_valerian

The Casio EXILIM EX-S20

WHAT IS SO GREAT?
It is Red. Also, instead of Auto Focus, it uses Pan Focus. There is a switch (!) between an icon of a mountain and a flower. The “Flower Range” is good at about 1 foot away but anything else I shoot with Mountain. The lack of auto-focus is great because there is no shutter lag when taking a photograph. 2 mega-pixels, no zoom, 10mb built in memory… just perfect. The 256 SD card in it takes 2 normal days to fill (or one long, interesting afternoon). It’s 37mm lens broke my exclusive 28mm use in film and opened new possibilities. Also, this camera kills humidity and makes darkness green and blocky, which is interesting because film does not. I love how it’s photos are boxy-sharp and flat, with blown highlights.

MORE NUMBERS:
The odometer filps over at 10,000 pictures and I’ve taken 13,987 since I bought it in June of 2005 (20,000 yen). That’s about 388 rolls of 35mm film at 36 frames a roll. Man, if you count the 1000 rolls (give or take a hundred) of 35mm film shot since buying this camera and add in 200+ of 120 film, and then a couple hundred polaroids, the Total comes to: A LOT.

OTHER:
I love this camera, if not for just the ease of use and weird little pictures it takes, but for also how it is the antithesis of all that is wrong with the measurebaiting that goes on online (Think photo.net or the “Online Photographer”) where is New is Better but the photos never change. I never think that this camera will make any “better” pictures than the ones it is able to make. It makes the pictures that it can make and so do I, regardless what camera is in my hand.

It is boring when tools and methods are blindly held against some Holy Grail of photographic technical perfection. SHhhhh I shouldn’t say this, but for the most part, current technology is Good Enough for 99% of people who are not making their living with a camera (and for 98% of those who do). I’d say it has been this way for decades.

More than demonstrating technical prowess, the actual and literal experience of making a photograph, followed later by relating and interpreting it is far more interesting than just making a photograph to use a camera.

Photography is not simply about making “better” pictures, but about answering and asking questions. The photographer has to deal with a multitude of issues with a camera to their eye, but all photographs can deal with are surfaces. The questions (and answers) a picture suggests are most interesting when they are about things that can’t actually be photographed.

There is no set way to do this, but different cameras slightly alter how you might go about trying.