The Faces of Occupy Chicago

I recently processed a roll of film from a trip to LaSalle Street in Chicago, which is where the Occupy Chicago folks have set up camp.  I've been shooting events like that with a wide angle (either a 17-35 zoom or a 21mm prime) - it gives me enough depth of field where I don't have to worry about shutter speed or focusing accuracy and allows me to focus more on the content of the shot rather than the mechanics behind it.  Shutter speed - constant. Aperture - constant. Focusing distance - constant at 5-6 ft.  Then it's all a matter of positioning yourself where you want to be and closing the shutter.

I'm out there and for some reason I decide to take out the 90mm Elmarit. It's a great portrait lens (low contrast, kind of flare-y if stray light hits, but a great looking "glow"), but not really your first choice for a cramped-quarters street lens.  It turns out that putting a 90mm lens on naturally turns you into a street portrait guy as opposed to a pure street photographer.  I was mostly setting up in a corner, waiting for someone to come into my field of view and notice me, then hitting the shutter the split second after the deer-in-the-headlights look went away (there's a microsecond where befuddlement turns to puzzlement turns to slight anger turns to acceptance turns to resigned acceptance - it's a great moment to hit).  And that's the moment I think I caught here.  And it planted the idea of a future project (hopefully something I can get done before the Big Cold One hits Chicago) - The Faces of Occupy Chicago.

One of the faces of Occupy Chicago.

Sloping

This is from a recent photowalk with the Chi-togs Facebook group.  This is a group of individuals I met through the Eric Kim street photography workshop.  Eric was back in town for a day so a few of us decided to get together and walk the streets.  This is a great group of guys, I'm reserving some time to blog about them later when I get a chance.

I think we ended up doing more talking than shooting though, as I only ended up with 30-40 shots out of which only a few were good enough to post.  This is one of them, taken during the Halloween festivities in Daley Plaza.  I'm not going to pretend this is a great shot or anything, I do like the angles and slopes of the metal sculpture - I've noticed that I tend to gravitate towards triangles.  Purely unintentional as a matter of fact.

One other notable thing about the photowalk is that I finally shot with all film.  I've tried to balance my film shooting with digital by carrying a Leica along with my D700, this time I took an M3 (w/ Tri-X @ 800) along with an F6 (Acros 100).  The Acros 100 (this shot was taken with it) was a particularly bad choice on an afternoon that was partially cloudy day made worse by the shadows from the Chicago skyline.  Shutter speeds were pretty slow even with a 17-35 2.8, I ended up switching to a 50/1.2.

Nikon F4s with MB-21 drive/battery pack

Nikon F4s with MB-21 drive/battery pack, originally uploaded by I_Take_Pitchers.

Here is the last camera I'll buy in 2009. I swear it. I really mean it this time, although I'd love to try out a Leica CL.
I literally stole this off eBay, paying roughly $80 for an all-time classic camera that really deserves it's reputation as one of the best 35mm bodies ever.
After shooting 3-4 rolls on this thing, I can unabashedly state that I love this camera! It's an absolute dream to handle, it weighs a ton (a good thing when compared to today's plastic SLRs).

Nikon FG

This camera was acquired through the online auction house. You know, that one. The included Series E 50mm 1.8 was the only reason I bought it, the auction listing actually said that the body was non-working and was for parts/repair only. But, $35 isn't terribly bad for a Series E lens so I went ahead and got it. It turns out the light meter does NOT activate on the Bulb (B) or Manual (1/90s) settings. This is what the previous owner had the shutter set to. Once I loaded some batteries it was working perfectly. In fact, except for the light seals the body is in fabulous condition.

Some quick thoughts:

-this is the first manual focus Nikon I've owned. The Type K focussing screen (with split image rangefinder) absolutely blew me away. This is head and shoulders better compared with other focussing screens I've used (mostly on M42 Pentax screw mounts). Really stellar, it's a snap to get perfectly crisp focused shots.

- Program mode seems to work pretty well. You just set your F-stop to the smallest value (highest F number) , focus, and shoot. The onboard computer calculates the best aperture and shutter for you. From an amateur's perspective it seems to underexpose ever so slightly, but what the hell do I know? I try not to use this feature a lot, if I wanted automatic operation I would just take out my Canon DSLR.

- This was one of Nikon's quote-unquote budget line SLRs, meaning they were using plastic for some components. While this has some drawbacks, one big plus is that it's really light and is perfect for carrying around all day. Especially if you've got the 1.8 Series E lens, you could carry this for hours and forget you had it on you.

- even though there is some plastic here, the build quality still feels really superb. I'm guessing it could take a fair amount of abuse and still come out fine. I recently took it on a week long trip to Costa Rica, see pics here:

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.