Photography has entertained, informed and infuriated me for 70 years. However, I am not a photographer. I use video and still photography to record and illustrate my observations of the natural world. In this blog I also comment on optical equipment used for viewing wildlife and on the changes in photography from the 1950s to the present day
In the past I have often carried a 1.4 or 1.7x lens extender for whichever camcorder I have had at the time. That extra reach a lens extender gives can be very useful for mammals a long way away and for small mammals, birds and reptiles. Purist still photographers hate extenders because they degrade the image a little and sometimes a lot; they also reduce the maximum aperture. However, I have found them really useful for video and Sony used to make both tele and wide-angle adapters for its camcorders. They no longer do that. When I bought the Sony AX-700 last year I looked around for a suitable tele-extender. Most that have been made in the past have a much smaller diameter than the lens on the AX-700. But one doesn’t: the Olympus Tele Extension Lens Pro TCON-14B. This fits the 62 mm diameter screw fitting of the Sony without needing conversion rings. I soon found a range for sale at camera dealers and on eBay. I bought a mint one for £5.
The AX-700-TCON-14B combination
I had read old reviews which praised the optical quality of this Olympus lens which was built for an early digital camera, the E-10, a model first sold in 2000. I have found it to be the best tele extender I have ever used. Its only disadvantage is its weight of nearly half a kilogram; it really is solidly built.
The TCON-14B is a 1.45x extender which means I can achieve a 35 mm equivalent focal length of 505 mm using optical zoom only or 757 mm using clear image zoom. The values are with stabilisation turned off since I cannot imagine using the combination without a tripod. I normally output 4k footage to 1080 which means I can up to double the effective focal length in post production to over 1000 mm.
At short focal lengths there is vignetting, as with all tele extenders and so I only use it near or at the maximum focal length of the zoom lens.
The close focusing distance of 100 cm does not change with a tele extender and so it can be used for close-up shots when greater separation between subject and background is needed.
The front end of the extender has the slightly unusual 86 mm diameter filter thread.
The match between the diameter of the extender and the outside diameter of the camcorder lens is very close. The TCON-14B could have been designed for the AX-700 rather than for a camera 20 years ago.
Tripods are rarely a triumph of engineering design. Over the years I have owned or used many and even though I have a clear out once in a while, they still seem to accumulate as I try to find the perfect one for the job in hand. A major problem has been the attachment of heads; the torque from long lenses and telescopes has freed many a head from its mounting.
My go-to home and local, as opposed to travel tripod, is a Gitzo G1228LVL Levelling Mountaineer Reporter Mark 2. Although this one almost but not fully solves one of the key problems in tripod design—locking the head to the column by a bolt tightened from the underside of the ‘Power Disc”—changing heads then becomes a hassle, especially if I want to do a quick change. I have, therefore, searched for and bought on eBay as many spare columns as I have been able to find: one full-length spare column and a shorter version. Therefore, when I want to change heads I just change columns. When the hook on the bottom of the column is not in place, that change takes seconds and even if I have the hook on, just a few seconds more.
The photograph below shows from left to right:
Manfrotto Junior Geared Head 410 on Gitzo Series 2 Column Kit D1228LVL.C or D1228C
3-Legged Thing Eclipse Airhed Switch head on Gitzo Series 2 Ground Level Column Kit GS2511KB
Gitzo GH1720QR 2-way Birdwatching Head on Gitzo Series 2 Column Kit D1228LVL.C or D1228C (Used for telescope and video)
The other infuriating thing about tripods is of course plates: different sizes from different manufacturers and different sizes for different heads by the same manufacturer. At least for the heads shown, I can now have just two kinds of camera plate. I have converted a plate for the geared head to Arca Swiss (Andoer Mini Adjustable Clamp Quick Release Plate Compatible Arca Swiss QR 38 mm) so that two can be used with a simple Arca Swiss Plate. However, the Gitzo birdwatching head still needs its own plates (medium-long version permanently attached to the telescope; short version for video cameras). At least, two is better than three.
As I have written before the ergonomics of Sony camcorders fall short. After trying my AX-700 in the field for wildlife and travel with unchanged function buttons, I started to make a series of changes which have made life more convenient for my particular purposes.
An annoying feature is that some of the function buttons are labelled with their default function, so that their label remains when the button does something entirely different. If I do not use the camera for several months or hand it to somebody else, it helps to be reminded of what the new function is. Therefore I used to a labelling machine to mark new or changed functions. The labels, of course, can be removed if necessary.
Because I sometimes want to take a still photograph and on this model a visit to the menu system is needed to shift from video to still and vice versa, I assigned Button 3 to toggle between the two modes. Then Button 4 becomes the shutter release (as labelled) in Stills Mode.
The normal Menu button is inconveniently placed way along the side of the camcorder. In Video Mode, therefore, I assigned Menu to Button 4, which is convenient for the index finger of the right hand.
I am often using the camcorder to take birds in bushes or trees. To check quickly if the autofocus is on the bird or surrounding branches, I have Button 5 set for Focus Peaking—also convenient for a finger of the right hand. I can then quickly decide whether or not to switch to manual focus.
I found I needed the option to swap quickly between focus areas so I have assigned Button 6 to Focus Area.
Buttons 1 and 2 remain unchanged.
Thus far, I find the modified set-up works well for the kind of work I do. Here is a summary:
Continuing my search for the perfect camcorder for wildlife and travel I bought a Sony AX-700. I should say at the outset that for wildlife, a camcorder is far more convenient to use handheld than a mirrorless camera. A camcorder is more compact, has a sufficiently long focal length lens for most purposes and can be held without shaking much more easily. I can speak from experience since I have both. But camcorders do not sell well and the few manufacturers bring out a new model very rarely.
I was looking for a camcorder with more reliable and defined-area autofocus than is available with the contrast only autofocus systems on Sony and Panasonic camcorders with a 1/2.5 in sensor, where the camera will often focus on what it can focus on rather than on what I want it to focus on, even when the object is in the centre of the viewfinder.
The Sony AX-700 has phase as well as contrast autofocus. The sensor is bigger (13.2 x 8.8 mm) than in my previous Sony and Panasonic camcorders (5.8 x 4.3 mm) but not so big that the depth-of-field at wide apertures and with the lens at full zoom is minute. It is the cheapest but most compact of the professional non-broadcast range of camcorders introduced by Sony in 2017 since it lacks the audio handle and microphone of those ‘higher’ in the range.
I have now had the opportunity to use the AX-700 at home and in Iceland.
The curate’s excellent parts of this curious egg of a camcorder are: the quality of video output and the autofocus which is truly outstanding whether using a wide autofocus area or a small central area. The increase in weight over the 1/2.5 inch camcorders is worth the trade-off.
But there are outstandingly bad features. The buttons, menu system and manual can only have been devised by somebody who has never had to use the results of his or her efforts. The menu is turned on by pressing a button under the lens on the side while controlling the selection by a joystick on the back panel alongside the start/stop button. The arrangement of the menu items is illogical and although the functions of the pre-labelled menu buttons can be changed there is often little advantage in doing so because for many functions, pressing one button is insufficient and the menu itself has to be brought up.
I defy anybody to understand setting up for slow-motion on first reading the manual. This is because it takes a while to realise that the camera does not record, say, 100 (120 in USA) frames per second, to the card, leaving the editor the choice of what to do in post-production. No, it stores footage taken at high frame rates and then records to the card the completed slo-mo video at 25 (30) fps—eventually since it takes time for this process to be completed and further shooting is impossible until that clip is produced.
Really annoying is the description of Super Slow Motion. I had to actually try the different settings using a falling pencil at my desk to see what the instruction manual is trying to say. And all that has to be done with manually set exposure and manual focus.
Bob Myers of AVP Studios produced this excellent review of the AX-700 on Youtube. It is well worth watching and I will not repeat his criticisms here, other than to agree with them:
A number of difficulties seem to arise from the fact that for any of the ‘special’ features like slow-motion this is not a 4k camcorder. It is really a 1080 machine that will shoot 4k at 25(30)fps. But even at 1080 there are many features that cannot be used with autofocus and autoexposure. One might have thought that it would at its price shoot 4k at 50(60) fps but it doesn’t.
The AX-700 is probably over-priced and slightly over-heavy (although it will run for hours—no 30-minute limit) without overheating which suggests some of the weight is in heat-dissipating metal).
In conclusion, Sony’s AX-700 is not the perfect wildlife and travel camcorder. Many useful functions needed within seconds cannot be changed or accessed quickly enough. It is on the ergonomics where it falls short.
This camcorder then is typical Sony: some brilliant features let down by poor ergonomics, poor user interface and poor documentation.
In my post of 28 August 2018 I explained how I my Sony AX53 had failed when nearly new and why I decided to replace it with the Panasonic HC-VXF1. I also pointed out how the Panasonic compared with the Sony in my hands. I have now used the Panasonic for wildlife at sea and on land. I am just as impressed with it then as I was at the beginning, especially the arrangement and control of the menu system which is vastly superior to the Sony effort. In many ways it is the ideal travel camcorder. The only area in which I have found it to be less good than the AX53 is the autofocus under certain and unpredictable conditions. Even in good light on occasion, the camera has not focused on the bird or mammal in the centre of the frame but has picked on a patch of ground further away. In one case, the focus point it picked was a patch of grass in good light, in another, the pebbles of a beach. I just could not get the camera to autofocus on a cicada sitting on a tree trunk; again it eventually settled on the background. My impression was that, although I obviously did not have an AX53 with me to compare, the Panasonic's contrast-detection AF was not quite so good as the Sony's, although the latter does not get it right every time. Another user I know has found the same problem with even a large antelope in the centre of the frame being ignored and focus being established on the background well to the left or right. The answer, some my remind me, is to switch to manual focus but speed is often of the essence. Birds and mammals may be in view for only a matter of seconds and by the time several buttons have been pressed and a ring turned, the opportunity may have gone.
My Sony AX700 which has phase and contrast detection autofocus on its larger sensor does not suffer the problem of the contrast-only autofocus camcorders. It is perhaps unlikely that on-sensor phase detectors can be installed on the tiny sensors installed in the camcorders at the lower end of the market. However, there is a trade off between weight and sensor size so I may well keep my Panasonic for those occasions when I do not wish to or cannot carry anything heavier.
Those of us brought up with the square format of 6 x 6 or 4 x 4 cm film can remember the delight of not having to move the camera. Printing to any size of paper (either landscape or portrait) was routine should the composition, or customer, demand it.
With modern sensors, the same number of pixels could be arranged as a square rather than as a 1.5:1 rectangle. The area of coverage on the film plane would be the same so there would be no question of having to have a difference in lens mount or focal length. The result would be as shown in the following diagram: a 29.4 x 29.4 mm sensor rather than a 36 x 24:
A Square vs a conventional Rectangular Frame Size The red and blue frames have identical areas and therefore the same number of pizels
Shock, horror may be your response—we would lose pixels along the horizontal. Yes, you would but not that many. My D810 would have 6011 x 6011 instead of 7360 x 4912, for example. But—shock horror—the camera would be bigger. Yes, it may have be be taller by 5.4 mm but it could be shorter horizontally by the same amount—and think of the ergonomic advantages whether hand held or mounted on a mono- or tripod.
The Micro Four-Thirds sensor goes some way towards a square format (1.3:1) but the manufacturers did not go the whole way.
Would I buy a ‘full-frame’ camera with a square sensor, smaller horizontally but larger vertically? Yes. Will one ever be manufactured? No chance. As I said, I never cease to be amazed by the ways of photographers still alive and well with the technological legacies of the 1950s.
We had thumbed the catalogue for weeks; the ‘we’ being my grandfather, my father and me. In the mid-1950s, Neville Brown & Co (NEBRO) produced a catalogue of the lines they sold*. in 1956, my grandfather fancied buying me the Gloria because it had an f/2.9 lens—probably the widest aperture on a (relatively) low-priced camera. Money was tight and it was either that with no ever-ready case or the cheaper Paxina with a case. Eventually, it was decided; a Gloria it was going to be. One Saturday morning we set off for Nottingham Photo Centre but when we arrived, there were no Glorias in stock. I left clutching a new Paxina in its box, the solid ever-ready case in another. So I never did get my hands on the Gloria—until I thought it would be fun to see what I had missed sixty years previously. I bought a good-looking Gloria on eBay and had it serviced by Ed Troszka before he gave up the business. It came back in beautiful condition. As well as cleaning the Prontor shutter he cleaned the rangefinder internally. I soon found a lens hood and filter mount plus a few filters of the correct size going for very little on eBay. I then put a couple of films through it to relive the dubious delights of 1950s photography.
The medium-format (we didn’t call it that then) Gloria and its cheaper sister Paxina were made by Carl Braun Camerawerk of Nuremberg. They produced the successful Paxette range and little-known Gloriette of 35 mm cameras as well as box cameras and a folder. From 1906 until the end of the Second World War, Carl Braun had produced parts for radios and binoculars. Like a number of other German manufacturers trying to get re-established after the War they entered the camera market in 1948 with their box cameras. The demand for German cameras was enormous in the late 1940s and 50s but the more expensive ones like Rollei, Leica and Zeiss Contax could not be imported into Britain because of currency restrictions. Cheaper models, however, could get in but even then Purchase Tax of about 30% or more was added. Nevertheless, there was an opening for cheaper cameras from first tier manufacturers (Zeiss), second tier (Agfa) and the new third tier manufacturers, like Carl Braun, to get a foothold in the British, Commonwealth as well as the US and world markets.
It should not be imagined these cheaper cameras were cheap. The Paxina 29 (named for its f/2.9 lens) with the Prontor-SVS shutter was 17 guineas (including tax) or £379 in 2018 prices, the Gloria about 12% more. That was big money in 1956. The cameras were 3 guineas cheaper with the Pronto 4-speed shutter.
These medium-format cameras taking 120 roll film had, in common with some other simpler models, one key feature. The lens/shutter assembly was held at the correct distance from the film plane by a metal tube that was either spring-loaded (Gloria) or manually pulled (Paxina) from the body. Other manufacturers like Zeiss and Agfa had stuck with a fold-down arrangement of struts and bellows. The resulting folding camera was flatter in profile for carrying but relied on the struts holding the lens parallel to the film and on the bellows not leaking light. One of the reasons my grandfather, brought up with folding cameras in the very early decades of the 20th Century, was so keen on the Braun cameras was that bellows did deteriorate and light leaks could be a problem. That design of the ‘tube’ camera makes one more attractive to people who want to use these cameras in the 2010s. With the Zeiss Nettars, Ikontas etc and the Agfa Isolettes there is always the state of the old bellows to worry about.
According to McKeown, the Gloria was made between 1954 and 1957, the Paxina 29 between circa 1953 and 1957. There were earlier Paxina models, made from about 1950.
The lenses were incredibly fast for their time, especially on a medium-format camera. The Gloria I have has a Praxar 75 mm f2/9. Both Praxar and Praxanar lenses are shown as having been fitted to the Gloria in Mckeown’s guide. The Paxina is said to have been fitted with a Praxar or Steiner but mine has a Praxanar. These lenses are triplets and have some form of coating. All the lenses were made by Steiner-Optik GmbH of Bayreuth, still in business as makers of binoculars.
As with most other than top-range cameras of the time, hoods and filter holders were a push fit. The problem was that when fitted they obscure the scale on the focusing ring.
Paxina 29 - tube in the closed position
The Gloria has several features the Paxina 29 lacks. The first was a non-coupled rangefinder, a good coincidence rangefinder with a coloured second image. The second was a body release (the shutter release on the Paxina 29 is on the lens/shutter assembly). The third is a double-exposure prevention device that comes along with the body release. The fourth is a spring-loaded tube to extend the lens to the taking position (the tube has to be pulled out manually and locked in the Paxina).
As for performance, these lenses were thought of originally as of rather low contrast compared to the cameras with the more expensive Tessar-type lenses. It is difficult to say how they compare now with the competition then in terms of contrast and sharpness because coatings etc may have deteriorated.
Using the Gloria reminded me of how slow the whole process was even though, and ignoring flash photography, there were only aperture, shutter speed and focus to set before cocking the shutter, pressing the release and remembering to wind the film on. An extra step could involve fitting filters and a lens hood after setting the focus and not moving the ring while doing so.
The lens at its extreme - f/2.9 FP4+/Rodinal, negative scanned, processed in Lightroom
Alloway Auld Kirk - on a dull day
The only problem I had was seeing the numbers on the film backing through the red window. The modern film I was using all had the same backing paper, with the numbers and arrows printed in a light shade of grey. That’s when I missed the automatically determined wind-on of a Rollei.
These cameras had no means of attaching a strap and every-ready cases (‘never ready’) are a pain with flaps getting in the way and the camera having to be removed completely to change the film.
One advantage of these cameras over a single- or twin-lens reflex is that they can fit into a large pocket although they are not so flat as a typical folding camera from that era.
I enjoyed using the Gloria with my iPhone as exposure meter—for a short period, but it is time for somebody else to enjoy the pleasure.
Finally, how long did I keep the Paxina I was bought in 1956. Not very long—but that’s another story.
I have made a short video on the Goria and Paxina:
*Inside Gloria and Paxina cameras sold in Britain can be found a sticker recommending Ferrania film. NEBRO were the agents for Ferrania as well as Carl Braun of Nuremberg.
