Then End of the Ricoh GRD
With August came the end of another camera era in my journey. The Ricoh had to go. Not because I didn't like it anymore, I still loved it, I just found the deal on a Leica I have been looking for and needed the Ricoh to help fund it. All in all it was a great little camera. If it had better ISO performance at night and still had the 40mm adapter I doubt I would have ever gotten rid of it. But I just had to see what the red dot mystique was about. Even thought it was small, it produced still to this day some of my favourite shots I have taken.
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| Purple Flower Close-up |
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| A long day of work ahead |
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| Trapped Morning Dew |
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| Shadow Giants |
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| Riding the Darkness |
The Leica M8
So why did I make the switch. Part of it came from curiousity about the "allure" of the Leica. But mostly it had everything I wanted in a camera. It was light, small, unobtrusive, allowed for interchangeble fast prime lens. On top of all of this it was nostalgic looking and made you feel a connection with the past. It was tough to adapt to because it took all bells and whistles out of photography, forcing you to read lighting conditions much more, and manually focus everything. But I am a bit of an old-timer at heart and I absolutely love the cognitive side of photography. I love that the camera made me think about so many things before just snapping a picture. My picture count went way down as I was thinking about them more, but the quality dramatically improved.
The only drawback though is the Leica has limitations due to its nature. It is meant for slow methodical photography. You can operate it on moving objects but it takes great practice at focusing and knowing the camera. It is a great camera for street photography and as such for all of August I pretty much solely focused on improving my street photography.
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| Reflections |
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| So Bored.... |
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| The Water Tunnel |
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| Entertainment Dancing |
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| Its Right There... |
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| A Breath of Fresh Air |
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| Quiet Alley |
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| Three of a Kind |
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| Isolated |
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| Yawning or Yelling |
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| Two of a Kind |
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| Texting Break |
Playing with Colour
It wasn't all black and white shooting for me in August. I dabbled a little into colour as well. Black and white is the generally accepted medium for street photography because it allows the artist to easily seperate their subject and story from the busy background, but artists have been playing with colour too. Colour just adds a whole new dimension to the photos and can often make them lose their impact on the viewer. But you always have to try :)
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| Not street - but a beautful lampost at dusk |
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| 24H Newspaper Sales |
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| Catching the Light |
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| Twins |
Well that once again concludes another part of my photographic journey. I hope you enjoyed this as much as the last 5. This month was dominated by street photography but I would still like to hear if you had any favourite images!
I will tell you mine if you tell me yours :)
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