Recent Shots

Downtown Charleston SC on King Street — “Second Sunday”, where the street is closed off to traffic, vendors set up on the street, and existing shops set up tables on the street outside of their shops.

Charleston SC, Marion Square, Holocaust Memorial framing statue of John C. Calhoun, Leica Q:

• This reply was modified 8 years, 8 months ago by  dalethorn.

Charleston SC, Grace Episcopal Church, Leica D-Lux:

My first image with the Leica X-U (X-underwater) camera. Shot as JPEG only on dry land – a spontaneous take in a local public park deli. I think the X-U does well at ISO 800. I should have some underwater pics in a couple of weeks. BTW, this camera has no jack for a USB connection.

Leica X-U, f1.8, 1/250 handheld, ISO 800.

The wind was blowing hard, so I needed to set the shutter to 1/2000 second.

Leica X-U, f3.2, 1/2000 handheld, ISO 200.

A store’s doorway:

Restaurant waiting line:

These images are from the Leica X-E, also (first 4) posted in the ‘X’ camera section.

Leica X-E, f5.0, 1/2000, ISO 200.

Leica X-E, f5.0, 1/25 sec. handheld, ISO 800.

Leica X-E, f5.0, 1/25 sec. handheld, ISO 800.

Leica X2, Paul Smith edition

My hometown at dusk, 30 August 2016, Akron Ohio, Main street. f5.6, 1/160, ISO 200. It’s amazing that with a 33 percent reduction in population since 1980, and 66 percent reduction in income, that they are able to keep the city clean. I suppose the feds prop it up.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 2 months ago by  dalethorn.

1) College campus with historic structures.
2) Walkway over beaver marsh in Akron Ohio.

Leica X-E, f5.6, 1/80 sec. handheld, ISO 200.

Leica X-E, f5.6, 1/400 sec. handheld, ISO 200.

Leica X2: Two very large and significant buildings in Northern Ohio, Akron and Alliance:

1) Glamorgan Castle, built by immigrants in the mid-1800s and donated to the city’s board of education in the 1950s – it’s a real castle by construction and furnishing standards, made for one non-royal family. It was here circa 1999 that I fired the board members as a gag (bit of a story to that).

2) The Goodyear Airdock, for more than 50 years the largest building of its type in the world. My grandfathers helped build the largest airships ever made in the U.S., inside this building. Now owned by Lockheed I think. The low flat foreground building, built in the 1970s, masks the size of the hangar visually, which had an astounding presence prior to the new building being there. I observed the same effect when the CN tower was erected in Toronto in the mid 1970s – when surrounding buildings were added later, the dizzying effect of seeing the tower from across the street no longer had that effect.

Leica X-E, f5.6, 1/640 sec. handheld, ISO 200.

Leica X-E, f8.0, 1/800 sec. handheld, ISO 200.

Glamorgan Castle, right side, f5.6, 1/640, ISO 200.

Glamorgan Castle, left corner view:

Historic Circular Church and portion of cemetery, Charleston SC.

Leica X2, f5.6, 1/60 sec. handheld, ISO 200.

A visit with Charleston’s finest. No significant processing here, just a slight crop and removal of a few small digital artefacts.

Leica X2, f5.6, 1/200 sec. handheld, ISO 200.

(Note: I haven’t finished the fake sky yet.)
I tried shooting this from every angle, making the subject turn 360 degrees in the process, to no avail. Lacking any HDR or pseudo-HDR capability on the primitive X2, I just did the best I could and blew the sky. I thought the X2 peformed very well, although I did have a small perspective change due to shooting close with the 35 mm equivalent fixed lens.

Leica X2, f5.6, 1/360 sec. handheld, ISO 200.

From a ‘Mini’ car club meet today – note the customizations on the car.

Leica X2, f5.6, 1/320 handheld, ISO 200.

One of my favorite diners to photograph. The photographer is in the mirror.

The ‘Pipes’ band played a nice selection of Irish and Scottish music. The lighting seemed to favor a little too much blue, or maybe that impression is driven by the costumes. — I’ve tried the photo of the church from the lot 2 blocks away many times, and never kept any, due to the clutter in the parking lot. This time I cropped more of the irrelevant stuff from the bottom, and I think it looks a little weird, but I really wanted to have this view, so I’ll see how I like it down the road.

Leica X2 Paul Smith edition, f5.6, 1/320 handheld, ISO 200.

Leica X2 Paul Smith edition, f5.6, 1/1600 handheld, ISO 200.

A view through the windscreen while cruising I-77 in Virginia USA.

No. 1 my favorite art gallery, having watched the master (Reinert) work his way from very good ca. 2010 to master craftsman today. No. 2, a self confident cat guarding an elegant estate in the historic district. This was a heavy crop, from 16 to ~2.5 mp.

Leica X2 Paul Smith edition, f5.6, 1/25 sec. handheld, ISO 400.

Leica X2 Paul Smith edition, f5.6, 1/80 sec. handheld, ISO 200.

Hurricane evacuation from Charleston SC – this image was taken through a hotel window in Greensboro NC, 300 miles distant. It was grey, very wet, and the image quality suffered from the combination of effects.

Normally I would never consider shooting the X2 at 1/5 second handheld, given that the X2 does not have a true optical VR/IS. But when I’m in a hurry and snapping more-or-less spontaneously, I sometimes do that and just accept that I might lose the images to blur, if it’s not critically important to get the shot. This image was selected from 2 bursts of 8 each – 16 total, and it was the sharpest, plus I helped it along a little in post processing.

Leica X2 Paul Smith edition, f5.6, 1/5 sec. handheld, ISO 400.

I had a unique experience with Mahmood of the Charleston Center for Photography, in that he took my photo with a medium format film camera using a Polaroid back, with very old B&W film donated by an industry insider. So I snapped this one. The Leica X2 sensor must be a very old generation, as the noise and image quality at ISO 800 are much worse than what I’d expect for an APS-C sensor and a great lens.

Leica X2 Paul Smith edition, f2.8, 1/200 sec. handheld, ISO 800.

Amazing how noise eats into moderate low-light shots that could probably be done just as well with an iPhone. And this camera’s sensor is an APS-C.

Leica X2 Paul Smith edition, f2.8, 1/40 sec. handheld, ISO 800.

A couple of street scenes, one a drawing on the side of an alley next to a door, easy to miss, looks like Val Kilmer (not sure). The actors were working on a commercial of some kind, moving down the street pretty quickly.

Leica X2 Paul Smith edition, f8.0, 1/60 sec. handheld, ISO 200.

Leica X2 Paul Smith edition, f5.6, 1/1000 handheld, ISO 200.