It’s been four years since my attention was diverted towards the publication of my other blog, The Days Zoom Past. It turned out to be a monumental undertaking, and expanded my photographic portfolio rapidly while giving me a chance to try out the best that Tamron had to offer in a range of situations. The various lenses outlasted multiple flights, a fair few weddings, a full-frame upgrade and on one occasion a not-as-fatal-as-expected downpour. They catalogued a 366 project (since it fell over the leap year), Olympic Torch Relays, a fantastic trip to Rome, my wedding planning, and the birth of my daughter.
That’s about where it fell apart.
As photographers, we’re used to having to pack heavily. I once limited myself to a week’s worth of clothing and a bottle of hand-washing detergent when I went away for a four-month trip, just so that I didn’t have to leave a tripod and a full set of lenses at home. This is fine when you’re on your own, but when life blesses you with a wife and child, and you have to start considering who else’s stuff is going in your case, it becomes harder.
And it’s not just the holidays that are a factor. The daily luggage considerations for infants and toddlers must surely compete with the duties of your average Sherpa. Mum will insist that the bare minimum for a six hour excursion is half a dozen nappies; a full pack of baby wipes; two sets of clothes; seven bibs; three dummies; four of the baby’s favourite toys; a complete travel system; coats in case it’s cold; shorts in case it’s warm; sunblock; two litres of milk and the same of water, and if it’s not too much trouble, the baby too. But this is why mums are in charge: if it were up to us, it would be a bottle and a roll of duct tape.
Just finding some way to carry a camera might require you to look out your ‘Buns of Steel’ VHS tapes. Time was, you were asked to leave the camera at home. “It’s not a priority”. Arguments may have ensued. Not anymore. Now, your camera becomes one of the most important things you have. You’re no longer a burden, stood staring into the horizon, facing the grim truth that this new section of seafront is superior to the one that you stopped to photograph five minutes ago, while your partner waits with waning patience. Nope. Now you are the Official Memory Scribe.
And you love it. Every nuance of your child’s face; every expression, every new experience is caught and recorded. It doesn’t matter if it’s a glorious afternoon, or it’s pitch black, and your only camera is the 36 megapixel behemoth whose resolution is meaningless in face of overwhelming ISOs. Everything is preserved to compact flash cards. Hard drives are screaming for mercy: your house is where they go to die.
So this was my dilemma. I was used to quality kit, but I wanted something small and capable, that wouldn’t force my to buy a third 3TB drive in under a year. Yeah, really.
I was on my way to buy an Olympus EM-10. It was in my hands, wallet in pocket. I loved the compactness of the 14-42mm lens; the look, the ergonomics, and I still itch to try a feature called ‘live bulb mode’. But I couldn’t do it. Turning on that combination and waiting for the lens to telescope out was like waiting for rain in the Atacama.
I ended up parting almost twice as much money for a Fuji X100T. I was told what they were capable of, as my friend had the previous model with an identical image pipeline. I didn’t really expect to see it though. That purchase spelled the beginning of the end of my commitment to Nikon. Poor b*st*rd. I never even saw it coming.
It’s a camera that can shoot everything. It’s got a 23mm (35mm full-frame equivalent) F/2.0 lens that will shoot everything. When it was dark, the ISO performance was a match for my D800, but had a more pleasing look and didn’t suck the resolution away, and when it was bright, one button-push dropped a built-in ND filter in front of the lens. And the flash syncs at any speed, so you can push it further than a DSLR. It’s a joy.
I came to love my little Fuji’s colours so much, that I bought an X-E2 with the 35mm F/1.4 lens (50mm equiv.) to use instead of the D800 and its 50mm 1.4. This was only possible because my wife, a committed non-photographer who loves photographs, also loves the Fujis. Why? Because it has wifi, and because I love the colours it produces. I’m happy with the results, and can send her the dailies immediately. If it wasn’t for that, it may have taken me months to figure out how good the results SOOC are.
In short, you learn very quickly that although you can shoot RAW files (and I still do), you don’t have to. I shoot more portraits now than I ever used to. The jpegs make beautiful prints. We have a wall covered in them. And it was staring at this wall one day that I realised that the Nikon had to go.
I’d been out with the DSLR for the day, the first day in three months. I’d been using it less and less, which meant I had nothing to write about. I didn’t use it to take a single photo that day, and my hand hurt from trying to carry it. I’d lost the familiarity with it. I got home, and I just stared at our photo wall for about fifteen minutes.
At around the same time, there was a firmware update for the X-E2. This caught me very much off – guard. It’s a three year old piece of hardware. If you don’t get a firmware update within the first year from Nikon, you don’t get one at all. They just slap another digit on the chassis and expect you to replace your camera. And that’s pretty much what Fuji did with the update: it’s brought it up to speed with current tech, but they didn’t charge me a penny for the privilege.
Less than a week later, I traded in everything Nikon related for a near full set of Fuji lenses, which are all seem to produce amazingly crisp images.
So now I’m free. Free to carry a full set of gear, while carrying out my Dadly duties. I’ve said farewell to assignments that have kept me in lenses for the last four years, a ten-year investment in Nikon products, and gone back to a smaller sensor system. I don’t regret it one bit.
discreetphoton 