Anyone going digital "old school?"

So, I'm not a complete newbie photographer and fully understand what megapixels, dynamic range, and high ISO ability bring to the table (D3, D3s, D7000, etc.)

For some reason, though, over the last few months I went on a KEH buying spree and scored some real low shutter count pro series Nikons- a D1x, D2hs, and D2x and have just been blown away with the saturation and flat out color rendition of these cameras- especially the D2hs. The D1x takes some great film grain black and white and the D2x is incredible at base ISO. I am shooting raw, BTW and use Capture 1 pro mostly. These are my first and only pro-series Nikons, I had been shooting pro-sumer until now.

So question for all of you... how many of you are a bit tired of the latest and greatest and have gone back to appreciating some old school digital? (yeah, yeah, yeah, I love tri-x pan as well, but this is about "old" digital)

These three cameras have really boosted my love of picture taking as of late and I've been using them fully manual with primes (especially the Voightlander 20mm 3.5)

Any old digital love still out there?

D2hs 24mm F/11 1/80 iso-400

I have a pair of Canon 1Dmk4 i use at work.
When i am shooting for fun i frequently use my old 1Dmk1 (4mp and noisy at anything over 640iso)

Sweet! That's what I'm talking about Echo... single digit megapixels and noise!

Darvis said:

So, I'm not a complete newbie photographer and fully understand what megapixels, dynamic range, and high ISO ability bring to the table (D3, D3s, D7000, etc.)

For some reason, though, over the last few months I went on a KEH buying spree and scored some real low shutter count pro series Nikons- a D1x, D2hs, and D2x and have just been blown away with the saturation and flat out color rendition of these cameras- especially the D2hs. The D1x takes some great film grain black and white and the D2x is incredible at base ISO. I am shooting raw, BTW and use Capture 1 pro mostly. These are my first and only pro-series Nikons, I had been shooting pro-sumer until now.

So question for all of you... how many of you are a bit tired of the latest and greatest and have gone back to appreciating some old school digital? (yeah, yeah, yeah, I love tri-x pan as well, but this is about "old" digital)

These three cameras have really boosted my love of picture taking as of late and I've been using them fully manual with primes (especially the Voightlander 20mm 3.5)

Any old digital love still out there?

D2hs 24mm F/11 1/80 iso-400

Click to expand...

Well I will say as a photographer I too am annoyed at the constant push to make people feel like their equipment is outdated. I fall into this trap so often. While I AM in the market to eventually purchase either a lower priced FX Nikon or maybe the DX D400 if that camera ever comes out I do find myself using my old D50 apart from my D90 a lot. The D50 is 2005's "amateur" dslr, but it has a quality about it that just makes the images special to me. Sure it's only 6mp, but I think cameras are like your favorite flashlight--- if you've become so comfortable with them you can do your best work with them. Sure it has HUGE limitations even compared to my D90 but I love it.

Darvis said:

Sweet! That's what I'm talking about Echo... single digit megapixels and noise!

Click to expand...

I wish my 1dmk2n still worked (blew the shutter) best camera I have ever used.

Enough MP to make a 16x20 (providing I didn't need to crop), awesome image quality, and the best Autofocus I have seen on a camera until the 1DX (which focused just as fast, as accurately and in lower light)

I've been seriously considering getting a 1dmk1 for use with MF FD lenses. 4 megapixels is more than enough... What should I be paying?

gtjonathan said:

I've been seriously considering getting a 1dmk1 for use with MF FD lenses. 4 megapixels is more than enough... What should I be paying?

Click to expand...

have a look at KEH and Ebay for a ballpark price

i picked mine up for nothing when work was throwing them out (i wish i had grabbed more than one)

Interesting thread. I have been taking pictures for lots of years. Learning on a Minolta rangefinder camera, no auto anything. Using a light meter to set the speed and aperture. I have a Nikon D70 and a D90. The D70 has been retired for the most part. I do appreciate the higher megapixels on the D90. I sometimes crop and the resulting image is still pretty good. There are so many features on both these cameras that I will never use. I don't need the in camera editing, the movie mode and most of the auto settings ( snow, landscape, sport etc...) Both these cameras can use the older 'screw' auto focus. I do like the newer VR reduction lenses - faster and quieter .

As an aside - I still use, rarely, a Twin Lens Reflex (TLR) 120 film camera - some of the best pictures I have ever taken.

I still like my "old school" D700.

Old school digital?

I used to take pics and develop the film in a darkroom.

Old school and digital in the same phrase seems out of place.

will said:

Interesting thread. I have been taking pictures for lots of years. Learning on a Minolta rangefinder camera, no auto anything. Using a light meter to set the speed and aperture. I have a Nikon D70 and a D90. The D70 has been retired for the most part. I do appreciate the higher megapixels on the D90. I sometimes crop and the resulting image is still pretty good. There are so many features on both these cameras that I will never use. I don't need the in camera editing, the movie mode and most of the auto settings ( snow, landscape, sport etc...) Both these cameras can use the older 'screw' auto focus. I do like the newer VR reduction lenses - faster and quieter .

As an aside - I still use, rarely, a Twin Lens Reflex (TLR) 120 film camera - some of the best pictures I have ever taken.

Click to expand...

I think that D70 uses an "electronic shutter" like the Canon 1Dmk1
Basically the mechanical shutter will move till max sync speed (1/500th on the 1dmk1) and then faster shutter speeds are achieved by turning the CCD sensor on and off.
this means if you are syncing with flashes (strobist style, or bigger studio units) then there is no upper sync limit, allowing you to add flash to very fast motion, without high speed sync, or shoot wide open with flash in full daylight.
Its pretty handy if you ever shoot with flash off the camera

I found this in wikipedia. The Nikon manual only refers to 1/500

'Due of its hybrid electronic/mechanical shutter, it is in fact possible to flash sync the D70 and D70s beyond their published 1/500 maximum sync speed up to the maximum shutter speed of 1/8000.'

Speaking of old school, I'm still missing Kodachrome. As far as I'm concerned, that was the BEST film EVER made. And it will NEVER have an equal!

Kodachrome - I scanned most of my film collection to digital images. ( still have quite a lot to do ) I have to say, the best images, most color saturated, and sharpest were those from Kodachrome. Unfortunately, viewing slides on the big screen has really become a thing of the past.

Digital really is so much easier, the old slides have been viewed a few times since they have been scanned.

Ah Kodachrome
mum recently found a pic of me when I was around a year old (and shot on Kodachrome) holding a empty cardboard Kodachrome box.

He first roll of film through My first SLR was 24 frames of Kodachrome too.


Very cool film, and even today (30ish years later) mum and dads pics are still really nice and vivid, with no real colour shifts

The key for me has been to shirk my reliance on auto-focus, aperature priority, etc. and get back to the basics. I had gotten into the habit of relying on the metering and autofocus to make some of the decision for me and I found myself regressing with regards to picture quality.

I had come across a bunch of black and whites that I had developed/printed in my old darkroom (aka-bathroom) and had wanted to get back to the fun I had with my fully manual pentax and one and only lens. It was after reading tons of online reviews that I realized some of the "old school" digital cameras, especially the D1x and D2hs produced great "grain" at higer iso levels; it was then I decided to grab one or two of them @ KEH for just pennies on the dollar. Since I wasn't interested in anything except decent metering ability, all extraneous things.. like video... were out. The bonus was getting the sheer overbuilt quality that the Nikon pro-bodies have along with their ability to use and meter with non-cpu manual lenses.

I was incredibly surprised by what I started getting out of the D1x with black and white and the color the D2hs put out (the late, great, Nikon LBCAST sensor).

I'm way hooked on old digital at the moment, not sure I can go back to crazy megapixels and wild high iso capability... My d7000 pics look kind of bland compared to what I'm getting out of the D2hs.

I use an "old school" canon 5D, as far as a 2005-2006 camera can be oldschool. For the final result, it doesn't matter all that much if you have the latest and greatest, and I really like the huge viewfinder shallow depth of field a full frame body brings.

I like old school controls on modern digital cameras. It seems the trend is to doumb down the gear and take controls away from us. As an example, no distance scales on many of the new Fuji and Zeiss FX lenses for zone focus. Just give me a focus scale, shutter speed dial and apertrue ring and I am happy. (shutter dial can have a A setting.)

Here is something I shot a few days ago. An Irish bagpipper with a Leica Monochrom.

http://wheelingwv.tumblr.com/image/79834256130

I love Leica but the prices are crazy.

Awesome pic iluvmycam.

Can't say I have any nostalgia for early "old-school" digital cameras. If you stick to the pro/prosumer model, all the manual controls are there if you want them and you can still run full auto or close for fast moving or uncooperative subjects.

I love low light photography as well and the new sensors have far less noise at high ISO, even without noise correction that it's no comparison. Can also stop down lenses for crispness and/or just have more iso/f-stop range to play with. Can always use programs like DxO to give your photos old-school look at well.

I don't go gaga over megapixels as often pushing the lens past its resolution prime operating area, but it can be nice for blowups or crops where you don't have the ability to frame and/or zoom.

No substitute for framing and lighting and that's why the best camera, sensor and lenses will only make me a good but not great photographer ;-) ... but I try.