Snap Decisions

After months of traveling and modeling for Playboy, Playboy Models and Playboy Video Productions, it's no surprise that our 30th Anniversary Playmate, Penny Baker, one day insisted that turn-about was fair play. Since she had spent countless hours in front of the lens, why couldn't she spend a day or two making snap decisions while hanging out at Playboy Mansion West? Never one to refuse a lady and sensing that there might be an interesting story in the works, we equipped Penny with five brand-new cameras that list for $300 or less and told her to snap away. Our premise was that you can be just as creative--and have just as much fun--with an inexpensive camera as with one that's a wallet buster. Most snap shooters are photojournalists. They do not construct elaborate sets and spend hours carefully lighting them. Rather, they excerpt slices of the reality around them and commit to permanence an instant from the flow of events.

Any professional photojournalist worth his f-stops knows that the decisive moment--the one that is most succinct and eloquent--announces its own coming. It can happen anywhere without much advance notice. You need a ready eye and a quick finger on the release.

"Anywhere" is the domain of many cameras nowadays--all those anywheres you never dared to take your camera before: the beach (salt and sand are your camera's enemies), the ski trail, the bath. Getting squeaky clean with someone can be ticklish, but would you risk your camera to photograph the consequences? You can with a tidy little instrument called the Fujica HD-S. It's Fuji's all-weather camera, specially sealed to be water-resistant. It's not really an underwater camera such as a scuba diver would take into the briny, but a Fuji spokesman affirmed that it is watertight to a depth of 18 inches.

Snowbanks, the nitty-gritty of the seashore, a dust storm on the veld and other environments interesting to people but unfriendly to cameras are likewise the domain of the HD-S. For all its mastery of nature, this camera, like all those featured in this article, is a fully automatic aim-and-shooter. Automatic programed exposure control responds immediately to prevailing light. If things get dim, the built-in flash is ready in moments. The f/2.8 lens has a 38mm focal length, giving it a moderately wide-angle view--an asset when two or more occupy someplace confining, such as (continued on page 196)Snap Decisions(continued from page 121) a shower stall. And with a tripod or other sturdy mount, the built-in self-timer lets you enter your own depiction of the bather's decisive moment.

The HD-S lists at $285, but you'll almost never find it bearing that price tag. While we quote list prices in this article, just about all the equipment can be obtained for considerably less.

There are other water-resistant cameras. Minolta's Weathermatic A, for example, is a 110 cartridge-loading model (our emphasis here is on 35mm) and, of course, the Nikonos is Nikon's full-fledged undersea machine. Being a full-fledged Nikon, it is priced accordingly.

However, the time-honored axiom that Nikon is expensive is no longer universally applicable. Like most manufacturers, Nikon has entered the so-called leaf-shutter-camera market (the shutter is within the lens, where it doubles as the lens-aperture blades). This market features simplified construction at moderate prices. Yet, owing to the wonders of the electronic age, these latter-day Brownies have the sophisticated technology that makes them swift in operation and accurate in results.

Nikon's economy model, a little brother of the L35AF shown on page 120, is designated the L135AF, though it has been dubbed the Nice Touch (a name we would somehow have associated instead with a camera you can take into the shower). It also has programed exposure control, built-in electronic flash and a semiwide-angle lens--in this case, a 35mm f/3.5. Several other features also heighten the ease and speed of operation.

For example, it has a built-in motor drive that automatically advances the film in about eight tenths of a second. The advantage of this is that you can keep the camera at your eye and continue shooting, directing all your attention toward identifying that decisive moment. An infrared beam provides automatic focusing, so that photographer, subject or both can be in movement while the camera sharp-shoots.

The L135AF also has an automatic loading system and it will even automatically rewind your film into its 35mm cartridge at the end of the roll. While auto rewind may at first seem a decadent luxury, it offers a critical safety factor for the absent-minded. It's all too easy to forget to rewind the film and open the camera with the film stretched across it. At the very least, you would lose four or five shots to light streaking. The list price of the L135AF is $162.

Highly similar in general features is the Ricoh FF-3AF, listing at $215. Like the Nikon, the Ricoh is one of the few cameras of its type that can accept the 1000-speed films from Kodak and 3M (Fuji has introduced a 1600-speed film that exceeds the metering ability of all but the final two cameras featured in this article). Ricoh has just introduced two accessory lenses that snap on over the standard lens: One is a close-up, one is a telephoto.

Close cousins to cameras of the leaf-shutter breed are the so-called clamshell cameras, such as the Pentax PC35AF (which also has a name, the Sport 35). While the Nikon and Ricoh models have built-in lens covers, the clamshell types possess sliding covers that practically engulf the camera when closed. The Pentax version has auto exposure, auto infrared focusing and built-in flash. Its 35mm lens has an f/2.8 maximum aperture. The Sport 35 has a back-light compensation button that causes the aperture to open one and one half stops more than the meter advises, for more accurate exposures of subjects when strong light comes from behind. And although an auto winder is available, it is an option rather than an integral accessory.

A novel--indeed, seemingly unique for this level of camera--variation of the Sport 35 is the Sport 35 Date, with the ability to imprint photographs with the date or time of day the picture was taken. For snap shooters who haul the camera out only every so often and spend a year using up a roll, this can be worth while for documenting scenes or people long forgotten. Anniversaries and parties looked back upon years later also can benefit from dating, as can many photographs taken for professional or legal reasons. List price of the Sport 35 is $169; for the auto winder, $38. The Sport 35 Date comes with auto winder included at $225.

The clamshell cover affords complete protection, sheltering the camera from the hard knocks of your backpack or back pocket and eliminating the worry of losing a lens cover. For that reason, clamshell models are popular with people who exercise their creativity from, say, halfway up the Matterhorn. One of the most professional clamshells--among the pioneers of its type--is the Olympus XA (list price, $200). Focusing is manual by range finder, film advance is manual and the flash is an external clip-on unit. The XA, incidentally, uses aperture-priority exposure automation. All the others mentioned so far use programed automation, with which the camera decides on both lens and shutter settings. In aperture priority, the photographer sets the lens (from f/2.8 to f/22 on the XA) and the camera selects the matching shutter speed. This has become the preferred form of automation among most professionals, because lens settings influence the depth of field (the range of sharpness behind and in front of the point actually focused upon). Such a degree of creative control is uncommon in these little whip-'em-out cameras.

Vivitar produces a clamshell model, the TEC 35, which has a feature that is handy for spontaneous action: the smart flash. This is a built-in flash that automatically pops up into working position when the camera senses its need and automatically retracts once prevailing light brightens up. The camera is equipped with a 35mm f/2.8 lens, auto exposure and focus, motor drive and rewind. List price is $239.95.

One of the newest clamshells is the Konica AA-35, nicknamed Double Take, which apparently refers to its half-frame format: The pictures are half the regular 35mm size. Half frame enjoyed a surge of popularity several years ago that has since slackened off. But now that Kodak, Fuji and 3M have all produced high-resolution films, a half-frame camera can achieve almost the same picture quality as a full-frame counterpart could three years ago.

The nicest thing about half frame is that it doubles a film's capacity: A 36-exposure roll becomes a 72-exposure roll. The half-frame format gives you, in effect, more mileage to the gallon. Auto exposure and focus, motorized film advance and rewind, 24mm f/4 lens and built-in flash round out the Double Take's major features. The price is $150.

Another recent half-frame arrival is the Anscomark/135. It is not a clamshell design, but it does have one unique feature: Instead of advancing the film after each exposure, it retards it. When the film is loaded into the camera, the motor drive automatically winds it to the end. Then, picture by picture, the film is rewound into the 35mm cartridge. If you were to accidentally open the body, most of your shots would be protected inside the cartridge. Listing at $132.95, the camera also includes flash, auto exposure and a 24mm f/3.5 lens.

All the cameras described so far have separate-window view finders and non-changeable lenses. These are among the attributes that make them so conveniently pocketable, ready for operation wherever and whenever inspiration strikes. And although interesting results can be obtained with them, many people insist that a single-lens-reflex model is the true "creator's" camera. Through-the-lens viewing reveals the frame area and depth of field accurately. But more to the point, SLR is the gateway to the most expansive array of lenses in the world. Many pros pick their cameras not for the cameras themselves but because of the lenses with which they can be fitted.

Powerful telephotos, zoom lenses in telephoto and wide-angle ranges, ultra-wide-angle lenses for a forced perspective, bellows and extension tubes for extreme close-up work and macrolenses for copy work all are among the choices available to the SLR owner. No, you don't have to have an SLR for photographic creativity. But it does greatly expand the universe in which you can be creative.

The Canon T50 is as simple and as automated as anything described so far, making it a gateway mechanism into SLR-dom. It accepts all but four of the nearly 60 lenses in the Canon line, including the recently introduced 20--35mm f/3.5 zoom, the widest-angle zoom to reach the market so far. Programed auto exposure, integral motor drive and shutter speeds from two seconds to one thousandth of a second are among the T50's features. List price with 50mm f/1.8 lens is $299.

The Minolta X-570 is an advanced SLR that begins to encroach on the professional domain. Its list price is in the $400 range, but discounters offer it for just under $200. Like the T50, the X-570 gives access to an outstanding line of optics--in this case, the Minolta lenses. But distinguishing it from all cameras mentioned so far is its possession of off-the-film-plane flash-exposure readings.

Most automatic flash systems read their light output through separate sensor windows. The advantage of O.T.F.P. metering is the same as in SLR viewing: What you get is what you see. The exposure is tailored to the lens's exact field of view, making it more accurate. Integrating the flash output with strong room light and even daylight (when flash is used for fill purposes) is more positively conducted. And multiple-lens apertures (rather than the single or couple to which external-sensing flash is restricted) can be used. This permits flash photography to include depth-of-field control to even a greater degree than daylight photography. (If you need the depth of field of f/22, you cannot command the sun to supernova, but you can force the flash to pump out more light.)

Nearly all the SLR manufacturers offer at least one model with O.T.F.P. flash readings. Predictably, a lot of these instruments have price tags nearing the stratosphere, and justifiably so. They are fine, extremely advanced photographic tools. The X-570 can be considered an entry-level camera into state-of-the-art photographic resources and potentials.

Ultimately, though, it is the mind, the heart and soul, the inner eye of the photographer that creates the photograph. The proof of that is the immortal compositions of such turn-of-the-century photographers as Alfred Stieglitz and Alice Austen, whose cameras were large, cumbersome and slow-moving and whose operating capabilities were far more restricted than anything in this article. You still need vision, a tad of skill and even a mite of experience to do more than mundane work with modern cameras. But the point is that with their automatic this and motorized that, these little whiz-bangs are working in your favor.

"Clamshell models are popular with people who exercise their creativity from halfway up the Matterhorn."