We Love Photography - We Hate Cockroaches

You can be forgiven for wondering at the conjunction in the title - our shop slogan with crawling insects. Leaving aside speculation about the characters of the sales staff, I can explain.

Someone in the shop asked me how I got good results for belly dance photographs and images of model cars. I think they wanted me to tell them a secret of a special lens or a special light - an item they could buy to improve their own pictures. I was delighted to tell them the secret, but it did not involve selling a piece of equipment - it involved selling an idea. And the price was cheap.

The real way to get good images of anything - cars, cockroaches, brides, or belly dancers - is to either love or hate the basic subject. You can choose for yourself which emotion you fancy, and you can freely switch between them as you like - provided you really do care one way or the other.

If you don't - either through general lack of interest in any topic or burnout from long exposure to it - any pictures you make will show this. And the people seeing those pictures will perceive that disinterest. That's a powerful clue for them to let them know how they should react to your work, and they will comply readily. If you don't care, they won't either, and you have wasted everybody's time.

I think this is a pretty good explanation for a number of photographic books and monographs that I have seen in bookstores in Melbourne over the years. The old Printed Image bookstore in Prahran had shelves of them - the NGV bookstores at the main gallery or their Federation Square branch are also pretty good ...errr...dump bins. Okay, not every picture book is Cowboy Kate but some of the depths of banality that are plumbed by small publishers...

Not talking about vanity photo books or self-publishing here - the things that we make of our holiday snaps or our hobbies. These actually have some substance - the audience may be limited to a family, club, or individual, but the book is often intense and treasured. At least the thick ones can be used to swat cockroaches with.

Heading image: Thanx to Jane and Henri

Students! - No More Naked Lenses!

I know you are a struggling student and I know you have no money and I know you are trying to make great art with your Canon DSLR...and I have a great idea for you.

Stop looking at the internet and the camera magazines and the secondhand cabinet. Count over your pennies, give up drinking at the student tavern for a week, and come in and get yourself a Canon 50mm F 1.8 EF lens and the proper accessories for it.

The proper accessories are a UV filter to protect the front of the lens from the fingers of your fellow students and a lens hood to protect your images from light flare. It is okay to have flair in your images, but not flare...

The 50 is about the most accurate small lens you will ever find for your little Canon - and remember that it is a red-dot lens and can go onto your Canon 1Dx when you become an international iconic superstar. It has great bokeh and can also make the background blurry, depending on which school you go to. It does good portraits so try to make friends with the good-looking students. It also does good art copy, so you can add the artists to your list.

It is light and fast. If you are trekking in the mountains with your Canon DSLR, or just fleeing from the authorities through dense bush, you'll appreciate not having to carry extra weight.

Best of all, the whole box and dice that you see on the heading image is only $ 169.45 complete with a year's warranty. No, you can't have a discount - that is cheap as chips as it is. You can get your normal 10% discount on ink, paper, film and chemistry.

Note to the non-student: the 50mm lenses of any manufacturer are generally the bargains of their respective ranges. They are, by now, probably the most developed of the glass, and can be the most accurate lenses in any lineup. YOU need one too.

Do A Friend A Favour - Promaster 2500 PK

If you are a regular reader*of this blog, it is unlikely that you will need this product. But you most likely are a source of inspiration and advice about photography for many other people. Nieces, nephews, sons and daughters, workmates etc. - they all depend upon you to steer them right when it comes to image making.

They are fortunate in that you are a real person, rather than just an electronic name on a screen. They can get rumours and rants all day in the photography forums and come away as confused as when they started. Much of what they read will be nonsense pushed at them anonymously - with no way to check up on it. In many cases, you - the real photo enthusiast or professional - are the Snopes for them - you can sort out fact from fiction.

So - you've got a student who needs a 35mm SLR to start a Uni or TAFE course. You can send them to the photo markets in Leederville to pick up what they might find - or to Cash Converters to pick up what others have found...Or you can send them in to us to poke disconsolately at the secondhand shelf in the window...

Or you can tell them about the Promaster 2500 PK. They are brand new and carry a full year's warranty. They are a standard-issue copy of what probably started as a Minolta design but has taken on some aspects of the old film Pentax cameras. It certainly has a Pentax K mount, thought I am willing to bet the f:1.7 lens is closer to a Rokkor than a Takumar.

No matter - the camera is well-built, has an accurate TTL meter, and the full complement of late-model manual features. Perfect to learn the trade on.

And there is - wonder of wonders - a retro 1980's fitted leatherette case included in the kit.

This is one of the best things a student can use, save mature judgement, and that generally doesn't arrive until they are about 30 and sorry for it. In any case, do your little friend a favour and send them into us to get one of these for their course.

Uncle Dick

* Not regular? All Bran.

Two Chances Only For A Unique Studio Softbox

Starting a studio? Going to try video for the first time? Need a softbox for your speed light?

All good questions that a new studio enthusiast or student might ask themselves - and there are two good answers sitting out on the floor in the CL sale right now - you'll have to be fast because there are ONLY two.

The first is a speed ring that has an integral 1/2" studio stand mount attached to it and a cold-shoe mount for standard portable speed lights at the back. Not a flimsy outfit - this is meant as a demo and display unit and really will last for a century. The speed ring is colour-coded for the CL softboxes, of which we have many and they are all on 50% off sale.

The second is the same speed ring but with a solid mount and an Edison-screw socket mounted ready to take a standard light bulb - or a stronger photo light if you can find one. It would be perfect as a soft fill for video as it will be silent.

Two only - come and get 'em.