Try Alex Majoli as an example. Pro's are pros because they pick the camera that is most suitable for the job. It's not unlike pro-badminton players who picks the best racket for the job -- why LD stuck to the AT700 despite all the nano advances. I know a few professional photographers who switched to the E-P1 due to the size but they also kept their bigger formats for other purposes. As an amateur, I personally steered clear of DSLR because I will not carry them around. Instead, I treated myself to an E-P1 the day it was launched. It has taken over my f100fd as my carry-around. I doubt this concept will take over the DSLR but it's an important progress nevertheless. Sometimes, the best camera is the one that you have with you (mobile phone).
im using the panasonic gh1, its pretty good camera. except theres no fast zoom lens. so for a badminton game its not ideal. i left some shots on the macau2009 forum for pictures. most were taken stretching iso1250 with shutter speed around 100. i think u'd see some fast zoom lens maybe next yr either from panasonic, olympus or ppl like sigma or tamron..
Olympus makes some very fast zoom lenses for Four Thirds cameras, i.e 35mm to 100mm f/2.0. There are also very fast f/1.4 lenses of 30mm and 60mm fixed focal length. They are also perhaps the smallest interchangeable fast lenses you can find in the market.
Some very fast and exremely high quality lenses for Four Thirds : 1st Tier (Extremely High Grade) 1. 300mm F2.8 Olympus 2. 150mm F2.0 Olympus 3. 25mm F1.4 (standard lens) Summilux-Leica 4. 35mm-100mm F2.0 zoom(constant max aperture at all zoom range)Olympus 5. 90-250mm F2.8 zoom (constant max aperture at all zoom range)-Olympus.
err.... Cheung asking for experience, not list. that means anyone ever use it and share with us on how are the lenses' performance.
No need to, from the lens materials used and configuration of the elements and groupings, all these lenses are superlative. The Summilux is also very well known, a legendary design and king of available light photography.
thx taneepak. im just waiting for the micro43 lenses. personally i just feel using 43 lenses with adapter on the gh1 kinda defeats the purpose of paying a lot of premium for the micro43 format which is suppose to be a lot more compact.
Ferrari make fast cars but may be difficult to drive around town. Care to give us your first hand experience with photos with this equipment setup? "Proof is in the pudding", so to speak Even Mercedes can make a crap car - in China, one guy trashed his Benz because it was bad. hehehe Hey, I thought of an alternative. Taneepak, you can give me the equipment (loan is OK) and I shoot the HK Open and give you my assessment. Only one condition, I will hand hold the camera.
Ah, too risky to loan out my equipment. But I would be willing to sell my very rare Black enamelled Leica M4 with 35mm F1.4 and 50mm F1.4 Summiluxes for US20,000. Or a black or standard chrome M4 instead, which will reduce the price by US$2,000 and US$5,000, respectively. I accept US currency too.
You should..and it's time for Mr. T to show us the proof is in the pudding.. ..i think for this yr, you should take a break from taking the HK Open pics. Instead you should invite, make that buy tickets for Mr. T to watch the HK Open and ask him to take baddy pics for us. After all, all of us are eager to see his pics taken with his beloved Leica M4 & 35/1.4 and 50/1.4 lenses!!
Nah.... the 50/1.4 is so very "so-so" ... Mr. T talks about only the superlative stuff... Legendary lenses like the Noctilux 50 mmf/1.0, the extraordinarily rare Nikkor 85mm f/1.0 and the even rarer still ( numbers in existance seem to be even fewer than the fingers in one hand!) Leica/ Elcan 90mm f/1.0 . I want to see picts taken by Mr. T with his very beloved Micro 4/3 camera(s) and exotic glass(es)!
Ahh, I'm not interested in those Then you accept my other alternative which is for you to take the photos with your own equipment. We shouldn't get distracted away by other exotic equipment. Just to clarify, we are only interested in the 4/3 camera with its complement of lenses for badminton photography and the results. We also not interested in driving the thread topic off at a tangent
I had a 'bad' start in photography, starting with those Brownie leaky cameras and also building my own box cameras when I was about 12. I then bought my first decent 35mm Yashica camera when 18, spent most of time in the dark (dark-room, a necessary evil with films) instead of studying, and was fascinated with producing images in the dark. I outgrew the Yashica after 3 months and instead went for Kodak cameras that were made in Germany spotting Schneider Kreuznach Xenon lenses, the latter very respectable and is unlike today's cheap Kodak cameras. Then in 1960 Nikon shook the camera world with the release of their Nikon F Photomic. I worked day and night during school vacations and earned enough money to buy my first expensive camera, the F Photomic in 1960. Then I got into bad company (professional photographers) at a photography seminar and couldn't sleep after they showed me their M3s. My Nikon F Photomic suddenly became a bad buy and compared badly with the M3s. I was struck by the beauty, the precision, and the feel of the M3 and I said to myself that I must get one. I sold the Nikon F Photomic to my Polish fellow photographer and bought my first M3 in 1961. I went on to buy a total of maybe 20 Leica cameras, from the Gs to the Ms, all of them were put to use. It is hard for me to convince you of the magic of the Leica M in your hands. The great Italian designer, Alessi, said the Leica M camera body is one of the few designs of the 20th century which he thought was so perfect he would never try to change. In 10 years time one of my Leica M4 body will probably cost more than 50 times of today's Nikon DX3 body. The former is an investment, the latter depletes completely in a decade.
It may surprise you, I don't have any Four Thirds or any digital cameras let alone their lenses. What I am suggesting to someone's complaint that there are no fast lenses for his Four Thirds camera is to list a few Four Thirds lenses that are fast and of high quality. Now, tell me is this information useful to the person asking, even if they may not be what he wants? The truth is that there are fast lenses for Four Thirds, but it seems this information is not quite well received by some.
I will be given 3 passes for the HK Open. I will attend if I am not called to Malaysia in November. But I have stopped bringing my camera gear ages ago. For some strange reasons I have dreams once in a while that during my travels to other countries, I keep having my cameras and lenses stolen. My main interest now, which keeps me fully occupied, is designing my own quality shuttlecocks. Posting here gives me some welcome distractions especially when an occasional tester gives me poor feedback on a shuttle design that I thought was supposed to be good.
no wonder that you keep telling us the old lenses are superb. get a cheap(not for investment) 4/3 camera that can fit the leica lenses and give it a try. i can bet that old leica lenses are crap on digital camera.
I still have friends who are in both the digital side and the film side, including my old friend the famous David Chan of Hong Kong. They actually "marry" old famous lenses from Zeiss and Leitz onto a Four Thirds body, but alas they can only use their slr lenses from Leitz and Zeiss and not the rangefinder lenses because of lens to sensor distance problem. Some even use old Zeiss lenses from the 1960s. They tell me today's digital lenses are no match for their old lenses because they lack texture and are too cold and bleached. However they are some old lenses from France-I think it sounds like Ageneuxe?-that are portrait lenses with purpose-built in softening to flatter the subject that don't look good on digital cameras. One of the chaps have both an Olympus E-3 with an Olympus 35-100mm f2.0 zoom and also a Canon 5D Mark II with 70-200mm f2.8IS zoom. Despite the David vs Goliath sensor battle, he says the Olympus zoom puts the Canon zoom in the shade. Can this be true? Perhaps some of your friends can find out from photographers who have both these cameras and zooms.
