Friday, February 15, 2008


VILLEFRANCHE-SUR-MER, FRANCE. (February 2008). Street photography with an old, film manual focus lens and the slightly smallish optical viewfinder on an Olympus E-410 is an exercise in patience. Here at
dingobear photography, we have much respect for those old-school film photographers who shot in everything in full manual and still got great pictures. Picture available for sale as prints. Original photo properties: Olympus E-410 dSLR, OM Zuiko Auto-S 50mm f1.8 lens (100mm, 35mm equivalent), handheld, manual focus and exposure, matrix metering, 1/60s f4, ISO 100, 3566 x 2674 pixels (after crop), RAW.

6 comments:

  1. Shot at f4, eh? Brilliant. Nifty little lens you've got there. I love this photo - it's exactly what Europe is all about.

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  2. At least I'm pretty sure it was f4 ... it might have been f2.8. Unfortunately, because my 50mm f1.8 is manual, the EXIF data doesn't record the aperture used.

    I like this photo, too. It feels very Europe to me.

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  3. Heh heh heh. You probably though nobody actually read all those little numbers down there. I do!

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  4. Well, how about that?! I'll try to be more careful ...

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  5. Teehee, I pay attention to all those numbers (One main reason I just added this to my feed reader!). Nice to see such a skilled photographer using an e410, I kinda got the feeling a lot of people looked down on it as being a 'consumer' toy.

    Funny, I found this site as I was doing background research on the f1.8 50mm that I recently just bought.

    Brilliant photography, I love the extra details, thanks for sharing :D.

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  6. Aegir, thanks for stopping in (and adding us to your feed reader)! Also, I appreciate the kind comments.

    In my opinion, the curious marketing angle that Olympus chose with the E-410 is one of the reasons why the camera doesn't get its due. Oly sells it as an entry-level offering, but for anyone who knows enough and is willing to actually read the spec sheet on the E-410, they'll see that Oly didn't cripple the model just because it's slotted in at the "entry-level" price range.

    Features like true spot metering, really flexible mirror lock-up, and LiveView depth of field preview can be invaluable to the serious photographer. In addition, the Zuiko 14-42mm (which I've tried to showcase a little bit here), is an excellent performer and though I admit I'm a little biased, I think it's the best zoom kit lens on the market today. As any photographer knows: everything else being equal, lenses are more important than bodies ... and at the enthusiast to semi-pro level, Oly's Zuiko line is probably unmatched and one of the best kept secrets in digital photography.

    I'm curious to see how the upcoming Olympus E-420 sells. Packaged with the new pancake Zuiko 25mm f2.8 it looks like a cracker, and I can definitely see numerous pros using it as a lightweight, go anywhere, travel cam.

    May I ask what camera you shoot with? Definitely enjoy that 50mm f1.8 that you bought for yourself ... I assume it's a Zuiko? If you haven't used such a fast lens before, you'll definitely love the low light possibilities and dollar-for-dollar, it's got some great bokeh. Happy shooting.

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