The Photographer and His Camera
After having been a nature photographer for 25 years and utilizing a myriad of techniques and processes, both in black and white and color to achieve the spectacular, I found myself going through some lean times. I took a job at one of the local camera stores to make ends meet. This was about 6 years ago. It was about this time that the first consumer digital cameras were hitting the market. Being without a darkroom at the time the idea of being able to produce viable digital photographs intrigued me. I tried every new digital camera that I could get my hands on to no avail. The technology of the time was not yet ready to challenge film so I tried a different approach. I bought a copy of photoshop and put it on my computer. I made a trip to the local book store to see if I could find a good book on the subject and to my surprise I found a whole shelf of information. But where do I start. Which one of the 25 different manuals was going to give me information I was seeking? I wanted the magic button. I didn't want to know how to turn a perfectly good photograph into some small part of a 6ft by 6ft conglomerate of Dante's Inferno, or how to create a so so photograph of a perfectly good corvette floating 6 feet above it's parking place, complete with a shadow to deceive the eye into believing it was real. I wanted "Reality". I wanted all of the subtle tones that nature provides early in the morning and late in the evening. I wanted long drawn out shadows that takes a flat image and stretches it to infinity. The beauty of wildflowers opening gracefully with the first rays of sunlight. So how did I pick my first book? I did exactly what every good photographer does in a decision rich environment. I flipped a coin.
Well my first photoshop book was the Photoshop Bible 4.0. It took me three years to teach myself what I wanted to know. By the way, I offer a 6hr seminar on photoshop that's guaranteed to save you three years of misery. If you live in the Monterey Bay area you are welcome to register by calling 831-768-1825. Not having a good digital camera I proceeded to scan in my film. I used an old Nikon LS 2000 (which I still have by the way). Finally I was able to get a good digital image to print out like photograph. Later on I won an Olympus C2500 in a sales contest. My first digital camera. I was able to go out and take small photographs (8X10) print them out sharper and clearer than ever before but I still wasn't satisfied. I wanted more detail and bigger size. I played with the C2500 for about a year when Olympus came out with their E-10. When I first got into digital I vowed that I would not by a camera until I found one that let me have control and the price was $2000.00 or less. The E-10 gave me this so it was off to the races and to the bank. Accessories, ink, paper!! If anybody ever tells you he is saving all kinds of money on film by shooting digital, bite your tongue, stick your hands in your pockets and slowly walk away. Thus you would have saved this person's life.
After shooting everything that walked, talked, swam, flew or just layed there with my E-10 I hit the wall with it. I wanted something bigger and better. I realized that I had come to a barrier with the Olympus image and what I wanted was on the other side. My next camera opened a door thru that barrier. That camera was the Kodak 660. Images that I get of out of this camera are all RAW and unprocessed but completely maliable. This left me room to create in the digital darkroom of my computer. The Kodak system is like having two cameras, the one in my hand and the other one that lives in the software. In the stock image library of this website you will find nothing but digital images shot with the Kodak 660 and 760 camera systems. I hope you enjoy them.
Thomas N. Tworek 2003
Bio update 2004 - 2007
A lot has happened since I wrote the above bio. I added a Kodak SLRn Pro to my collection of cameras. This is a 14 mgp CMOS sensor camera based on a Nikon N80 although it does not resemble one at all. It has a full frame sensor so all of my lenses now produce 1 to 1 images. My 28mm is a 28mm. This camera gave me a bigger file size resolving more detail and it opened the door to bigger and better prints. After shooting Kodak for what seems like for ever, in 2005 I sold all of my Kodaks and bought a Nikon D2X. With the D2X I am able to get the best of everything. Not only do I get the detail my Kodaks provided but I am now getting better color. I no longer have to deal with the purple fringing in the high contrast edges inherent to the Kodak sensors. The D2X supplies 12.2 mgp CMOS senor. The images from the Nikon are a lot smoother with less noise. Although the D2X has a 1.5 sensor the quality of the images lets me put up with this small handicap. Solution, buy wider angle lenses. Nikon has provided these for it’s customers. The 17 to 35 seems to be quite sharp and adequately solves the small sensor problem at the wide angle point. The benefit of the 1.5 sensor is my 300mm f4 is now a 450mm f4. Life is getting better. I also believe the smaller sensor utilizes the sweet spot of the Nikon lenses. I have noticed that the full frame sensors tend to have “fall off” around the edges at the wide angle position. This is due to the fact that film and digital handle light a little differently. Film seems to be able to handle the lower light around the edges better than the digital sensor. The sensor wants to see even light all the way across the sensor and the 1.5 sensor seems to make this happen. There was just one thing wrong with my life at this point. I only had one camera. When I planned a trip into the Eastern Sierras I would worry that, if my camera failed, I would not have a back up to continue my trip. About that time, which was just before I signed up for therapy, Nikon came out with the D200. A professionally built camera offering a 10 mgp CCD senor. This was the best selling camera in 2006 out selling the Canon equivalent 5D 4 to 1. I’m in heaven. With my D2X and D200 in hand I am now teaching in the field workshops in Death Valley and Owens Valley. Life is very good.
Stay tuned for the next step. Ultra high resolution Digital Backs for medium format cameras.
Thomas N. Tworek 2007
