The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

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The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

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Vintage Camera Marketplace by ImagingPixel

Malaysia's Online Marketplace for Vintage Film and Digital Cameras, Lenses,
and Camera Accessories. Follow ImagingPixel on Facebook, Pinterest, and X.

The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

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The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

<< Click on image for enlarged Lightbox display >>

The Nostalgic Film Look, Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2

Cameras and Lenses: A look at the emulation of nostalgic film-look images on the Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, a revolutionary a very advanced and highly praised hybrid mirrorless camera.

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The nostalgic film look, a retro emulation that evokes sentimental feelings about scenes, music, settings, and characters of the past, enhances emotional connections and makes for a richer narrative in visual storytelling.

The imagery, often exhibiting deep shadows and vibrant colors, is best captured in low-light conditions for its 'warm images' and 'punchy contrast' look.

While the better way to achieve the film look is to shoot actual film on a film camera, doing it in a digital format is more convenient and open to experimentation and creativity. Initial images shot in digital, though, will not inherently resemble a film look when done without emulation.

For the vintage enthusiast, one camera with the functional ability to emulate film looks is the Lumix DMC-GH2, Panasonic's flagship camera, launched in 2010. The mirrorless, compact Micro 4/3 system camera has a 16MP CMOS sensor and the ability to support multiple aspect ratios in 3:2, 4:3, and 16:9 formats.

The camera, noted for its advanced still photography and HD video recording capabilities, has a touch-sensitive swivel-and-tilt LCD screen and a 1.53-million-pixel EVF.

The camera's menu system offers nine 'Film' presets - Cinema, Standard, Dynamic, Smooth, Nature, Nostalgic, Vibrant, Standard B&W, Dynamic B&W, Smooth B&W, My Film 1, My Film 2, and Multi-Film. Each mode is further enhanced with adjustable options for contrast, saturation, sharpness, and noise reduction, which can be saved as one of two custom options. Set the film mode to 'Nostalgic' for the first trial shoot.

To enhance the emulation, adjustments to lower the contrast and saturation settings (to help replicate the softer tonal range of film), introducing grain in post-processing to mimic the texture of film photographs, and modifying shadows and highlights to create more authentic images, will help. For a more subdued look, with softer and less harsh images better suited for post-processing tweaks, set the film mode to 'Smooth.'

Images here were shot on the GH2 mounted with a Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph., a wide-angle prime lens designed for the Micro 4/3 camera system, cropped for tilt (where necessary) and framed to the 5:4 image aspect ratio, with minor tweaks on the desktop image editor for Auto-Correction, Tone Curve, Brightness & Contrast, Color Balance, and Hue & Saturation.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

The Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph., known as one of the world's lightest interchangeable lenses available on the (vintage?) market, is particularly suitable for travel, street, architecture, and night photography (due to its wide aperture), has a focal length of 14mm (28mm equivalent in 35mm format), 6 elements in 5 groups design, including 3 aspherical lenses, 7 rounded diaphragm blades, takes 46mm filter sizes, and weighs 55 grams.

The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

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The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

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The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

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The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

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Vintage Camera Marketplace by ImagingPixel

Malaysia's Online Marketplace for Vintage Film and Digital Cameras, Lenses,
and Camera Accessories. Follow ImagingPixel on Facebook, Pinterest, and X.

In The City, A Black-and-White Hustle

Cameras and Lenses: Images with a M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8, an ultra-compact pancake wide-angle lens for MFT (Micro Four Thirds) cameras, and a Lumix DMC-GH2, on a hustle and a short discourse on black-and-white photography.

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In the city, the morning hustle is reflected in the black-and-white photography genre, which remains a choice for many photographers and artists looking for nuances of the creative process and the emotional impact the images evoke.

Black-and-white photography allows photographers to explore and concentrate on contrasts, shadows, and highlights, and to elicit stronger emotional responses from the viewer.

The genre is often perceived as timeless. Its ability to evoke emotion through tonal contrast continues to inspire both photographers and viewers alike. It has transcended other eras and trends and has remained a staple since the inception of photography.

Just for the trial, these images here were shot on a Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2 mounted with an M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8.

Black-and-white photography can be traced back to its origin in 1826 with the first permanent photograph taken by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce (1785-1833) using heliography.

This was followed by Louis Daguerre (1787-1851) and the daguerreotype process in 1839 and later works by William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877), who contributed to the development of photographic processes, including calotypes, and the concept of negative-to-positive printing.

The flourish of black-and-white photography in the early 20th century as an artistic and documentary medium includes credits to the works by Ansel Adams (1902-1984), Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908-2004), Dorothea Lange (1895-1965), and other iconic notables.

Ansel Adams, in particular, is renowned for his breathtaking landscapes of Yosemite National Park. Cartier-Bresson, often called the father of photojournalism, captured candid moments that reflected the human condition within the living environment.

The genre took a leap forward with the introduction of the 35mm film roll by Oskar Barnack (1879–1936) in 1925, making photography more portable and accessible to the whole community. Even with the advances of color film and its associated development in the genre, black and white remained a preferred choice for many serious photographers.

Currently, we are also seeing the resurgence of timeless aesthetics through the works of contemporary photographers like Sebastião Salgado (1944-), Sally Mann (1951-), and Michael Kenna (1953).

Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

In the digital realm, pointers to acquiring a greater mindset for black-and-white photography include the notion of capturing images in color and then converting them to black and white, shooting in RAW to preserve image details and flexibility in post-processing, keeping the ISO setting low to avoid digital noise, avoid from burning out highlights or blocking shadows, looking for scenes with contrasting textures, distinct shapes, or dramatic lighting, and using the Zone System to adjust the lens aperture based on the subject matter, as developed by Ansel Adams and Fred Archer to help with film exposure and development.

The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

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The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

<< Click on image for enlarged Lightbox display >>

The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

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The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

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At The Thieves' Market, Petaling Street

Panoramas: The pull and the crowd of an early morning street (thieves') market for used, vintage, and collectibles, in the 65:24 image aspect ratio.

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You will have to be early to pick up the best bargains here, as the market starts just after 5 am in the morning, and lasts till about mid-morning. As I was just as early, with the location was still pretty dark, I took an hour off for a spot of breakfast at a nearby 24-hour outlet, and was on my way back to the scene, the sun was breaking the horizon.

Heaps of goods and merchandise are stacked on makeshift stalls or just strewn on display mats laid on the ground. There were as many sellers, and a steady flow of patrons and bargain hunters streaming and weaving around, selecting and picking the items they were after. I brought along the Lumix DMC-GH2 mounted with an M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8 for the shoot.

The smallish and compact Lumix DMC-GH2, a 2010 release by Panasonic, is neither conspicuous nor intimidating when lugged around or held up to the eye when shooting. As a single-lens shooter, the camera has served me well, even when used with my other lenses, and in the camera bag, which also carries an ultra-compact as a support camera, the DMC-GH2 and lens are hardly a burden.

Though acknowledged for its advanced video capabilities (which I do not have), the camera's high-quality imaging functions and user-friendly design are very notable to enthusiasts looking for a low-cost entry into the genre.

The 6 elements in 4 groups (including one aspherical element) M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8, a pancake measuring only 22mm in length and weighing only 71 grams, is a lens you want to look at if you are into not only landscapes and street photography, but other genres as well. The lens is equivalent to a 35mm lens on a full-frame camera, the all-rounder focal length favorite of many professional photographers, and a must-have for advanced amateurs.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8

For a change, I trimmed the images to the '65:24' image aspect ratio to accentuate the 'wide-angle' nature of the lens. The format is reminiscent of the image format of the Hasselblad Xpan (and Fujifilm XT-1) 35mm film camera.

The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

<< Click on image for enlarged Lightbox display >>

The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

<< Click on image for enlarged Lightbox display >>

The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

<< Click on image for enlarged Lightbox display >>

The Galleria, Photo of the Day

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

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A Retro Perspective of the 28mm Lens for Street Photography, II

Cameras and Lenses: The 3:2 image aspect ratio, as seen with an ultra-pancake wide-angle Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph. lens, shot with a Lumix DMC-GH2, a very advanced and highly praised hybrid mirrorless camera, Take II.

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Still on the street shoot theme here, with images continued from my previous post, shot in the 3:2 image aspect ratio with the 2x crop-sensor Micro 4/3 Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2 mounted with an autofocus Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph. lens.

The DMC-GH2, as mentioned, features an oversized sensor, at 18.3mm x 13.8mm, that is larger than the standard Micro Four Thirds sensor size of 17.3mm x 13.0mm.

The enlarged sensor size allows the camera to capture images in various aspect ratios while maintaining the same diagonal angle of view. This helps maintain image quality with a lesser loss of detail.

The lightweight and compact Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph., 6 elements in 5 groups, designed with a metal mount and a non-rotating front element, has a length of approximately 20.5mm and a weight of around 55grams, and was officially recognized as the world's lightest interchangeable prime lens when it was launched.

The lens is equivalent to a 28mm lens on a full-frame camera, has a fast, quiet autofocus motor, operates on the 'focus by wire' principle, and takes 46mm filters.

The lens has its share of good reviews, especially for its sharpness and compact size, while criticism includes occasional vignetting and some chromatic aberration. The lens was updated to the Panasonic Lumix G 14mm F2.5 II in 2014, with the same size, weight, and optical construction as the original.

The 3:2 image aspect does make for very versatile compositions, well-suited for a variety of subjects, including landscapes, portraits, and documentary photography or creative storytelling, and is still the standard format on many digital SLR cameras these days.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2, Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 Asph.

Shooting in black and white with an equivalent 28mm prime is a nod to the first 28mm lens, for capturing wide street photography scenes, which was introduced alongside the Nikon F in 1959. The immersive nature of the 28mm field of view gives you the challenge of having a dynamic, real-world image that makes viewers feel like they’re in the scene.