B&H Summer 2009 Catalog

Concept: 3 out of 5
Execution: 2 out of 5
Yeah, but: It's free p0rn - who says no to that?

The Long Version: B&H Photo puts out its catalog twice a year, and it's 450+ pages of optics, electronics, and other goodies. It spans a huge range of products, from home theater A/V gear to lame iPod knock-offs called the "Zune". While I certainly like looking through the camera gear, it's actually the pro audio and video section that I really enjoy. Some of that stuff is so expensive that it makes my still cameras and lenses seem quite reasonable.

The catalog has other bright spots, as well. Its cover earned a place on the Photoshop Disasters website, but there are also some gems inside. The description of the Nikon F100 boasts about its "balanced bill-blash," and the photo for the Olympus FE-3010 looks suspiciously like the Nikon P90. But it hardly matters; the FE3010 has already dropped by about $25 from its listed price, and it's on the cusp of being discontinued and out of stock. I can certainly appreciate the difficulty and futility of writing and proofing the blather for the hundreds of interchangeable products that won't last longer than it will take the paper to biodegrade - but it's still funny.

The printed catalog is the exact opposite of a website. It's hard to find specific things, it's outdated almost immediately, and it costs a lot to distribute. But it's also easy to flip through. A website provides a specific answer if you already know the question; a catalog might be archaic, but it's the best way to find randomly interesting things. I wouldn't pay to buy one, but it's entertaining, educational, and I usually wear out the old copy by the time the next one arrives.

Buying A Bike Online

Concept: 2 out of 5
Execution: 4 out of 5
Yeah, but: Who needs a test ride?

The Long Version: I hate shopping, but I like buying, and enjoy doing research. Going into a store and being lost and uncertain bothers me - it makes me feel lost and uncertain. But in this brave electronic internet world, there's lots of information and options available, and I feel right at home with it.

Buying a bike is always an interesting experience. My first bike (as an adult capable of making purchasing decisions) was picked out of a lineup at a manufacturers warehouse sale. I knew nothing about it, but it turned out pretty well. It was a mountain bike, pre-suspension era, and it was blue. After some time, I decided to get more serious, and bought an exotic road bike. I lusted after it for months before I bought it, and although I flirted with a couple of others and went on some test-rides, my original this-is-better obsession held firm. It was a great bike, too. It was heavier than comparably priced road bikes, but had full suspension, and riding it felt more like flying. The only place where you'd be likely to see one is at a triathlon, and even there they were serious machines. They're even more exotic now, since the company now only makes bike racks, so so much for that.

It's been many years since I've actually ridden a bike, and a year since I finally sold my old racer. Cycling had stopped being fun; the skinny road bike needed the fancy shoes and wardrobe, which turned transportation into a special event, and the mountain bike somehow never took back its primary role. I was obsessed with being Serious and somehow, even when I realized that the mountain bike was just more fun, it wasn't enough. And getting bikes in and out of the house / up the stairs / on and off an elevator was just a hassle, and then where do I store the thing?

Now I've had several changes that put me into a better frame of mind. I've stopped taking myself seriously, and learned to slow down and be less competitive overall. (Riding a scooter is good for that.) I'm happier and spend less time working, have tremendous support at home, and live in a much more bike-friendly area. And with the BMI steadily trending upward, it was time to get back into the only physical activity that I actually like. It was time to have a bike again.

Shopping for a bike took weeks of varying levels of intensity. Sometimes I was just idly thinking about it, other times I was staying up late to read just a few more reviews. What I was looking for was a bike with small wheels, making it easier to use the elevators and navigate halls and doors. Folding is an asset - and practically assured with the 20" wheels - but I just want one that can be folded for winter storage, not necessarily the ability to hop on and off crowded trains or take it into stores on errand runs. Fenders and a rack are a hassle for small wheels, so having them included with the bike is a bonus. Suspension makes life more pleasant, and I want decent tires that can take a pothole or two. Riding my Xootr scooter needs constant vigilance to avoid pebbles, twigs, and cracks in the sidewalk, so I really want a bike that doesn't have racer-skinny sneakers. There are also some hard-packed dirt trails nearby, so some off-road versatility is also on my list.

Research on the internet is a funny thing. Manufacturers sites are great for specifications and publicity photos, but they're low on real-world perspective. Consumer aggregate sites, with their pro-con lists and star ratings, encourage short-form reaction but there's not enough room to develop a narrative. The source I found most useful are the blogs where people write about their own stuff. That's actually a little scary, because I know someone who writes one of those, and it just shows me that anyone can be an authority. So as with everything, it's reader beware, and just because Google ranks it on the first page doesn't mean it's been peer-reviewed. But with that in mind, there's a lot of good stuff out there, and I've enjoyed being the reader for a change.

At various points I had decided for certain on four different bikes. I've liberated their publicity photos to create the nightmare of a mashup that forms the illustration for this review. There's a Dahon, which contributes the front wheel, fork, and fender; a Bike Friday, which provides the seat, seatpost, handlebars, and steeting column; a Xootr, which is the main frame; and an Airnimal for the rear triangle, drivetrain, and suspension. These bikes are all folding designs with 20" wheels, three of them have (or offer) some sort of suspension, and three of them are essentially internet-only in Canada. The Dahon is the cheapest of the four by a good margin, is available locally, and there's lots of them on the streets. Naturally, it's not the one I chose.

Eventually it came down to two bikes. They're pretty comparable: neither is exactly perfect, but I could flip a coin and be happy with either one. The deciding factor turned out to be customer service. One would have to be ordered through my local bike store, and they must be too busy to have been able to answer either of the price/availability e-mails that I sent them over the past ten days. The other brand was orderable straight from the manufacturer, and after a very quick e-mail exchange to sort out the shipping options and a small amount of customization, it was done. My shipping notification from the carrier was sent less than five hours after I placed the order.

I'm not actually going to say which one I picked, because that's not really the point. It will be reviewed here sooner or later, along with a host of other cycling-related stuff. The purpose of this article is really to consider the process. This is the second bike that I bought after extensive internet research, and the second bike that I've bought without any test-rides, but it's the first time I've done both of those together and bought one that I've never even seen in person. Obviously, if I was a Serious Cyclist I wouldn't be doing this, just like if I was a Serious Audiophile I wouldn't have bought my speakers (An SVS subwoofer and pair of Kef XQ1's) off of the Internet without ever hearing them. I'm not looking for custom or cutting-edge, but I'm also not willing to walk into the store and take what the salesperson wants to sell me. Finding information from a wide variety of sources has never been easier, and with some good insight the inconsistencies can usually be sorted out. I haven't been burned so far, and shopping on the internet is almost a hobby in itself.

In a week or two, I'll be able to say whether I'd do it this way again.

Nikon 85mm f/2.8 PC-E Micro-Nikkor

Concept: 4 out of 5
Execution: 4 out of 5
Yeah, but: This one goes beyond 'exotic'.

The Long Version: The 85mm f/2.8 pc-e micro-nikkor is the only reason why I bought a Nikon D700. I'm a fan of exotic lenses, with the Olympus 7-14 and 35-100 being two of my favourites, but even by my standards the D700+85/2.8 is some mighty heavy iron. Make no mistake, there is almost no reason for anyone to own this lens. The very few who will be able to use - and expense - it will already know the deal, and don't need me to tell them about it. But even with so little pressure, this is still one of the most intimidating reviews I've written. After two months of frequent use, and hundreds of photos, I still don't know nearly enough about how to use this lens. Another couple of years should do it.

PC-E stands for Perspective Control - Electronic, and it's what makes this 85mm lens special. It has a diaphragm that's electronically controlled, which is a first for Nikon, and means that the lens doesn't need to have its aperture set manually. Perspective Control means that the lens is split in the middle, and can slide 11.5mm off-axis. This essentially lets the camera shoot at an angle instead of only directly ahead. It's usually used to raise the front of the lens to correct for perspective distortion, but it can shift in any direction. The photo above is shot behind glass, and shifting the lens sideways let me avoid capturing my own reflection. When the front of the lens is lower than the camera, it lets products be shot with a normal perspective from an overhead point of view. Yes, you can fix convergence in photoshop, but this is faster and better, two very important qualities. Besides, if you start pushing pixels around, how do you know when it should end?

TANSTAAFL still applies. The maximum shift will cause vignetting, but how visible it is will also depend on the subject. I've emphasized the contrast in my photo of the Cole Haan logo on orange, so this is something of a worst-case scenario. Because the falloff only affects one side of the photo, it can't be corrected with the semi-automated tools in Lightroom, Photoshop, or their competitors. Lens movements also affect the metering, so working in one of the semi-auto modes will require some exposure compensation adjustments. It's not always easy to predict, so bracket and/or chimp as the spirit moves you.

But shifting isn't all that the 85mm PC-E can do. New to this version is the swing function, which means that the plane of focus can be changed. The photo of the DMT sharpener - the setup shot is the first photo for this review - was taken with the plane of focus placed along an angle, bringing the entire sharpener into focus but leaving its case blurred. This effect would be impossible with a single photo from a normal lens. The magnification factor would probably have needed multiple shots processed through a focus stacking application, and then the case would either need to be blurred in post, or have another layer with it out-of-focus blended in. If I wanted to work that hard crunching numbers, I would have become an accountant.

Naturally, the 85/2.8 swings both ways. Instead of carefully aligning the plane of focus to place it along the subject, it can also be used to shorten the depth of field. Some might think that this is unnatural, but my opinion is that if the tool can be used for the job then it should be left to an individual's creative freedom. There are lots of (usually bad) fakes of this kind of photo on the internet, taken by people trying to make the world look like a toy train set, but it has its real uses as well. The photo above was shot in the underpass at a train station. I liked the light, and naturally I wanted the sign to be the focal point, but that would have also put the garbage can into focus. A little swing was enough to fix that, and I like the result. Simple moves like this are easy enough to see in the viewfinder, but if placing the plane of focus at several points is important, nothing beats a tripod and a magnified live view.

And let's not forget that this is a Micro-Nikkor, or what the rest of the world would call a Macro lens. While it's not a true macro, as it only focuses to 1:2 for half-life-sized, that's ample for most photography. I'll combine it with a Sigma 1.4 Teleconverter - Nikons' own TCs aren't compatible, even though they're listed as working with f/2.8 lenses - and/or some Kenko extension tubes for the times that I really need to get closer. Carpenter ants can be pretty big, so the one above was taken with the unenhanced lens, and it's easy to see how the plane of focus falls across the frame at an angle. This wouldn't be possible with a standard macro lens, and Canon's 90mm tilt-shift only focuses to one-third life size. It may not sound like much, but it's the reason why I'm not shooting with a 5DmkII.

Given its macro design and advantage in magnification over the Canon 90 TS-E, I would say that there's no better lens for product photography. The Hartblei 120 Macro would be another strong contender for that title because it's a super-rotator design - the direction of the shift can be adjusted independently from the direction of the swing. (Canon's new 24mm and 17mm tilt-shifts can also do this, so perhaps their 90mm will be redesigned as well.) There are only two real problems with the Hartblei. Despite being called a macro lens, it has a 1:4 maximum magnification. That's not insurmountable, but it's also half-again more in Euros than the Nikon 85/2.8 costs in Canadian dollars. I'd love one, but I'd also love a technical camera or even a Horseman LD with its similar movements. But reality does enter the picture for me sometimes, and the extra cost and complexity of these systems makes the 85 PC-E a more reasonable choice for the quality that I need.

Some people have criticized the lenses lack of the super-rotator design, which apparently can cause a serious RTFM error. But the compromise for the cheaper-than-Canon fixed design is that it comes with the tilt and shift at opposing angles. In the shot of the 50/1.8, I've used both lens movements, so you can see the perspective shift as well as the greater amount in-focus on the left hand side of the nifty fifty. It might be nice to have tilt and shift set to the same direction, which any friendly neighbourhood service centre can do for a fee, but I doubt that I'll have the alteration made. Shifting and swinging it in the same direction can only compound the asymmetrical falloff.

When I bought this lens, I did expect too much. The photo above is shot at f/22 with maximum swing, and it's still not quite keeping the pearls within its depth of field. Forget about getting low-level shots with most of the item in focus. The lens is capable of stopping down to f/32, or f/45 at its closest focusing distance, and I've been impressed at how little quality is lost to diffraction with the D700. The Sigma 1.4 EX teleconverter will effectively let the aperture close down another full stop, but I still keep around f/18-22 and have no problems with the image quality. In fact, my biggest complaint about the combination (and the Kenko extension tubes) is that the lens release buttons are right around the same location as the tilt/shift rotation release lever. They even feel a little bit similar. I once hit the wrong one by mistake, which is an expensive but convenient way to get that thrill-ride stomach feeling.

Here's another shot at f/22, this time with the front dropped, which means that there's no swing to realign the depth of field. Sharpness is excellent, but there's no way to get around the need for focus stacking with this kind of shot. The stones are prong-set and quite raised from the band, which doesn't help, but there's got to be at least a millimeter between the sapphire and the diamonds. I'm actually pleased that I got them all in focusish. It's also worth noting that to get this much magnification I combined my 1.4TC with a bunch of extension tubes, and it resulted in significant mechanical (hard, unrecoverable) vignetting. To remove it I've cropped the image down to about 9 megapickles. Otherwise this photo is pretty much untouched, with just the Lightroom adjustments that I could make while I was standing up.

There's a rumour on the internet that the 85/2.8 hangs up on the flash housing of the D700, and I'm pleased to say that it's not true. It started because the D700's housing is larger than the one on the D300, and the 85mm PC-E is similar to the 24mm PC-E. It's a k'rock. And even if it were true, the lens rotates through 180 degrees, so if the shift knob (closest to the camera body) does hang up on the flash, you can still turn it the other way. But that would be an annoyance, so do check it on the body you'd be using if you're considering this lens. You'll also want to make sure that the electronic aperture control works, or that you're okay with setting it manually. Non-electronic cameras, and other brands with adapters, will not be able to set the aperture at all despite the presence of an aperture ring. The only solution is to set the aperture on a Nikon camera and then switch it to the other body. That puts a bit of a crimp in my plan to use an F-to-4/3 adapter to let me mount this one on my Olympus bodies. It's also the only lens I own with slower autofocus than the Sigma 150/2.8 in 4/3 mount, but I don't hold that against it.

So overall, there's not a lot to complain about with this lens. It has some limitations, and it's not a replacement for a technical camera, but it's vastly more capable than a straight lens. It has changed how I shoot and what I am capable of doing more than anything since I switched from a Canon Elph to an SLR. After two months and almost 1500 exposures, I feel like I'm just beginning to get familiar with it. I've used it for far more than I expected to, because its specialty - controlling the world - happens to be one that I love. It has replaced the Olympus 35-100 as my most jaw-dropping performer. It's not a trivial investment, so as tempting as other tilt-shift lenses are, I doubt that I'll be adding any others without a strong business case. All I can really hope is that Nikon comes out with a match for the Canon 17mm TS-E a few months before I get an exceptional architectural contract.

Manfrotto 454 Micro Positioning Plate

Concept: 3 out of 5
Execution: 2 out of 5
Yeah, but: It's perfect for detail-oriented control freaks.

The Long Version: Baseball and football have both been described as games of inches, which seems pretty generous to anyone who has tried macro photography. With high magnifications and low working distances, very slight changes in camera position make a big difference to the image composition. This is part of the fun of shooting close-ups, and anything that's meant to be fun doesn't need to be complicated. But there's a limit to what can be accomplished with a flower icon. On the other end from 'fun' there's a degree of obsession that leads to tripods and worse.

The Manfrotto 454 combines a base that mounts on the tripod with a plate that attaches to the camera which can be slid back and forth with a worm drive. Gross adjustments use a lever to disengage the gears, allowing the plate to slide fairly freely. When the gear is engaged a full turn from the thumbscrews on the ends of the plate slides the assembly 5/4 of a millimeter at a time; a comfortable twist of the screws on the front and back of the slider, somewhere between one-third and one-half of a turn, translates to about half of a millimeter. For readers in Burma, Liberia, and America, that translates into slightly over one-nothingth of an inch.

Our tour of the micrometric positioning plate ends with the brass knob on its side. This is used to lock the sliding plate firmly into position. When the screw is loose, the plate can be moved back and forth, but the slight wiggle is enough to change the framing of the shot. When the plate is locked down enough to prevent side-to-side motion, it doesn't allow any movement at all. Sometimes this doesn't matter, and sometimes it really, really does.

Changing the focusing distance changes the magnification, so an effective way to work with macro photography is to set the amount of magnification and then move the camera (or subject) until the desired part is in focus. The 454 plate makes this simple, and combined with a camera with live-view magnification, achieving critical focus has never been easier. The shallow depth of field that's endemic to close-up photography can also be beaten with judicious use of software like Helicon Focus or Photoacute, which stack vast numbers of photographs taken with different parts of the image in focus. But now we're back to the problem that changing focus with the lens changes the magnification, so precise adjustments in camera position becomes even more critical. The sample photo above is from eighteen images processed with Photoacute. Slight shifts in image position don't bother that particular piece of software - in fact it can help - so the slight wiggle in the Manfrotto 454 isn't an issue.

The setup that you see in these photos isn't just what comes in the box with the positioning plate. It doesn't include a quick-release, so I've added a Manfrotto 323 QR (with a spacer made from popsicle sticks) and a 341 elbow bracket. These are compatible with the RC2 plates that I already use, and the whole assembly is much cheaper than the equivalents from Kirk or Really Right Stuff. I've noticed that those call themselves focusing rails, while the manfrotto is merely a micro-positioning plate, but I don't know if that's significant. I'm willing to accept that things that cost several times more money might be better, have less play, and infuse the photos with a magical aura, but the extra hundreds of dollars are quite comfortable in my pocket.

Despite its flaws, the 454 is a very nice piece of work. I'll be buying a second one to stack perpendicular to the first, giving me full lateral control as well as fore-and-aft movement. I've always been something of a gear-head - and already use a Manfrotto 410 Geared Head - so this gives me a phenomenal level of control. It's exotic, but it's worth it when I'm in this narrow little slice of the photographic universe.

CRKT KISS Folding Knife

Concept: 2 out of 5
Execution: 2 out of 5
Yeah, but: Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.

The Long Version: CRKT - Columbia River Knife and Tool - is a company that I like. They make decent products very well, and they're not too expensive. They're also quite an innovative company, and have a lot of blade shapes that I haven't seen elsewhere. I do give them a lot of credit for being a little edgy and experimental. But when things all look pretty similar, it's usually because it works.

The KISS knife is designed to be as simple as possible. Its short blade has a single-sided chisel grind, with the chisel-front "tanto" point. When closed the sharp edge is held safely against the handle, and when it's open the frame itself forms the lock. It has a pocket clip and a thumb stud for one-handed opening. Honouring its desire for simplicity, I've actually taken the stud off and just use the really, really steep grind on the blade for an opening surface. The stud caught on my pocket too easily, and I don't miss it at all.

But here's the problem: the steep chisel grind doesn't work very well. The blade is too thick to slice through cardboard easily, and when it does, it drifts. For anything heavier than breaking packing tape, it wouldn't be what I reach for. The knife is neat, clever, and pretty; it's spawned a lot of spin-offs and imitators, but it's not a great working tool. It serves as a backup and lives in one of my T2 bags in case I forget one of my CS Voyagers, but that's about it.