the expected ship date of August 1st. Let the celebrations begin!

Anyone else pre-order and get their Sony dSLR already?

Tweet This Post

In my previous discussion on how I came to shoot with Minolta, I explained how I started toting my dad’s old Wirgin stereo camera until I out grew it’s capabilities. I was taking an advanced darkroom class and my mentor suggested I pick up a nice Pentax.

On his suggestion, I headed off to Adray’s intending to buy a Pentax SLR. In those days, Adray Appliance in Dearborn was THE place to buy camera equipment in the suburban Detroit area. There were some other good camera stores in downtown Detroit, but Adray’s owned the western Detroit suburban camera market. The only place I saw that offered better camera selection and prices in that era was New York City. And Adray’s approached even that.

It took me less than thirty seconds to determine I wanted nothing to do with the Pentax SLRs. The tiny pentaprism looked like a toy to my eyes and the whole feel of the camera seemed toy-like. Even worse, at that time Pentax had yet to offer their K-bayonet mount. The idea of a screw-mount SLR camera just didn’t fit my idea of a serious camera for travel and adventure. I knew I would be doing a lot of shooting in the outdoors, in wilderness conditions. Cross-threading or getting sand and dirt in the screw-mount threads seemed inevitable with the use I had planned.

My new friend behind the counter, sensing a sale, suggested a Nikon — I don’t remember the model. Now, many Nikon owners are known to be fanatical about their cameras, feeling that Nikon is a step above anything else. If you are one of those, why not do us both a favor and stop reading right about now. You probably don’t want to hear what I have to say.

I hated that Nikon. It was bulky and square-cornered and heavy as a brick. In fact that was it felt like — a brick with a flat pentaprism and a lens stuck to it. On top of that, my sales friend explained that I would have stop down the lens to meter correctly. To be fair, Nikon has produced some excellent cameras and their current crop of dSLRs seem to have excellent ergonomics. Too bad the current engineers weren’t around in that era to prevent Nikon from producing bricks. Maybe I would have gone with a Nikon back then. As it was, I knew i would never be happy with that Nikon.

I asked my sales-friend what else he had. “Well, there is the new Minolta SRT102,” he replied. He handed me the demo model and that was all he had to do to make the sale. Unlike the Nikon, the 102 felt good in my hands. The controls were extremely well laid-out, and the view finder was bright and clear, No stop-down metering here. The SRT102 could meter at full aperture.

In all, I felt the Nikon was an old farm truck, while the SRT102 was a sports car. I was sold. “Write it up,” I told the counter guy.

Amusingly enough I recently read the comments of a Nikon lover who claimed that the Minolta SRT series was ergonomically flawed compared to Nikon because the meter on/off switch was on the bottom of the camera. I would certainly prefer living with the SRT’s bottom mounted meter switch over the bulky, sharp-cornered Nikon any day. The only time the bottom switch caused any problem was when the camera was on a tripod or equipped with a flash bar that attached to the tripod socket. In these cases, the meter switch could be inaccessible. Even this was never much of a problem, primarily because the SRT102 was an all manual camera with a mechanical shutter. This meant the only thing the battery had to do was power the meter, so there was little battery drain. My usual procedure was to turn the meter on when I first brought the camera out of the case. I would then leave it on for as long as the shoot lasted — which might be all day when I covered major racing events. Then I would turn off the meter when I put the camera away for the day. Following this procedure, I usually replaced the battery once a year — whether it needed to be or not. Hardly seems to be much of an ergonomic problem — especially when the rest of the camera handled so well.

Unlike today, it wasn’t all that common to own a SLR in that era. To be sure, many amateurs and well-to-do folks owned SLRs and range-finders but it was much less common than today. The Minolta SRT and the rest of the offerings of that era were metal bodied cameras with mechanical shutters. In another decade, plastic bodies and less-expensive microchip controlled shutters would allow camera makers to slash the price of a SLR to the extent that they were affordable by even casual users. Today, you’ll find dSLRs in the hands of casual shooters as well. In the early seventies, SLRs were priced beyond the reach of most people. Even among those who could afford the sticker price, the idea of spending “that” much cash on a camera just didn’t seem practical.

There was second reason the average Joe (or Jill) avoided SLR cameras. They were perceived as difficult to operate — requiring a skilled expert to use properly. Only trained photographers knew how to operate a SLR. Of course this was a myth — early seventies SLRs were far easier to use than the dSLRs of today. But today’s cameras have auto exposure, auto focus, auto ISO (ASA back in the seventies), auto white-balances, auto x-ray vision. Okay, I made the last one up, but you get the idea. The older manual SLRs didn’t really require a PHD in Photographic Studies to operate — but many people assumed they did.

I remember the time I was photographing an auto race for a national publication. One of the racers that I knew casually approached me about some photo work he needed, He looked over my SRT102 equipped with a side grip flash and external battery pack. Shaking his head, he exclaimed “Man, how did you ever learn what all those dials and buttons are for? I couldn’t even begin to know how to use that thing!”

The hilarious thing was, this same man built racing engines for a living. Here was someone who understood all the intricate details of assembling a race engine to the finest tolerances and how to tune it to get the maximum power — yet he assumed my SLR was too difficult for him to use!

The SRT series was simple to use and required far less thumbing through the owner’s manual then any auto-everything film or digital SLR available today. Yet the older cameras were thought to be difficult to use, while almost anyone assumes they can use a dSLR. After all dSLRs are “automatic.”

I guess that’s what you call progress.

I’ll talk more about the SRT102 in the next post. Until then, stay focused! — Tom

Have comment on this post? Let me know what you think!

Tweet This Post

I’ve been pleased with the traffic to the site — and now that I’m seeing traffic, I thought a weekly poll would be a good way to see how the readership thinks. As long as the readership shows interest, I intend to add a new poll each week.

The question for this week is a natural for this site — do you intend to buy a Sony A100? The Alpha 100 is just starting to ship, so I think it will be interesting to see what everyone’s plans are for the new pice of hardware.

The poll will appear in the sidebar, and you can see immediately how everyone is voting. I’m using the Democracy Wordpress plugin by Jalenack and they say it checks IP addresses to prevent users from voting more than once. No stuffing the ballot box at Alphatracks!

Democracy Wordpress Plugin.

So let’s here what your intentions are. Are you waiting switching or pre-ordering? If you want to share more than a simple vote, go ahead and post your ballot, then leave a comment as to why you are or are not considering an A100. If you are buying an A100 — tell us why. If you won’t be buying an A100 we would like to know that as well.

I’ll continue my story about how I got started shooting with Minolta in the next post. Until then, stay focused!

– Tom

Tweet This Post

Most of the activity on this weblog has consisted of posts about the Sony A100 — with good reason. The A100 is Sony’s first SLR and it provides an upgrade path for current Minolta users. Minolta shooters want to know whether Sony got it right — or not. If you have a large investment in lenses and accessories and a new company shows up and becomes the only outlet for new and improved gear — it is natural to be a little apprehensive. There is a lot riding on the Alpha camera line, and anyone with a vested interest in Minolta auto-focus SLRs is watching the A100 to see just how true Sony will remain to the Minoltas of the past. So, in a sense, the eyes of most Minolta shooters are on the A100.

This weblog is about more than Sony, however, and it isn’t restricted to digital SLRs — although I think most of the posts will focus on digital offerings from Sony and Minolta. Film isn’t quite dead yet, however. There are still a host of photographers shooting film, either because they still aren’t comfortable with digital — or because certain occasions or circumstances call for film for best results.

With the introduction of the A100, I started to think about how I got involved with Minolta — and photography — in the first place. More years ago then I really want to think about, I was serious about a career in film making. Not Hollywood style chase-scene and explosion films, but travel documentaries — better known as Travelogs. I took a series of classes taught by Adrian Lustig. Lustig had created and produced travelogs for many years and proved an excellent trainer.

After competing my classes with Lustig, I thought I should develop my still photography as well. I had recently spent three weeks on Isle Royale National Park, a small patch of wilderness located in the middle of Lake Superior. I had packed along my trusty Kodak 110 Instamatic. Besides images of the breath-taking scenery, I managed several dramatic close-ups of moose and fox. That was with a 110, non-telephoto snapshot camera. Imagine what I might have achieved with a telephoto lens! Fresh from that experience, I thought a little camera training might improve my shooting.

Instead of a class on how to take better photos, however, the class I enrolled in turned out to be a class in darkroom techniques. Although it wasn’t what I expected, I was immediately intrigued by developing and printing my own images. I loved the class and soon had my own black & white darkroom.

There was just one problem. My 110 negatives were just two small to really get the great prints I was after. The film choices were limited, the grain in 8X10s was huge, and most enlarging lens were designed for larger negatives. Obviously, I needed a camera that would produce better negatives — at least 35mm in size.

My dad had an old Wirgin Stereo camera. He had a boxes and boxes of 3D Stereo slides that looked three dimensional when you wore those funny glasses. I had no interest in stereo photography — but the Wirgin actually took standard 35mm film. I started loading the Wirgin with Tri-X and Plus-X pan film. Because it was a stereo camera, it actually produced two negatives of every shot — today people order double prints, back then I was shooting double negs. In addition, the negatives weren’t standard 35mm size — they were square “half-frame” negatives measuring 7/8″ wide by 15/16″ high.

There was no light meter either. I had a hand-held Norwood Director that measured ambient light. The camera had a flash-shoe, but I don’t remember ever taking anything but available light images with the Wirgin.

If you are interested in finding out about the long-forgotten Wirgin camera company, try the following link:

The History of Kamerawerk Gebr.Wirgin

I dragged dad’s old Wirgin around for several months and soaked up as much photo-craft as I could. I learned the ins and outs of the black and white darkroom. I inhaled too much Dektol, D-76 and Fixer to be healthy. I helped the owner of local film store put his kids through college.

Most of the images from the Wirgin seemed to be slightly over-exposed, either because I developed the film too long or because the camera and/or light meter were out of calibration. Still, I got some nice images. Few and far between, perhaps, but the Wirgin did give me some good images.

Even so, It was obvious I was outgrowing the Wirgin with it’s fixed 35mm, f3.5 lens (To be correct, I should say lenses because of the dual stereo setup.) The half-frame negs were much larger than my old 110 negs, but still only half the size of a true 35mm camera. The ambient light meter was fine for close-ups, but often inaccurate for distant objects where the light characteristics might differ greatly from where I was measuring the light. I had to custom make gear to allow me to use the half-frame negatives in my enlargers. My film cost was higher, as well, because each shot was recorded twice. Most importantly, there was no interchangeable lenses for the Wirgin Stereo.

I needed something more. I needed another camera. I needed a 35mm SLR.

Next time, I’ll discuss how I settled on Minolta as my camera of choice. Until then, Stay focused — Tom

Tweet This Post