Quality genuine leather camera strap from a UK company at a great price.

Hi everyone,

I just took delivery of a new handcrafted leather camera strap for my PEN-F camera made by a UK company called Bowman Leather: https://www.bowmanleather.co.uk/ . They do quite a range of straps and I’m very impressed with the quality of materials and workmanship, the attractive “organic” cloth, and not plastic, drawstring bag inner packaging and the very fast 24 hours tracked dispatch at a very fair price. Great to see a UK company producing quality items like this. I chose their Stride – Thin Leather Camera Strap in Mid Tan colour which I think looks great on my PEN-F camera and they have several other colours available. I’m delighted to see that they use traditional manufacturing methods and sustainable materials and they offer a 10% discount for new customers as well as a plant a tree policy. This strap is comfortable, pretty supple and should last me a long time, they have a 10 year warranty policy so they must be confident about the quality of their products.

In these days when just about everything seems to come from China I’m more than happy to pay for a quality product like this from a UK manufacturer. As always, this review isn’t solicited in any way and I paid for the item from my own pocket.

Kind regards

Leigh

PEN-F lens cap stickers.

January 14, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, photography, Photography equipment | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

Fed up with not being able to get PEN-F logo lens caps in the sizes that I wanted I decided to design my own stickers. 🙂 Gloss finish,1.5 inch diameter and come as a sheet of 20 for a fraction of the price one might pay for a shop-bought caps which are hideously overpriced and aren’t any good to me anyway as they come in the wrong size for my various lens caps.

Kind regards

Leigh

Olympus PEN-F, a passion.

January 12, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, photography, Photography equipment, Travel and tagged cameras, Photography | 2 Comments

Hi everyone,

What follows is probably going to sound more than a bit flowery and nostalgic but it’s true to my feelings. When Olympus released the PEN-F camera all I could do was look longingly and admiringly at pictures of it and marvel at its beautiful retro rangefinder looks. That’s all I could do as I certainly couldn’t afford to buy one. Years later I found one going second hand in mint condition at a price I absolutely couldn’t resist and so I took the plunge. It was a very long time since I was that excited to see any piece of photographic gear arrive on my doorstep.

This camera, more than any other camera I’ve owned in years, has served to reignite and fuel my passion for photography. One only has to look at it and hold it in one’s hand to get a buzz of excitement. Every time I use it I’m transported on a journey back and I’m seventeen again using my first Olympus 35mm film camera. Of course this is my very personal experience, not only does the camera look a thing of beauty it has everything and more that I require in a camera. If it wasn’t such a joy to use I’d put it in a display case where I could sit and look at it’s beautiful looks but that’s not what I bought it for. 🙂

This camera is just made for anyone who shares my passion for classic styling with the obvious benefits of modern technology. I don’t know if we’ll ever see its likes again, this camera has achieved cult status in a relatively short period of time. No camera is perfect but it suits my needs and comes as close as I’ve ever experienced to the simplistic joy of taking photographs. There’s something indescribable about the feeling one gets when using it.

Kind regards

Leigh

New Work: “The Canal”, Chichester.

January 12, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Landscape, Leigh Kemp, photography, Travel | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

First new work of the new year,

Kind regards

Leigh

My stealthy sub £20 camera bag.

January 10, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, photography, Photography equipment, Travel and tagged adventure, hiking, Nature, Travel | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

I was walking past one of those cheap shops in Bognor Regis when I spotted this small rucksack for £9.99 UK and I thought it would make a nice small lightweight bag. After I got it home my thoughts turned to wondering if I could adapt it to serve as an inconspicuous camera bag. I dug out a padded camera insert with a velcro fastening flap lid that I’ve had for years and it fits very nicely with some room to spare for a rolled up waterproof jacket or suchlike resting on top and my neoprene “tripod in a pencil case” fits in the mesh side drinks holder pocket. I bought a hi-vis £4.99 waterproof rucksack cover to fit it. So as I’m guessing that I probably spent about £5.00 on the insert so the total expenditure comes out at approximately £20.00. It’ll hold a camera and lens and one or two additional lenses and I can put a few bits and bobs such as my camera rain cover, filter pouch and spare battery/s in the front pocket. 🙂 Most of all it just looks like what it is, a cheap rucksack. I’ve always liked adapting non camera bags to suit my purpose.

All the best,

Leigh

Luminar Neo

January 9, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Landscape, Leigh Kemp, photography, Travel | Leave a comment

Hi,

For some considerable time now I’ve been using Skylum’s Luminar editing software in it’s various iterations. I created my own vintage film look preset and applied it to one of my works of Chichester Canal as well as the amazing Generase tool to get rid of people, rubbish bins, signage and anything else that I didn’t want in the shot. 🙂

Best wishes,

Leigh

I bought a new lens, TTArtisan 23mm f/1.4.

January 8, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, photography, Photography equipment, Travel and tagged camera, cameras, film-photography, Photography | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

I’ve been looking at this lens for some time now and finally decided to pull the trigger and purchase one for £83 UK with free delivery from the manufacturers in China, when it comes to such things it doesn’t get much cheaper than that 🙂 . The lens is the manual focus TTArtisan 23mm f/1.4 which, as a 46mm full-frame equivalent, should fit in nicely with my favourite focal lengths. The lens gets pretty good reviews across the board as long as one is aware of it’s limitations and stopping down to f/5.6-f/8 would seem to be the accepted way of getting the best out of it but that’s probably true, to a greater or lesser extent, for a good many Micro Four Thirds lenses. I’m very much enjoying a retro “filmic-look” experience right now both in gear and in processing and I’m really liking using lenses with less than clinically sharp rendering and saturated colours as is the case with my other TTArtisan lenses. When I say that I’m enjoying the retro-look I think that I always enjoyed it even back in my film days when it was current and not “retro” and I shot with Fuji, Kodak and Ilford films on small, solidly-built, lightweight Olympus 35mm film cameras and lenses. 🙂

I can happily live with such things as less than tack sharp edge-to edge/corner to corner sharpness, vignetting, slight barrel distortion, chroma etc. it doesn’t bother me in the slightest that’s what gives these kind of lenses character. 🙂 The thing is that now, thanks to modern digital post processing one can correct for these sort of things as and if one wishes something that simply wasn’t possible back in the analogue days when it really was a case of what you got was largely what you lived with. I’m really looking forward to trying it on my all-time favourite digital camera my Olympus PEN-F, a modern classic in itself. I’ll post my experiences with the lens and some shots when I’ve been out and tried it. I think that it’ll make a nice compact manual-focus companion to one of my similar focal length auto focus lenses such as my Olympus M.Zuiko 17mm and 25mm f/1.8 or my Panasonic Lumix 20mm f/17,

Kind regards

Leigh

Revisiting manual focus lenses.

January 6, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, photography, Photography equipment, Travel and tagged camera, cameras, lenses, Photography | Leave a comment

Hi all,

Just lately I’ve dug out my TTArtisans manual focussing lenses, my 17mm f/1.4 and my 35mm f/1.4. It’s been a long time since I only packed manual focus lenses. Whilst I fully appreciate the value of autofocus especially when it comes to ultra quickly nailing focus, there’s something about manual focusing. It hard to put into words exactly but it’s not a hinderance given my typically slow-paced landscape photographic interests where I’m not capturing fast action or have the need to zone-focus. Not only has it taken me right back to my film days but most importantly it has slowed me down and somehow concentrated my mind and involved me more in the shot. Of the two lenses I surprisingly prefer the longer focal length which equates to 70mm in full frame terms. They both have their quirks but this gives them some character, they’re not the “sharpest tools in the box” and, if edge-to-edge image quality is absolutely paramount, then “these aren’t the lenses you are looking for” 🙂 but, for the price, they’re a lot of fun and a good buy. I decided to pair them with my old, largely redundant, Olympus E-PL5 camera in order to make things as compact and lightweight as possible. I’ve fitted step up rings and lens hoods to suit my preferred filter size of 58mm.

I call this my “Silver Machine” 🙂 Olympus E-PL5 and TTArtisans 35mm f/1.4 lens.

Kind regards

Leigh

“Messin’ about on the Canal”

January 4, 2025 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Landscape, Leigh Kemp, photography, Travel | Leave a comment

Hi everyone,

Happy New Year, a new work.

Best wishes,

Leigh

Away in a manger

December 25, 2024 by Leigh Kemp - UK-based "Paintographer" in Leigh Kemp, photography | Leave a comment

Kind regards

Leigh

As I sit here looking at my modern digital cameras I’m reminded of my first camera and, in particular, the first photograph that I ever took. Nowadays we take cameras and camera technology pretty much for granted but when I was a child I can’t remember many photographs. The only time our camera saw the light of day, and it had to be the light of day, as there wasn’t a flash, was on a few family occasions, the usual thing, school sports days, birthdays, etc.. My interest in photography didn’t start until my grandfather “loaned” me his camera to take with me on a week-long school trip, sleeping under canvas, in Snowdonia, North Wales. It was a somewhat battered old twin-lens reflex camera in which one looked downwards in to the viewfinder when taking a photograph.

I remember being very excited at being entrusted with the family camera, film wasn’t cheap and I had very little to no idea how to use it. The experience must have made some kind of impression on me as, after all these years, I still remember taking my first photograph. The coach stopped en-route at Blenheim Palace, the ancestral home of Sir Winston Churchill and it became the subject of my first photograph. Although, sadly, like my other photographs from the trip, it has long since disappeared, however, I really don’t need the photograph to remind me as the experience is indelibly etched on my mind. I wonder if this is perhaps where my interest in landscape photography stems from but that’s probably too much of an assumption. As far as I remember I was the only kid on the trip to have a camera, that’s how different things were, nowadays, just about everyone has a camera of some sort built in to their mobile phones. It also taught me to be disciplined to the point of being frugal when taking photographs as the trip was for one week and I only had a 12 exposure black and white film in the camera.

Some years later I really got the photography bug and bought my first camera, an Olympus OM-1 35 mm film camera and I went on to own their OM-2 and OM-4ti cameras and a range of lenses. Film was still pretty expensive considering I earned about £20 a week in my first job so I got in to developing and printing my own black and white and, later, colour films to help keep the costs down and make things more affordable. Not only did this experience teach me an awful lot about image-making start to finish, many of the techniques and skills that I learned in my makeshift darkroom, a small room adorned with genuine World War 2 blackout curtains fitted to keep out the light, another hand-me-down from my grandfather, these skills would re-surface and be invaluable some years later when I started working on processing my digital images.

I put myself through University as a mature student and I badly needed the money so I had to very reluctantly part with all my photographic equipment, but needs must. After I graduated I bought my first digital camera, a small fixed lens Kodak compact camera, reduced in a sale. It had, by today’s standards, a laughably small maximum image resolution of 640×480 pixels or, to put it another way, a stunning 0.4 Megapixels!. For all of this and further equipped with screw on wide angle and telephoto lens attachments, it proved to be a fabulous little camera which I took all over the place with me. Put simply, digital photography was a revelation, to me, no requirement for film, no real running costs and a lot of image capacity on a small memory card which I found absolutely liberating.

A few years before that I had discovered some free graphics editing software on the cover disk of a computer magazine and that started off my real passion for working with graphics and, ultimately, photo processing. So I then had all the tools I required to develop, pun intended and further, my interest in digital photography. Processing is where the magic starts for me, I am totally absorbed in and fascinated by the range of options that digital processing affords me. It encourages me, if, that is, I ever need encouragement, to constantly experiment with new styles, new techniques and is such an important part of my enjoyment and interest in photography.

I went on to own several DSLRs but, as I got older I began to find that they were simply too heavy and bulky. I switched over back in 2013 to Micro Four Thirds cameras and lenses. My choice of MFT system was heavily influenced by my experiences with my Olympus film cameras, maybe it was, in truth, part based on nostalgia that I decided on their OM-D system. As a landscape/travel photographer I have to carry my gear around all day and the weight and bulk saving is highly significant. I’ve been very impressed with the image quality of my Micro Four Thirds equipment, it has traveled with me extensively, never let me down and I have never had cause to question my decision to go over to that format.

So my 50-plus year photographic adventure has led me from twin-lens reflex and single-lens reflex film cameras to digital cameras, from stumbling around in a dimly-lit darkroom to working with my images on my computer. I’ve heard it said on occasions, including a comment I read some while back by a very famous photographer, that cameras being so much an every-day item now and available in mobile phones etc. devalues photography. I feel quite the opposite, I firmly believe that it empowers everyone with affordable technology to take photographs and enjoy photography and that, in my opinion, is fantastic. Although I’ve very much enjoyed my personal photographic journey I do confess to feeling a slight tinge of regret that the technology wasn’t available when I started out but one can’t put the clock back and I intend to keep on embracing all these great technological advancements, experimenting and enjoying my work.

Cameras:

Olympus: OM-D E-M5 Mk II (titanium) & HLD-8G grip, OM-D E-M1 Mk I (black) & HDL-7 grip, OM-D EM-5 Mk I (silver) & HDL-6 grip, PEN EPL-5, PEN EP-5 (silver) +VF-4, PEN E-PL8 (Silver) +VF4, Tough TG-5 (red), PEN-F (silver), Canon Powershot G10, Nikon Coolpix A100

Lenses:

Olympus: M.Zuiko: 12 mm f/2, 17 mm f/1.8, 25 mm f/1.8, 45 mm f/1.8, 30 mm f/3.5 macro, 9 mm f/8 body cap fisheye, 15 mm f/8 body cap, 9-18 mm, 12-50 mm, 12-40 mm f/2.8 PRO, 14-150 mm II, 40-150 mm II, 12-45mm f/4 PRO, MCON-P02.

Sigma: ART 60 mm f/2.8.

Samyang: Manual focus 7.5 mm f/3.5 fisheye.

TT Artisan: Manual focus 17mm f/1.4, 23mm f/1.4, 35mm f/1.4.

Panasonic Lumix: 14 mm f/2.5, 20 mm f/1.7, 12-32 mm x2 (black and silver), 12-60 mm, 14-42 mm II, 35-100 mm, 45-150mm.

PEN E-P5, 9-18mm,12-32mm, 40-150mm II. A lightweight kit with virtually continuous coverage from 18mm wide angle to 300mm telephoto.

OM-D E-M1 I, 14-150mm II, 12-40mm PRO. . Heavier than my other kits but with complete weather-sealing. Coverage from 24mm wide angle to 300mm telephoto with some overlap for backup.

OM-D E-M5 II, 17mm, 35mm, 12-60mm. A balance of two fun manual focus lenses with a weather-sealed body and zoom lens.

PEN E-PL5, 9mm, 15mm, 25mm, 60mm, 12-50mm. Another lightweight fun kit with a zoom option.

TG-5, OM-D E-M5 mk1, 7.5mm, 12mm, 17mm, 45mm, 30mm macro. M-CON.

PEN-F, 14mm, 20mm, 12-32mm, 35-100mm. Probably my favourite lightweight day-to-day kit. Two fast primes and two zoom with almost continuous coverage from 24mm wide angle through to 200mm telephoto.

Software:

Corel: Paintshop Pro Elite 2020 & Video Studio 2019.

Skylum Software: Aurora HDR 2019, Luminar 4, Luminar AI and Luminar Neo.

DXO Labs: PhotoLab 5 Elite, Viewpoint 3, NIK Collection 6, Film Pack 5 and PureRAW.

Anthropics Technologies: Landscape Pro Studio 3 and Portrait Pro.

EyeQ: Perfectly Clear

Topaz Labs: Studio 2, Sharpen AI, A.I Gigapixel, AI Clear, AI Adjust, DeNoise AI and Various legacy plugins.

Adobe: Lightroom.

GreenScreenWizard Studio Pro.

Serif: Affinity Photo

Microsoft: Image Composite Editor (Free).

Darktable (Free).

Olympus: Olympus Capture, Olympus Workspace and Olympus Webcam (Free to Olympus owners).

Sony: Movie Studio Platinum.

Lighting Gear:

Godox TT350o flash, Godox X1T radio flash trigger, Godox Lux Junior flash, LED ring flash, GVM RGB LED light, Olympus MAL-1 Macro Arm Light. Two Godox LED36 lights, Godox Litemons LED6R light. Three Bowen studio flash heads, barndoors, honeycombes, umbrellas and flash meter.