KenyaReplay
New Member
Hi,
My name is Gino and I live in Melbourne, Australia. I am in my 50’s with 2 kids in their early 20’s. I am a cell biologist by training, now working for a pharmaceutical company and get to travel quite a bit in my job. I have always been interested in photography having started with a Canon FTb 35mm when I was 14. I seriously considered studying photography when I finished high school but in the end decided to pursue science. Graduating to a Canon A1 when I got my first job, the one thing I found frustrating about film photgraphy for me back then, was the lack of creative control in processing as I never had access to a darkroom. Fast forward 30 years where family, career, mortgage etc had meant my interest in photgraphy (other than happy snaps) had cooled somewhat.
I bought myself a digital mirrorless camera about 5 years ago-an Olympus OMD EM1 and rekindled my love for photography. I have really enjoyed re-learning (digital) photography and the complete creative post processing control has added a new dimension for me. Having teenage kids I learned about Instagram and fell in love with the idea of easy access to a global gallery to share my photos (@gvairo1). This provided the inspiration to go out and shoot and learn more and extend myself in my photgraphy. I have developed a passion for landscape photgraphy and especially long exposure photgraphy. I love my Oly OMD EM1 mark 2 and am continually blown away by the power of the features in this beast of a camera (live composite, live time, in camera focus stacking, 80 MP RAW HiRes mode, 60 FPS RAW burst.....) and I find the quality of the MFT images are more than adequate for my purposes including exhibiting photos as A2 prints.
I am however, an analogue purist at heart. My other passion is HiFi and my pride and joy is my Garrard 401 turntable setup playing through a Leak 12 watt tube amp (both as old as I am). Both my son and daughter shoot film (my son, being the eldest, inherited my Canon A1 and my daughter also shoots film- she received a Contax TVs 35 mm for Christmas!). I have had a desire to go back to film myself and a couple of years ago successfully fought off the urge to buy a Leica M7, convincing myself it would be impractical to shoot film and I would be better off investing in digital gear (hence the upgrade to the mark 2 OMD EM1). But the urge for film hasn’t gone away and just prior to Christmas I stumbled across an add for a Hasselblad kit that had belonged to a retired ex pro. The Hasselblad 500 series was the camera I lusted after as a kid and I would watch in rapture at weddings when the professional photographers would ply their trade with this instrument. I was a young child watching the moon landing and learning those iconic space images all shot with this camera was the ultimate in marketing. I caught myself looking at the moon on the weekend thinking there are a dozen or more Hassy’s up there waiting for some alien to find them and catch the film bug too!
Well, the next chapter of my photography journey has started. I am the very proud owner of a Hasselblad 500c/m & 500c, 40mm, 50mm, 80mm and 150mm Carl Zeiss lenses, and various other bits and pieces (the cost of this entire system was not too different from the sole Leica M7 I was looking at a couple of years ago). These have been returned to good working order by a lovely older Japanese man who is a local camera tech and a wizard at what he does. I have so far shot 2 test rolls of B&W film that have been processed and all seems to be fine. I have 2 more rolls of “happy snaps” being processed and am waiting on these to come back. (I have decided if I can take a decent, in focus photo of Otto, our 18 mo old German short hair pointer I will be ready to shoot anything!-he is full of bounce and can’t sit still especially if I have a camera in my hand-the one good shot I took on Sunday will be blurry because he licked the lens first!).
My plan is to develop the B&W negs myself and digitise using my EM1 (that HiRes mode will be perfect for prize images!). I have found a local darkroom club that I can join and use their equipment for real printing too! I have a steep learning curve ahead of me and am excited to get back to film and address the issue I had as a youngster and take full control of my images!
This forum has been a wonderful resource to learn about the Hasselblad gear since buying it a few weeks ago. I joined yesterday and made my first post and was asked by admin to “briefly” introduce myself (once I started writing I couldn’t stop!). I look forward to making some new “online” friends that share my passion. I am a tech geek/boffin at heart and love the technology almost as much as the art!
Here I go!!
My name is Gino and I live in Melbourne, Australia. I am in my 50’s with 2 kids in their early 20’s. I am a cell biologist by training, now working for a pharmaceutical company and get to travel quite a bit in my job. I have always been interested in photography having started with a Canon FTb 35mm when I was 14. I seriously considered studying photography when I finished high school but in the end decided to pursue science. Graduating to a Canon A1 when I got my first job, the one thing I found frustrating about film photgraphy for me back then, was the lack of creative control in processing as I never had access to a darkroom. Fast forward 30 years where family, career, mortgage etc had meant my interest in photgraphy (other than happy snaps) had cooled somewhat.
I bought myself a digital mirrorless camera about 5 years ago-an Olympus OMD EM1 and rekindled my love for photography. I have really enjoyed re-learning (digital) photography and the complete creative post processing control has added a new dimension for me. Having teenage kids I learned about Instagram and fell in love with the idea of easy access to a global gallery to share my photos (@gvairo1). This provided the inspiration to go out and shoot and learn more and extend myself in my photgraphy. I have developed a passion for landscape photgraphy and especially long exposure photgraphy. I love my Oly OMD EM1 mark 2 and am continually blown away by the power of the features in this beast of a camera (live composite, live time, in camera focus stacking, 80 MP RAW HiRes mode, 60 FPS RAW burst.....) and I find the quality of the MFT images are more than adequate for my purposes including exhibiting photos as A2 prints.
I am however, an analogue purist at heart. My other passion is HiFi and my pride and joy is my Garrard 401 turntable setup playing through a Leak 12 watt tube amp (both as old as I am). Both my son and daughter shoot film (my son, being the eldest, inherited my Canon A1 and my daughter also shoots film- she received a Contax TVs 35 mm for Christmas!). I have had a desire to go back to film myself and a couple of years ago successfully fought off the urge to buy a Leica M7, convincing myself it would be impractical to shoot film and I would be better off investing in digital gear (hence the upgrade to the mark 2 OMD EM1). But the urge for film hasn’t gone away and just prior to Christmas I stumbled across an add for a Hasselblad kit that had belonged to a retired ex pro. The Hasselblad 500 series was the camera I lusted after as a kid and I would watch in rapture at weddings when the professional photographers would ply their trade with this instrument. I was a young child watching the moon landing and learning those iconic space images all shot with this camera was the ultimate in marketing. I caught myself looking at the moon on the weekend thinking there are a dozen or more Hassy’s up there waiting for some alien to find them and catch the film bug too!
Well, the next chapter of my photography journey has started. I am the very proud owner of a Hasselblad 500c/m & 500c, 40mm, 50mm, 80mm and 150mm Carl Zeiss lenses, and various other bits and pieces (the cost of this entire system was not too different from the sole Leica M7 I was looking at a couple of years ago). These have been returned to good working order by a lovely older Japanese man who is a local camera tech and a wizard at what he does. I have so far shot 2 test rolls of B&W film that have been processed and all seems to be fine. I have 2 more rolls of “happy snaps” being processed and am waiting on these to come back. (I have decided if I can take a decent, in focus photo of Otto, our 18 mo old German short hair pointer I will be ready to shoot anything!-he is full of bounce and can’t sit still especially if I have a camera in my hand-the one good shot I took on Sunday will be blurry because he licked the lens first!).
My plan is to develop the B&W negs myself and digitise using my EM1 (that HiRes mode will be perfect for prize images!). I have found a local darkroom club that I can join and use their equipment for real printing too! I have a steep learning curve ahead of me and am excited to get back to film and address the issue I had as a youngster and take full control of my images!
This forum has been a wonderful resource to learn about the Hasselblad gear since buying it a few weeks ago. I joined yesterday and made my first post and was asked by admin to “briefly” introduce myself (once I started writing I couldn’t stop!). I look forward to making some new “online” friends that share my passion. I am a tech geek/boffin at heart and love the technology almost as much as the art!
Here I go!!
