Long time, no update.
I didn't realize how long it had been since my last update... I haven't even really been reading my friends page that faithfully lately.
Work is still going well. I can't believe I've been up here for a year and a half now. The past six months have gone by so fast.
I just got back from my 5-year college reunion last weekend. God I feel old, nearly all of my friends were there with spouses or fiancees (most of whom were ALSO friends of mine at Cornell). Sadly, despite being a 5-year reunion, except for one or two people, everyone I saw were people I see at least once a year. None of my friends that don't attend Homecoming at Cornell attended Reunion, although this is not surprising - like myself, most of my friends had closer ties to the band (which spanned classes) than to our particular graduating class. Despite this disappointment, it was fun, other than the severe camera envy that I came out of the weekend with.
A friend of a friend at the reunion had a Nikon D200 DSLR and some serious glass. (I'm estimating on the order of $5000 between body and lenses.) We talked for a bit and I realized how much I missed shooting with an SLR. (I had stopped because film was too expensive, and for my 21st birthday I was given an Olympus C-3000 which had lots of SLR-like features as opposed to the minimal functionality so many other digital cameras of its time had.) So now I have a Pentax K10D on order from Amazon, which will hopefully arrive Friday in time for this weekend's Strawberry Festival in town.
Why the K10?
1) Nikon can go fuck themselves with a chainsaw after the .NEF metadata encryption fiasco. They're never getting any of my business until they change their tune, which likely means that they're never getting any of my business. Also, the D80 was just a bit out of my price range if I wanted an image stabilized lens. My Panasonic DMC-LX1 has spoiled me in terms of optical image stabilization.
2) A Canon Digital Rebel XTi with their "general purpose" IS lens was a serious contender due to previous good experiences with Canon, although it was a little expensive. At least this was until I found out that the XTi didn't have spot metering - the body alone costs twice as much as my LX1 and the Panasonic has spot metering. It also apparently refuses to record in raw format in certain shooting modes - Even though they are modes where one "doesn't really need RAW", I want RAW recording to be set-and-forget, I don't care if it results in giant files, flash memory is cheap nowadays.
3) My family has previously owned a Pentax SLR (a PZ-70). While I never liked how difficult it was to find compatible accessories from third-party vendors, Pentax-branded equipment doesn't seem nearly as overpriced as it used to be (or maybe I'm just richer and stuff doesn't look nearly as expensive as it did to a high school/college student), the Sigma 28-200mm autofocus zoom lens and Pentax 50mm f/2 fully manual lens sitting back home in New Jersey will both work with the K10D. Even better, the K10D's sensor-based image stabilization (and yes, it's actual mechanical correction, not crappy digital stabilization) will work with both of those lenses. Mmm. 320mm image stabilized telephoto. (the K10D's sensor size means that all lenses have a 35mm equivalent focal length that is 1.6 times their actual FL.) Oh yeah, the K10D not only has a documented and supported-by-dcraw RAW format, it also gives the user the option of shooting in the open DNG RAW format.
Work is still going well. I can't believe I've been up here for a year and a half now. The past six months have gone by so fast.
I just got back from my 5-year college reunion last weekend. God I feel old, nearly all of my friends were there with spouses or fiancees (most of whom were ALSO friends of mine at Cornell). Sadly, despite being a 5-year reunion, except for one or two people, everyone I saw were people I see at least once a year. None of my friends that don't attend Homecoming at Cornell attended Reunion, although this is not surprising - like myself, most of my friends had closer ties to the band (which spanned classes) than to our particular graduating class. Despite this disappointment, it was fun, other than the severe camera envy that I came out of the weekend with.
A friend of a friend at the reunion had a Nikon D200 DSLR and some serious glass. (I'm estimating on the order of $5000 between body and lenses.) We talked for a bit and I realized how much I missed shooting with an SLR. (I had stopped because film was too expensive, and for my 21st birthday I was given an Olympus C-3000 which had lots of SLR-like features as opposed to the minimal functionality so many other digital cameras of its time had.) So now I have a Pentax K10D on order from Amazon, which will hopefully arrive Friday in time for this weekend's Strawberry Festival in town.
Why the K10?
1) Nikon can go fuck themselves with a chainsaw after the .NEF metadata encryption fiasco. They're never getting any of my business until they change their tune, which likely means that they're never getting any of my business. Also, the D80 was just a bit out of my price range if I wanted an image stabilized lens. My Panasonic DMC-LX1 has spoiled me in terms of optical image stabilization.
2) A Canon Digital Rebel XTi with their "general purpose" IS lens was a serious contender due to previous good experiences with Canon, although it was a little expensive. At least this was until I found out that the XTi didn't have spot metering - the body alone costs twice as much as my LX1 and the Panasonic has spot metering. It also apparently refuses to record in raw format in certain shooting modes - Even though they are modes where one "doesn't really need RAW", I want RAW recording to be set-and-forget, I don't care if it results in giant files, flash memory is cheap nowadays.
3) My family has previously owned a Pentax SLR (a PZ-70). While I never liked how difficult it was to find compatible accessories from third-party vendors, Pentax-branded equipment doesn't seem nearly as overpriced as it used to be (or maybe I'm just richer and stuff doesn't look nearly as expensive as it did to a high school/college student), the Sigma 28-200mm autofocus zoom lens and Pentax 50mm f/2 fully manual lens sitting back home in New Jersey will both work with the K10D. Even better, the K10D's sensor-based image stabilization (and yes, it's actual mechanical correction, not crappy digital stabilization) will work with both of those lenses. Mmm. 320mm image stabilized telephoto. (the K10D's sensor size means that all lenses have a 35mm equivalent focal length that is 1.6 times their actual FL.) Oh yeah, the K10D not only has a documented and supported-by-dcraw RAW format, it also gives the user the option of shooting in the open DNG RAW format.