Conservative Papa

Does this article make sense to you? Ken Rockwell argues that Costco (or similar stores) will make film prints for less than they do for digital prints. Therefore, one should pick up an insanely cheap professional film camera and get prints developed and the digital files on CD for “free.”

This is what I did before shelving my Nikon N60. :’( To get double 4×6 prints and a CD, it cost me about $10 for every 24 shots at Sam’s Club. I had pause when pressing the shutter, because I knew it cost almost $0.50 each time I did so.

With my digital camera, I shoot with abandon and just delete the duds. Also, only one or two dozen shots ever make it to paper each year. The rest are posted online or burned to CD and sent to family.

The only way Ken’s article makes sense is for someone who wants a print of every single shot and would be paying for it whether the shot came from a film or digital camera. Who does that?

Ken generally seems to gave good advice, and I enjoy his site. This time, I guess he just got off on a rant because electronics married photography and ran away with cameras as they once were.

Hail the Hasselblad H3D-39! Most digital cameras have an image sensor that is smaller than standard 35mm film. This beast has a 48×36mm sensor — analogous to film’s “medium format.”

I won’t be adding this beauty to my collection — or even my wish list — any time soon. It has a car-sized price tag of $31,995!

Children can be rather challenging to photograph. When I squatted down to get a better angle, Esther Joy thought it would be a good idea to copy me.

Check out Nikon’s D40: Picturetown ad campaign for the Nikon D40 digital camera.  Not only did they start out with an interesting concept (hand out D40’s to 200 “ordinary” people), but they posted some of these peopole’s pictures on the web site with a blog-like commenting interface.  This advertising tactic is as enterprising as posting ads on the sides of trash cans, and a whole lot more engaging!

By the way, if no one wants to buy me the D80 for Father’s Day, the D40 will do just fine!

The stars were dim, and thick the night,
The steerman’s face by his lamp gleamed white;
From the sails the dew did drip–
Till clomb above the eastern bar
The hornéd Moon, with one bright star
Within the nether tip.
— from the The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Well, it wasn’t quite within the nether tip, but Venus appeared close to the Moon on Saturday evening. I was busy making sawdust when my mother pointed out the lovely lunar spectacle.

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As I was reading PC World last night, I came across an interesting column. It’s about the Lensbaby variable focus lens. You move it around with your fingertips to bring just one area of the frame into focus. Way cool!

Sadly, the lens is made for an SLR camera, and my faithful film SLR has rested in its coffin-like case since the last wedding I shot more than a year ago. If I ever shoot another wedding, I’ll buy a digital SLR first. Until then, or at least for a while longer, I’ll have to be content with my pro-summer digital camera.

Hey, if some one wants to buy this for me, it’s cool enough that it would make a great paper weight for my desk! That’d be rather pricey for a paperweight, though.