Blog

Short blog posts, journal entries, and random thoughts. Topics include a mix of personal and the world at large.

Not of this reality

It seems what’s popular these days amongst millennials and Gen Z is buying old iPhones to take pictures. I guess these folks don’t want the latest and greatest in imaging technology that Apple has to offer? An iPhone 7 offers a comparatively nostalgic look in its photo processing, yet still has enough megapixels to do prints. (I remember it was around the iPhone 7 era that I was able to use photos taken with the phone in making calendar-sized prints.) I often see on social media people carrying two phones: an older iPhone strictly for photography, and a modern one for everything else.

I can understand why. Honestly, I am not a fan of how the modern iPhone processes its photos. It’s too sharp, too crunchy, too much HDR. Computational photography deserves kudos for what it can do with such a small camera sensor in smartphones, but at some point it gets to be a bit too processed, a bit too perfect. A photograph’s job is to be evocative, to elicit an emotional reaction. A direct technical copy of how a scene is in real life is not a requirement. A black-and-white picture taken from the real world of color is a great example of this notion.

It seems nostalgia and retro-ness always have a place. What was once old becomes new again. Just look at the return of bell-bottoms and baggy pants (that was the fashion of my high school days). We all think a decade ago were better times: we were objectively younger, with less ingrained responsibilities. The photographs from that time have a certain look, which explains why people are buying older phones (and cameras) to replicate that feel.

The instant film - be it Polaroid or FujiFilm Instax - will never go out of style, even though smartphones have surpassed it in technical image quality a long time ago. It’s the look that people want: a feel that isn’t of this reality, because our reality it too burdensome to bear. That’s how instagram came to its immense popularity, isn’t it? Nostalgic filters to make a photo look not of this present. I too have rose-tinted fondness for the early days of instagram.

Big spending season

It’s September already, and that means big spending days are coming ahead. The $250 annual fee to host this very website on Squarespace is coming due. So is the $1,100 six-months insurance premium on my BMW M2 Competition (I’m just glad it didn’t increase). On top of that, the $600 California license fee is due on the BMW. A surprise to nobody: it’s expensive to own a high-dollar sports car. At least maintenance is still free this year (also this month), the final one of three.

Traditionally, September is new iPhone month as well. As a person who’ve bought a new iPhone ever year since the iPhone 7, I’m staring at yet another thousand dollar outlay (spread over 24 months, whatever, all the same) on top of the aforementioned. But perhaps not? I’m kind of considering not making the upgrade this year.

The reason I’ve been buying new iPhones annually is because of the camera improvements on every new model. I’m sure the forthcoming iPhone 15 will be no different. However, this year I bought a Fujifilm X-T5 camera, and I’ve simply fallen in love with using that wonderful device. I’ve fallen back in love with photography, too. Now that I’ve unencumbered myself of any arduous editing, my desire to go out and shoot photos have increased dramatically.

What does this have to do with the iPhone? Well, I’ve come to dislike the photos taken with my iPhone 14 Pro. The iPhone’s over-sharpened, high-dynamic range look compares poorly to the warm and sultry tones of the Fujifilm. It’s a throwback to the early days of smartphone cameras: for the serious stuff, you want to take the photos with your “real” camera. Nowadays, I want to take photos with the X-T5 as much as possible.

It’s not the iPhone’s fault: computing power can only do some much against the laws of physics (much larger sensor in the X-T5, obviously). Apple will have to wow me plenty come next Tuesday to entice me enough to upgrade this year.

I need it

Did I already buy another lens for my newly purchased Fujifilm XT-5 camera? Yup! Looks like gear acquisition syndrome is in full bloom. I mean, what’s the point of an interchangeable lens camera if I only have one lens? Granted, if I were to have only one lens, the Fujinon XF 23mm F2 would be it. A compact walk-around lens at my favorite, most-used focal length: 35mm full-frame equivalent. Obviously then the 23mm F2 was the first lens I bought along with the XT-5.

Soon to join that lens is its close cousin, the Fujinon XF 50mm F2. At a 76mm full-frame equivalent, it’s ideal for portraiture, and when I want to punch in a bit during photowalks. Shooting down urban streets, the 50mm can compress the background and block out the peripherals stuff that a wider lens would otherwise get in the frame. During the photowalk in Chinatown last Sunday, I was limited in what I can do when photographing straight down Grant Avenue, carrying only the 23mm. I actually took out my iPhone to use its 77mm full-frame equivalent telephoto lens instead.

Won’t have to do that anymore! With the 50mm F2 in tow for the future I’ll just have to quickly swap between the two lenses should I desire a different perspective. You know what is really baller, though? The professionals that carry multiple camera bodies, with different focal lengths of lens attached to each. Therefore, instead of swapping lens, they just swap between the bodies during a shoot. In a money-no-object world (or a I actually make a living from this hobby world), I would have a second XT-5 attached to the incoming 50mm lens.

Another reason for buying the XF 50mm F2 right now is I want to take photographs of my friend’s newborn twins. Not only is 50mm a more flattering focal length, but I can also get the shot I want without being super close to the babies. Trust me, I’m not spending money simply to have more shiny objects on my bookshelf! (Though that’s very nice too, admittedly.) Everything I buy these days must serve some utility.

JPEG shooter

This past Sunday I got a chance to take my new Fujifilm X-T5 camera out for some first time test shooting. A photowalk around San Francisco Chinatown in the afternoon was called for. After reading the manual front to back and adjusting the custom buttons to my liking, it was time to see what the X-T5 camera can do. (Pairing it with a Fujinon XF 23mm F2 lens.)

Perhaps it’s the substantial money I dropped on essentially switching to a new system (Sony to Fujifilm) talking, but I was pretty immediately smitten with the X-T5. A touchscreen on a camera is so useful (My old Sony A7R2 did not have one). On the Fujifilm I can touch to lock focus on a subject/object and it will do so until I tap again to cancel. It honestly feels kind of cheating to me. I remember the old days of having only eight focusing points on a DSLR, and needing to perform the focus and recompose technique.

Now I can simply touch almost anywhere on the frame and it will lock focus automatically. Magical.

Fujifilm’s famous film simulation modes is as advertised. After seeing how each of them look, I chose Nostalgic Negative as my go to. Nostalgic Neg has the bump in saturation I typical do for my own RAW edits, plus a warm tonality that I prefer over something cool. Set white balance to automatic, and I simply let the X-T5 do its own interpretation of the scene vis a vis the colors.

Kind of funny how I’m essentially treating a “DSLR” camera as a point-and-shoot. It’s like going back to the days of instant film cameras: I don’t control how a film roll will look coming out of development. Being able to get interesting and usable JPEG files straight out of the camera makes me want to go shoot more. Because upon returning home, all I do is transfer the JPEG files off the X-T5 and onto my Mac’s Photos app. That's it! I’ve not touched any of the RAW files from the Chinatown photowalk - there’s really no need.

At some point I might even shoot only in JPEG…

Pursuit of imperfection

Perhaps going from a full-frame sensor Sony a7R II camera to an APS-C sensor Fujifilm XT-5 would indeed be a downgrade. You can’t beat laws of physics, right? Given the same situation, the larger sensor Sony will always capture more light, with better resolving power, than the Fuji. I don’t suppose it’s typical that a photographer goes back down a step in terms of sensor size. Once they get to full-frame, they either stay there, or wait enough years to pay up for an ever larger medium-format camera.

I have my reasons for going back to an APS-C sensor, of course. As someone who is wholly satisfied with the pictures my iPhone outputs, I am not concerned about sensor size. A photograph is capable of telling a story no matter the tool that it was taken with. Physical limitations are something work around, rather than lament the lack of. The iPhone can never match the bokeh of a proper DSLR/portrait lens combo, but I can still be creative in how I frame the subject. It’s a sort of creatively that breeds from limitations.

The modern full-frame camera is simply too good. Most units from a major manufacturer can output pin-sharp photos in crazy high resolutions. There’s so much dynamic range, so much leeway to edit a file that the capture process almost seems secondary. Why care about getting the proper exposure or framing something just right when it can all be fixed in post-processing? And because you can get a photo to be even more perfect in post, editing becomes a necessary chore. You have to, because you can.

The reason I bought the Fujifilm XT-5 is because I only want to shoot. To use the JPEG images straight out of the camera (got to love those Fuji film simulations) - because I’ve already put enough thought to exposure and composition at the moment of capture. The point is to shoot more, and not spend hours in front of the computer editing. I am perfectly happy to give up some fidelity in pursuit of this. (Near) perfection is overrated anyways. A picture with blown highlights and or crushed shadows can tell a story just the same as one with the utmost amount of dynamic range.

Limitations breeding creativity.

Is that what I am?

It was a bit jarring to hear a friend describe me to another person as a “photographer.” I could only reply sheepishly to the fact I’m a mere hobbyist, nothing serious. My slightly embarrassed response is because I haven’t really been doing much “photography” at all, not ever since the pandemic started some three years ago. It’s a dormant hobby at best, abandoned at worst.

The only sort of photography I do these days is to make sure I take at least one picture a day for the 365 challenge. It’s something I’m proud to have kept going since 2011.

But otherwise there’s really not much else going on. My bread-and-butter in terms of interest is travel photography. Easy to figure out then why I haven’t done much these past years. I long to do another project like the one I did for my Japan trip. To do some writing to go along with the photographs. To tell interesting stories of a foreign place. A soft goal of mine is to return to South Korea for this purpose. It was not something I had in me when I first visited back in 2017.

And what camera will I do it with? As great as iPhone photographic capabilities have advanced, smartphones are still not substitutes for dedicated “DSLR” cameras. Difficult to believe my Sony A7R2 is now eight years since it was introduced back in 2015. The image quality out of that camera is still top-notch, but as is my wont I am hankering for something newer and a completely different brand.

Whether or not I actually spend that money remains to be seen. Honestly, whether or not I actually return to doing lots of photography is also an open question. It’s that whole different stages in life thing, you know? What is for sure is that I do want to travel back to Asia again.

Entirely shot on iPhone

It is a good weekend indeed when I accomplish everything I list out to do. Errands were done, a book was read, and the piano was practiced. While sometimes it is good to do absolutely nothing on weekends, I have to say it’s a nicer feeling come Sunday evening when the two days have been spent towards action. I guess that’s just how I am wired.

Now that I have my new MacBook Pro, I was finally able to put together my annual calendar (shoutout to the Apple Photos app and the Motif plugin). Made up of photographs I took throughout the year, the self-made calendar is what I give out to friends during Christmas. It isn’t exactly cheap at about $25 a copy (altogether), though cumulative speaking it is cheaper than buying individual gifts. Not that my friend group does that anyways. This year we’re doing a white elephant gift exchange, with a limit of $30.

It would be cruel, wouldn’t it, if I put my calendar into the white elephant pile. “Sorry guys, only one copy this year. Fight it out!”

After nearly a decade of making these calendars, this is the first year that every single photo was taken with an iPhone. The cameras in the iPhone 12 Pro and the iPhone 13 Pro are simply that good. I bet if I didn’t explicitly tell my friends the pictures were from a smartphone, they would not suspect otherwise. Smartphone camera technology have come a tremendously long way indeed. All hail the gods of computational photography, bending the rules of physics.

Perhaps then I should sell my Sony A7R2 full-frame camera. I honestly have only used it once this year, and otherwise it’s sat on the shelf collecting dust. Are there a huge demand for used cameras due to the global chip shortage, similar to the used car market? I’ve read the waitlist for the newest Canon full-frame mirrorless camera is six months!

Yeah, probably not. Once I can properly travel again, I would prefer to take the Sony with me. For the truly beautiful and breathtaking stuff, I still want the “proper” camera. For now.