Contax Zeiss 135mm F2.8

Contax Zeiss 135 F2.8



This little guy (a euphemism, i assure you) has found his way into my life. While I have only done one test shot with this beautiful (and rather heavy) lens, it managed to do something that I was unaware of being possible. It made the top of my fridge (which is home to various cooking/baking things) look amazing. Seriously. No colour correction... pure AWB and BAM! A box of Saran Wrap and a steel mixing bowl looks like artwork.

I have to say though... this little gift imparted on me on the weekend was totally unexpected. I had talked to my friend Scott about the Leitz Elmarit R 135 that I was spying on Ebay. We had discusses how the 135mm length has seemingly produced many great lenses through out the years. Leica, Zeiss, Takumar, Canon, Nikkor, Pentacon...etc... etc... Many have compared them over the years, and because beauty is in the eye of the beholder, the results of those comparisons has been usually suspect and left mostly to personal impression and influence.

What makes this Lens so great? Well... if you clicked that last link, you'd know. If you didn't... well... The reason that makes this lens so great is how it renders out-of-focus (oof) blur. It's the blur and Bokeh (amount and shape of blur, imparted by the lens' iris/aperture) that makes it awesome. The bokeh is more often than not, pleasing with this lens. More spectacular is that it renders really nice Bokeh through a good range of its F-stops (which start at 2.8 and end at 22).
Supposedly, this particular lens, while marked with the usual F-stop range, supposedly can do 1/2 stops in between those marked F-stops. That means, instead of doing 2.8 and then having 4.0 next, you can have something in the approximate range of F/3.2 (i think... it might be 3.4 or 3.5 - i dunno.)

Outside of the amazing bokeh/blur, the lens has a nice large grip and decently layed out markings on the barrel. It has a built-in hood and the standard threading for what appears to be 55mm filters. All in all... it's a definite throw-back in feel and what not. Reminds you of when Men were Men, Women were Women and Decent Focal Lengths demanded respect.

The downsides to this fantastic lens...
1) It's heavy
2) It's not a native EOS mount - I know these adapters are supposed to preserve Infinity focus, but I am still skeptical in that realm.
3) 135mm on a crop body (Rebel series) becomes an effective 216mm (thanks to the 1.6x). I don't really buy that whole magnification nonsense, but it does seem to be somewhat true. In other words, what should be a great portrait lens, is not.

Suffice to say... I'm looking forward to playing with this lens. I'll revisit this topic when i have some examples to show off.
:)

Inept...

You know... this whole blogging thing is supposed to be real easy, right?

Well... It's apparently not so. At least, for me, it is not. I can't be bothered to do regular updates.

Hell, I can't even get my act together to keep my apartment clean longer than 2 days. I'm gonna remedy that though, by sticking myself with a schedule. I can't decide if i want to make it every 1st and 15th or Every 2nd wednesday. The former should be easier to keep track of. But, every 2nd wednesday would mean that i'd have my gear together for the weekends, and increase the potential of having a clean place for when my girlfriend spends the weekend here.

In other realms... Since my last update I've acquired a Canon 70-200 F4L and a Yashica YUS 28mm 2.8. Both are fantastic lenses, to say the least. The 70-200 gives me what has been out of my reach for far too long... TELEPHOTO!

The 28mm Yashica was an experimentation (albeit a totally unintentional one) with the world of Manual Focus. The Yashica is as old as I am. Or maybe not. I don't know because info on it is scarce. What i do know is this...

Focal length	:	28mm		Nearest focus	:	35cm
Aperture blades	:	6		Aperture stops	:	2.8 - 4.0 - 5.6 - 8.0 - 11 - 16
Length/diameter	:			Weight	:	260g
Lenses/groups	:			Filter diameter	:	55mm
Angle of view	:			Max. magnification	:
Remarks	:

Source: Yashica.org

Another source has this to say...

 4.1.  What's the difference between Yashica DSB and Yashica ML lenses?

Yashica DSB lenses are single coated, ML lenses are multi coated (ML
stands for Multi Layer). As usual, a marketing department messed
things thoroughly up by introducing another designator, MC for Multi
Coated, for later multi coated lenses. Contrary to the quality jump
from DSB to ML, there is no distinguishable quality difference between
ML and MC lenses. For quite some time, Yashica offered both DSB and ML
lenses; later on, DSB lenses were sold in package deals with bodies
(like the FX-D Quartz SE and the FX-7).

That not withstanding, with a little off-camera flashing, I've obtained a few amazing shots with it. I can't say that I'm overly pleased with outside of that application, but then again I haven't shot much with it. So, I'm really at a disadvantage. Some non-chalante comments have put this at a fantastically sharp lens, particularly when considering its cost (second hand) which averages around $20CDN Here's an off-camera flash example taken approx a month ago. [Wow... I've just realized that I haven't really shot much in the last month.]

As you can see, the DJ in this picture is quite sharp and the backdrop is slightly blurry, giving the lens a nice quality. I haven't used it in a way that would reveal its bokeh better, yet... but i will eventually.

As for the 70-200 F4L... there's plenty of stuff on Flickr demo'ing that guy. I don't have much to say that pics taken with it, posted on Flickr can't show. Anyhow... so concludes yet another sporadic posting by yours truly. See you in another month and half. :P

Updating...

I'll admit right away that i'm not the best at updating this. But, truth be told, i haven't really engaged in anything that should be considered worthy of updating here.

Needless to say, I'll be going somewhere fantastic this upcoming weekend, and the update after will be awe-inspiring to say the least. :)

Cherry Beach Redux... [Canada Day actually]

It seems that I tend to not go to Cherry Beach as much as I should, or want to. I'm usually on the go, and my go is not going to Cherry Beach. There's a few dozen reasons why, but I'm not going to write about them. [Although, one being that the ****ing parking bastards ticket cars for retarded reasons]

I tend not to go because, well... I usually have other things to go to.

Having said that, on Canada Day, I had to work. So, what's a good way to end a day of holiday work? Go to Cherry beach!

The promise boys were on hand, as they always are, for Canada Day celebrating. They had all of their regulars hit the decks to pound out great music for a few hours.

Over by the way side, the burners lit up and gave a fireworks show of a different sort. It was here that i learned a magical combination... small aperture, bulb mode and off-camera flashing. Said combo is what resulted in the pictures here.


The reason for this, is one that is long and difficult to explain, but needless to say, I'm loving the results that it has yielded me. All i have to do at this point now, is remember my personal Sunny-16 rule for doing these kinds of shots. If you're thinking I'm gonna post my EXIF's or other numbers, you're sadly mistaken... My pics... My skills... My secrets. :P

Some of the burners that were present for the night were Mo Bot, Sadie Spins, Platypus Mags, ScottG, Ian Injurious, Robin Spunkbucket and Anakin... Naturally, these are not their real names, because they are performers. Stagenames rule.

Actually... truth be told. I'm gonna wrap this one up now because I haven't much to say right now. Enjoy the pics.

If you'd like to see more, well... too bad. I ain't posting more.

(psst... they're on Facebook)







































I'm going to end this off with a photography tip. When trying something new that compromises the safety of your camera and your personal well being... have an assistant help you with said project. I stupidly climbed a tree to take the last pic, and I don't think I will be trying that again without help. Safety first kids!

Cosplay/Anime North, UNITE! in Buffalo, Luminato, TTC, Goat Cheese and other stuff...

Let's start off, shall we?

Well, I guess I should do this in a chronological order, if only to make some resemblance of sense.
---------------------------------------
-- Anime North/Cosplayers/Otakubaloo --
---------------------------------------
On the Saturday of the long weekend, I made my way across town to hit up the Photo Show. As that ended at 7, I headed over to the Toronto Congress Centre to take photos of the Anime-loving kiddies. To say the least, I was quite impressed with some of the outfits. I know I'm going to draw a little ire by saying the following but... Dressing as characters from Naruto [or Dragonball Z for that matter] is pretty lame. I mean seriously lame. No effort, as far as i could see, from a creativity standpoint, was put into any Naruto costume that I saw at Otakubaloo. I'm sure there was a few kids fully decked out in home-made Naruto costumes, but the greater deal of kids that i did see, were wearing crap they probably bought off Ebay.
Having said that, Kudos to all the boys and girls that rocked out with costumes they made... or at least, were custom made (rather than factory produced). Then again... Kudos to all you that [while not sporting a custom outfit] at least you didn't wear the same costume as 300 others.

As for all you that stuck around for the Happy Hardcore. Congrats, you've just had your first taste of Rave music. Yeah... all those stories your parents heard about Raves being evil, drug-filled orgies, were wrong. Raves, for the most part, are large gatherings of people overnight having fun partying and dancing to really loud electronica music. True, there is a tendancy of drugs being at these kinds of parties, but the amount is no different from that of a rock concert or club. Actually... there's probably less than in those spots... and those kinds of places make their money on selling booze, so Raves can have a tendancy to be much cleaner than any of those venues. You need not buy into the pop-crap produced by big companies (like Disney) and sold through HMV and iTunes. There is better stuff out there, and a lot of it is rather esoteric like your tastes in Anime.
In Toronto, the scene isn't exactly as big as it once was. But there are still good times to be had. Darkrave is held every 1st saturday of the month at the Big Bop; and Cherry Beach has weekly session put on by Promise - While those parties are more geared towards the ears of the older crowd, it's still fun and it IS a family event. More info for parties can be found through the usual portals like Facebook, but the best source (For Toronto/Southern Ontario) usually is Purerave or Toronto Raves. Buffalo kiddies... check out Buffalobaseline.

Speaking of Buffalo... Let's jump forward a week.
------------
-- Unite! --
------------
Unite! promised to be a great alternative for those less fortunate in the ownership of the cottage type. What it delivered was a bit of a Gong show, with a heavy side of mismanagement. Several clubs went the night practically empty, while others were rammed. Set times were posted only in one location and many of the big acts overlapped each other. So, if you wanted to hear Monk from Rabbit in the Moon, and then Mark Oliver or Skynet... you were SOL.All three played at roughly the same time. The little info booth set up by the organizers wasn't exactly helpful either, as the people manning it were totally clueless.

One particular club, which will remain unnamed here, must have fed its Bouncers some shitfries with extra dicksauce, because they weren't exactly up-to-speed with the whole economy thing happening on this particular night. I barely got into that bar after pointing out that their headlining DJ was a Trance/Techno dj. He begrudgingly let me in, but barred my friend from entering, giving him the same BS excuse. Sorry dude, but you fail at bouncing. When the club is at 1/4 capacity on Sunday night at 1am, for a "festival" LET EVERYONE YOU CAN IN! The Bartender's aren't going to make tips and the club isn't going to make money by not serving drinks. As a result, I had 1 beer, and that club lost a minimum of 3 other sales. By my best math, that's at least $30-40 lost right from the get-go. Probably more towards $100 the way most of us tend to drink...

If they do this again next year, I hope they do a better job because that was just plain awful.

---------------
-- The Break --
---------------
The weekend of following Unite was an off-weekend for me, as I had issues that needed addressing with my Camera. So, i was without a camera for about 2 weeks while it was sent off to Canon for servicing. So we now fast forward to after i got my camera back, which was about 1.5 weeks ago. Receiving my camera before work, I decided to head out on my lunch and test it a little.
The images post-repair (which was minor, and Canon probably spent more time cleaning the sensor) were much sharper than before, thanks to the sensor cleaning. Still, the issue that prompted the whole repair thing was because of straight flaring in some of my photos. Canon didn't say anything in regards to this, so i think I'll go with what was said on FM Forums. (reflections are due to sensor reflection on to filter glass)

As you can see, the picture is quite clear and crisp. My focussing does leave much to be desired, but i'm still a relative newcomer to producing crisp photos.

-------------------------------------------------------------
-- TORONTO TRANSIT COMMISSION - GREENWOOD MAINTENANCE YARD --
-------------------------------------------------------------Approximately a week ago... say June 3-4ish. I felt like taking a different route home from work. I happened to end up on Jones Avenue, and after being tired of climbing that damn hill, I turned on to a sidestreet and zig-zagged my way home. It was on Chatham street that I saw something that caught my eye and bewildered me... The Greenwood Subway yard.

After passing this, I knew I had to go back and take a photo. So i did. The sheer amount of light pollution in the yard is overwhelming. How overwhelming? I was able to catch the picture above using F/8 @ 1/25th of a second on ISO800. Yes, you read that right. Not quite a Sunny/16, but suffice to say, the light was enough that I was able to stop down to F/8 and use a quarter second shutter.Granted... this was on 800ISO, but still... That's a LOT of light. And if you'll notice, there isn't a soul walking about on the yard. Nope... it was a complete ghost-town. A well-luminated ghost-town, but one nonetheless. This begs the question... why was the yard lit up so much? Don't Subways have headlights? Don't they operate in the dark underground? So... why is the whole area lit up like a football stadium??
------------------------------
-- LUMINATO --
------------------------------
I haven't seen much yet this year for Luminato. Truth be told... With this weekend being the end of it, and me not being in Toronto for it... I doubt i will see more.

So what have i seen? The Luminato Cube and some of the Red Ball Project. The former is a large 20x20 cube set up in Sam Pollock square with different pieces of artwork [i use that term loosely here] for each day. The latter is a more interesting display of large red balls placed randomly through the city. Longwave is what i have photographed above. If you're wondering about the weird blurriness, that's from a special lens I use. If you haven't gotten out to see any of Luminato, do so soon. It's ending THIS SUNDAY.
A lamp post/beam in Sam Pollock Square, next to the Luminato Cube...


Life at 8:00 PM EDT at the corner of King and Bay


Dear lord...it's 2:30 am.... I need to get to sleep. Enough writing.

Cherry Beach and The Sky over Toronto

Last Weekend I took a few photos when i went down to Cherry Beach for a free techno party. Aside from the cold, it was pretty good. My only mistake was not bringing a heavier layer (jacket) and some sort of booze. I wish i did, cause both would've kept me warm for sure. ;)

Here's a few shots from my little photographic adventure at Cherry








Because These were taken around 5pm-ish, I had a good amount of "North Light" to work with. Although, the one picture of the DJ, did not benefit from Northlight, directly... No, that one was a case of my being lucky and having perfect light balance.

Now... this one was not what i was hoping for, but in the end, it gave me a little post-processing fun. Incidentally, it looked much better in Adobe Bridge (pre-processing), for reasons that escape me.



The Dippers overhead my place. I've outlined as best as i could, the two outlines of the most famous (non-zodiacal) constellations, in the sky. If i had a better placement, I could've also indicated Polaris and the twin galaxies M81/82, not to mention, the owl Nebula.

Well... the Owl Nebula is technically in this shot, it's just very faint. It's more easily resolved with binoculars or telescope (or better yet, a camera with a decent telephoto lens)

Taking a shot like this requires a bit of skill and a whole lot of understanding that... quite frankly I don't possess. The exposure i used was I think... 10seconds. I tried doing a 30min exposure, but I forgot to switch a setting in my camera that allowed that. The camera, as far as i can tell, turned off mid-exposure, thus not taking the photo at all. Note to self: next time change auto-shutoff to "never".

East York... at Night

As many of you know, this is Toronto's 175th anniversary after being incorporated. I'm not entirely sure, but it's probably around the 10 year mark after megacity amalgamation as well.

Being a resident of East York, I am privy (although, i don't necessarily engage in) to witnessing the beauty of this multicultural community. We have the Greeks on Danforth, the Pakistani/Indians on Gerrard, and the Chinese on Broadview and Gerrard. And of course, everyone and everything in between along the gaps and such.

Two Things that caught my eye last night were... 1) The statue of Sun Yat-Sen, in Riverdale - poorly lit because the chinese community seems to not give a damn about the man that modernized China. And 2) The fountain at Logan Ave - featuring the bust of Alexander the Great. The juxtaposition is kinda scary when i think about it. The Sun Yat Sen statue has a burnt out lamp, and is all concrete and bronze, surrounded by parkland. The Alexander bust, has benches, a fountain, trees, lights and a conveniently placed Gyro spot next to it.

Anyhow... The following are some of last nights photos.












Click on this one to see the fuller 1024x324 version.