Digital Pentax 645

Last week we went to check out the new Pentax digital camera. The presentation wasn't quite my cup of tea but the camera has a nice feel to it. Although not a full frame 645, the large sensor sure knows how to make the 40 mega pixels be worth their money. With a serious range of functions, some quite fun - like the built in level finder for when your tripod's level is confused - the 10.000 EUR Pentax with the 55 millimeter lens was presented as the ultimate device in landscape photography. Again, not my cup of tea, but hey, to each his own. Basically what i found quite convenient is that it weighed less than the Hasselblad H40 counterpart - 1400 grams vs 2290 grams - makes it rather obvious which of them you'd shove in a backpack.

Now having had a run in with both of them, i can say that my first impression still lasts. They are great. Both of them. All medium format digitals are brilliant pieces of equipment. But they do something to you - like religion, they indoctrinate the photographer. I deeply dislike that and the only company that has successfully pulled this off is Leica, with their elegant scarfs and red dot cameras and sonce their response to the format i have yet to test out - i shall not discuss the matter. I am however a firm believer that anything over 15 mpx is Enough. The rest is down to the person behind the display and God knows I've seen some except images taken with very expensive cameras. The opposite applies just as well...

Observations on Orchid Offering rituals

One lovingly unlocks the golden cages where fears lie trapped and allows for the unsavory spectacle to parade down the cobbled Main Street. These days one bows to no gods save for his own fears. They whisper in the ear. They trace the outlines of nightmares, with long bony fingers, on forearms and spines. Hair standing on the edge is a reminiscence of our primal nature - our body's need to react to fear's embrace and to the devastating thought that one's mind allowed for its creation.



Too often have i, the mortal not I the God, lost sight of what is important in favor of what is convenient. The days have been kind and the world has come to terms with the matter because it knows that, in the end, we all react in such a positively savage fashion. Tacit agreement, it is so courteously entitled. Two gazes cross paths - their mutual understanding unassailable.



There is that one moment, however. The split second when the lines are clear and the fog rises and one is allowed to step back and admire the whole picture. However, like waking up from any other dream, when the moment passes, so does everything it brought. The undeniably cruel anguish of having been offered the absolution of pure truth cannot bear comparison to any other feeling in our repertoire.



It is only so, with heavy mind rather than heart, that we take it upon ourselves to retrieve and conceal these beings in Nelda's baltas kastites. Come morning, all traces of the sleepless promenade would have been erased. The poles have long ago reversed and shall forever be kept in this fashion. They have done so to such an extent that the words that need saying are shamefully hidden from sight in a whirlpool of dissociated fragments while the demons that need be enshrouded in silence are proudly allowed to develop their distasteful practices out in the open, like extraordinary children whose parents allow for their virtues to be shown to the stunned audience.



The thick red curtains are drawn yet again (one of the curtains is burned in a corner, from a previous show perhaps). Nineteen orchids are thrown to anyone on stage who might still take them. A camera snaps the last few images of the actress walking away. "The concert is either too long, or not long enough", he thinks while carelessly letting the camera tumble in the bag. On the road to the exit, he steps on roses that missed their mark. Waste of a good intention.

Good stuff

My picture and our race in this month's edition of Vogue Italy

http://www.vogue.it/en/uomo-vogue/what-and-where-to-buy/2011/03/transilvania-trophy

This is becoming a habit