Hello from East Anglia

[Wes Gibbon]

Hello,

I have been following Photoclubalpha for a year or more, and find it a really useful source of information (and not just about Minolta/Sony!). So I thought it's time to sign up to it.

A brief note about myself (though it's easy to be brief when you're twenty, not so easy when you're approaching sixty!):

I started out as a professional musician (bassoonist), after a few years I tried my hand at teaching (disaster!) and then became an I.T.professional, which I still am after over 20 years. I took up photography in 1990 as I decided I had to have a camera to record a once-in-a-lifetime visit to Ukraine. The salesperson in Jessops thrust an XG/2 in my hands, and I took it from there. I eventually settled on X500 bodies, which I used for a number of years; after a brief flirtation with Dynax 600si's (when they appeared dirt cheap on Ebay) I acquired an Alpha 100 when the price dropped below £300. I feel like a bit of an imposter because for the last ten years I have been using a Mamiya 645 system for landscape work, which is now my main interest. However, I still use Minolta/Sony for 'urban' landscapes and on a recent visit to Prague I took a few hundred images on the A100 (I'll maybe post a few of these on the forum). SSS is great - I could only find one shot where camera shake is visible. For a while I also used a Dimage 7 with IR filter for the occasional infra-red shot, though I have now replaced it with a modified Nikon D80 + 18-135 zoom - I found the Dimage viewfinder just too difficult to use.

I have lived in Peterborough since 1984, but have been working in Milton Keynes for the last ten years or so.

Nice to meet you all!

[David Kilpatrick]

Welcome! The east of England is popular with good photographers I realised that in our latest magazine issue we have two articles emanating from Rutland - must be a record for the smallest county.

Seriously committed if you have an IR modified DSLR - not apparently so easy to do with the Minolta or Sony bodies. We have some DSLRs which are very simple to modify for IR, the Sigma series (all three - SD9, SD10 and SD14). You just remove the IR cut filter from behind the lens and pop it back afterwards. If your 18-125mm Nikon takes 62mm filters, I have one spare Kenko D655 IR cut external filter up for grabs. These were bought in by Minolta to fix a problem with the Dimage 7 and IR in some types of photography, and we acquired half a dozen from the warehouse shutdown. Fitting it allows normal photography with an IR-converted DSLR.

David

[Cogito]

Hello from Chatteris! Was wondering ( I only came back from America 4 years ago) if Cambs qualified as East Anglia......
You seem to have enjoyed your visits here in the past and am sure you will continue to glean useful information!
One benefit of being 60+ is a bus pass.............

[Wes Gibbon]

Hello from Chatteris! Was wondering ( I only came back from America 4 years ago) if Cambs qualified as East Anglia......
You seem to have enjoyed your visits here in the past and am sure you will continue to glean useful information!
One benefit of being 60+ is a bus pass.............

Cogito, thank you for your welcome. You might like to know I am giving a lecture just down the road from Chatteris at Wisbech Camera Club on Monday 17th November - medium format landscape slides (so not really relevant to Sony/Minolta!)

[Wes Gibbon]

Welcome! The east of England is popular with good photographers I realised that in our latest magazine issue we have two articles emanating from Rutland - must be a record for the smallest county.

Seriously committed if you have an IR modified DSLR - not apparently so easy to do with the Minolta or Sony bodies. We have some DSLRs which are very simple to modify for IR, the Sigma series (all three - SD9, SD10 and SD14). You just remove the IR cut filter from behind the lens and pop it back afterwards. If your 18-125mm Nikon takes 62mm filters, I have one spare Kenko D655 IR cut external filter up for grabs. These were bought in by Minolta to fix a problem with the Dimage 7 and IR in some types of photography, and we acquired half a dozen from the warehouse shutdown. Fitting it allows normal photography with an IR-converted DSLR.

David

Thanks for the info, David. Re the Dimage 7: although sometimes the results were great, at other times I found that sometimes the images were less than acceptably sharp, and I couldn't work out why. It also seemed that attaching a remote cable drained the batteries flat within minutes (I tried three different cables, and several sets of batteries). There were also one or two occasions when I just couldn't see the image clearly enough in the viewfinder to frame the image properly.

The Nikon conversion seems to have been successful (it was done in the UK by Advanced Camera Services - http://www.advancedcameraservices.co.uk). It can't be used for anything else now but the IR results so far are very good. It might have been better to have my Alpha 100 converted, but they weren't sure if it was possible (it depends how permanently the hot mirror is fixed in place). I chose the D80 because they were (and still are) offering a very favourable bundle price with the 18-135 zoom, and I was looking for a one-lens solution.This lens is almost exactly the equivalent of the lens on the Dimage 7. The Nikon lens has a 67mm filter thread. Was the filter you mentioned an Infra-red blocking filter? If so, I don't see how it would work with the Nikon - they fitted the IR filter internally (i.e. a filter that only allows IR through and blocks visible light) and adjusted the position of the sensor for Infra-red 'light'.

Does anyone else have experience of converting Alpha bodies for Infra-red?

I have posted three Prague pics in 'Give it your best shot', but didn't realise there is a limit of three attachments. I will be posting the rest on my website in due course - I am still building it but please feel free to have a look: http://www.WesGibbon.com. Meanwhile, here's another attempt:

Streetlight in Jakubska (Prague)

All the best

[David Kilpatrick]

I didn't realise they were going as far as putting a visually opaque filter over the sensor - I thought they just removed the IR cut filter, and left you to use an R72 or whatever on the lens. That really is a dedicated IR camera after a conversion as permanent as that.

David

[waveney]

Seriously committed if you have an IR modified DSLR - not apparently so easy to do with the Minolta or Sony bodies.

David

David, could you tell us why it is so difficult to modify the KM 5D. Since getting the a700, I was considering having the 5D converted since it gets so little use. It's disappointing to hear there are insurmountable difficulties?

cheers
waveney

[David Kilpatrick]

I think the problem lies in relocating an AS-equipped sensor board accurately in the camera. There's more to do than with fixed (not spring-mounted, floating) sensors. I'd like to know if anyone can get it done.

David

[Wes Gibbon]

I think the problem lies in relocating an AS-equipped sensor board accurately in the camera. There's more to do than with fixed (not spring-mounted, floating) sensors. I'd like to know if anyone can get it done.

David

That could well be the main problem - the modification that ACS carries out involves repositioning the sensor because Infra-red focuses at a different point from visible light. However, when I spoke to them they didn't mention the sensor but said that the main obstacle might be if the hot mirror was fixed in place too permanently. They have only recently started doing converstions - if you are still interested it might be worth contacting them. They weren't able to commit to an Alpha 100 modification when I asked because they hadn't seen any Alpha cameras, so you might have to send one to them to have a look at. They might have to order the IR filter specially if it's a different size from other cameras. The cost for Nikons varies between £175 and £225 (VAT & postage extra) depending on model (probably more for a full frame sensor).

You could try a Fujifilm FinePix IS-1 which has a fixed 28-300mm (35mm equiv) lens which is IR enabled (I think you need to add your own filter).