I am looking to buy a professional fine art camera. I have Nikon N60 and want to upgrade. I am seriously considering a Contax G2 with the TLA 200 flash and a Zeiss 35-70mm lens. Are there any other cameras comparable to this one? Please help me...should I buy the Contax system?

--Owen

-- Owen Keller (kelo003@newhampton.org), May 20, 2000

Answers

Please define "professional fine art camera". Cameras don't create fine arts. The user does.

-- Chuck (chaohui@msn.com), May 20, 2000.

I fell in love with the G2 at one point. Then I tried the "manual" focussing feature. A camera where I can't determine the plane of focus doesn't meet my "fine art" needs between 35mm and 70mm. I think the G2 would be a great way to mount the Hologon and the 21mm Biogon (if I could afford them).

-- John O'Connell (boywonderiloveyou@hotmail.com), May 21, 2000.

Asking which camera you should buy is like asking which woman you should marry. No one can tell you the answer. You must work it out for yourself.

-- Dave Jenkins (djphoto@vool.com), May 21, 2000.

35mm for fine art? No way. Get thyself a 4x5 camera or stay home. 35mm cameras are built for convenience, not quality. And before anybody jumps down my throat and starts telling me how good their 35mm prints are, realize that I have shot more than 12,000 rolls of 35mm film in the past 15 years and printed more than 20,000 black and white images by hand in that time. I know what 35mm can do.

Of course, Owen didn't define "fine art" so maybe 35mm would be applicable for his needs. Are you talking street photography Owen? If so anything from a Canon F1 to a Leica M6 to a Nikon F3 to an Olympus OM1 will do the job. You'll want an all-manual camera so you don't have to depend on the battery.

If you're talking landscapes, anything from a Minolta Autocord to a Linhof will do the job. Come to think of it, the camera doesn't make one whit of difference. It's the photographer that counts.

Buy the camera that feels right in your hands and works the way you want to work.

-- Darron Spohn (dspohn@photobitstream.com), May 21, 2000.

Oh yes, there is a "professional fine art camera"--the Holga Camera. New York-based fashion photographer Pauline St. Denis uses one to achieve that professional fine art effect . . . .

-- Hoyin Lee (leehoyin@hutchcity.com), May 22, 2000.

Several points:

1) There is no such a thing as a professional camera, nor such a thing as a fine-art camera. There are cameras professional photographers use, there are cameras so-colled artist photographers use. And some are durable, sharp - others are toy-like and produce soft photos. All can be used professionally and to make "art" whatever that is.

2) You already have a camera. Do produce some good pictures with it.

3) Upgrade? Is just as relative a term as nikon better than lica

4) Darron Spohn first tells you to get a 4x5 or to stay home. But then he says that the camera doesn't make a difference. What is it Darron? Besides, if you printed so much and made so many photos Darron, you should know by now that a sharp lens, a good camera and flawless technique can produce photos in 35 mm that makes 4x5 shooters green of envy in landscape, arquitecture or whatever.

5) Most important point Owen: Buy tha camera that suits your temperament or else tame your temperament and shoot with whatever camera you can afford. If you are slow and deliberate in your approach a large format will satisfy you more. If you are hurried a 35 mm will do fine

6) I shoot with rangefinder leicas and the cameras don't suit my temperament. But I cannot afford a Hasselblad. And I do produce good photographs which are deliberate and resemble larger format work. They might not have every spec of dust sharply delineated nor the tonality of a bromide contact print, but they come mightily close.

7) Lastly: sharpness and tonality alone a good photo don't make (This is bad English, sorry!)

8) Good luck

Wlad

-- Wladimir Schweigert (sgert@golden.net), May 30, 2000.

I see that this topic has a life of it's own now...

The Nikon N60 is not a bad camera, as matter of fact it's a great camera! It has everything I need to create a photograph.

The question is, does an SLR or Rangefinder suite your subject matter or shooting styles?

Remember, the G2 is a rangefinder camera. You do not have visual focus confirmation and you cannot easily have macro close up images. Can you deal with this?

The G2 is an excellent travel and street camera.

The Nikon makes a better studio camera or overal camera for multipurpose work.

I too would like a G2, but not as my only camera. An SLR is so valauble and flexi

-- Nhat Nguyen (nhat@lowrider.com), June 05, 2000.

Art can be made with anything from a plastic-lensed disposable camera to a $10,000 banquet camera. It all depends on what you want to do.

If you want a hand-holdable system that's small and unobtrusive, provides sophisticated automation designed with user input in mind, and will provide the shapest possible image, the G2 is the camera you want.

Carl Zeiss and Contax make lenses that go toe-to-toe with Leica glass, but at more reasonable prices. The G2 is a very capable camera, and that zoom is unquestionably the finest zoom available in 35mm photography. You'd need to kick yourself up to medium format (and a -nice- medium format system, at that) to get better results.

The downside is that the Contax G line isn't very flexible. You have some options for going wide, but not telephoto, you can't check depth-of-field and it's difficult to do macro photography. Also, at $200, the price of the TLA200 is ridiculous.

My personal choice for a portable, high-quality camera is the Contax Aria with the 45mm Tessar lens. It's not autofocus, but it does offer spot metering and DOF-preview. The lenses available for the Contax SLR aren't as breathtakingly brilliant as those for the G, but come in a very close second. Very much worth the price.

(Disbelievers: forget MTF and knife-edge tests: give your lenses the "Mom" test. Break out the slide projector, and mix in some slides of pretty flower close-ups made with Cannon, Nikon and Contax systems. When the Contax shot comes on the screen, Mom will say "Oooh! This one's in three-dee!". It's not, of course, but the clarity and contrast of the image is such that it will be noticeable, even to non-photogeeks. Bokeh, resolution and contrast do matter, but only when they are engineered to work with one another for the best photographic effect.)

-matt

-- Matt Gabriel (mgabriel@crosswinds.net), June 06, 2000.

What's wrong with your Nikon N60.

I've shot my non commercial fine art images for the past 5 years on battered and roughed up second hand old SLR's like the original Contax RTS and Kiev 60. I wish I hand a camera like the N60 back then.

The N60 can use all the fine Nikkor optics. Nikon lenses are among the best. Just stay away from the inexpensive zooms that sold in the kits, they are not as sharp at the prime single focal length lenses.

The N60 has matrix metering and all the modern features that help you concentrate on the image in your viewfinder instead of twindling and messing with the details. It's not the toughest built Nikon, but it's no delicate flower either.

My days w/ abused used cameras are over nowadays as my girlfriend gave me a used Nikon F4s and I'm lovin' every moment of shooting with that camera.

The Contax G series? Well I am getting a used G1 soon only to use as a companion to my F4. I want a light weight travel camera and the Contax G series are just that. It's discreet and less obtrusive. So if you "fine art" work is candid people street photography or landscape, then get the G series.

I wouldn't recommend the Contax G series as your only camera as it is not as versitile as your Nikon N60. Sure there is more prestige with a Contax and there is a certain level of joy of ownership that a Contax gives that my Nikon can't, but at the end of day you need a camera that is versitile for all situation . That is more in the lines of your SLR.

I say keep you Nikon N60 and invest that time in more film and processing and printing of images. The more you shoot the better you get....

-- nhat nguyen (nhat@lowrider.com), June 20, 2000.