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  • A Fetishist’s Guide to the Monochrom (Part 1)

    A Fetishist’s Guide to the Monochrom (Part 1)

    Sharpness is nothing more than a fetish. So, too, is tonality. Noise, contrast, micro-contrast and megapixels? All fetishes. Even black and white. Show me a photographer and I’ll show you a fetishist.

    Every new camera will titillate some photographers, while disgusting others. Fortunately, none of us are so dysfunctional that we possess every known photo fetish, but we all possess at least a few. Curiously, most of us fail to see our own proclivities as fetishes — believing that our desires represent a photographer’s “true” needs, while anyone with contrary needs is some kind of deranged sicko. In reality, we’re all deranged sickos.

    When Leica asked me to shoot with the Monochrom and articulate my impressions, I knew I could follow one of two paths: either I could look at the camera strictly within the confines of my own specific fetishes, or I could use it more liberally in situations where I wouldn’t normally be motivated to take photos. Because the latter path would benefit a wider range of sickos photographers, it became my roadmap for this series of articles.

    Knowing that my Monochrom impressions would be read by thousands of potential purchasers had a profound influence on what I shot and how I shot it. Normally, I tend to be a very frugal photographer. I prefer to make my selects before I press the shutter rather than after. If a shot doesn’t make my heart skip a beat, I’ll usually skip the shot. Thus, if I go out for a day with my old M2, I’ll probably come home with only 3 or 4 shots — one of which might be vaguely worthy of some future consideration. With the M9, I’ll come home with about a dozen shots, though it remains likely only one still warrants any future consideration. When the Monochrom arrived, I knew such an austere methodology would yield an article with only 2 or 3 photos. Since my readers would definitely want more, I needed to devise a way to take a lot of photos in a very short time. To meet this task, I released my inner-Winogrand. Quite famously, Garry Winogrand once stated, “I photograph to find out what something will look like photographed.” This became my mantra for my time with the camera — I photographed to find out what something will look like photographed with the Monochrom.

    As a result, the goal for this article is not to shine a light upon my photographic “brilliance” (cough), but to instead illuminate the various attributes of the Monochrom, and how those attributes might appeal to a wide range of users. This is an article in which the pictures serve the story, rather than the story serving the pictures. Consequently, some of the images are trite; some are pedantic; but they exist to edify rather than entertain.

    The sad result is that I can no longer write disparagingly of people who photograph walls when they write about cameras, as I’ve now joined their dubious ranks.

    So without further ado, I invite all you photographic deviants to search this 3-part article for your various fetishes, beginning with the mechanical here in Part 1, and decide whether or not the Monochrom might be right for you.

    Leather Fetishists

    Let’s get the kinky fetish out of the way first — leather. Unlike the previous digital M’s, the Monochrom ships with a swanky leather strap. Sure, it looks nice dangling from your shoulder — but who carries their Leica like that? If you’re using your Monochrom for sport, rather than for show, you’re going to be wrapping that leather strap around your wrist, not draping it oh-so roguishly from your shoulder. I carry my Leica in-hand, where it’s ready to respond instantly to the dynamic world around me. Stiff leather does not conform to a bundle of twists about the wrist nearly as lithely as nylon. On more than one occasion, I felt the urge to open my toolbox, extract a hammer, and smite that strap into submission. On several other occasions, I fantasized about tossing the strap onto the middle of Vancouver’s Burrard Street bridge, where heavy vehicular traffic would pummel it into something approximating “pliable.” But, conscientious citizen that I am, I knew the next recipient of this demo camera would not appreciate receiving a strap that looked like week-old road kill, so I refrained. Ultimately, were I to own a Monochrom, I’d have to decide whether to cudgel the strap into something more supple, or simply purchase a nylon strap — thus leaving the supplied leather strap unscathed, and more enticing to whomever purchases the Monochrom from the estate sale that follows my demise.

    The next topic in my leather litany is the camera’s synthetic leather body wrap. The Monochrom’s body “leather” is different than any other M-body I’ve owned, thus continuing Leica’s long tradition of changing covers with each new M-body release. It’s much more finely grained than my M9, meaning it’s much smoother. “Smooth” normally means “less grip,” which isn’t exactly a desirable trait for someone who carries their Leica in-hand. But looks can deceive — and while the Monochrom is definitely smoother than my delightfully pebbly M9 wrapping, I found it afforded an almost identical amount of grip when my hands were dry, and a surprisingly more reassuring grip when my hands were sweating. Sadly, none of my digital M’s have had wraps that grip nearly as well as my M6TTL which, in turn, isn’t nearly as grippy as the original vulcanite on my M2. I wish Leica could wrap these cameras in the same kind of materials used in the old days, but I suspect price and/or environmental issues prevent it.

    Talking about leather may seem trivial, but when you spend all day, every day, carrying a camera, comfort and security are important.

    Metal Fetishists

    There are those who believe plastic — any plastic — on a camera is blasphemy. I’m happy to report that, like all the M’s before it, the Monochrom retains the highest metal percentage of any modern camera, and features the same die-cast magnesium alloy body and solid brass top deck and bottom plate as the previous models. This is a camera that will simply delight metal fetishists.

    I’m somewhat less happy to report that the brass top deck is finished in black chrome, rather than black paint. The type of black finish is, not surprisingly, its own sub-fetish in the Leica world — with black paint fetishists occupying one dungeon and black chrome fetishists occupying another. Black chrome has a tendency to look a bit dull and weathered out of the box, but takes a pretty good beating without ever becoming duller or more weathered. The black chrome finish on my old M6TTL is virtually indistinguishable from the black chrome finish on the brand-new Monochrom — meaning either that the M6 looks “new” or the Monochrom looks “old,” depending on whether you’re a “glass is half empty” or “glass is half full” kind of person.

    The powdery luster of a black paint body (like my M9) is, I believe, the “prettier” of the two black finishes. One of the main characteristics of black paint is that, over time, it wears away and the brass shows through. Some find this look “ugly,” while others (like me) think it’s beautiful. To me, a brassed camera is a loved camera. My M9 is just beginning to show the tiniest hint of brassing, and I couldn’t be happier — it’s like a badge of honor. Leica designed the Monochrom for maximum stealth, so one could argue that an old brassed camera becomes “flashier” and thus less “stealthy” than an old black chrome camera. But I think the older a camera looks, the more stealthy it becomes — simply because people tend to completely dismiss any photographer they see carrying what they perceive to be an old camera.

    Ultimately, if you’re going to let the fact the camera is finished in black chrome rather than black paint influence your purchase decision, you’re not a fetishist — you’re just plain nuts.

    Handling Fetishists

    How does the camera handle? With photographers possessing a profusion of polarizing proclivities (how’s that for some impressive alliteration?!), it’s a question without a definitive answer. The Monochrom is, of course, a rangefinder. It features the same basic body and controls as the Leica M9 which, in turn, is ergonomically similar to every other M-series camera dating back to 1954. Whether or not you think this is a good thing depends on whether or not you like rangefinders. For my photography, there is no better form factor, and I’m absolutely delighted that such a bold and purposeful camera has arrived in rangefinder form. Those familiar with the M9 will find the button layout identical and the menus very similar to (though, obviously, not exactly the same as) Leica’s flagship color digital M9.

    Operationally, the Monochrom handles identically to my M9. I had expected that the Monochrom would be even slower than the M9 at writing image files to the SD card, but I ran a series of tests in which I triggered both cameras simultaneously, and they took exactly the same amount of time — even when shooting a 4-shot burst in “continuous mode” (which, admittedly, is a feature I’ve never once used).

    Unfortunately, I did experience one recurring issue with the Monochrom that I’d experienced only once in 3 years with my M9 — camera lock-up. Specifically, every few days, the Monochrom would completely lock-up when I pressed the shutter button. It wouldn’t take a photo, it would just die. The camera became completely unresponsive (as if it had no battery installed), which meant the buttons, LCD and power switch did nothing. To bring the camera back to life, I’d simply remove the battery, wait for a few seconds, then re-insert it. The camera and I would then continue on our merry way, though I’d be disappointed at having missed the photo I’d wanted to take. Not surprisingly, in total adherence to Murphy’s Law, it seemed like the lock-up ALWAYS occurred during the most intriguing photo opportunity of the day. Unfortunately, I was unable to identify the root cause. Lock ups would happen whether the battery was fully charged, half-charged, or nearly depleted. They’d happen if I tried to take a couple photos in quick succession, but they’d also happen if I hadn’t taken a photo in hours. They’d happen if the camera had fallen asleep, and they’d happen if the camera was still awake. I have since returned the camera to Leica and they’re investigating whether or not my problems are an isolated case or endemic of a wider problem.

    Luxury Fetishists

    Some people actually acquire Leica products because of their luxury status. Leica, itself, feeds this market with special edition versions of their products — versions that will sit in display cases as objects d’art rather than in the hands of hardworking documentary photographers. From my vantage point in a completely different universe, I simply can’t imagine the Monochrom having much (if any) appeal to the luxury crowd. It’s not covered in ostrich skin. It doesn’t gleam in the showcase. Shine a light on it, and it’ll suck it dark like a black hole. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say the Monochrom is, perhaps, the most austere, unadorned and restrained camera I’ve ever used. I quite like this about the Monochrom — but I suspect Luxury Fetishists will feel just the opposite.

    The camera is flat black with nary a Leica logo in sight. The model name is barely discernible atop the right edge of the hotshoe, and there’s no engraving anywhere except on the back — save for a small serial number stamped atop the body, which makes the camera resemble a piece of bog-standard government issue more than an item of luxury.

    Plain, unprepossessing and perhaps a touch “homely,” the Monochrom is designed to draw absolutely no attention to itself — making it essentially the opposite of a luxury camera. Save for the conceit of a leather strap, it is, pure and simple, a shooter’s camera.

    So, in Part 2 of this article, I’ll discuss how the Monochrom lives up to its raison d’être — photo fidelity — and all the various image fetishes surrounding it. No more “fun and games.” We’re going to get our hands good and dirty…

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    This article (along with many of its associated comments) first appeared in my f/Egor column for the Leica Camera Blog on October 23, 2012.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • The Inverted Maslow

    The Inverted Maslow

    Recently, I ended my ePub-a-Dub-Dub article with a question: “How’s that for a crazy, upside-down world?” I asked. Though meant rhetorically, it prompted a hint of genuine self-curiosity. Why do I always believe the world is upside-down? I know plenty of people who think it’s A-OK just the way it is. There must be some explanation; some viable theory? I filed the question in my mental “To Do” list of existential problems that I’ll likely never solve, then carried on with my daily business.

    A couple days ago, while chasing down some unrelated snippet of trivia, I stumbled across a Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs diagram. Anyone who’s ever been subjected to an introductory psychology class has had this old chestnut foisted upon them.

    For the benefit of all who skipped class on Maslow day, I’ll provide a brief overview. In the early 1940’s, Abraham Maslow devised a theory that the human condition has a pre-defined set of needs, and that humans go about satisfying these needs in a certain order — from the bottom up. Maslow theorized that humans must satisfy one set of needs before they can address the next set, creating a foundation upon which ever-more psychologically complex needs reveal themselves.

    In Maslow’s model, humans have a primal instinct to first satisfy certain physiological requirements, like food and water, before worrying about much else. Once their physiological needs are met, people become more concerned with safety and security issues — issues that are, in turn, more urgent than the next hierarchy of needs: love & belonging. According to Maslow, once humans have food, water, a job, a home, good health, family, friends and sexual intimacy, they can then go about satisfying their need to be respected and appreciated. Finally, once they’ve gained the respect of their peers and colleagues, they can begin their quest for the ultimate need — the need for self-actualization and the knowledge that one has achieved their full potential as a human being.

    Maslow’s pyramid implies that human motivation always builds upon a balanced foundation of needs, and that we’re each distinguished by how high we’ve managed to build our pyramid of sated demands. But like most “catch all” theories involving human existence, Maslow’s has one fatal flaw — it doesn’t “catch” me. In fact, it utterly fails to define the seemingly haphazard way in which my own needs structure has evolved — a structure that looks something like this:

    Sadly, I’m not the only person with a needs structure that’s more “shanty” than “pyramid.” In fact, I’ve know people whose needs structures aren’t even “structures” at all — they’re demolition sites.

    Unlike Maslow, I don’t profess to have insight into all human motivations, but I do know a little something about the needs of creative people. Mind you, when I use the term “creative people,” I’m not talking about someone who takes a pottery class at the local community center. I’m talking about people who are compulsively driven to create something that will change the world — or, at least, change that one little piece of the world that interests them. This person could be a composer, a writer, a scientist, or even a photographer. These people, who I’ll refer to simply as “creatives,” have needs structures that appear to totally invalidate Maslow’s theory.

    For creatives, it’s as if Maslow doesn’t exist. Everything in the creative’s world is sacrificed for the pinnacle of the pyramid — self-actualization. But Maslow’s model dictates that people can only be interested in higher-level needs once their lower-level needs are satisfied.

    As I looked at the standard Maslow diagram, the question that began this article entered my head: “Why do I always believe the world is upside-down?”

    On a whim, I turned Maslow’s needs pyramid upside-down — and that’s when I saw it: The creative person’s hierarchy of needs was simply an inverted Maslow pyramid!

    It all made sense. Maslow’s theory that one must satisfy a lower-level need before addressing an upper-level need is actually sound — it’s just that he got the order inverted for creatives. Self-Actualization is the fundamental need that drives all creatives. It is, in many ways, their most basic need. Of course, once they’ve satisfied their own creative mandates, creatives want others to know and appreciate what they’ve done. Esteem is thus something that can be sought only after a creative has satisfied himself. And though many creatives long for intimate relationships, they’re rarely able or willing to put the time and energy into making them work — love simply takes too much time away from the process of creating. Thus, establishing intimate and meaningful relationships is something many creatives can do only after achieving a certain measure of self-actualization and esteem. Finally, many creatives seem to view their own safety, security and physiological needs with a sort of “disdain” — as if the act of assuaging them (or the effort spent in trying) is so pedestrian, banal and trite that their fulfillment is tantamount to “selling out.” Only the most successful, respected and loved creatives ever seem to achieve the top echelon of the inverted Maslow Pyramid.

    Not only does the inverted Maslow do an excellent job of explaining the motivations of creative individuals, but it also indicates why creative people are often more fragile and unstable. Just look at that structure. The entire thing — a creative’s entire existence — balances on a single point. Unless those needs situated above self-actualization are met with the utmost care and balance, the whole pyramid tips over on its side.

    All these years I thought Maslow was a crock. Turns out I was wrong. I was just looking at it upside-down. Typical.

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: Yes, indeed, they’re all photos of steps. What can I say? I’m a sucker for symbolism. “Into the Light” was shot with a Leica M9 and a 28mm Summicron. “Pyramidal” was shot with a Leica M9 and a 1982 v4 35mm Summicron. “Ascent to Nowhere” was shot with a Ricoh GXR using a 50mm A12 lens module. “Descent to Nowhere” was shot with a Leica M Monochrom and a 35mm Summilux-M lens.  No shutters were activated in the creation of the three Maslow Needs Pyramids, which I created by sprinkling a bit of mirth on a Photoshopped amalgamation of various existing illustrations.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • ePub-a-Dub-Dub

    ePub-a-Dub-Dub

    Wizened elders speak of a time, long ago, when writers wrote, illustrators illustrated, photographers photographed, publishers published and coders (what few there were) coded.

    I, myself, am not wizened enough to have lived in these magical times, but I am elder enough to have borne witness to the ongoing elimination of barriers between professions.

    In the late 1980’s, if I wrote an article for a music magazine, I would type it up on my Macintosh Plus (typewriters were already anachronistic), save it as a text file, prepare a few PICT illustrations in MacPaint, then drag everything onto a floppy disk, which I’d slide into a cardboard envelope and “snail mail” to the publisher. Three months later, my article would appear in print: formatted, kerned, justified, paginated and nestled amongst several glossy ads for the latest “must have” synthesizers. Since I served as both writer and illustrator, it wasn’t quite the legendary purity of professional separation — but it was the closest I would ever come.

    In the early 1990’s I was creating electronic music hardware and software and, while the coders were off coding my latest design, I would write the owner’s manuals. Unlike the halcyon magazine days, I was now my own publisher — creating templates in FrameMaker and learning all about fonts, digital “typesetting,” layout, indexing, and the mechanics of “signatures,” “bindings,” paper “weights” and other esoteric bookmaking terms.

    By the mid-1990’s CD-ROMs became all the rage, and it wasn’t cool to have printed manuals anymore — you had to create interactive, hyperlinked multimedia manuals that shipped on CD (saving companies a minor fortune in printing costs). This, of course, meant it was no longer enough to be a writer, illustrator, layout designer and publisher — I needed to also become a graphic designer, an animator, and a code writer.

    Time marched on. The CD-ROM died and was replaced by the internet, which required a whole new set of coding skills, along with a new knowledge of server technology and a basket full of new acronyms like HTML, CSS and SQL to wrap my head around. It also coincided with the time people decided they didn’t like to read anymore — meaning I had to learn how to create videos, plus a whole lot of nonsense about frame rates, codecs, color grading, motion graphics, etc.

    While all this was happening in my professional music life, it was being mirrored in my photographic endeavors. Marketing my photography meant self-publishing material on the internet, which eventually morphed into the ULTRAsomething website, which meant indulging in numerous publications about WordPress, Search Engine Optimization, Javascript, and even more CSS. Then the world went all social-media crazy, and the internet fragmented into a million different pieces. This required duplicating, triplicating and quadruplicating my efforts so that my content could find everyone — whether they preferred Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Pinterest or some other hip but ultimately unnecessary extraction.

    Then came the proliferation of mobile devices and the realization that I must further fragment and repurpose my content specifically for the different types of devices one might use to access that content… which brings us to the point of this article (and after only eight paragraphs)!

    My latest article for the Leica Blog, in which I wrote about my impressions of the Leica M Monochrom, was 10,000 words long — perhaps too unwieldy for the attention-deprived tendencies of the blogosphere. I had originally wanted to publish it as a downloadable PDF, but Leica requested a three-part blog entry instead.

    After fulfilling Leica’s blog requirements, I returned to the idea of turning the Monochrom article into a stand-alone PDF. Naturally, this decision meant discovering a plethora of additional things I didn’t know. Specifically, I didn’t know how to create a PDF in which photographs could be clicked and zoom to full-screen at a higher resolution. Nor did I know whether the fixed layout of my fancy and beautifully-realized PDF would actually be legible on the new breed of smaller mobile devices, like the iPad Mini. And what about the crazies who might actually want to read this on a smart phone? Influenced by years of internet-induced schizophrenia, I opted not to bother learning the answers. Instead, I shifted gears and decided to publish the Monochrom article as an ePub.

    Of course, I knew nothing about how to create ePubs other than the fact Adobe’s inDesign (which I’d used to create owner’s manuals in the early 2000’s) would allow me to export a document in ePub format. So it’s got to be simple, right? Wrong. The document looked absolutely hideous on my iPad — crazy fonts, weird page breaks, and photographs that split across two pages. After some investigation, I learned that many of these issues could be rectified by creating and embedding custom CSS — but what I couldn’t figure out was how to actually get at that CSS in my inDesign file. So, rather than spend even more time learning about inDesign quirks, I decide to switch to Apple’s Pages application, which could also output an ePub file.

    The Pages output looked much better, but still had numerous problems that needed to be fixed with CSS. And just as with inDesign, I couldn’t figure out an elegant way to modify and experiment with the CSS stylesheets. It seemed that Pages required that I first generate an ePub and then try to find and modify its CSS, which would require going back and manually re-coding every change each time I updated the Pages document. At that point, it seemed quite pointless to use Pages, since I’d ultimately have to hand-code the ePub anyway. So I dug deeper, and discovered Sigil — a free cross-platform ePub creator. I was able to use Sigil to create the Monochrom ePub, and I was able to fix some of the display problems with custom CSS… and that’s when I realized that, because ePubs are an open standard, no one actually wants to support them. After all, there’s no money in standards. If you’re Apple, you don’t want people reading ePubs when they could be buying iBooks. Same holds true if you make Kindles, or Sony readers, or any of a number of different dedicated devices. Everyone seems to purposely break their device’s ePub reader, just so their own proprietary (and lucrative) format becomes more enticing by comparison. It’s a crazy world.

    So after spending way too much time researching work-arounds and dealing with an endless stream of formatting frustrations, the Monochrom ePub is finished:

    EPUB DOWNLOAD: “A FETISHIST’S GUIDE TO THE MONOCHROM”

    It’s far from perfect (I seem to have no control over orphans or hyperactive hyphenating), but it’s functional — at least on my first generation iPad. Frankly, I haven’t tested it on any other devices because I don’t own any other devices. Besides, I’d probably collapse into a blob of quivering goo if I were to discover that, like the iPad, some other device failed to support the most simple of CSS tags in their ePub reader, thus breaking the format in a whole other manner.

    But hopefully, it was worth it for anyone who prefers to kick back and read lengthy articles on their tablet’s ePub reader. iPad users should also be aware of a handy feature in their iBooks application, which enables them to double-tap any photo in the ePub and make it zoom to display full-screen — an absolute necessity for examining some of the detailed image characteristics discussed throughout the article. I have no idea if this is possible on other devices.

    Needless to say, I won’t be providing tech support for this. It either works or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t, there’s always the good old-fashioned, 3-part web version:

    You know what the craziest thing is about all this? The more professions I need to learn; the more hats I need to don; the more all-nighters I need to pull; the more hurdles I need to clear just to get content into the hands of end-users — the more my income drops. How’s that for a crazy, upside-down world?

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: All photos were shot with a Leica M Monochrom camera using various lenses. Specifically: “Encroachment” used a 28mm Summicron lens; “Meter Feeders” was shot with a 1982 v4 35mm Summicron, “The Model” employed a Voigtlander 15mm Super Wide Heliar, and the two “Worst Food Cart Logos,” “Circus Geek Category” and “Ruggero Deodato Category” were shot with a 1991 v5 50mm Summicron.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • Terrible Parables

    Terrible Parables

    One day, I realized that photo blogs are never written as parables. On the second day, I wrote a pair of parables. On the third day, I read my parables and realized why photo blogs are never written as parables. On the fourth day, I published them anyway…

    – — –

    The Mermaid and the Curmudgeon

    One summer’s afternoon, a photographer strolled lazily upon the beach. His mind vacillated between dreams for the future and recollections of the past, while he avoided most adroitly any thoughts of substance.

    On the seawall above him, bicyclists zipped to and fro, and he pondered how mankind could still fancy such a primitive mode of transportation some 50 years after witnessing James Bond tool around in a jetpack.

    The photographer’s thoughts shifted from Thunderball to Dr. No, and his mind’s eye watched with delight as Ursula Andress emerged from the sea in a fetching yellow bikini. Only the girl wasn’t Ursula Andress and her bikini wasn’t yellow. In fact, there was no bikini at all. “This is not my mind’s eye,” thought the photographer. “This is real!”

    The naked girl materialized from the surf, and sauntered most purposefully across the man’s path. But unlike Ms. Andress, who seemed quite miffed to find Sean Connery upon the beach, this Ms. Undress was rather cavalier toward the photographer’s presence. He wanted to believe this was because he was far more handsome and dashing than Sean Connery, but suspected a more likely explanation: that the girl from the sea was simply a bit of an exhibitionist.

    In spite of being a photographer, the man completely forgot that he was grasping a camera, and had the mermaid not nodded toward it with a coy smile and a tacit acceptance, he would very likely have failed to take a photo.

    The photographer was one of those grouchy, anti-zoom, fundamentalist types with a penchant for wide angle lenses and a righteous attitude that no one ever needs carry more than a single lens of a single focal length. On this day, he happened to have a 21mm Elmarit lens mounted to a Leica M2. Though now quite painfully aware of the error of his ways, he snapped a photo anyway.

    MORAL

    The only thing sadder than an unprincipled existence is a principled one.

    – — –

    The Stradivarius and the Punk Rocker

    Once upon a time there lived a man vicariously through his camera. Like others with a derivative existence, he was forever searching for increased lucidity within his surrogate world.

    As a photographer, he did as others before him: he sought that lucidity in the form of the immaculate image — a quest that lead him to appreciate quality camera equipment and, most specifically, quality lenses.

    The man had a profound fondness for a particular league of sorcerers, who practiced their spells and incantations in the fabled land of Solms. There, through a combination of alchemy, mathematics and secret incantations, these magicians crafted looking glasses with preternatural abilities. The man was infatuated with the way these enchanted discs translated and transformed the world — how that world glowed and sparkled; how its colors teased his retina; and how it unambiguously revealed its tiniest secrets.

    One day the wizards from Solms loaned the man a parcel, within which resided one of their most mystical lens creations. He knew of this particular lens’ legendary powers, and had witnessed its grandeur through the altered realities of other photographers. So, like them, he set forth and photographed luminous blue oceans, velvety green foliage and autumnally amber sunsets. And each time he would do this, he would throw up a little in his own mouth. Because, while this lens had a profound capacity to paint the most sensuous dreams imaginable, they were not his dreams.

    He was, you see, a photo punk — more Strummer than Clapton; more Stravinsky than Mozart; more Lee Morgan than Louis Armstrong. For him, passion trumped technique. Visceral trumped visual.

    In the eyes of many, lending this man a precision optic was akin to giving a Stradivarius to a punk rocker. The rocker may audition it clumsily with an appropriate stab at Brahms, but would inevitably cast the instrument as a caterwauling accompaniment to his latest cacophonous sonic assault. And all those who sought to pigeonhole the instrument would cover their ears in horror.

    And the simile was fair and just, because the photographer indeed removed this beautiful lens from its beautiful surroundings, and carried it onto the ugly streets — casting it as an interpreter of a tortured anti-fidelity where images are as flawed as the world he photographs, and where beauty is something he feels and not something he sees. And all those who sought to pigeonhole the lens would cover their eyes in horror…

    MORAL

    A tool used as intended is an avenue unexplored.

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: “Illustration 1: The Mermaid and the Curmudgeon” was shot with a Leica M2 and an old Leica 21mm f/2.8 Elmarit-M pre-ASPH lens on ADOX CHS-100 Art Film, which I developed in a 1:50 solution of Rodinal. “Illustration 2: Maximum Banality” was the very first image I shot with a borrowed 35mm f/1.4 Summilux lens mounted to my Leica M9. “Illustration 3: The Stradivarius and the Punk Rocker” was shot with the same equipment about 2 hours later, once I’d gotten the banality out of my system. And yes, the third image does violate my “do not photograph panhandlers” principle, but I admire this fellow’s dedication (he’s in the exact same spot every night, every month, every year). So I took a little advice from my own opening parable…

    This article (along with many of its associated comments) first appeared in my f/Egor column for the Leica Camera Blog on September 24, 2012.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • ((P)re)incarnation

    ((P)re)incarnation

    Reincarnation

    Teleport yourself to any random coordinate on earth, then ask the first person you see if they believe in something they can’t necessarily prove. Some will profess to a belief in ghosts; or Heaven; or fate; or telekinesis; or the likelihood that we humans are nothing more than genetically engineered apes — the byproduct of some precocious alien teenager’s high school biology project. The beliefs will be as varied as the people you ask, but each and every person will cling to at least one fanciful notion.

    We all believe in something we can’t see. We have to. It gives us hope. Personally, I believe in science. Yet even science, at its most extreme, requires substantial leaps of faith. How else should we explain all those severed human heads stored in cryogenic chambers throughout the world?

    The more spiritual beliefs have always been tougher for me to swallow. Take reincarnation — the belief that the soul doesn’t die, but is instead transferred from one body into another. Born and re-born, it lives throughout all eternity. It’s a romantic idea — beautiful and poetic. But why is it that everyone I’ve known, who claims awareness of a previous existence, professes to have been royalty, famous, or at the very least, epically heroic? It just doesn’t seem statistically feasible that every reincarnated soul has enjoyed such an enviable preincarnation!

    Incarnation

    My driver’s license reveals that I’m no whipper snapper. I’m old enough to have taken a substantial number of film-based photos, and I’ve done so. Many will likely conclude that my current love for old film cameras is simply the result of an acute case of obstinacy — that I’m merely a luddite with one foot still stuck in the primordial ooze from which I quasi-evolved. It’s a notion nearly as idealized as reincarnation — but it’s false.

    In reality, I began extricating myself from film quite early on. In 1992, I purchased a film scanner and Photoshop, and began to process all my photos digitally. In 1994, I stepped on the slippery slope of digital cameras with Apple’s QuickTake 100, and by mid-1998 (and the arrival of the Kodak DC260) I was shooting more digital than film. When I acquired an Olympus E-10 in late 2000, I sold my last remaining film camera.

    So an aversion to digital can’t very well explain why, in the year 2012, I’ve shot more with film cameras than with digital. I’ve already professed to my belief in science and the future of technology, so how could anyone conclude I’m simply clinging to the old, familiar ways?

    Besides, the whole “Egor is a knuckle dragging Neanderthal” theory doesn’t address the most curious aspect of my film fixation — that my addiction is not to the film cameras from my “glory days,” but to cameras that existed before I was born; cameras like my twin-lens reflexes, and my 1959 Leica M2 and 1952 Leica IIIf.

    Initially, I assumed my love for these old cameras was due entirely to a single practical reason — price. With a little bit of digging, you can find some nearly mint gear for next to nothing (and sometimes even for nothing)! The fact is, most people have only a limited amount of space to store discarded items. So, to make room in the garage/attic/basement for last year’s outdated digital camera, people are throwing out last century’s film cameras. This means a careful picker can pick himself a cabinet full of cameras for less than the price of a single, modern digital enthusiast camera. But it occurred to me that this can’t be the only factor influencing which cameras I select . After all, I frequently come across newer, less expensive, and more scientifically advanced film cameras that are ripe for the picking. Yet lately, I’ve been bypassing these technically superior models from the 1980’s and 1990’s — products that I lusted for in my youth — in favor of the more cumbersome mid-century cameras.

    Thus, I’ve concluded there can be only one possible reason why I’m running more and more film through cameras that are older than I am — reincarnation.

    Preincarnation

    Apparently, in my past life, I was a photographer. Or at least I wanted to be. But unlike my other reincarnated friends, I wasn’t royalty — not even close. I probably owned something like an Argus C3, but lusted after the unattainable offerings from Rollei and Leica. The imprint from my previous incarnation is so strong that it bleeds through into my current incarnation, which rejoices in the fact that it’s now able to realize the dreams of a previous existence. It’s a good thing for me that Leica and Rollei had no concept of built-in obsolescence — these cameras are every bit as functional today as they were when my preincarnation drooled over them at the local cameradashers.

    These old cameras are quirky, intractable and eccentric. Each forces the photographer to completely rethink his methods, his beliefs and his approach to photography. They’re not just old school, they’re your grandfather’s old school — or your preincarnation’s.

    Those of you who weren’t mid-century photo geeks in your previous life will likely prefer the 1?button simplicity of your iPhone cameras. Those who are photo geeks in this lifetime, but weren’t so geeky in your previous existence, simply want a “bigger” iPhone — something like a DSLR that still provides 1?button simplicity, but packs a whole lot more processing power, pixels and optical quality behind that button. Me? I gotta push me some buttons. Lots of buttons! And throw in some dials and levers while you’re at it. I want to control the camera. I don’t want it to control me.

    Sometimes the lives we lead are our own. Sometimes, we’re still living the lives of our preincarnates. So for those with photographic preincarnations similar to mine (or for the entertainment of those who are easily entertained), I present the following discussions about how two such dream cameras from a previous era fit into the current one.

    A Reincarnate’s View of the Rolleicord

    By the time I’ve popped open its shade, wrapped my head around the reversed image on the ground glass, flipped up the magnifier, then twiddled the knob to achieve the precise focus necessitated by medium format film, my subject is already home having dinner. Good thing, too — because they’d grow mighty hungry waiting for me to futz around with the exposure controls.

    On the Rolleicord, shutter speed and aperture are set with a pair of fiddly little metal protrusions that extend from a single exposure dial encircling the taking lens. These protrusions are locked together and spin in unison — so rotating the shutter speed tab simultaneously changes the aperture, and vice-versa. To uncouple them, you need to press the tab to the lens’ right, which allows it to turn independently from the tab on the lens’ left.

    This default linking of aperture and shutter speed probably seems strange to anyone whose preincarnated self wasn’t a photographer during the first half of the 20th century. But it actually makes sense. Since these cameras come from an era when people could actually function without light meters, camera makers devised a simple, single-number designation to represent exposure — the “EV” number. EV, which stands for Exposure Value, is a ridiculously easy way to set exposure. Using the pictograms on the back of the camera, or the pictograms on a box of film, or a simple little chart you keep in your mind, any photographer can properly expose any scene by simply looking at it and setting their camera to the proper Exposure Value. Got Tri-X and a sunny day? That’s EV15. Heavily overcast? Probably EV12. There are many combinations of aperture and shutter speed that will result in the same exposure value. For example, 1/500 @ f/4, 1/250 @ f/5.6, 1/125 @ f/8 and 1/60 @ f/11 will all produce the exact same exposure — EV13.

    Cameras like the Rolleicord put primary emphasis on setting the exposure value, while treating shutter speed and aperture as “fine tuning” controls. The theory is that, first and foremost, you need to get the right exposure. Then, once you’ve dialed in the right exposure, you can adjust either the shutter speed or aperture to give your photos a certain look, but without worrying about altering that exposure.

    That’s why the biggest numbers on the Rolleicord’s exposure dial — the ones beneath the tab on the lens’ right — are EV numbers. Pressing and turning that tab allows the photographer to set the desired exposure value. Then, if the photographer wants to vary depth of field, he can rotate either tab to set the desired aperture, and the coupled dial automatically adjusts the shutter speed to insure the EV doesn’t change. Similarly, if the photographer is more concerned with freezing motion, he can rotate the dial to a faster shutter speed, and the aperture will open to compensate. It’s easy to see why cameras no longer operate this way — it made too much sense! By suppressing the concept of EV numbers, newer cameras forced people to think of exposure not as a single number, but as a complex matrix of f/stop and shutter speed combinations, which insured everyone would need to buy a new camera with a new-fangled light meter in order to save them from the “complexities” of exposure.

    Having come to terms with the Rolleicord’s exposure methodology, the camera offered one additional surprise — the shutter needs to be cocked manually before it will fire. In most semi-modern cameras, advancing the film also cocks the shutter. Not so with the Rolleicord. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve attempted to take a photo, only to realize I hadn’t cocked the shutter. Actually, I probably could tell you — but I’d be too embarrassed to.

    And speaking of the shutter, Rollei seems to have forgotten that a camera needs a shutter release button. In order to actually take a photo, you need to push the shutter cocking lever horizontally back to its uncocked state. If that bugs you, then you can always try to find a stubby little mechanical shutter release button and screw it into the socket located to the left of the lens. Yes, I said left. Unlike every other camera you’ve ever used, you’ll need to train your left finger to take photos with the Rolleicord.

    And yet, in spite of all its finickiness, I dearly love to shoot with the Rolleicord. In my hands, it’ll never be an efficient camera for candid street shooting, but that’s OK. I need to grow. Because I’m so enamored with the quality of images that come out of the Rolleicord, and because it’s not quite fast enough to shoot dynamic subjects with ease, the camera forces me out of my comfort zone — if I want to take photos of people, it’s easier if I just ask them! Somehow, I think this is probably good for me. But as much as I like the Rolleicord, I’d still rather have a Rolleiflex. Alas, some things don’t change from one life to the next — in my previous incarnation I couldn’t afford a Rolleiflex and in this incarnation, I still can’t afford a Rolleiflex. Maybe in the next life…

    A Reincarnate’s View of the Leica IIIf

    My 1952 Leica IIIf is a direct descendent of the 1925 Leica I — a camera that ushered in the era of 35mm photography and revolutionized the idea of what cameras are and could be. Cameras of this lineage are colloquially known as “Barnacks,” in honor of their inventor, Oskar Barnack.

    While there’s no denying that these are unbelievably beautiful cameras, they do possess a number of quirks, which I prefer to think of as “anachronistic charms.” You’ll stumble upon the camera’s first idiosyncrasy before you even consider your first exposure — during film loading. I’m not talking about the fact that this camera, like the M-series that succeeded it, loads from the bottom. That’s only slightly idiosyncratic. No, I’m talking about the fact that Barnacks require your film to have a 10cm leader, even though all modern film comes with a 4cm leader. So before you’ve even loaded your camera, you’ve already pulled out the scissors and are engaged in a fun little arts & crafts project.

    Once you’re up and running, you’ll bump into a second idiosyncrasy — dual viewfinders! Again, like the M-series that succeeded it, the Leica III is a rangefinder. But unlike the M-series, which integrates the rangefinder into the viewfinder, the Barnacks keep them separated — you peek through one window to focus, then shift your eye over to a second window for framing. Like I said, this camera is positively dripping with anachronistic charm.

    If you think it gets more standard from this point forward, you’re in for a surprise. Let’s talk about shutter speeds. Most cameras space their shutter speeds at one stop intervals — beginning at 1/1000s and stepping down to 1/500, 1/250, 1/125, 1/60 and 1/30. That makes it easy to adjust the exposure on these cameras without actually looking at the dial — you simply count the clicks, with each click equalling one stop. My Leica IIIf? It’s all over the map. It begins in familiar territory, dropping from 1/1000 to 1/500, but then it drops to 1/200s — a gap of 1 1/3 stops. From there it drops to 1/100 (1 stop), 1/60 (2/3 stop), 1/40 (2/3 stop) and 1/30 (1/3 stop) before forcing you to use a second dial to set slower shutter speeds — a second dial that, I might add, arranges those speeds in a seemingly random, non-sequential order, which makes the selection of slower shutter speeds a bit like a scavenger hunt.

    But I’ve definitely saved the quirkiest operation for last — aperture control. This is almost too crazy to be called “eccentric.” Unlike modern mechanical cameras that have nice big aperture rings surrounding the lens, the lenses for these cameras have little aperture tabs — teeny-weeny microscopic tabs that sit flush with the face of the lens. These diminutive little widgets actually forced me to grow my fingernails longer than I like, just so I’d be able to set the aperture on my Barnack-era lenses without using a stylus! Furthermore, once you put a hood on the lens, you really will need some kind of long pointy stick to change f/stops. And filters? Unless you can actually find 19mm filters (which are rarer than fertilized dodo eggs) you’ll need to use larger filters that cover the entire face of the lens. Of course, that means the filter covers the aperture tab completely, thus requiring you to remove it every time you need to change aperture. And at this point, it gets even weirder! My 1946 35mm Elmar lens comes from the days before aperture stops became standardized. That means, instead of f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, f/16 and f/22, my 35 Elmar gives me demarcations for f/4.5, f/6.3, f/9, f/12.5 and f/18.

    Obviously this isn’t a camera and lens combo for either the mathematically or mechanically challenged. Heck, I’m a nimble-fingered musician with an electrical engineering degree, and I still don’t possess enough manual or mathematical dexterity to change exposure quickly in dynamic lighting conditions.

    Consider the following photo of a Vancouver alley. There were people in this alley when I first set about trying to take this photo. But by the time I’d mentally translated my known shutter speed and aperture settings into “Barnakese,” removed the lens hood and fiddled with finding a fingernail long enough to wiggle the little aperture tab to a new position, the alley was barren. But after going through all these gymnastics, there’s no way I was walking away — so I snapped a photo anyway.

    But just as with the Rolleicord, I truly love to photograph with the Leica IIIf. In spite of its peculiarities (or, perhaps, because of them), I find the camera actually inspires me to try and take photos worthy of its craftsmanship, ingenuity and pedigree. Lately, because of its diminished size and weight, I’ve been using it as my walk-around camera — snapping up the sort of little, personal moments that the less photographically neurotic usually grab with their cell phones.

    And so, at this point, my previous life is complete. And having satisfied the lustful desires of my previous incarnation, I can hardly wait to speed through this life and begin my next one — maybe then I’ll be able to afford a nice, used Leica M-Monochrom…

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: “Classics,” “Where the People Were” and “Hiding in Mill Ends Park” (which, by the way, is officially classified as the smallest park in the world) were shot with a Leica IIIf and a 35mm f/3.5 Elmar thread mount lens on Tri-X at ISO 400, developed in a 1:50 solution of Rodinal.  “Hawthorne Bridge, Portland Oregon” was shot with a Leica IIIf and a 50mm f/3.5 collapsible Elmar thread mount lens on Tri-X at ISO 400, developed in a 1:35 solution of Rodinal. “Preincarnation 1,” “Cannabis Day Couple 1” and “Cannabis Day Couple 2” were shot with a Rolleicord Vb (which features an f/3.5 Xenar lens) on Tri-X at ISO 400, developed in a 1:35 solution of Rodinal.  “Preincarnation 2” was shot on a Rolleicord Vb with Fuji 160c film at ISO 160, which I stand-developed in a 1:100 solution of Rodinal. The three product shots were taken with a Leica M-Monochrom using a variety of different lenses.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • Venus in Furs

    Venus in Furs

    Here’s a thought: Did Leopold von Sacher-Masoch celebrate his 100th flogging? I’m guessing he did. Because if he didn’t, there exists no logical explanation for why I’m celebrating this — my 100th ULTRAsomething article. What purpose, beyond a soul that festers with venomous masochistic tendencies, could possibly explain why I’ve written 100 articles about photography and published them on the internet?

    Yet every few weeks for the past four years, I’ve dressed the Macintosh in furs, chained myself to its keyboard, and whipped out an article for all the world to read. Each time I’ve submitted to this act, I’ve begun with nothing more than a mind that’s void of a single fruitful idea and a collection of photos that nobody’s mother could love. It’s as if public humiliation and degradation were my ultimate reward.

    I’d much prefer to lay the blame for these 100 ULTRAsomething posts at the feet of another, less embarrassing personality trait. But what? It can’t be ego — I don’t have nearly enough fans to stroke it. It can’t be greed — the site doesn’t even garner enough donations to pay for its own existence. It can’t be guilt — I actually feel a twinge of relief, not remorse, when I’ve let too long a period lapse between articles.

    Maybe I’m looking at this wrong. Maybe I didn’t achieve 100 posts through some character flaw, but through some character strength. Perhaps this site is the battlefield of a heroic and solitary man, fist thrusting skyward, who fights to right a world full of photographic wrongs. Now that’s an explanation I can embrace!

    But what “wrongs” am I righting? It’s just photography — there are no wrongs. I’d like to think I’m railing against the oppressive photographic tyranny of pretty pictures, banal scenes, mindless mimicry and moronic gear lust. Except that, when ULTRAsomething first began, I was taking pretty pictures of banal scenes in a mindless mimicry of other commercial photographers, and moronically lusting for a competitive edge within the latest gear.

    Truth is, the site wasn’t born as any sort of artistic manifesto, but as a humble “me too” exercise — one of a trillion photo blogs hatched when the economy tanked, the clients all waved goodbye, and the notion of “if you build it they will come” permeated those of us who blindly believed that a net presence — any net presence — meant salvation. What a load of hooey.

    In the early days, ULTRAsomething accomplished only one thing: it hastened a realization that my efforts to emulate popular photographic trends were pointless, and that the world’s appetite for photos adhering to aesthetic conformity lead only to my visual stagnation. I realized that most photographers were all striving to create the exact same images, and once successful in their replication efforts, they’d invent artificial differentiators to market themselves. Wouldn’t it make more sense to actually distinguish oneself through one’s photos? Through one’s own personality?

    As I grew and transformed — both as a person and as a photographer — so too did ULTRAsomething. That’s why it’s a site full of contradictions, oxymorons and conundrums. ULTRAsomething isn’t about the destination, but the journey. And wherever that journey leads me, I follow… or maybe it’s the journey that follows me? I don’t know. And the fact I don’t know is, perhaps, ULTRAsomething’s ultimate gestalt. It’s a site without solutions. It’s a site about searching — searching for improvement; searching for meaning; searching for individuality. It’s quite possibly the most existential photography blog on the internet — a distinction that virtually guarantees it’ll forever remain fodder for cultists and anathema for the masses.

    Maybe 100 posts isn’t something I should be celebrating. After all, each and every day, there are thousands of bloggers who exceed the 100 post mark before they’ve even finished breakfast. Perhaps I should celebrate only after accomplishing something meaningful — like writing 100 good articles! Problem is, I won’t live that long. Besides, I’m retiring from the blogging business. Mind you, I’ve actually retired 99 times prior to this, so I wouldn’t put a whole lot of faith in this proclamation. It just keeps me from having to admit that, one day, I’ll very likely succumb to the temptation to create article #101.

    In the end, I’ve given up trying to comprehend why I publish ULTRAsomething. Maybe I’m trying to help my fellow searchers. Maybe I’m just marking a few trees. Or maybe I want to see how many different ways I can state the same thing: that photography should never be a product of one’s camera, but of one’s soul — even if it’s a masochistic one.

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: “Venus in Furs” was shot with a Leica M9 and a v5 50mm Summicron lens. “Metaphorically Apropos” and “Waiting for The Tide” (which, not coincidentally, is also metaphorically apropos to this article) were both shot with a Leica M2, using ADOX 100 film, which I developed in a 1:50 solution of Rodinal. The only difference is that I used a v4 35mm Summicron lens for the prior, and a 21mm Elmarit pre-ASPH for the latter.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • Fireworkzzz

    Fireworkzzz

    Fireworks? I’ll admit to enjoying them immensely. But photos of fireworks? On the ULTRAsomething Tedium Scale (U.T.S.), I’d rank them roughly on par with “photos of derelict farm implements” and “generic Hollywood romantic comedies.” I’d prefer to tender a more precise U.T.S. ranking, but viewing any of these genres for more than several seconds induces a narcoleptic effect that renders me incapable of detailed analysis.

    Consequently, when Vancouver hosts its annual international fireworks competition for three nights each summer, it affords me the rare opportunity to leave the apartment without a camera. Not only does the subject fail to inspire me photographically, but the pitch black shores of English Bay aren’t exactly conducive to a light-based medium.

    Yet once every three years, as if possessed by some inner-biological masochism clock, I’ll inexplicably grab a camera on the way out the door. In spite of any hearsay from friends and loved ones, I think I’ve gotten a tiny bit smarter since I last exercised the futility muscle back in 2009. For example, instead of waiting for total darkness, this year I arrived on the beach at dusk. That way, should something attract my attention, I could set my M9 to 1/90s at maximum ISO, open the Voigtlander 50mm Nokton to its full f/1.1 aperture, and still possibly grab something resembling an image. Granted, adjectives like “sharp” and “noiseless” wouldn’t apply to any such photos, but then these adjectives rarely apply to any of my photos — even those shot in the midday sun. If I haven’t let this fact bother me yet, why start now?

    Amongst the half-million people attending this event, I would guess that 50,000 of them had cameras mounted to tripods — all aimed skyward in anticipation of the impending spectacle. I assume the remaining 90% had attempted this same exercise in some previous year — only to realize the true meaning of the adage, “seen one, seen ’em all” upon subsequently viewing the night’s photos.

    Me? I wandered the beach, enjoying the beautiful Vancouver landscape and the cooling ocean breeze. Once or twice, I even snapped a photo of something I could barely see. When the fireworks began, the camera dropped to my side. Meanwhile, all the other photographers leapt to their feet, peering into their LCDs — each firing off a barrage of shots; each quickly realizing their automatic in-camera meters were grossly overexposing the scene; each frantically trying to troubleshoot the situation while reading their camera manuals by the light of an iPhone. Much like the fireworks themselves, this too is an annual scene I enjoy immensely — witnessing this rookie photographer rite of passage, and knowing that the lessons learned here will help so many to move beyond their camera’s auto settings.

    Ten minutes after the grand finale, I was wedged into an overcrowded elevator, rising skyward toward my apartment within one of Vancouver’s ubiquitous high-rises. In the constricted confines, I held my arms against my chest, clutching the Leica just beneath my chin. A woman, pressed so tightly against me that we exceeded every recognized definition of “second base,” broke the awkward silence with a nod toward my camera. “Did you get any good shots of the fireworks?”

    “Actually,” I responded, “I didn’t take any pictures of the fireworks.”

    A look of horror crossed her face, morphing quickly into confusion, and then to amusement. “Oh,” she said with a smile, “you’re kidding.”

    “No,” I replied earnestly, “I never take photos of fireworks.”

    Her smile faded and her brow furrowed. “Then what did you photograph?” she asked.

    I thought for a second. I suppose I could tell her I took a photo of some people waiting in line for the toilets…

    Or that I might have a nice shot of a gentleman face-plowed onto the beach prior to the start of the fireworks…

    Or — as shown in the photo at the top of this article — that I lazily took a couple of hackneyed silhouette shots of some kids atop a public sculpture…

    … but I didn’t.

    45 seconds spent pressed together in a congested elevator may well nurture a kind of physical intimacy, but emotional and intellectual intimacy require substantially more time to progress. To reveal these answers to her would only prompt more questions — questions with conceptual answers like, “I prefer to photograph those things that no one else bothers to photograph,” which is, itself, an answer demanding more questions. The time constraints dictated by a mere 30-story elevator shaft were insurmountable. Perhaps if we lived in the Burj Khalifa…

    So, instead, I simply answered, “people.”

    “Yeah. I like taking pictures of my friends too,” she responded.

    Just then the doors slid open and she exited the elevator, waving goodbye. “Perfect timing,” I thought to myself, “otherwise I would have felt obligated to mention that I don’t actually know any of the people I photograph.” As the years wear on, I find that taking photos isn’t nearly as difficult as having to explain why I take them.

    Several floors later, I was back in my apartment — downloading the evening’s photos, fighting off an inexplicable craving for a cigarette, and relishing in the realization that it would be at least three years before I felt compelled to drag my camera to another fireworks display. Something I’m sure you, my readers, are relishing too.

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: “Roundtable”, “Main Attraction” and “Beached” were all shot with a Leica M9 and a Voigtlander 50mm f/1.1 Nokton in near total darkness. Should you wish to see photos of the actual fireworks, might I suggest Flickr? It’ll likely contain several thousand for your perusal…

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • Red v. Green

    Red v. Green

    This article discusses the making of the film Forty-Seven Photos of Rain, which was posted to this site earlier in the week. For those seeking to protect their index fingers from the wear of needless navigational strain, the film is also available at the bottom of this article.

    New visitors to the ULTRAsomething site will likely expect me to jump right into the nuts and bolts of this undertaking, but veteran ULTRAsomething fans know better. They know my photos are rarely the result of a linear thought process, which means any article discussing these photos will contain enough character development, plot twists and story arcs to insure only the hardiest make it to the end. What can I say? Knowledge is pain.

    So settle in — it’s going to be a torturous, agonizing ride.

    RED

    I suspect most of my readers are at least tangentially aware of the Red Digital Camera Company and its Epic and Scarlet professional cinema products. I also suspect — given the fact Red cameras are bulky, expensive and marketed primarily to high-end filmmakers — that many of you haven’t burned too many precious web hours researching whether or not Red is a viable candidate for the coveted distinction of “next camera purchase.”

    But for me, new or old, cheap or expensive, if it can shoot an image then I’m crawling all over it.

    And the more I crawled all over the Red, the more intrigued I became by its possibilities. Not because I’m a filmmaker of any great repute — one viewing of my Pavement film should prove that — but because Red cameras are designed for both motion and still photography. Red even designates their cameras as “DSMC” devices, which is an acronym for “Digital Still & Motion Camera.”

    It’s completely beyond the scope of this article to discuss they whys and wherefores of Red’s technology. What’s important is the end result — a camera that captures high-resolution RAW images at high frame rates. “Big deal,” I hear you mutter from the cloud. And “big deal” are the same words I first uttered, too — until I realized this technology completely obliterates a wall that’s always existed in the digital photographic world: the wall between still photography and motion photography.

    Prior to now, photographers had to gather in one of two camps — either they needed a high frame rate (likely because video was the intended delivery medium) or they needed high resolution (likely because single, still images would be the intended delivery medium).

    Video guys are probably saying “Hey, all my frames are shot in HD, so I’m already shooting at high resolution.” But all you still photographers know better. You know that any frame extracted from a video stream is limited to a maximum of 1920 x 1080 pixels, and that those are going to be some bloody ugly pixels. That’s because each frame, aside from containing only 2 megapixels of image data, is compressed, dithered and pre-baked into a quality level just suitable enough for the eye to view for a period not longer than 1/30th of a second. It certainly isn’t going to result in an image you’d hang in the Museum of Modern Art or deliver to Vogue.

    Meanwhile, all you still photography guys are probably saying “Hey, my camera has a continuous shooting mode, so I’m already shooting at high frame rates.” But now it’s the videographers who know better. They know that a little 10 frame-per-second burst here and another 10 frame-per-second burst there will result in some rather lousy motion video. Scenes of only 1 or 2 seconds in length, shot at 10 frames per second, are certainly not going to result in a film that debuts at Cannes, Sundance, or even network television.

    In the last few years, the advent of still cameras with built-in video capabilities has had a profound impact on the industry — finally, you could buy one camera to fulfill two purposes. But even then, the two purposes were separated within camera: either the camera worked in video mode, or it worked in stills mode. Digital Still and Motion Cameras (DSMC’s) remove these differences. They remove the need to compromise resolution for the sake of motion; or to compromise motion for the sake of resolution. The Red Epic, for example, has a sensor roughly 14 megapixels in size. That’s about 7 times greater than an HD video camera. It can expose all those megapixels at 120 frames per second (12 times greater than the Nikon D4). If you’re willing to drop your resolution to, say, 9.4 megapixels, then you can increase your frame rate to 150 fps. Want to shoot 200 frames per second? Drop down to shooting 5.3 megapixel images, which is still 2.5 times the resolution of HD.

    For the video guys, the benefits are obvious — they finally get to shoot video that (on some levels) equals or surpasses the capabilities of 35mm motion picture film. But what of us still photographers? We’ve long had digital cameras that (on some levels) surpass or exceed the capabilities of 35mm film. What do we gain? Frame rate. Once again, I hear you mutter “big deal” at your monitor screen. And it is a big deal, because it means that a single push of the shutter can deliver a burst of images, hundreds possibly, rather than just a single shot.

    This has numerous implications for the still photographer. For example, high-end fashion photographers and photo studios (such as Smashbox in Los Angeles) have already begun to incorporate Red cameras into their workflows. And why not? In a world where image is everything, the ability to shoot 120 frames per second and then select the one frame where hair, clothing, light, shadow and expression coalesce into their most potently marketable combination has tremendous financial benefits for all involved.

    But what of the documentary photographers? The photojournalists? The lifestyle and event photographers?

    V.

    The more I thought about Red, the more I thought about how this technology has the potential to fundamentally alter the way documentary photographers work. In a single forward technological leap, every skill I’ve spent a lifetime honing — the ability to spot, anticipate and shoot optimal instants — would become obsolete. The selection of so-called “decisive moments” would no longer occur behind the camera in hostile real-time conditions, but in front of a scrub wheel and a computer screen in climate-controlled comfort. The realization that I might soon become as obsolete as a telegraph operator in a railway station provided a certain motivational impact. I needed to get my hands on a Red. I needed to develop these techniques myself before the new breed of DSMC-wielding photographers sent me out to pasture.

    There were only two problems with my plan: 1) The Red is a big, bulky, street-hostile camera, and 2) it’s freakin’ expensive.

    In reality, for now, these are good things. Because as long as they remain true, the world won’t yet be powering up electric vehicles to cart my ilk off to the glue factory.

    Canon, sensing the same paradigm shift as I, recently unveiled their new EOS-1D Cinema camera. It’s a sort of “mini” Red in a traditionally-styled pro dSLR body, which is capable of shooting 8.8 megapixel RAW files at about 24 frames per second. It’s still not small. It’s still not inexpensive. It’s not as well spec’d as the Red cameras, and it’s not even available yet — but it’s a harbinger of things to come.

    “What if,” I pondered, “Leica were to come out with such a camera in a more compact, photojournalist-friendly, M-mount body?” The answer, obviously, is that it would change the world of documentary photography. So how exactly would I, a hard working documentary-type photographer, put such a camera to use? Since this product currently exists only within my mind, experimentation would require a bit of good old-fashioned ingenuity.

    GREEN

    I suspect the majority of my readers are at least tangentially aware of Lomography cameras. I also suspect — given the fact they’re rather cheaply built, dubiously appointed and marketed primarily to hipsters — that many of you haven’t burned too many precious web hours researching whether or not a Lomography product is a viable candidate for the coveted distinction of “next camera purchase.”

    But it’s this very cheapness that makes them ideal “guinea pigs” for photographic experiments. Besides, as I discussed in Shooting Through the Wormhole, I have a certain fondness for non-literal photography. This actually makes me predisposed to like various Lomography cameras.

    Last year, Lomography introduced the LomoKino 35, a plasticy little hand-cranked film camera that could shoot 144 frames on a strip of 36-exposure 35mm film. I gave it the bare minimum of attention. “I’m not a video guy,” I reasoned… but that was before the Red obsession.

    Digital video specs are less concerned with the number of pixels in the total frame than they are with the number of pixels in the width of a frame. That’s why Red cameras like the Epic are known as 5K cameras — their sensors capture a video frame that’s 5120 pixels wide. Canon’s new EOS-1D C Cinema SLR is known as a 4K camera since it sports a sensor that’s 4096 pixels wide. It soon occurred to me that the LomoKino 35 camera would essentially become a 3K camera once I scanned its frames on my flatbed. Considering that the entry price for a 5K Red system equals a high-end performance-oriented luxury car, and the entry price for some 4K Canon EOS-1D Cinema paraphernalia equals a nicely appointed commuter car, the fact I could get a LomoKino off Craigslist for the price of breakfast at my local diner made the decision entirely painless.

    I quickly dubbed the LomoKino my “Green” camera — not because of its eco-friendly nature, but because of its wallet-friendly nature. In my hands, a Red Camera would result in nothing but red ink on the accounting logs. But a LomoKino? A field of soothing, pastural green ink. In fact, I just spent more on milk and cereal from the corner grocery than I did on the LomoKino.

    PROOF OF CONCEPT

    The idea was simple: I would walk around with the LomoKino, and when I wandered into the midst of something interesting, I’d simply start “rolling.” As luck would have it, Vancouver was belching rain on the day I decided to experiment — a perfect environment for the LomoKino’s moody plastic lens. I wandered into the middle of a crowd at one of the summer street festivals, and began to slowly crank the LomoKino’s film advance handle. Since my goal was not to make a linear video, but to find visually compelling “stills”, I would simply stop cranking when things got a bit uninteresting. I’d resume cranking when my eye liked what it saw.

    Back home, after rather harshly developing the film in Rodinal to try and accentuate the grain, I cut the negative into 6 strips of 24 frames and scanned each strip as a single “image.” Using Photoshop, I then extrapolated each of the 144 resulting frames into single images. Now all I had to do was select one or two frames that “told the tale.”

    You might as well have asked a mother to choose her favorite child — I simply couldn’t decide. Out of the 144 frames, I liked dozens. So I shifted gears, selected 47 of the frames and sequenced them into a slide show, which I thought would more accurately convey the day’s mood than would a single frame.

    Ultimately, I think the experiment is a success. Not only did I prove I could find compelling images by scouring motion sequences for individual frames, but I think I might have inadvertently stumbled upon a new way of documenting certain events or happenings.

    So, Leica, should you secretly be planning a 4K M-mount camera for a bold new era of photojournalism, please send one my way. Thanks to my little Green camera, I will soon be quite experienced in the school of DSMC shooting techniques, and I will have done it without going in the red for a Red.

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: All rain photos were shot within a 2 minute period using a LomiKino camera loaded with Tri-X film exposed at ISO 400, aggressively developed in a 1:50 solution of Rodinal then scanned on an Epson V600 flatbed using VueScan software and sequenced in Final Cut Pro X against a custom score, which was improvised in real-time into Ableton Live using numerous software-based synthesizers. The LomoKino “product” shot was done with a Ricoh GXR, using the 28mm lens module.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • 47 Photos of Rain

    47 Photos of Rain

    It might be a film. It might be a slide show. It might be a music video. Or it might just be me trying to grunt and babble my way to a new visual language. All that’s really known is it’s a collection of 47 moody, melancholic, phantasmagorical photos of rain, sequenced into an ebb and flow and supported by a suitably elegiac musical score.

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: All photos were shot within a 2 minute period using a LomiKino camera loaded with Tri-X film exposed at ISO 400, developed in a 1:50 solution of Rodinal then scanned on an Epson V600 flatbed using VueScan software and sequenced in Final Cut Pro X against a custom score, which was improvised in real-time into Ableton Live using numerous software-based synthesizers. That answers the “what.” The bigger question is “why,” and it’s answered thoroughly in the article, Red v. Green.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • Term Limits

    Term Limits

    (A Diatribe in Three Harumphs)

    PROLOGUE

    I see him hovering in the fringes of my peripheral vision — analyzing me; analyzing my camera; analyzing my subject. He begins strolling toward me. I take a deep breath, grit my teeth and wait for the inevitable…

    “You a photographer?” he asks, nodding at my camera.

    “Aren’t we all?” I grumble, hoping to quickly diffuse the exchange.

    He nods in agreement, oblivious to my response. “So you a pro?”

    “Only when someone pays me,” I reply.

    “Me too!” he laughs, failing for a second time to decode my cunningly crafted verbal hints. “Well, I don’t actually do it full time, but all my friends tell me I should go for it. I was the second shooter at my sister’s wedding last year. They hired a wedding photographer, but I actually shot more frames than he did. Everyone thought the pics were great, and I didn’t even own a Nikon then.”

    He thrusts the camera toward my face as if to prove his point.

    “You shooting street?” he asks, without waiting for an answer. “How long you been pro? What kind of camera is that? You on Flickr?”

    “Sorry, man… gotta go. Late for a client meeting,” I lie.

    “OK. Nice meeting you. Maybe we can work together sometime…” his voice trails off in the distance.

    HARUMPH 1

    What are we? How do we define ourselves? Convention says we’re photographers. I call myself a photographer. You likely call yourself a photographer. When someone takes a series of photographs we admire, we all say “now that’s a photographer!”

    The last time I looked, Leica had 173,000 fans on Facebook. Discounting the 7 brainiacs who are actually optical physicists and another 4 who thought it was a site about Laika, the first dog to orbit the earth, that leaves… well… 173,000 people unaccounted for. Flickr states over 6 million people visit their site each month, and DPReview claims that more than 80 million of us land on their pages in a year. Heck, I’ve even got a pocketful of people subscribing to the RSS feeds on my ULTRAsomething site.

    Who are all these people?

    They are photographers — one and all — each suggestive of the fact that the word “photographer” has become an utterly meaningless label.

    The most frequently repeated conversation in my life occurs in coffee shops, where the barista asks, “The usual?” and I reply, “Yep.” The second most frequently repeated conversation in my life occurs when people tell me that they, or their friend, sibling, co-worker or spouse are “good enough to be a professional photographer.”

    What does this mean?

    Besides further confirming the obvious — that nearly everyone in the world is now a photographer — it also illustrates that most people don’t have a clue what it means to be a professional photographer.

    The word “professional” is not an adjective. Well… OK… actually it is. But it’s not a synonym for “great,” “talented,” “brilliant” or “awesome.” It doesn’t mean your photos are in focus and properly exposed — if it did, there would be billions of professionals. It doesn’t mean you have an expensive camera and more lenses than a politician has enemies — if it did, there would be millions of professionals. It doesn’t mean you take interesting, compelling and appealing photos — if it did, there would be tens of thousands of professionals.

    Being professional simply means that you are paid to take photos, and that you are paid enough to call it a “profession.” And this is precisely the reason why there aren’t many professional photographers any more. How could there be? Now that everyone identifies themselves as a photographer, why would they actually pay someone else to take a photo? In fact, I’ll go so far as to proclaim that becoming a professional photographer has less to do with one’s ability as a photographer than with one’s ability as a salesman. It’s been said that a good salesman can sell sand in a desert — certainly a desirable skill for anyone wishing to sell photographic services to a world full of photographers.

    HARUMPH 2

    “Photographer” is a vestigial term — presently misinterpreted by historical connotations that we all still apply in spite of the fact they’re no longer applicable. A photographer is and always has been, by definition, “a camera operator.” Period. 100 years ago, when not a lot of people could operate cameras and the whole photographic process required considerable training, knowledge and expense, being a photographer implied something more substantial — it meant you paid your dues, learned a set of skills, and offered a service few others could perform.

    Calling yourself a “photographer” today is as trivial as calling yourself a “looker.” After all, the vast majority of mankind is perfectly capable of looking at something, just as they are perfectly capable of photographing something. And no one would ever hire a professional looker would they?

    Actually they would.

    People hire private investigators whose anonymity allows them to look more discreetly at something of interest. We hire nannies to look after our kids so we can go look at something else. We hire lawyers to look at legal documents that are too confusing for us to decipher. We pay police to look for clues we’re not trained to see, doctors to look at ourselves (even though we all have perfectly good mirrors), and security personnel to look at our luggage before we board a plane. We hire real estate agents to look for our houses, chemists to look for alternative fuel supplies, and pest control companies to look for bedbugs. Every one of these people is a professional looker — but none of them are dumb enough to actually call themselves “lookers.”

    No lawyer refers to himself as a “loophole looker.” Nannies are not “offspring lookers.” Everyone is capable of performing the simple act of looking, so the term “looker” is of absolutely no value in defining one’s profession. Instead, the various “looking” professions are distinguished by what one looks for and the services that they provide.

    With this in mind, those of us who rely on a camera — whether for personal expression or for next month’s rent — need to neologize the word “photographer” right out of existence. It’s an albatross with lead feet and two broken wings.

    HARUMPH 3

    I am a man who observes human behavior. I endeavor to anticipate the precise moment at which a human’s actions are the most poignant, ironic or meaningful, and then push a button on a mechanical device to record that moment for detailed examination by sociologists, humanists, historians or the just plain curious. Most would call me a photographer. On a more granular level, they would qualify me as a documentary or street photographer.

    Some people travel to beautiful locales. They endeavor to find the precise coordinates at which the region’s beauty is at its most aesthetically appealing, and then push a button on a mechanical device to record that scene for the purpose of informing all those who could not make the journey themselves. Most would call these people “photographers.” On a more granular level, we would qualify them as landscape photographers.

    Curiously — aside from the fact we both ultimately push a button to complete our tasks — the combination of skills, vision, temperament, equipment and mechanics required to perform these two missions have almost nothing in common with each other. Yet we’re both lumped together as “photographers” — the implication being “if you’re good at one, you’re good at the other.” You might as well toss in fashion photography, astro photography, lifestyle photography, forensic photography, spirit photography, and “here’s a picture of my cat” photography.

    Do people believe that if a coworker writes a cohesive email, then that coworker is perfectly capable of becoming a novelist? Of course not. The skill required to write a novel is much different than the skill required to write an email, technical document, legal brief, poem, comedy sketch, or an editorial capable of challenging people’s minds and perceptions. Each of these disciplines is performed by a “writer,” but no one has delusions that writing a thank-you note to Granny qualifies them to bump elbows with Hemingway. People have been writing for a lot longer than they’ve been photographing. And therein lies the problem — photography is still new enough in the context of human history that we haven’t yet learned to disassociate the word “photographer” from the word “artist.”

    Many working pros are angry that the Instagram crowd has stolen their photojournalism jobs; or that the CEO’s nephew absconded with the corporate website photo assignment; or that everyone’s Uncle Mike is taking jobs away from wedding photographers. These pros, struggling to define the difference between their work and the dilettantes, proclaim themselves “real” photographers, as if to imply all these other people are not photographers. But they are photographers. They are camera operators — the same as all of us.

    The reality is that 95% of the time, the photojournalist will take more compelling and contextual pictures; the trained corporate photographer will deliver more powerful and persuasive content for a business website; and a dedicated lifestyle and event photographer will create a more memorable portfolio of someone’s wedding. But since society still applies the term “photographer” to each of these disciplines, they’re perceived as tasks that can easily be performed by anyone who’s labeled a photographer — which is just about everybody.

    We need to fit the term “photographer” with a pair of concrete shoes, and drop it in the nearest lake. Those of us who believe we have a unique visual communication skill need to define ourselves by what, exactly, that skill is — and not by the equipment we use to realize it.

    A novelist is not a “fictional typist.”

    A hair stylist is not a “topical scissorist.”

    A sommelier is not an “articulate drinker.”

    Photography is no longer a unique ability — but the numerous tasks we can accomplish with photography are still unique. And this uniqueness is how each of us, moving forward, must define ourselves.

    EPILOGUE

    I see him hovering in the fringes of my peripheral vision — analyzing me; analyzing my camera; analyzing my subject. He begins strolling toward me. I take a deep breath, grit my teeth and wait for the inevitable…

    “You a photographer?” he asks, nodding at my camera.

    “No. I’m a momentist.” I reply.

    “A what?” he asks.

    “A documentary poet. A snarkicist. An encapsulator.” I reel off a string of alternate terms, watching for one to strike a chord.

    “Wow, what is that?” queries the fellow.

    “Technically,” I answer, “I’m a Human Proclivities Visual Artist, specializing in Wily Human Observational Recording— a W.H.O.R. for short.”

    “Cool, replies the Nikon toter. “I’m hoping to specialize in Ego Inflationary Face and Body Re-pixelation myself, but that’s obviously going to take me years of practice and study.”

    “Best of luck,” I reply, “Gotta go… I’m late for a client meeting.” And this time, I’m not lying.

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: “Stultified Bride” was shot with a Leica M8 and a CV 35mm f/1.4 Nokton Lens. “Businessman” was shot with a Leica M8 and a 28mm Summicron lens. “The New Cool” and “Several Red Flags” were both shot with a Leica M9 and a v5 35mm Summicon lens. “Lookers and Photographers” was shot with a Leica M9 and a v5 50mm Summicron lens. “Makeshift Mask” and “Makeshift Wig” were both shot with a Leica M9 and a 21mm Elmarit-M (pre-ASPH) lens. “The Zone” was shot with a Leica M9 and a 90mm Elmarit-M lens. “Hitchcock Fanatic” was shot with a Leica M6TTL and a v4 35mm Summicron Lens, using Tri-X at ISO 400, stand developed 1:100 in Blazinal.

    This article (along with many of its associated comments) first appeared on June 27, 2012 in my f/Egor column for the Leica Camera Blog.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • Pavement

    Pavement

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.

  • Hatch Battening

    Hatch Battening

    A half-dozen years ago, I began making the journey back to my photographic roots: black & white. For many photographers in the current digital age, “black & white” has become little more than a special effect, created after-the-fact through controlled desaturation of a color image. This process of selectively filtering certain colors to either accentuate or diminish luminosity variance is identical to what we did with film. The difference is that, with film, the color filtration occurs before the image is shot — meaning the photographer must possess the ability to pre-visualize the effect, and that the effect is permanent once the film is exposed. With digital, the filtering occurs after the image is shot — meaning the photographer can see exactly how a filter modifies the final image, and is free to alter it as often as necessary to achieve the desired effect.

    Most photographers believe this to be ample justification for using color digital cameras whenever black & white is the intended output. Sadly — and although life would be so much easier if I were — I’m not most photographers. There are, in fact, many reasons to shoot “in” black & white, rather than simply converting from color. Besides the somewhat intangible benefit of discipline, which comes from the psychological knowledge that true B&W won’t give one the luxury of fixing the contrast later, there are perceptible benefits as well. My most common argument is that digital color cameras struggle with high contrast scenes, and (to my eyes) produce a far less pleasing tonality. No matter how much post-process color-channel mixing I do, I can never get the black & white tonality of my digital images to match the aesthetic appeal of my film images. It’s not that digital black & white images necessarily look worse — they just look different.

    Which brings me back to where this article began — a half-dozen years ago. Back in those halcyon digital days, I was painfully aware (in spite of the obvious advantages of post-filtering images) that I wasn’t completely happy with the look of digital black & white photos. I identified this as a two-pronged issue: First, film has a non-linear response to light that creates a wonderful rolloff in highlight and shadow regions — regions that tend to either clip, posterize, or simply degrade into noise with digital. Second, properly exposed film displays a seemingly bottomless pool of grey tones — tones that appear somehow coarser and more dithered in their digital cousins.

    Based on these observations, I soon surmised that what I wanted was a monochromatic sensor that recorded light in a non-linear manner, and thus mimicked the response curve of film. Of course, I had absolutely no idea if this was technically feasible, so around 2006 I began to read everything I could find on the technology behind digital cameras. That’s when I first realized that most digital cameras already contained monochromatic sensors, and that the color information they recorded was actually a software interpolation derived algorithmically from a color filter array placed in front of that monochromatic sensor. This, as most hardcore photographers now know, is the ubiquitous Bayer filter — a repeating array of green, red and blue filters, which create a mosaic that the processor inside the camera (or the computer’s Raw converter) interpolates into a color image.

    From the moment I learned of this, I knew what I wanted — a camera with the Bayer filter removed. Granted, such a device would still fall short of my own personal utopia (a digital camera with a sensor that had the luminosity response of film). But by removing the color filter array and the subsequent image interpolation requirements, the camera would likely produce photos with greater dynamic range and an increased potential for richer grey tonality. As an added bonus, the lack of color interpolation would theoretically create even greater resolution (which was already one of the fundamental advantages of digital photography — at least when compared with 35mm film).

    The production of such a camera seemed, to me, to be a “no brainer.” And when I expressed this opinion to a smattering of fellow photographers, they readily agreed that it was indeed a “no brainer,” but that I was the one with no brain. “Just learn to use Photoshop,” they said (unaware that I’d been a skilled Photoshop user since 1991). “Absolutely no advantage to such a camera,” said others (uninterested in my theoretical musings). “Prohibitively expensive to manufacture a monochromatic sensor,” claimed still more (who failed to realize that the sensors were already monochrome). I soon found a smattering of like-minded photographers posting similar desires on internet forums. They too were quickly dismissed by a collective flurry of taunts, bullying, snark and name-calling usually reserved for UFOlogists, Elvis impersonators and Uwe Boll fans. I realized that mine was a futile wish — unlikely to ever be granted.

    So I did the next best thing — I started shooting film again. This two-hatted technique liberated me. If I desired ease-of-use, high-resolution and complete post-capture control of the contrast relationships within an image, I’d shoot digital. If my photographic desires leaned toward tonality, extended dynamic range and a certain ‘richness’ in the greys, I’d go with film. I had the best of both worlds, and I nearly forgot about my once passionate desire for a black & white digital camera.

    Flash forward to May 10, 2012. That’s the day Leica announced their new M-Monochrom camera — essentially a re-engineered version of the Leica M9 with the Bayer filter removed. Not only is this the technological manifestation of my earlier dream, but it’s even packaged within the body of my all-time favorite digital camera — the Leica M9. I know serendipity when I see it, so I knew nothing would prevent me from obtaining this camera. Then I saw the price. Ouch. Funding the new M-Monochrom would require that I sell a significant portion of my current photography equipment. Is it worth it? I don’t know. Leica has yet to release the camera, and what few prototypes exist are held very tightly to Leica’s collective chest. Since May 10th, I’ve made several requests to Leica for a review sample. OK, it’s really several hundred requests — I’m hoping that if I annoy them enough, they’ll just mail me the darn thing so I’ll shut up.

    On one hand, I can’t wait to get my hands on this camera. On the other, I’m dreading it. What if I love it? What if it really is the camera I’ve been wanting for 6 years? What will I have to sacrifice in order to get it?

    To protect myself from these fears, I’m using the weeks prior to the camera’s August release date to “batten the hatches.” Specifically, I’m in the process of doing everything I can to persuade myself I don’t need this camera. I’ve been trying to shoot photos with the M9 that I don’t think would look as good (or at least the same) with the M-Monochrom — hoping to convince myself that post-capture black & white conversion is “better.” Similarly, I’ve been shooting photos with all manner of film cameras, using all types of film, which I’m developing in all sorts of chemicals — just to remind myself that the M-Monochrom will not, in any way, achieve the same sort of response curve as these shots. And just to give myself some breathing room, I’m making sure to take a lot of jumpy, scale-focused street shots — my “bread and butter” photos — which by their very nature are likely incapable of capitalizing on the obvious resolution advantages that the M-Monochrom is sure to exhibit.

    In short, my goal for the next two months is to take photos that shouldn’t look any better if I’d used an M-Monochrom instead of my existing equipment — thus saving myself the anxiety of Craigslist, and the endless stream of nitwits trying to lowball me on price, or failing to show up at the appointed time.

    But there’s another angle that has me on guard. In theory, the M-Monochrom should depict images with a look uniquely distinct from either film or color-converted digital. I’ve long maintained there’s no reason one camera technology needs to supplant another — that film and digital give different results, and thus can and should coexist happily. As photographers, we should seek to expand our visual vocabularies, not limit them. So what happens if the M-Monochrom renders an alternate tonality every bit as viable and useful as both film and color digital, yet completely and pleasingly different? Then what? Will I be shooting three formats soon?

    So it’s all-hands-on-deck in the great ULTRAsomething hatch battening exercise. Will my efforts prove successful? Or will I succumb to the temptation to finally own the digital camera I once only fantasized would ever exist? There’s only one way to be certain… I need to shoot with an M-Monochrom for a couple of weeks. So, Leica, consider this my several-hundredth-and-one request. I’m waiting patiently for its delivery and to learn, once and for all, if all us crackpots who cried out for a Bayer-less camera were actually sane all along?

    ©2012 grEGORy simpson

    ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: “Bottom’s Up” was shot with a Leica M2 and a 21mm Elmarit-M using ADOX CHS 50 Art film, developed 1:100 in Rodinal. “Photography’s Other Half” was also shot with a Leica M2 on ADOX CHS 50 Art film and developed 1:100 in Rodinal except, in this case, a v4 35mm Summicron-M lens was used. “Corridor, Portland OR” and “Waiting for the M-Monochrom” were both shot with a Leica M9 digital, using a 28mm Summicron-M lens. “Tornado Potato” was shot with a Leica M9 and a Voigtlander 50mm f/1.1 Nokton lens.

    If you find these photos enjoyable or the articles beneficial, please consider making a DONATION to this site’s continuing evolution. As you’ve likely realized, ULTRAsomething is not an aggregator site — serious time and effort go into developing the original content contained within these virtual walls.