A digital convert or Why I love my Olympus e510.
Why I continued to use film cameras
I have a large investment in specialist Minolta (MC and MD) lenses, bellows and microscope attachments. These lenses have served me well for more than two decades in taking scientific, nature and macro photographs. Apart from using a Nikon coolpix 5000 and a small canon digital compact for snapshots – I have largely steered away from using digital cameras for my ‘serious work’ because of the need to use my specialist lenses and my fondness for the information that these manual lenses supplied me with such as hyperfocal distance, infrared focussing corrections and magnification information.
Purchasing a digital SLR
I considered purchasing a canon DSLR because of their high quality sensors and the excellent 400mm f5.6 L series lens that would be great for my bird photography. However in the end I went for an Olympus four thirds system using the e510 body because I could use all my old manual Minolta lenses with a commercially available adaptor that enabled infinity focus (although the auto aperture facility is lost and lenses must be manually stopped down). An added benefit with the four thirds system was that its 2X conversion factor meant that it was easy for me to calculate magnification and focal lengths relative to a 35mm system.
Excellent image quality
Providing that I keep to an iso of 400 or less the image quality is excellent. When shooting film I usually use Velvia at 40 iso or Kodachrome 64 so for me 400 iso is fast. Â Oh and it is so convenient not having to worry about colour correction filters and exposure corrections for long and short exposures. I love my e510.
Proof of the pudding
The following images of a Tree Fern Gully and my Pet Dove show the quality possible with the e510.
Tree Fern Gully – 17mm MD mount Tokina Lens f22 1/2 second 100 iso
My Pet Dove – 35mm macro digital Zuiko lens f4 1/80 second 400 iso
MORE NATURE IMAGES BY PETER KINCHINGTON FROM VICTORIA, AUSTRALIA