The Reduction

[Godfrey]

That's good!

After selling off a healthy bunch of stuff, and lots more yet to go, I allowed myself to get suckered into buying another Nikon body, companion to my 1964 F: a Nikon F6. Such a beautiful camera and at a very good price. Now I have the first and the last of the legendary Nikon Fs.

But the Reduction continues ...

G

 

[Tim]

a Nikon F6. Such a beautiful camera and at a very good price.

The F6 is the culmination of line and a beautiful design IMHO. It appears to me to be better engineered than the F5 was. It appears more compact. What stuns me is the price you can get such a finely crafted device for.

 

[Jorgen Udvang]

Reading this thread and Guy's "Filter explosion thread" under B&S coincides with a minor "accident" I had yesterday:
I bumped into one of the side mirrors of my old Toyota Soluna yesterday, causing it to break off. My father bought that car 18 years ago, the cheapest car available in Thailand at the time, believing none of them would last for long. This month, we'll celebrate his 90th birthday, but the car is literally falling apart and I should probably fear for the safety of myself as well as other people on the road.

Since I'm so extremely happy with my D810/F6 duo and the 21/28/50/105mm quartet, I'm ready for a reduction too, to create a basis for the acquisition of a car that is maximum 17 years old. I'll start the coming weekend.

 

[4season]

That's good!

Thanks, but I had some help:

http://www.shambhala.com/books/hooked.html

Clever angle that the book takes is that it's not about abstinence, but rather, getting to know the feeling that goes through one's mind as one shops for new tools/toys/experiences. And as I perused the tent sale offerings, I couldn't shake the feeling that the biggest rush I was going to get that day would happen as I walked to the checkout line, and that everything else would be kind of anticlimactic: Why even bother to unbox it when it's likely headed for eBay sooner rather than later?

I did get my first hands-on time with the RX100 Mk III and A7 II and liked them, but they mostly seemed to address shortcomings in the Mk I models which hadn't really been bothering me much. Was a bit less enthused about the added bulk and heft.

Also wanted to try the Olympus EM5 Mk II but there were no special deals to be had that day, and admittedly I mostly want it because it looks nice: Perhaps another toy for another day? Or maybe I should just divest myself of M43 altogether.

Still planning on getting Sony's new 90mm FE macro lens, but there were no samples to try at this event. Probably will just pick one up from stock this summer (no preorders for me!)

 

[jeffreybehr]

'The Reduction' Indeed

The last year-and-a-half, I've gone thru a Canon 6D system, Sony systems in a7R and a99, and a Canon 5D3 system. I kept a Samsung NX1 system that I bought last fall, and I'm currently using Canon TS-E (and other) lenses on it. The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd systems are gone, as is most of the 5D3 stuff. I've been thru tripod and gear-carrying systems, too. I've ordered a 5DSR, and I'll keep the NX1 while I fall in love with a Canon body again. Then all the Samsung stuff will go.

I've never been a collector of foto gear, but I've sure had a lot--TOO MUCH--stuff over this period.

Sure is easy to have too much stuff!

 

[Godfrey]

Re: 'The Reduction' Indeed

The last year-and-a-half, I've gone thru a Canon 6D system, Sony systems in a7R and a99, and a Canon 5D3 system. I kept a Samsung NX1 system that I bought last fall, and I'm currently using Canon TS-E (and other) lenses on it. The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd systems are gone, as is most of the 5D3 stuff. I've been thru tripod and gear-carrying systems, too. I've ordered a 5DSR, and I'll keep the NX1 while I fall in love with a Canon body again. Then all the Samsung stuff will go.

I've never been a collector of foto gear, but I've sure had a lot--TOO MUCH--stuff over this period.

Sure is easy to have too much stuff!

It certainly is.
My Sony gear will be gone by next week.
Getting it down...

G

 

[Tim]

Re: 'The Reduction' Indeed

It certainly is.
My Sony gear will be gone by next week.
Getting it down...

G

Mine's gone too G.
I tried both the A7 and A7II and while I like them, I'm out for the moment.
I may try a A7r when the price drops some more if the A7r II comes out, but I am considering going back to m43 EM-5 II mainly because the lenses are smaller and cheaper.

 

[4season]

I was feeling sort of restless this weekend and was tempted to do a bit of retail therapy! Among other photo items, I half-seriously considered picking up another Digital Harinezumi, a Olympus EM5 Mk I, a Sony RX1, a Sigma DP2 Quattro and an Olympus Stylus Tough TG4.

But in the end, I instead took photos of some of my computing relics using the Ricoh GR: Hardly my first choice for product-type shots, but just as I did previously with the Sony RX100, I thought I'd use the GR more or less exclusively for awhile and see what transpired. Found myself initially griping about the overly-wide FoV and the exaggerated perspective when I moved in close enough to fill the frame. But after awhile, I relaxed and just went with it.

 

[Tim]

4Season, I was there when these Macs were released. You have there either a 128/512 or a Mac Plus.

From 1983 to around 2000 I was an Apple Qualified Tech. Back then we did chip level repairs on Apple II+ motherboards. I saw the Apple IIe, III and Lisa released. I even swapped out "Twiggy" drives from Lisa's to the 3.5" single sided floppy disks.

The first 128Mb Macs that we got in Australia were all 110v USA versions and we sold them with 110v stepdown transformers. The rest is history.

I really miss pre-OSX. It was a great OS IHMO. These were the days of $12,000 B/W laser printers, Localtalk and 50 pin SCSI.

I only have a few momentos, things like an Apple II "The Personal Computer" mug, a Mac pull apart tool, and an Apple IIc lapel pin.

 

[Godfrey]

I remember those machines well. I was the last developer who signed up for the Macintosh developer program just before the announcement/advertisement at the 1984 Super Bowl.

I don't miss Macintosh operating system though. I was one of the team at Apple that helped bring OS X into life in the late 1990s/early 2000s. I honor the advancement that Macintosh and Mac OS up to 9 brought to the computer world a decade and a half before, but by the end it was a pretty rickety, fragile thing to base your work on. By comparison to the OS X Yosemite system I'm using now, never mind the underlying hardware, well ... there is no comparison.

G

 

[4season]

The past is fun to revisit, but I wouldn't want to live there

By the part #, my Mac started life as a 512K and got upgraded to a Plus at some point. Maybe 15 years ago, I picked it out of someone's trash, but I actually had a very similar unit when it was the very latest thing.

I agree with Godfrey that the "classic" Mac OS was becoming a creaky beast held together with baling wire and duct tape: There were some nice features grafted onto the thing, but the foundation was in dire need of a Unix transplant. Smartest thing about OS X and it's predecessor NextStep was building them upon a core of free open source software rather than attempting to do it all from scratch.

For grins I've been toying with the idea of making the new 12" MacBook my primary computer, possibly hooked up to 24" 4K display: That computer seems scarcely larger than my first iPad and costs less than my first 100 megabyte hard drive. :ROTFL:

 

[Godfrey]

... That computer seems scarcely larger than my first iPad and costs less than my first 100 megabyte hard drive.

My original Apple 20Mbyte hard drive for my first Mac Plus cost me $1,560.00 in early 1986... !

G

 

[Jorgen Udvang]

I remember those machines well. I was the last developer who signed up for the Macintosh developer program just before the announcement/advertisement at the 1984 Super Bowl.

I don't miss Macintosh operating system though. I was one of the team at Apple that helped bring OS X into life in the late 1990s/early 2000s. I honor the advancement that Macintosh and Mac OS up to 9 brought to the computer world a decade and a half before, but by the end it was a pretty rickety, fragile thing to base your work on. By comparison to the OS X Yosemite system I'm using now, never mind the underlying hardware, well ... there is no comparison.

G

The height of satisfaction with the old Mac OS was several hours after latest deadline, the messenger waiting at the reception, artwork finally finished, just need to save it to the.... aarrrrgh... bomb :cussing:

 

[Tim]

My original Apple 20Mbyte hard drive for my first Mac Plus cost me $1,560.00 in early 1986... !

G

I remember selling dual 5.25" floppy drives for the Sorcerer computer for about $1500 Australian. I think the 300/75 baud acoustic couplers were $300.

 

[4season]

The height of satisfaction with the old Mac OS was several hours after latest deadline, the messenger waiting at the reception, artwork finally finished, just need to save it to the.... aarrrrgh... bomb :cussing:

I liked OS 9.x so much that I bought a Thinkpad with Windows 95 and didn't buy another Apple product for myself for years. I still keep current Windows and Linux machines around. You know, just in case Apple ever starts to suck again.

 

[Godfrey]

The Reduction continues ... Sony A7, spare batteries, chargers, all lens mount adapters: all gone now. The closet is beginning to look a bit more sane.

Next bunch of stuff to go up on the auction block perhaps Sunday evening... Leica R lenses and such. Maybe the E-PL7 as well ... I'm not using it as much as I expected, although I do like it a lot.

G