CERN

When a trip to CERN was mooted last year, I didn't take much persuading that it would be a great place to see.  The only issue in my photographer head was whether it too could be satisfied.  The website says it's cool to take photos anywhere so that was a start, but I was still a bit sceptical.  This is high level tech.  But when we got there, it became clear - CERN is a collaborative effort between many countries - there can't be any secrets about what it does, else it wouldn't work.  Shoot away, they said.  So I did.  An amazing place that challenges your concept of the world around you, not only in terms of the theoretical physics (which is so obtuse as to be way beyond the comprehension of most people) but also in the scale of the civil engineering and computing challenges they deal with.  I'm still trying to get my head around some of the things we saw.

All of these shots were with the X10

Imperial War Museum North

Unusually for me for a while, I've been out with the 5D.  I was working in Manchester today and took a quick detour on the way home to have a look at the Imperial War Museum North.  It's all about lines and textures, shapes and contrast.  It was a fun way to spend half an hour.  All Canon 5D, 24-70mm and edited in Nik Silver Efex Pro.

Nokia Lumia 920

Nokia sent me a Lumia 920 to road test for a couple of weeks.  They were keen to see how I got on with it as a camera rather than as a phone with a camera added on.  So, that's how I've been using it.  I shoot quite a lot with a couple of compact cameras - a Ricoh GRII and a Fuji X10.  I thought it would be interesting to see whether the Lumia was good enough to stand in the shoes of either of those cameras.  So, that's the premise of this review.  It's not intended as a technical pixel peeping exercise and nor have I done any side by side comparisons - I just wanted to see whether I could get images I was happy with and see how this camera could fit into my workflow.

First impressions were pretty good.  The screen is big, bright and detailed.  The Windows 8 OS is easy to use and swiping between pages and apps was quick and easy - the touchscreen is responsive.  Setup was pain free; email, twitter and facebook all installed quickly and worked first time.  So too did connection to my WiFi at home.  I bought a PAYG sim card and I was good to go on the road as well.  None of this was essential to test the Lumia as a camera, but part of what I do as a photographer is sharing photos on social networks when I'm out and about and I wanted to see how the Lumia would deal with this.  The answer is, for the most part, very well.  Only once or twice over 2 weeks did a post fail to get through and that was probably the result of weak signal more than anything else.

I also quickly realised that signing up for a SkyDrive account was going to make things considerably simpler.  This meant that folders on the Lumia would sync with equivalent folders on my PC at home.  In theory this was supposed to work automatically (ie as soon as there was a WiFi connection, any photos not already synced would be uploaded to my SkyDrive).  In practice it didn't always work without a kick, but it did work.  From there it was just a case of pointing Lightroom at the SkyDrive folder on my PC and importing into a Lightroom library for editing.

Camera operation is easy enough and as expected on a smart phone.  The camera button will wake the camera from the lock screen in a second or two.  Shots are taken either by pressing the camera button again, or by tapping the screen at the point where you want the focus to be centred.  There's not a great deal of user control - there are a few scene modes (close up, low light etc) and the aperture seems to be fixed at F/2.0 all the time.  The camera makes decisions about shutter speed and ISO.  Surprisingly slow shutter speeds produced sharp results (thanks to the image stabilisation).  The image above was shot at 1/20th second.

I always edit my images in Lightroom and a variety of plug-ins or other software.  It was legitimate, therefore, to do the same exercise with the shots from the Lumia.  Although I did play around with a couple of apps on the phone from the Windows Store I stopped using them when I found that most of them both reduced the image size and stripped the exif data.  The shots in this post are all done with desktop editing software.

Images from this camera are sharp and impressively free of noise, even at high ISO.  Lightroom can deal with any unwanted noise easily enough.  Colour rendition was less impressive.  Straight out of the camera, I felt that the colours were muted and lacking in contrast.  But the .jpgs seem to contain a reasonable amount of information such that moving a few sliders to the right in Lightroom made a huge difference.  Scenes with a high dynamic range would cause problems, but that can be said for any number of cameras.  Upping contrast and vibrance levels for colour images was always required.  Conversions to B&W would give a good range of tones.

My overall impressions of this camera are positive, as I would hope that the images demonstrate.  The fact that it shoots .jpg only is a limitation that I can't live with as is the lack of control over settings such as shutter speed and ISO.  My usual workflow expects RAW files for the most part and I shoot a lot of low light subjects, which this camera can't deal with very well.  So, it won't work as a replacement for my current compacts.  But, that said, it's a very good indication as to what we can expect in not too many years away.  I also like working with a camera that has WiFi built in; there was no messing around with cards and card readers.

The Lumia won't replace a mid / high end compact in the same price bracket at the moment.  It can't live with the company on its camera credentials alone.  It's good but not that good.  It is, however, a very nice piece of gear.  The Windows 8 OS is easy to use and just works as it should - not buggy, never crashed.  I think if I were writing this in, say 2015, then the conclusion may well be different.

The Boys

A couple from a few days ago.  Having a few beers in Ye Cracke in a side room called the War Office.  Originally the place for vets from the Boer War to go and reminisce.  Both shots with the X10 using its low light mode.  Hardly ever fails to deliver, even with portraits.

Provenance Man

I've been documenting Prov for more than a year now. It's been fascinating to see how he is evolving.  Recently he seems to have taken on fabric design.  Or wallpaper.  Or something.  Long may it continue.