Journal Entries
RF Wrestling 2: Mixing it Up
Posted Jan 31, 2009
Will the GTN live up to the reputation of Rangefinders as the ideal urban image capturing devices? Will I be able to master the unique operating system to get the photos I want? It's now time to hit the streets and throw each other into proverbial balsa wood buildings and get snagged in proverbial scaled down powerlines, and maybe use proverbial miniaturised bullet trains as proverbial nunchakus.
First Things First: Batteries.
My grand initiation to the new-old world of the Yashica Electro. It's an old camera, but not a purely mechanical one. It needs a battery which was pulled out of production because it used an element called Mercury as electrolyte. Modern batteries are available (made of supposedly safer substances), but they are smaller and just rattle around the GTN's capacious battery compartment. Hence the new-old solution of rolling a modern battery in paper and tape to make up for the difference in diameter, and wrapping a piece of cork in foil to make up for the difference in length and complete the circuit. The GTN, therefore, loses points for requiring a hard to find battery, but gains them all back for satisfying my tinkerer urges.
Sucker Punch.
I had been warned about this. One of the first comments I received on Flickr when people found out I had a Yashica went something like, "Uy sarap gamitin yan." They were referring to the feather light shutter release of the Electro. Since the GTN (like all rangefinders and non SLR cameras) doesn't have an angled mirror to spring out of the way every time the shutter release button is pressed, each exposure occurs with minimal Rube Goldberg-ian complication. I didn't think it to be that big a deal; it's not like the mirror slaps and shutter releases of my trusty Nikons are like slamming portcullises (portculli?). But the Yashica really delivers in this department. I'd say it's as loud as striking the flint wheel of a cigarette lighter. However, the discreetness of the shutter release is offset by the rattle and clunk of the film advance lever. It's the mechanical equivalent of shouting, "HOY!" at your subject and then, having caught their attention,
shrugging and whispering, "Wala lang." Again, the Yashica scores a major victory and suffers a major setback in the taking of just one picture. But then the Electro gets a follow up to his all but neutralized sucker punch. "Yashica Electro! Mechanical Vibration Reduction!!!" The combination of the Copal leaf shutter, and the relatively large mass of the GTN means that potentially image blurring vibration caused by a piece of metal flicking open and shut at light capturing speed inside a handheld camera is simply lost. It's possible to get reasonably sharp photos at slower shutter speeds than a typical SLR, no tripods and using the same speed film of course. Whether intentionally or not, the boffins at Yashica came up with Image Stabilisation decades before the ones at Canon and Panasonic.
Just when I thought I had the upper hand, it looks like this camera can still win. Time to back off and regroup.
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Latest reply: Jan 31, 2009
Hello
Posted Jan 5, 2009
I can't believe it's been almost a year since my last entry. Hmmm I guess I should add "post more H2G2 content" to my list of New Year's Resolutions. As if I made a new one for 2009...
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Latest reply: Jan 5, 2009
RF Wrestling Round 1: Feeling Out
Posted Jan 24, 2008
After a couple of poses (kind of difficult to pull off without four other metallic painted neoprene colour coded ranger suit clad friends), I launch my initial barrage. "You call yourself a Rangefinder!?!? You're as massive as my MF Nikon with a short normal lens attached! Rangefinders are supposed to be compact and discreet!!!!!"
All my potshots hit home but the Yashica just shrugs most of them off. With appropriate camera angles and audio echo effects, it screams, "YASHICA ELECTRO! ERGONOMIC ATTAAAACK!!!" and launches itself into my hands. It can be said that the Electro has the ergonomics of a brick. But come to think of it, a brick has pretty decent handling qualities that contribute to ease of use in its intended purpose (propping things up, holding doors open, or for throwing). It fills the hand well and has enough weight to let the user know that said brick is out for some serious work. Now, while the Yashica might never be called upon to perform any doorstopping duties, it does settle in my hands pretty well and does not feel like a plastic "instant entry into the artsy crowd" camera. And being as chunky as an SLR means that all the controls (on both the body and lens) are SLR sized and at easy SLR reach, with friendly and familiar throw and travel. As for being un-compact, the cheeky Yashica tries to counter by pointing out that compared to weather sealed, rubber armoured, mega zoom lens, vertical gripped "pro" DSLRs, it's virtually pocket sized (virtual pockets are slightly larger than pockets in the real world, of course).
As to being indiscreet in actual use, that has to be settled in succeeding rounds. I call this one a draw.
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Latest reply: Jan 24, 2008
Wrestling with a Rangefinder
Posted Jan 22, 2008
(Cue the Music: A Japanese chorale with kids singing slightly off key. Rolling bassline, march-y but not too militaristic. Electric guitars and horns to give it some swinging sixties secret agent funk. Lyrics about defeating the injustice in the world with wholehearted devotion.)
(The Setting: An appropriately scaled city made of light plywood and heavy cardboard. Pyrotechnics of course, and don't forget the mock high voltage power lines and miniature elevated trains.)
Enter the combatants!
Rising out of the ocean (with appropriate pause for name to be displayed at the bottom of your screens). Seawater running off it's cold black metal body and textured leatherette paneling, the late afternoon sun glaring off its sinister ATL and Rangefinder windows and its cyclopean 45mm/1.7 YASHINON lens, the Yashica Ellectro 35 GTN (insert: giant beast monster fighter scream)!!!!
Clad in the standard issue giant beast monster fighting metallic painted neoprene suit and polypropylene battle armour, me!!!
The Yashica has challenged my photographic talent and skill, claiming I am no match for its technological sophistication and optical quality. I intend to show this chunky little rangefinder who's boss.
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Latest reply: Jan 22, 2008
I Couldn't Beat 'em....
Posted Jan 11, 2008
So I'm no longer a SLR only photographer. In the Get-a-Gift-for-Yourself period between Christmas Day and New Year's Eve, I acquired a Yashica Electro 35 GTN. It was practically an impulse buy as my camera purchases go. I just saw a "for sale" post on the Flickr Philippines pool, skimmed through some websites about the quirky little beast, and made the call. In less than a week, tarah! I'm now the proud owner of a "Poor Man's Leica"
I don't think it's fair to compare the two cameras, though. For one thing, you can't call a Leica a "Yashica for Snobs." Well maybe you can. My point is, the only similarities between the Post War German, all manual, gears and springs unit and the Mod Generation Japanese, semi-automatic, circuit boards and electromagnets product is that they both have the range finder focusing systems, infinitesimal shutter release vibration , and phenomenal lenses.
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Latest reply: Jan 11, 2008
shadowsintherain
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