by cg on January 30, 2009
Here’s another photo with the new Zeiss Planar on a Leica M8 body. “Optically I judge it superior to any of the Leica 50mm f2 Summicron-M lenses I have used” says John Kwok. High praise, especially given how much cheaper the Zeiss Planar is…
Ron Miller asked on Twitter: what do journalists use to organize their notes? I use the file system on my Mac… but cloud services like Google Docs have the advantage of being available anywhere there’s a net link. If only I could add mp3s et al. on Google…
by cg on January 29, 2009
I see my (klutz) adventures with a plastic tub of Whole Foods soup, have sparked a lot of comments. I don’t mind being open about misadventures (think: Homer Simpson’s ‘Doh’ moments). I’m a klutz as well as a geek. My friends know it, and I’m probably doing a wider audience a favor by letting them in on the secret. If you see me coming with a plastic container of soup, run. You’ve been warned…
Random stuff:
We’re at Peet’s (3:30) after doing the shopping, dry cleaning pick up et al. We posted a live snap of the ‘action’ over on my Blogger blog.
Thomas Keller’s Slow-Cooker Cassoulet. Yum…
Speaking of working with dinosaur photo gear: Nikon Rangefinder SP Black 2005. I had a Nikon S when I was 19 and trying to break into the London photo scene…
The N Judah project is back on my radar. Made some good progress yesterday – news TK. I documented my 3-times-a-week journey on the blog. These are pictures I took on the eponymous streetcar while commuting to radiation therapy and slowly becoming half-paralyzed, in November and December of 2006 It was good to have something to do while coping with the ‘new me’…
by cg on January 28, 2009
Sure looked like a ’soup container’ to me…
by cg on January 27, 2009
We’re really having fun with the new Zeiss Planar, carrying it on either an M8 (digital) or M4 (film) body pretty much everywhere we go. I like the saturation, as well as the sharpness: this snap taken in the back hallway of the local Starbucks succeeds because of the richness of color and detail in the blond wood.
Working with a rangefinder again reminds me of how touchy the focus is – rangefinders were never as good as reflex cameras for normal and telephoto shots (the 50mm Planar is the equivalent of a 70mm on the digital M8). But, with instant viewing of the photo on the M8, I can correct static situations like this one if the first try is a bit off.
Working with the rangefinder is good therapy for my recovering left arm and hand, which really need work to get the fine motor skills back (I’m typing this with the left hand, also good exercise). THe new Zeiss has a stiff focusing ring – common in new manual focus lenses. While it should loosen a bit with use, the extra oomph is a good exercise for my week hand.
So, we’re back to full-dinosaur snapping with the M4 which has no battery or exposure meter – the shutter spring and film advance require the photographer to flip a lever with the right thumb – which lever was itself a much-hailed advance when it debuted in the 1950s (I think). Heh, like the McDonald’s jingle, ‘I’m lovin it‘…
by cg on January 26, 2009
A week ago, Scott and I made a Saturday morning run to Keeble & Shuchat, one of the Bay Area’s best camera stores. Scott was looking for a tripod and I was just looking (honest, dear). While Scott perused the very lightweight (and expensive) Manfrotto carbon-fiber tripods I gazed at the Leica shelf. I have been half-way looking for a 50mm lens for my Leica rangefinders.
In the old days, I used the Leica as a wide angle camera. My Nikons had normal and telephoto lenses mounted as I made my rounds, working mostly for daily newspapers. The Leica 21mm was very sharp and distortion free, and gave me an edge over the 24mm Nikkor then used by most photojournalists. The 35mm was a great ‘normal’ lens, and very useful shooting groups at social events. People on the ends didn’t get that fat look that lesser wide angles produce.
Nowadays I’m using my Leicas as much as possible – in part to make my left arm and hand work by focusing the Leica (using rangefinder technology invented early in the last century). So a ‘normal’ angle lens was on the wish list. At the store, a new Leitz 50mm f2 lens was $2000. A beat demo lens was $1700. No thanks.
However, a Zeiss Ikon camera was sitting on the shelf, with a 50mm Zeiss Planar T* – my old film Contax camera had a Planar, as did my Hasselblad – I had always loved the images from both. The salesman quoted a price for the Zeiss lens that was a third of the Leitz 50mm. I made the command decision, and ordered one in black, to match my Leica bodies.
The lens arrived last Thursday – the pictures above were made with the new lens. The picture at top is a crop from the picture at left, and shows the Planar’s crisp resolution and very nice saturation. This new Planar does not disappoint…
by cg on January 25, 2009
by cg on January 25, 2009
by cg on January 24, 2009
The Cook Doctrine at Apple – Go West:
We believe that we are on the face of the earth to make great products and that’s not changing. We are constantly focusing on innovating. We believe in the simple not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products that we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution. We believe in saying no to thousands of projects, so that we can really focus on the few that are truly important and meaningful to us. We believe in deep collaboration and cross-pollination of our groups, which allow us to innovate in a way that others cannot. And frankly, we don’t settle for anything less than excellence in every group in the company, and we have the self-honesty to admit when we’re wrong and the courage to change. And I think regardless of who is in what job those values are so embedded in this company that Apple will do extremely well.
(Via Scott Loftesness.)…
by cg on January 23, 2009
Thanks to Scott’s evangelism I’m running friendfeed (now via FriendDeck) and Twitter via Tweetdeck, as I mentioned a couple days ago. A whole bunch of old colleagues suddenly surfaced: it reminded me of the heady old days of constant chatter and cross-linking on the then-nascent blogs.
But my day yesterday basically went to hell schedule-wise as I dealt with the data torrent. Something would catch my eye: when I explored that link something else would divert me to yet another location.
The whole process reminded me of the computer concept of interrupts, whereby a higher-priority process can interrupt lower priority code. Interrupts can be interrupted up to the ability of the processor’s memory registers or ’stacks’ to hold the interrupted code.
Yesterday’s chain of interrupts waaaay overloaded my ’stack.’ Spouse came home to find mail not sorted, wash not moved over and recycling bins still on curb. She was sweet about it, though. Nevertheless, this morning she looked at a half-dozen parallel waterfalls of posts, links, photos and other data pouring down the screen like the opening scenes from The Matrix trilogy and asked me if I thought I’d have time to shop and make dinner. Either I’m getting slower or the net is running a whole lot faster…
by cg on January 22, 2009
With all these new social media sites on my radar, I decided I needed a more atmospheric portrait. I have always relied on Anne Knudsen, a very talented Silicon Valley photographer, to render me as well as this old mug will allow.
Previously Anne has photographed me in the very flattering style that most corporate publications favor – appropriate for the large corporations I’ve worked for, as well as the startups where we were trying to look bigger than we were.
Today, between dropping off her daughter and an assignment in Menlo, she shot me – in about 15 minutes – after very carefully setting a single strobe. And, boy, did she nail it – I am one very happy ‘client’ – it really pays to work with a pro. Wow, and many thanks, Annie…
