Cherry Blossom Festival in San Francisco

Once in a while, I get to take my family to a real vacation away from home. San Francisco is one of those place where I know that I will get a lot of photo opportunity. So, let's see if what I've learned and practiced in the past couple of months about taking more interesting pictures can be put to good use.

The first photo-op came as a surprise, when my sister-in-law notified me that there was a big festival going on in SF Japan Town on the weekend.

So we all drove up to SF, coming off the US-101 into a very crowded street, inching our way towards the usual parking place, which, of course are full that day. I end up dropping off the family at the sidewalk near the Kinokuniya bookstore and drove off in search for a parking space. The atmosphere that day reminds me of those days when I was a little kid in a large fair, people in and out of cars everywhere filling every little nook and cranny of the streets. It's been a while since I've experience being a part of such a big crowd.

After circling in the radius of five blocks, twice, I couldn't believe my luck. In one of the smaller roads, I saw a family of five walking towards a Ford Expedition and just as I was taking my eyes off them, they stopped and started to get into the car and eventually got out of the parking spot, and it's only two blocks from Japan Town!!

A few minutes later, I jog my way through the crowd to the place where my family was waiting. After some indecision regarding where should we stand to see the parade, we started our way towards the edge of the street where people already lined up against the metal fence they usually put up to prevent people from crossing the street when the parade has started.

Here are some pictures from our spot:








Take a look at this one, it has a very nice separation between fore- and back-ground.


At the end of the day, after watching the parade for two hours, everyone is pretty tired, my daughter had a blast, she made new friends with the people at the parade.

Now, a couple of thoughts from the photography side of things that day. I used two cameras, the OM-1 "panda" paired with the Zuiko 85mm/2 and Ilford XP2 400, and the Oly C-5050. While the C-5050 has proven to be very adept (and boy what a sharp lens it has! see the one with the police officer), I still prefer the shots from the OM-1 (the Taiko drummers and the red Thunderbird especially).

I think the C-5050 is capable of producing images with good bokeh, but it doesn't come quickly, I pretty much have to use its manual focus to get them. The automatic settings will get all sharp pictures which may or may not be what I wanted.

The OM-1 still proves to be exciting to use. I'll scan the next batch from the trip tonight and we'll see how it captures image on a Kodak T-Max 100.

Meet the Ace

Once in a while, there are cameras that intrigues me more than others. Even among Olympus cameras. One of them is the Olympus Ace. This is the first and the last foray into interchangeable-lens rangefinder market that Olympus ever made (as far as my research shows).

Last week I got a Tower 19, which is what Olympus Ace E is known in the United States, distributed by Sears, the only indication that it's manufactured by Olympus is the lens markings and the leatherette embossing on the back


Cosmetically, it is in a pretty bad shape, there are dirt, grime, grease, oxidation, you name it all over the top chrome covering, the bottom is pretty clean, and the leatherette cover is in very good condition.

However, the rangefinder is working, the self-timer is working, even the selenium meter is pretty accurate.

Operations on the camera are smooth. Just as I expect from Olympus cameras (when they are in working condition, that is). The film advance lever has a tactile feel to it, and it springs back nicely, the shutter on the other hand is too light to touch for me, I accidentally snapped two frames just because I rested my finger on it.

One thing that confuses me is that the shutter speed ring has the ASA numbers on it (at the bottom) but the ASA selector knob is detached from the ring, as the result, when I change the shutter speed, the knob is no longer pointing to the correct ASA number. What gives??


I hope I'm just missing something obvious here.

Now, the cool part about this camera is that the lens is detachable, there are a total of 4 lenses available when this camera hit the market in 1958. One day maybe I will get the other lenses, but for now, I'm stuck with the "standard" one, a five-element 45mm/2.8 E.Zuiko.


As for the all important image quality, have a look at a this flickr set

This one is my favorite:

Wondering about the possibilities

These past few weeks has been a blast. First, I finishes two rolls of black and white films. What's so special about that? well, those two rolls contain my first attempt at street-photograpy.

Those who has tried it will nod approvingly at my sense of accomplishment, and those who hasn't will have not clue how hard it is to pull off.

Second, I setup a table at a local camera show and I had a terrific time talking to and observing people. Met interesting people and learn a bunch about cameras and photography. I even sold 3 cameras (but I purchased 2 Olympus cameras for my collection), so it's a wash from money perspective.

On another topic, this thread on flickr made me think hard about possibilities... where to go from here, will photography remains a hobby for me? what will it take to go the next step?

What a Trip!

Launching a blog is not a big deal nowadays! And this one is about photography in general, more specifically vintage cameras and the pictures they take.

Yes, I am a camera nut, not just any cameras, though, vintage ones, almost all film (hmmm wonder why that is...?), and almost all of them made out of metal (mostly).

Why? because they are elegantly crafted, still works *well* after 20, 30, or 40 years (some of them 50), and I just dig the retro look.

Now, let's kick it off with a camera that I got last week. The Olympus 35 Trip. One of the most simple yet elegant cameras I've ever used. No fuss, no muss, no batteries to worry about, just load the film, enjoy the buttery-smooth thumb-wheel film advance and go take pictures... that is until I realize that I have to know how to use the zone focusing... effectively!

That said, this camera which was introduced in 1968 is absolutely pretty to look at (the black version is much prettier than the silver ones, and rarer also) and a joy to use.