The "Photo-Essay" and Stock Photography

Stock photography provides a good opportunity to put together a series of pictures to document a location. This gives potential buyers more choice and provides images that show what its like to visit a place. Too often I see pictures that are all shot from the same angle and give no sense of either the context or the detail.

This is Hurst Castle in Hampshire. An old fort located on the end of a sandspit. There are two forms of access, one is by walking along the top of the spit and the other by ferry from the local harbour. The following is a series of images I put together over a couple of days.

Nikon D7000 55-300mm

Nikon D7000 55-300mm

Nikon D7000 10-24mm

Leica M8 Voigtlander 28mm f/2 Ultron

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Donkeys to Power Stations

Some examples of the location, landscape and stock shots I'm taking this week, in this incredible weather.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Leica M9 Voigtlander 28mm f/2 Ultron

Nikon D7000 10-24mm

Nikon D7000 10-24mm

Leica M9 Voigtlander 28mm f/2 Ultron

Nikon D7000 10-24mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Leica M9 Voigtlander 28mm f/2 Ultron

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Stock shooting with Nikon D5100 and Leica M9

Leica M9 Voigtlander 75mm f/2.5 Heliar

A couple of times a year I head to the coast to add to my stock of images of British seaside resorts. Due to this years unpredictable summer this second trip has been somewhat delayed. However this late September heatwave has provided an ideal opportunity for some sunlit images.

Nikon D5100 16-85mm zoom lens

For the first time in a while I left the smaller cameras at home and have just brought the Leica M9 and my two Nikons, the D7000 and D5100.

Nikon D5100 16-85mm zoom lens

Nikon D5100 16-85mm zoom lens

Nikon D5100 16-85mm zoom lens

Nikon D5100 16-85mm zoom lens

Nikon D5100 16-85mm zoom lens

Alcester with D7000 - Pentax 645D raw files - Interpolation

Alcester with D7000

Nikon D7000 16-85mm zoom lens

Alcester is a town not far from where I live. On Sunday the sun appeared finally in the late afternoon and since we were going out to a meal with friends nearby, I decided to grab the D7000 and take a few shots on the way, in what turned out to be very nice evening light.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm zoom lens

The main street has a lot of half-timbering and "olde-worlde". It is however like most towns these days, full of parked cars and it can often be difficult to get angles that show the historic old buildings off to their best advantage.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm zoom lens

It is also one of the most patriotic towns I've seen with Union Jacks on poles lining the street.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm zoom lens

Nikon D7000 16-85mm zoom lens

The D7000 is my current "camera of choice" and with the 16-85mm zoom proved extremely useful. 

Pentax 645D raw files and interpolation

There's a link on 1001Noisy Cameras - http://www.1001noisycameras.com/2011/09/flagship-wars-nikon-d3x-vs-pentax-645d.html which leads to a comparison between a Nikon D3X and a Pentax 645D. There's also another link which leads to some raw samples from the camera - http://www.1001noisycameras.com/2010/08/pentax-645d-realworld-dng-samples-uk-decision-still-coming.html including one particular image of a steam train. 

It is quite spectacularly sharp. The camera has no AA filter, and when I first processed the .DMG file in Photoshop it had a lot of moire and CA. However there is a camera / lens preset in Adobe Camera Raw which removes the majority of it, and produces a quite extraordinary file. I've often toyed with the idea of selling everything else and buying a 645D, with just the 55mm lens. I used a Pentax 645 film camera for years, and always liked it. It was a hand holdeable MF camera that worked like a big DSLR and was a great favourite of travel and stock photographers.

The thought of buying one again has occurred to me again, since until the end of September there is a 10% cashback on the 645D, which would bring the camera and lens down to a "bargain baesment" £8730!!! The one lens wouldn't be that much of a problem, since you can crop into these files and still produce a huge high resolution file. Though to buy this would mean selling a great deal of what I have already.

However, two things put me off. Firstly the weight, Its actually heavier than a D3X. I used to haul one these and three lenses everywhere, and used to think that it was quite light, which shows how things have changed! Secondly, some of the pictures from the 55mm lens had quite soft edges.

I then had a look at one of my Leica M9 files blown up to the same size (113MB) as the Pentax image that had so impressed me and I realised that there actually wasn't that much difference between them.

I then decided to have a look at some other files and was quite surprised as to what size I could make them before they started to look bad. I was able to upsize G3 and D7000 files quite dramatically and they still looked fine. Bags of detail and still very sharp.

Olympus are currently advertising their new 45mm f/1.8 lens with A3 double page spreads in UK photo magazines, and they do look very impressive indeed, with what is an interpolated file, since Pen cameras don't produce A3 size files unless you upsize them.

A few years ago, I was upsizing all my digital camera files for picture libraries, since they required larger sizes than the cameras at the time were capable of producing, and everybody, including clients, seemed quite happy with this. I think we sometimes forget just how big some of the files that we shoot can be printed. Pixel-peeping on a computer screen, we can see all kinds of minor differences between files, but making prints and published files often make that difference far less significant. 

The great advantage of files with lots of MP's and files from MF cameras is the ability to crop into them. I've always got round that by shooting a range of images with different lenses, to give clients the choice they want without having to crop. 

Interpolation is often "frowned upon" but it still happens all the time, particularly in publishing and if done carefully, with a good initial image, often works very well. It can enable us to use the camera we like without having to constantly feel that we need to upsize our MP count, and its often said that you probably have to double it to notice any real difference. I'm not sure thats true but there is far less difference between 12MP and 16MP than many would have us believe.

"Its not the size, its the quality" is of course true, and the quality of the sensor and lenses is of course very important. The Pentax 645D produces amazing files, but then so do many of the cameras I own already. They also offer me a lot more flexibility and provide the opportunity to get pictures that I would never be able to get with the 645D.

Pulling shadow detail from a Nikon D7000 file

 

One of the really useful things about the Nikon D7000 and the Sony sensor it uses is the ability to lighten very deep shadows without lots of noise being generated. This "elasticity" means that its preferable to expose for the highlights, in order to protect them from burning out, in the knowledge that any under exposed areas can be "rescued" later.

There are many who recommend exposing for the shadows with digital cameras, the so-called "exposing to the right". However articles that recommend that were often written before sensors like this Sony 16MP were designed. Also before m4/3 appeared. Expose for the shadows with those sensors and you'll get unrecoverable burnt out highlights.

I first saw this latitude with this Sony sensor with a Pentax K-5, and the D7000 performs almost exactly the same. Obviously its a good idea to expose properly in the first place, or if there might be problems to bracket some exposures. And this is what I usually do. The above example is somewhat extreme but it does show what is possible if I don't do either of those.

Nikon D7000 review - Part 5 - Is this the best camera I've ever owned?

  

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

During the last part of my review of the D7000 - http://soundimageplus.blogspot.com/2011/06/d7000-is-nikons-best-dslr-ever-ken_19.html I wrote this:- "In the coming weeks I'll be using it more and writing about what happens." Having done that I'm now in a position to conclude the review.

I'm as fond of small, rangefinder and "rangefinder styled" cameras as anyone. I love using my Leica and m4/3. Manual focus lens and adapters have a fascination for me. I'm keen to promote the idea of lighter, more easily carried gear, that avoids backache. I do tests to prove that these cameras are every bit as good at producing quality images as big heavy and bulky DSLR's.

So why in this post / review do I pose the question "Is the Nikon D7000 the best camera I've ever owned?"

IMAGE QUALITY.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

To me this is the most important element in any camera. Does it produce high quality images that I can send to clients with confidence? All the people who buy my pictures aren't the slightest bit interested in what camera or lens I use. They want to see high quality files, with rich saturated colour, with no noise or artefacts. They want to see an image that looks good on the printed page or on their website. They don't care whether the camera it was taken on cost £50 or £5000.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

The image quality from the D7000 is very good indeed. The 16MP Sony sensor that it uses is now in many cameras. The Pentax K-5, Sony a55, a580, NEX-C3, NEX-5n, the Nikon D7000 and D5100. It has low noise at high ISO's, great shadow recovery at low ISO's and rich saturated colour. As far as I'm concerned, at this moment in time, the best APS-C sensor ever.

Are the D7000 images sharp? Well yes they are. Not the sharpest I can produce. Thats reserved for my Leica M9 and m-mount lenses. And yes I can produce slightly sharper files from G3 plus high quality primes and my NEX-C3 plus Voigtlander lenses. But producing images for sale is not all about pixel peeping. The difference between a D7000 file and a Leica M9 file may be noticeable on a computer monitor at 100%, but in terms of reproduction it will be insignificant. 

The D7000, in common with many DSLR's, has an anti-aliasing filter. This is primarily designed to reduce moire in images. Its not supposed to reduce luminance and colour noise, but it usually does that as well. A camera manufacturer will attempt to make its higher specified cameras useful in every picture-taking situation. If one of those situations involves taking pictures where moire might occur, then they try to make sure their cameras avoid it. So the D7000 can be used with confidence for fashion shows and photoshoots, weddings and portrait, event and social photography.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

I use my D7000 mainly for travel, location and landcape photography and it works beautifully for all of those, producing "punchy" images with great colour, well-controlled but realistic contrast and enough resolution and detail to be able to allow large-scale reproduction.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

HANDLING

This is where many DSLR's still hold an advantage over other smaller cameras. The D7000 is a dream to use. Its fast responsive, well designed and laid out. Its pretty obvious where things are and changing settings isn't the pain and head-scratching puzzle that it can be on other cameras. Its built and designed for speed and ease of use. For the most part, I don't need that. I'm usually working in a situation where I have the time to consider what I'm doing. But not always. 

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Yesterday I was working in the centre of Warwick, a picturesque old town in the English Midlands. It was a lovely sunny Sunday afternoon and there were lots of people about. I was often having to work very quickly, photographing buildings when there was a gap in the traffic or there were no people on the pavement. I needed a zoom to be able to get my composition quickly and accurately. I can often "zoom with my feet" when photographing landscape, but standing in the middle of the road with the amount of traffic that was around yesterday wasn't an option!

The D7000 performed flawlessly. It has very fast AF and a shutter with no discernable lag. It allows me to get the shot easily and with the minimum of effort. 

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

NEGATIVES.

No camera is perfect, and the D7000 has a tendency to overexpose at its default settings for my taste. I usually work with spot metering and -.7 exposure compensation dialled in. That avoids highlight problems and with the sensors ability to lift shadow areas with the minimum of noise I find it works well.

And yes it is fairly heavy, particularly when fitted with the 16-85mm zoom I was using yesterday. This is less of a problem now I'm using it with a handgrip. It might seem that doing that would make the camera more of a weight, but I actually find it easier than having the camera on a strap over my shoulder. There's no denying however that I would love it to be half its weight. I appreciate the build quality, but carrying it and walking for a long time can be tiring.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

CONCLUSION

Cameras are compromises. There isn't a camera made (or probably ever going to be made) that will give me 100% of what I want. However the D7000 is probably the closest I've ever had. Yes, I'd like it to be lighter (Though not necessarily smaller) Yes, I'd like it to have more pixels and yes I'd like a weaker AA filter (Though I'd still like the same low noise and lack of moire)

Ultimately it comes down to what would I choose if I could only have one camera and lens? My answer now would be exactly what I was using yesterday. The Nikon D7000 plus 16-85mm lens would "Get the job done" for 99% of what I do. And it would do it efficiently, quickly and (I'm assuming) reliably. Add in the fact that I have the Nikon lens range to choose from, the fact that it shoots great video and that for its specification its not that expensive and its not hard to see why I can say that, yes, it is the "best" camera that I've ever owned. 

I get asked from time to time to recommend cameras and I'm usually quite reluctant to come down definitively in favour of one model or another, but if anyone were to ask me what would be the most suitable camera for someone who has "professional" aspirations, then I would have no hesitation in recommending the D7000. In terms of handling, specification, value for money and most important of all, the quality of images it produces I can't think of anything else that I've used that ticks as many boxes. 

Often when I return home after a days photography, I've found something out on location that I don't like or has caused me problems, but the D7000 is refreshingly free of that. I often think when I'm out working with it, "Why do I use anything else?" Its certainly the easiest camera I own to work with, and I do actually enjoy using using it. 

Perhaps its greatest virtue is that when I'm out with it, I spend my time thinking about the pictures I'm taking rather than the camera itself. And thats really what its all about.

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm

Nikon D7000 16-85mm