Greetings Oly faithful,
its been a while since I posted to this list, and a fair bit has
happened to me and my OM gear in the meantime, so be advised a long winded
sentimental waffle follows, albeit sprinkled with OM 'n Zuiko content.
By way of reintroduction:- I am in my late thirties, live in
Melbourne Australia, with a Wife 'n two kids a dog and goldfish to feed and
two years ago, didn't give a hoot about photography or cameras. In these
last two years I have switched from Pentax Auto to Oly Manual focus SLR's,
spent a small fortune on OM cameras, lenses, flash units, and other
accessories, joined a camera club, setup a darkroom, learnt to do B/W and
Ilfochromes and eat sleep and breath phototgraphy.
The fun came to an abrupt end around five weeks ago however, when
the majority of my Zuiko primes (24/2.8,35/2,50/1.8,100/2.8) a T32 and OM4
were stolen while taking them on holiday. Now practically speaking, a Zuiko
is simply a tool for photography and can be replaced. However I had become
very fond of every one of thoses lenses, as one is apt to do with OM gear,
and knowing that in all likelihood I would never see them again was well,
incredibly painful!! Anyway, shortly after the theft I considered throwing
in the towel, selling the remains of my OM system and buying a Pentax PZ-1P
and a couple of ugh! Sigma zooms. After all, to avoid such pain in the
future one must become less attached to ones camera equipment right?
Well that train of thought lasted 30 seconds as the reason I
switched to Oly in the first place prevailed - I really admire the look and
feel and size of OM's and prime Zuiko's. They cater for most things I want
in my photography. While I suspect my pictures would look just as (and I
use the term loosely) good, if taken with a decent outfit from Nikon, Canon,
Minolta, Pentax etc. I can't see my enjoying it as much as I when using
Oly equipment, even though it can be a pain to have to swap primes when a
zoom will cover the requirement - for some reason, I'm not attracted to
Zuiko zooms.
Any way, I've pretty much completed a rebuild of my Zuiko primes
arsenal albeit with some different focal lengths:-
For my stolen 24/2.8 ( a great lens - farewell my faithful old
friend), I have procured a 21/f2 and 28/f2.8, there were a number of times I
wanted to go longer than 24mm so it will be interesting to see how this
combo compares.
For my stolen 35/2 nothing yet - the few pictures I have taken with
this lens please me enough to warrant waiting for another one of these
beauties to come along.
For my stolen 50/f1.8, errr well.... as all you chronic zuikoholics
out there know, you simply pull out another one from your Zuiko 50/f1.8
storage facility and activate it for regular and illustrious service. So my
SC 50/F1.8 will come out of semi-retirement duties (where it currently leads
a sheltered life as a loupe) .
For my stolen 100 f2.8 (another fine lens, prehaps a tad long for
indoor portraits, at least in my lounge room it was) I have succumbed to a
bargain grade 135/2.8 from KEH and will look for an 85/2 to pair with it for
indoor use.
So now I'm feeling more confident about going out and taking some
pictures again and as soon as I've sorted out insurance cover for my lenses
I'll be doing just that. Now if only I had some money left over to buy an
OM body to use em with - dough!
Take care out there and regards
S.C.
PS I also lament the loss of my OM4 whose spot metering functionality I was
just starting to come to terms with, luckily I do have another one so it is
not true to say I have no OM body to use 8-)
PPS Actually, I really am impressed with the specifications and US market
price of the PZ-1p ...........Oh alright, I also admit to owning and liking
a Sigma zoom lens - what do you expect from a guy who didn't know a camera
from a bar of soap two years ago?
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