amipal photography

The Panasonic Lumix GH1 was a very powerful camera at the time; in fact, it was top of the range across both Panasonic and Olympus. So why then did I pick up the bottom-of-the-line, hamstrung Olympus E-PL1 ? Because, despite the GH1 being smaller than any DSLR out there and lightweight in comparison, I didn't want to take it out to social events. Olympus E-PL1 May 2012 to July 2014 ~3000 shots And that's where the E-PL1 came in. It was a backup to the GH1, definitely not a replacement in any way, shape or form. 12 megapixel sensor, instead of the ~16 megapixel multi-aspect sensor in the Lumix. RAW files with little headroom. Poor low-light performance. Rangefinder form-factor, rather than faux-DSLR. No viewfinder. No control dials. Cheap construction. I'd never even considered an Olympus Micro Four Thirds camera up that point. I had tried a friend's Olympus PEN E-P1, and didn't get on with the interface. Sure, it had produced some nice out-of-camera JPE...

The Lumix GH1 was not my first digital camera - that accolade belongs to the Olympus_µ700 point and shoot. Nor was it my first camera bought because I'd got into photography proper, which was the Panasonic Lumix FZ50 bridge camera. And neither was it a camera bought through in-depth study and knowledge of the technical aspects of photography. What it was, though, was my first interchangeable lens camera. Panasonic Lumix GH1 February 2010 to October 2012 ~9000 shots Why did I buy the GH1? Why not go for a DSLR from one of the established and ubiquitous firms such as Canon or Nikon? The answer to both those question lay firmly at the feet of Panasonic's graphical user interface. My experience with the FZ50 had shown me how easy it was to navigate and find what you were looking for, so I went for more of the same. In addition, I wanted a 10x zoom, just like I had with my FZ50 - the superzoom range on that had made it the perfect travel camera for my trip to China in 2008 ....

On an unknown forum on the vast expanse of the internet, I read a post about someone switching to a Micro Four Thirds camera body from an existing Nikon system. They posted some images from their old camera as examples of the best they'd achieved with that kit - and that got me thinking about a post I could write for this very blog. Over the years, I've purchased a number of camera bodies as upgrades to replace my main camera, or as backups to use alongside with or for different scenarios. I initially decided to put all of it into one post, but after I went through the process to do so, it ended up absolutely massive. So instead, I'll do a post a day covering each of the cameras, which will also allow me to add a bit more commentary around them - I'll post ten images from each which I consider memorable photos, not necessarily brilliant photos. I hope you find them interesting! Panasonic Lumix GH1 Olympus E-PL1 Panasonic Lumix GH2 Panasonic Lumix GH3 Panasonic...

In a prior post, I mentioned trying to find the perfect lens for flower photography . And how I was going to do some tests with the lenses mentioned within said post. Well, this isn't that test. It's another test. A test with very similar focal-length lenses, and with similar apertures. This is the Battle of the 50mm or Thereabouts Lenses for Photographing Clematis ! What are the contenders in today's test? Well, we have a trio of legacy 50mm lenses from a variety of mounts. And also an auto-focus lens specifically designed for Micro Four Thirds. Jupiter-8 f/2 50mm - m39-mount Helios-44 f/1.8 50mm - m42-mount Voigtlander Color-Ultron f/1.8 50mm - Q-mount Lumix f/1.7 42.5mm - Micro Four Thirds mount All lenses were shot wide-open, and all from the "same" distance from the flower. This distance was calculated based on the closest focusing distance of the lenses with the longest closest focusing distance, the Jupiter-8. Jupiter-8 f/2 50mm Helios-44...

We're almost to the end of the camera club season, so over the last fortnight we've had both the Print of the Year and Projected Image of the Year competitions. You're free to enter up to two image that you'd submitted to previous competitions in the season, both open and set subject. And you're also allowed to change the title, crop, clone and reprint if you want. While I didn't win either, I was very happy with all the photos I submitted for the end of season, so share them with you today. Projected Image of the Year London Neon Picture info: Lumix GH4, Voigtlander f/0.95 17.5mm, ISO800, f/2, 1/2000 sec Street Food Picture info: Lumix GH4, Voigtlander f/0.95 17.5mm, ISO200, f/8, 1/250 sec Print of the Year Lonely Station Picture info: Lumix GH4, Voigtlander f/0.95 17.5mm, ISO200, f/5.6, 1/200 sec Day Approaches Picture info: Lumix GH4, Lumix 12-32mm @ 12mm, ISO200, f/7.1, 1/320 sec Hopefully next season I'll have more success!

I have been a Lumix GH-series man for many years, starting with the original GH1. And yet I've rarely used them for video. So historically, why did I pick the GH cameras over the regular G or GX series? Because they tended to have more horsepower under the bonnet to process the high-definition (and later 4K) video files, larger buffers, and usually the latest sensors - and this made them very snappy cameras for photography. When Panasonic announced a top-of-the-range photography-centric camera based around the GH5, my interest was piqued - looking at the specs and comments coming out, this seemed like the ideal camera for me. And so a couple of months back, I received my annual bonus at work, and mere hours later I was the proud owner of a brand new Lumix G9 (the advantage/disadvantage of having Park Cameras half an hour drive away). First things first - it is larger than the GH4. And I don't mean slightly larger, I mean substantially larger. The GH4 look and size were...

I know things have been quiet from me on the blog front lately - this is due to being exceedingly busy at work, as well as illness at home. But I have at least been keeping my Photo 52 project for 2018 up to date. Now we're a quarter of the way through the year, I thought it'd be a good idea to cast my eye over the shots so far - and please bear in mind that I do take more photos than those that are selected for the 52 project. As I predicted earlier on in the year, the photos are all from the local area, with half of them coming from a small area of seafront barely five minutes from my house. This speaks more about my ability to get out and about and taking photos than anything else! But I also think it shows that a variety of images can be gathered from quite a limited location. In the six images I have a dramatic storm, a sunrise and sunset, geometry, street and long-exposure light streams. How do a select images for my Photo 52? Well, I tend ...