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Logic be damned I bought an ND I am crazy too

dirk

DPRF-Founder
Administrator
Hi

I jumped also in the boat and bought a Contax ND. It is crazy I know. Ther is no the slightest sign yet, that there will be any future with that brand at all - I would say all signs are indicating currently that there is no hope. But nevertheless, I made that jump.

I have not made testshots yet. I have first to charge tons of batteries (I am scared 12 are not enough), but I must admit the handling is great. Feels like a Contax N1, just a little thicker and heavier.

LCD screen is typical for the first generation DSLRs of that time. Of course there have been much improvements over the years and a Nikon D70 for ex&le gives a lot more comfort in this respect.

But the ND is a fullframe camera and uses Zeiss lenses. These have been the most important factors for me to buy one. In the past, I did not use slide filme over ISO 400, in 98% percent of the cases even under ISO200, so I guess I have no right to complain in this field neither.

The Viewfinder is a pleasure compared to a Nikon D70 or Canon 350D et alii. Basically the same as in the N1. I compare the ND against those models of Canon and Nikon, because this would be the logical alternative in price as long as a Contaxian does not want to spend to much when looking on the other side for testing the digital competition. so a canon 20D would be the maximum alternative for me.

I will see over the time whether I will be able to handle Photoshop good enough to get the quality I would like to have with the ND
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I will report my learning and suffering curve here of course
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I hope that there will be still some ND users around also in the future, even if Canon and Nikon makes it harder every day to stay with Contax
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Well done Dirk! Looking forward to hearing how it goes.
It makes me quite ashamed as I was considering going over to the opposition!
 
Congratulations Dirk !!! Please shoot me any questions you may have about processing the images. I have a ton of tricks up my sleeve to squeeze the most out of ND images. And what I don't know, Irakly will know ; -)

Even though my N gear is on the auction block, including my ND, I still shoot Zeiss C/Y glass on my 1DsMKII and 5D, and all those delicious Hasselblad Zeiss lenses are harder at work than ever before.

Best of luck. Talk to you soon.
 
Dirk,

Congratulations! I know you'll enjoy the camera and the power thing can be overcome. I actually bought one of those $50 digipower (I think that's the name) units last week and you can shoot all day with it.

I'll be happy to share any experience that might be helpful as you begin to shoot with the ND. Best of luck and HAVE FUN!

Kent >
 
Congratulations, Dirk! Other than the power gobbling, you'll really enjoy the camera and its results.

I need to post some stuff from my Arizona trip two weeks ago. I took one of Alan Briot's workshops and we visited some gorgeous places: Monument Valley, Canyon de Chelly, Antelope Canyon and others. It was quite tiring, as we were doing sunrises, driving through the day then doing sunsets, over a span of 5 days, but it was great fun too. I really got a chance to stretch those Zeiss and Leica optics. the problem I'm having is that images with tons of detail that look awesome at 11x17" or 13x19", because of the amount of detail they can look really bad in small web sizes. Images that are not as busy looking, like this one, look OK though ...

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I have been spending a lot of money beefing up my Canon L lenses collection. The 85mm f/1.2 is a joy to use. I am thinking to sell some of my N gears to ease my wallet. But having see some pics I took with my ND, I just could not do it.

In the last few months, I bought two more CZ AF lenses, am I crazy or logic be damned?

Dirk, looking forward to hearing your ND user experience and s&les.

I do have a personal tip for you: the ND tends to under expose. So I set my compensation to + 1/3 or +1/2 all the time. The highest f-stop (brightest zone) contain half of the entire 6mp information. So never underexpose.
 
Indeed, with digital the rule is "expose to the right" (of the histogram, that is). Of course you don't want to overdo it and blow critical highlights
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. When in doubt bracket or expose twice with a twitch of the compensation dial (what I do). I've got some REALLY mushy looking raws that just transform into beautiful colors when processed accordingly. Isn't this stuff fun??!!
 
Excellent tips regarding exposure. I actually shoot at +1 most of the time with the ND.

Kent >
 
Hey guys,

thank you very much for your support. I am sure, I will need many times your advise for the Contax ND
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I hope I will have time to shoot in the neighbourhood a little bit tomorrow to get my first impressions...

I will also make a series of images with different exposure compensation. Thanks for that tip by the way.

I thought the exposure system (calculation) is the same as in the Contax N1. So i.e. with Matrix metering in both and same shot, I would get same results too. Is this not the case?
 
The ND metering is pretty good, except it tends to under either in no flash or flash. N1 metering is great but I can't tell if they are the same as I always over expose my negs. (expose for shadow.)

With flash, it is more tricky. In Av or Tv mode, the body tends to switch to pgm mode.

Tip #2, always shoot in RAW, it is 100 times better than Jpeg, ND Jpeg sucks, TIFF is so so and produce huge 18mg file. No LCD/histogram review for RAW, but I trust its metering as long as I set the comp to + side.

With flash, always set your body in M, meter the sense and set your flash to A mode.
 
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