deepend
21-07-2017, 7:00pm
I'm probably one of the few non-Aussies in here, so being from a different environment and culture, some apologies in advance from me, just in case I step on anyone's toes!
My 1st contact with a camera was back in the early 70s with my mum's Werra that was totally manual in focus and exposure - not even an exposure meter in the camera so it was all by guesstimate. And the only film available to us in those days was B&W.
Fast forward through a whole bunch of instamatics, rangefinders, SLRs, my first digital cam in the Sony Mavica FD73 with its funky 3.5" FD drive in the late 90s, a Lumix TZ10 that I used for a few years for regular as well as underwater photography till my 1st "real" DSLR in the Canon 600D (not sure if naming convention is different in Oz) in 2011. Started building up my lens collection based on my interests which was mostly macro with the Tamron 90mm 2.8 and birding with the Canon 70-300 (non-IS). But all this came to an abrupt halt in 2014 when the company house I was living in was broken into, and I lost all my gear except for a tiny pair of Zeiss 8x20 binos :(.
The loss wasn't a huge amount in terms of value, but I was still devastated, and I moped around for a good few months, until 1 night after dinner whilst I was outside looking up, and I saw Orion's Belt in the sky. So I pulled out my binos and took a peek at it. The sight blew my socks off :eek:, and while you might be wondering what this has to do with photography, well, within 6 months I had built up my camera and lens collection again after I acquired a couple of telescopes and mounts. The original reason was to be able to share what I could see in the night sky with my family and buddies. So, being familiar with the 600D, I got the 650D which was great for me. Then the Sigma 24 Art came along, the Sigma 85 1.8, the Canon 200 2.8 L, the 300 f/4 L and the Tamron 150-600.
This didn't last very long as I found I was getting more and more into astrophotography, so I had the Canon IR-modified but then I could no longer shoot terrestrial without a hot mirror filter. I had the filter, it was the remembering to bring it along that was a pain, so eventually I got a Canon 70D for my regular shots. That was in 2015 and from then till now, I've switched camps completely and replaced both Canons with the Sony A7S & A7S2 with a bunch of lenses. This was a big jump for me but in the end I find it worth the while, not just because of the move from APS-C to FF, but in terms of low light sensitivity and low noise that mattered more to me than anything else. Of course Sony is known for not having any long primes, so for my birding, I got the Nikon P900 with its massive zoom range. Sure, poor IQ from a tiny sensor, but not having to crop all the time meant I was getting a lot more shots than DSLR users with their massive lenses. Oh, and I've had the A7S Mk1 IR-modified as well :lol:
Phew .. A bit about myself now .. I'm a software guy by profession, mostly designing and developing SQL databases for commercial applications. Single, need to get back to my scuba diving which I slowed down after my main dive buddy passed on 5 years ago. As a semi-retirement business, I took over a pub in my hometown (I live and work 90Km away).
The thing with Oz is I love the fact that the centre desert portion is always cloud-free so I'm gonna have to plan a trip there sometime to explore the outback as well as the night skies !
Cheers all,
Roger
My 1st contact with a camera was back in the early 70s with my mum's Werra that was totally manual in focus and exposure - not even an exposure meter in the camera so it was all by guesstimate. And the only film available to us in those days was B&W.
Fast forward through a whole bunch of instamatics, rangefinders, SLRs, my first digital cam in the Sony Mavica FD73 with its funky 3.5" FD drive in the late 90s, a Lumix TZ10 that I used for a few years for regular as well as underwater photography till my 1st "real" DSLR in the Canon 600D (not sure if naming convention is different in Oz) in 2011. Started building up my lens collection based on my interests which was mostly macro with the Tamron 90mm 2.8 and birding with the Canon 70-300 (non-IS). But all this came to an abrupt halt in 2014 when the company house I was living in was broken into, and I lost all my gear except for a tiny pair of Zeiss 8x20 binos :(.
The loss wasn't a huge amount in terms of value, but I was still devastated, and I moped around for a good few months, until 1 night after dinner whilst I was outside looking up, and I saw Orion's Belt in the sky. So I pulled out my binos and took a peek at it. The sight blew my socks off :eek:, and while you might be wondering what this has to do with photography, well, within 6 months I had built up my camera and lens collection again after I acquired a couple of telescopes and mounts. The original reason was to be able to share what I could see in the night sky with my family and buddies. So, being familiar with the 600D, I got the 650D which was great for me. Then the Sigma 24 Art came along, the Sigma 85 1.8, the Canon 200 2.8 L, the 300 f/4 L and the Tamron 150-600.
This didn't last very long as I found I was getting more and more into astrophotography, so I had the Canon IR-modified but then I could no longer shoot terrestrial without a hot mirror filter. I had the filter, it was the remembering to bring it along that was a pain, so eventually I got a Canon 70D for my regular shots. That was in 2015 and from then till now, I've switched camps completely and replaced both Canons with the Sony A7S & A7S2 with a bunch of lenses. This was a big jump for me but in the end I find it worth the while, not just because of the move from APS-C to FF, but in terms of low light sensitivity and low noise that mattered more to me than anything else. Of course Sony is known for not having any long primes, so for my birding, I got the Nikon P900 with its massive zoom range. Sure, poor IQ from a tiny sensor, but not having to crop all the time meant I was getting a lot more shots than DSLR users with their massive lenses. Oh, and I've had the A7S Mk1 IR-modified as well :lol:
Phew .. A bit about myself now .. I'm a software guy by profession, mostly designing and developing SQL databases for commercial applications. Single, need to get back to my scuba diving which I slowed down after my main dive buddy passed on 5 years ago. As a semi-retirement business, I took over a pub in my hometown (I live and work 90Km away).
The thing with Oz is I love the fact that the centre desert portion is always cloud-free so I'm gonna have to plan a trip there sometime to explore the outback as well as the night skies !
Cheers all,
Roger