The great magazine for a photographer:
meet c’t Digital Photography!
I do not read much magazines these days, you know… And if I read something, it is usually not about photography.
There is a reason for this: I’ve found (it was about 5 years ago) that unfortunately there are almost no photography-related magazines exist which I can read without getting over tons of advertisements and craigslist-like listing, and it is about 50% of entire magazine filled with it. Go to a book store and open any of of the magazines with word “photography” on a cover and you’ll see what I am talking about.
I simply can’t tolerate when publisher want me “eat” Ads and “for sale” listing for my own money! BTW, that was one of the reason why I’ve disconnected my TV from a cable long time ago: I couldn’t watch anything because of repeated stupid ads every 5 minutes… and they wanted my money for such crap.
Why I am writing about this? Here is the story:
Few weeks ago I’ve got an email from one of the guys from c’t Digital Photography Magazine, he asked me to take a look at few issues he is going to send me if I am fine with it. In return, he wanted to hear my my opinion.
Skeptically, but I’ve agreed: why not? I have not seen this magazine before and was curious.
I was surprised: it appears that I’ve got pretty interesting reading:-)
First of all, there is no advertisement inside. I mean I did not notice it:-) It might be that some of the articles or images are AD-placed, but I couldn’t recognize them immediately.
What I really liked is that every article is deep and detailed. You know how much technically oriented I am, and I was pleased to find that magazine editors think the same.
The magazine has 128 pages, and because there is no “craigslist” in it and almost no AD there is plenty of room for long reviews, gear test and other interesting stuff. HDR, lens reviews (with image examples and 100% crops), HDSLR, etc. What I also likeed that they oriented on enthusiast and professional photographer, not only for beginners. For example, on a manual lens review (for DSLR) they have compared Lecia, Zeiss, Shneider lenses along with current Canon and Nikon ones. All of them can be used on canon or Nikon cameras (via adapter), and it was interesting to see how good-old-German ones can compete with the current mid-level Canon and Nikon lenses.
Truly, I’ve enjoyed it.
As a bonus, every issue comes with DVD full of images from the tests, software, plugins for Photoshop and other useful stuff.
BTW, if you think they have paid me for this post, you are wrong: the only bribe I’ve received is four issues for 2010 year. Not much for a “prepaid” post, if you ask me:-)
Now, let me talk about the illustration for this article, the image you’ve seen on top.
I’ve took this photo using my charismatic Cambo Ultima view camera, and I hope you’ve noticed unusual focus on the image: the spread of magazines all in focus, while any other non-flat object are blurred. This is what happens when you tilt the lens 🙂 Look at the lighting setup and camera position below:
Studio view camera with “selective” focus
Alex-koloskov-photography-class-shooting-setup1
The only working ligth sources was stripbox on top and spot behind the composition. The one under the table was a legacy from a previous shot:-)
Schneider 120mm HM macro lens is tilted:
Alex koloskov photography class tilt of cambo view camera
Must say that at such big tilt angle image quality suffered a bit. but it was a good trade-off the the focus whihc goes in parallel with the shooting table. More about view camera capabilities can be found here: Exploring tilt and swing of a view camera with 35mm DSLR
All the best!
Alex
P.S Another magazine i enjoy looking (there is nothing to read in there) is ‘”Archive” (Luerzer’s Archive). Great source of inspiration, take a look if you have not seen it yet!