The snow came and so did the cold wind that cleared the frozen ground.
This past week I was walking along the river with my tiny Nikon V1.
For those that aren’t familiar with this not-so-popular and now discontinued mirrorless camera by Nikon. The Nikon 1 series was released in 2011 and was the first of Nikon’s interchangeable lense, mirrorless cameras. It came with a 10.1 Megapixel 13.2mm x 8.8mm format CMOS sensor. Unfortunately, the Nikon 1 camera came late to the mirrorless scene and other manufacturers were offering more advanced models with larger sensors.
What I like about the little camera is it and it’s lenses are small and compact. Even with two lenses and it’s flash it takes up very little room. Yes, the sensor is small and one shouldn’t expect sharp 16x20 prints, but an 8x10 photograph is great and for posting on any Internet forum or for photos that accompany articles on a blog or Facebook, the limited quality goes unnoticed.
As I wrote, this past week I was walking along the river with my little Nikon. I thought for fun I would try out my newly purchased Sigma 50mm 1.4 Art. (There is an adaptor that allows the use of any modern Nikon AF mount lens to be used)
Nikon’s larger “DX” cameras have a crop factor of 1.5x, so if you take a 50mm wide-angle lens and multiply it by this number, the result is 75mm. This basically means that the 50mm lens on the crop sensor DX camera would behave more like a 75mm lens on a full-frame camera in terms of field of view.
The Nikon1 has a 13.2mm x 8.8mm CX format sensor that has a crop factor of 2.7 times. So the 50mm field of view is like a 135mm lens on a full-frame camera.
I wandered along the frozen, partially snow covered river’s edge looking for anything that might be interesting enough to photograph. This time of year the river is low and if one trusts the ice its possible to walk almost half way across in some places. However, my respect for the wide fast moving and very cold water of the South Thompson River is such that I stay pretty close to the foliage covered edge.
Walking during the winter along that river has always been enjoyable. Sure, it was icy cold and the wind kept blowing my coat’s hood back, but I like the quiet stroll. I think someone that doesn’t have a camera in their hand might get lost in thought or be able to sort out all kind of personal problems, but I don’t seem to think of much but the process of photo-making and the hunt for another object to point my camera at.
I just remembered a photo-blog I read that said, “Photography is good for the soul”
I did some searching and it was from a photographer named Erick Kim (erickimphotography.com) a street photographer based in Los Angeles who wrote, Why Photography is good for your soul.
“ Photography is a tool to encourage you to live more adventurously; to live a more fulfilling life. Photography encourages us to take unknown paths,
Photography encourages us to embrace the randomness, chance, and chaos in everyday life.”
I do agree with Kim, and I am sure my walks down that cold winter river’s edge will always be good for my soul, spirit or inner self or whatever one wants to call it.
Stay safe and be creative. These are my thoughts for this week. Contact me at www.enmanscamera.com or emcam@telus.net.
