I just had to share some of this with you all...hopefully not too OT. I
was shooting the Sears Point (one of only two NASCAR road races held
each year) this past weekend and overheard, was told, and/or observed
many interesting tidbits.
Digital is definately here. Funny part was one guy with two Canon
digital bodies and a huge assortment of _very_ expensive lenses looks at
the guy next to him with 2 D1s (and another huge arsenal of lenses) and
asks what he thinks about it and what kind it is. The guy looks at the
camera looking for a model number, shrugs his shoulders and says "it's a
camera, I never know what kind they give me." Many Nikon and Canon high
end AF digital cameras being used. One guy (Nikon D1) was telling me of
his memory cards...he has three that hold something like 700 images
each. He take the cards and sends them to his publisher via laptop and
cellular modem from the track parking lot.
At one corner where there were maybe 7 or 8 of us shooting I would
estimate the value of the gear laying around to be more than my Santa
Cruz, CA. house. Staggering. Fast 600s everywhere (5 digit price range
lenses).
Bright spot? (Olympus content here) I ran into this guy in the
photographer's tent with 2 IS-3s. Naturally I had to commend him and
talk with this guy. Old timer racing photographer type... Had the
various assortment of IS adapter lenses in his vest and carried nothing
but IS-3s. His comment was "I don't care what you get the shot with so
long as you get the shot, these always get me great results, they are
small and light, and do everything I would want from one of those big
things" (as he points at a Canon Eos 1N on the table nearby).
Funny wunderbrick comments overheard: "I don't know how to use 950f
the features this thing has, and sometimes I get crossed up and can't
control them." I smiled and chuckled quietly as I ate my "free lunch"
(catered for media photographers if you can believe that). In
discussions of Eos 1V lust, comments like "you can blow through a whole
roll in less than 4 seconds!" And, if I hear the phrase "tack sharp"
spounted by another Canon user (WRT AF) I think I'll gag (not to say
they don't do a good job...after all Canon AF lenses are very good).
Still see many of the Manual/AF switches switched to manual a lot of the
time. I guess there is something to be said for time honored pre-focus
techniques.
I have only seen my Friday Practice and Qualifying results so far and am
quite pleased. I found a new spot where pans with the Zuiko 135 filled
the frame and it was such a nice, compact, package that it made panning
extra fun (and I got some really nice results). Used my "eBay score"
Tamron 70-350 f4.5 (fixed) with Tamron SP 1.4x converter quite a bit and
the more I see from that lens, the more I realize what a bargain I
really got. I also realize that much more how bad I really do want/need
that Tamron SP300 f2.8 (or better yet that elusive Zuiko 350 that I know
I can't afford).
All in all a really fun weekend. I'll get some of this work on my site
soon (within the week) for those who are curious.
Mike Veglia
Motor Sport Visions Photography
http://www.motorsportvisions.com
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