Rangefinder Magazine
July 2005

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Rf Cookbook: Tele-communication by Michael Campbell

To try out a Fujifilm S3 camera, I asked a scientist/model friend, Anne, to meet me at Torrey Pines State Beach after work. It was 4:30 in the afternoon, and the weather was great for tanning but terrible for portrait photography. The sun glared down from a clear blue sky casting hard shadows and creating highlights destined to burn out to 255-255-255 on the histogram of my trusty Fujifilm S2. I had heard the S3 had a wider dynamic range and could keep detail in the highlights. I was skeptical: I know Ansel and the Zone System could do it, but let’s see any digital camera keep detail at both ends of the tonal curve in good old San Diego afternoon sunshine! Usually I avoid shooting at this time of the day as it is a waste of time unless you want to drag along reflectors, scrims, gobos, additional fill lights and a crew of assistants to stop everything blowing out to sea.

I had also borrowed an impressive-looking zoom lens—a Tamron SP AF 200–500mm f/5–6.3 Di LD (IF)— whose appearance tends to make mothers grab their small children and run for cover. 

I asked Anne to kneel in the sand, and I said goodbye to her, as I planned to use the lens at 500mm, I told her to keep her cell phone handy so I could call her when I was ready and tell her when to smile. I set off down the beach. After walking until Anne was a mere speck on the horizon, I checked her out with the lens and found I had a close up of her right ear. Whoops… need to go a bit farther! Poor girl was still kneeling in the sand while waves periodically washed over her as I continued my march. Eventually I got far enough away to be able to shoot a full length. I put the lens on my Carbon Fiber Gitzo tripod and attached the Fuji S3 camera. With the naked eye I could just about see there was a person on the edge of the sea. Then I took a look through the camera and was amazed to see Anne patiently playing the part of a stranded mermaid. I called her up on her cell phone. “It’s me,” I said. “Smile!”

I set the camera on Auto Aperture priority at f/6.7, and it figured out an exposure time of 1/350 at 100 ISO.

I put the dynamic range on Auto and the contrast on ORG.

Later in Photoshop on my G5 I opened the image and found to my surprise that the highlights were detailed and nothing had blown out to 255, even in the frothy surf. The 200–500mm lens had isolated the subject from the background, and also pleasantly softened the contrast by compressing the effect of atmospheric haze. For this sort of shot it seems to be a great combination.

INGREDIENTS
• Camera: Fujufilm FinePix S3 Pro
• Lens: Tamron SP AF 200–500mm f/5–6.3 Di LD (IF)
• Memory Card: Lexar 512 CF Card
• Software: Photoshop
• Computer: Macintosh G5