Gear Doesn’t Matter, Except…

6FPS V4#1 - Photography and More
A Newsletter by Chuq Von Rospach
January 10, 2022

 

Welcome to the new issue of 6FPS.

This issue is a few days late, and my apologies.

In December, my doctor and I made a change in my meds for my vertigo, which turned out I tolerated poorly, and I spent some time trying to tweak dosages, and one thing that made things worse was, sadly, staring at the computer a lot. Ultimately I decided to go back to the previous drug, and while things aren’t perfect, they’re way better again.

It made it impossible to spend enough time at the screen to write anything for over a week, around the same time we got snowed in for Christmas and locked away from the world (and mail, and packages, and…) all while the acquisition of my company became final and all the medical plans got snafued and needed to be sorted out.

The sorting has happened, I think (waiting for final confirmation), the snow has melted and we are actually connected to the world again other than virtually, and it’s hard to get milk and eggs delivered with a foot of snow and ice covering your driveway.

So yeah, a couple of interesting weeks, finally sorting out again.

We’re looking at next steps for the vertigo, once I get confirmation I have medical coverage again (any minute now! really!), and that seems to involve a CT scan and then probably a consult with an ENT specialist. Not sure where this is going, but the easy button treatments don’t seem to be quite cutting it any more.

On the plus side, the nausea that comes with some of the vertigo has kickstarted my weight loss goal for 2022, but I don’t recommend this as a dieting strategy.

Despite the early wobbles in the new year (literally), I have hopes and plans for 2022 that, Omicron notwithstanding, I am looking forward to planning out and making happen. With the snow melted, bird feeder V3 is now up and I’m starting to see nuthatches and chickadees on it, which is nice. And because we have proof the birdfeeders get eaten by the local bears, the feeders will live inside at night, not outside 24x7.

Christmas was nice, and quiet, and we passed into the days when the length of day is getting longer again, although I’m still literally at a point where I go downstairs to work and it’s dark, and it’s dark when work ends. That said, I’m really looking forward to the flip side of this, when the sun hangs around all the time.

New Ebook: 2020.1

Also, don’t forget to grab a copy of my latest ebook, a compilation of my favorite images of 2020:

2020.1: Images from the year when Covid changed everything

I’m pretty happy with the design of this one. It contains both images from the before and after times of Covid, but does not include a set of blank pages to represent the months where I never turned on a camera due to the lockdowns.

And with that, see you next issue!

What's New from Chuq?

Gear Doesn’t Matter, Except…

An interesting thing happened in a recent posting by David duChemin: he admitted he’s sold his Fuji gear and shifted to Sony.

Now, David is fairly well known for his comment that Gear is Good, but Vision is Better, but he’s never really been part of the “Gear doesn’t matter” crowd; instead he tries to encourage us to consider cameras as tools to help us create the vision we have for an image. And some tools are better than others for implementing that vision. I’ve long agreed with him that a big problem with the online culture of photography is an unbalanced fascination with the nerdy details of the technology of the camera, instead of the results and end product those cameras produce.

The reason I bring this up this month is that on and off for the last year, I’ve been pondering the same shift.

I love my Fuji gear and at this point, I don’t have any plans to upgrade or replace it any time soon, but I keep finding myself thinking that while the Fuji platform is fine for what I am trying to do, Fuji seems to have shifted a bit away from the X line to their digital medium format line, which is also awesome, but not a direction I think I’d venture.

One big reason I started pondering this switch is that the new bodies available from Sony have better Autofocus than I see with Fuji and some of the features I see with that intrigue me.

Now, to be clear, I haven’t started doing any serious research into what I might buy, much less started planning buying it, but these days, when I’m asked about Fuji and what gear to buy, I do offer suggestions, but I also always suggest they research Sony as well. Sony camera have a lot of innovation and momentum right now, where the Fuji platform is innovating somewhat slower, but it’s a nice, solid and stable platform.

If there was one place I wish Fuji was better, it’s third party lens availability from Sigma and Tamron. Fuji made a deliberate choice not to encourage/support that until recently, and while the Fuji brand lenses are a solid lineup, they’re the only options.

If I decide — or maybe I’ve decided, I’m not sure — to shift to Sony, it won’t happen until I have a reason to, and right now, the XS-10 bodies and my lens collection are more than good enough for me. And when I do, it’ll probably be a 2-3 year migration, much as when I shifted from Canon to Fuji.

It’s not because the Fuji system is bad, but that I think the future of Sony is brighter right now, and there are technology innovations Sony is making I find really interesting. But first, for me, is to start figuring out what I need and how to start this shift to a new platform. Being me, that probably means buying a new birding setup, and then filling in the landscape gear later — the opposite of how I left Canon.

For anyone asking me about gear and what to buy, I’m still happy to tell you what I think, but I’ll also add in the thought that Sony is worth researching as well — and I’m the wrong person to ask about it still…

Photo Wednesday/Feathery Friday

Here are the images I posted since last issue to the blog for Photo Wednesday and Feathery Friday. To see all of these images at full size and read the stories behind their creation, you can visit:

For Your Consideration

Photography

Birds and Birding

Science and Technology

Interesting Stuff

Recommendations

This month, a Youtube channel:

  • Tasting History with Max Miller: New to me recently, this Youtube channel discusses ancient recipes and makes them, and then tries them out to see whether they’re any good. Each episode includes a nice history segment discussion some aspect of the history surrounding the reciped, and I find this a fun and interesting channel to add to my regular lineup.

See you soon!

And with that, I'll see you in the next issue. I'd love feedback on this, what you like, what you want more of, what you want less of. And if you have something interesting you think I might want to talk about, please pass it along. Until then, take care, and have fun.

Chuq (chuqui@mac.com)

 

6FPS (Six Frames Per Second) is a newsletter of interesting things and commentary from Chuq Von Rospach (chuqui@mac.com).

Coming out monthly on the 2nd Monday of the month, I will place in your inbox a few things I hope will inform and delight you. There is too much mediocre, forgettable stuff attacking your eyeballs every day you're online; this is my little way to help you cut through the noise to some interesting things you might otherwise not find.

Some links in this newsletter may point to products at Amazon; these are affiliate links and if you use them to buy a product, I get a small cut of the sale. This doesn't make me rich, but it does help pay my web site bills. If you use the link to buy something, thank you. If you prefer not to, that's perfectly okay, also.

Know someone who might want to subscribe? Send them here. You'll also find the archives there if you want to look at previous issues.