Descriptive adjectives and ebay.

What's ebay doing to the English language?
Recently, two advertisements were posted with the following pictures. 

Extremely good condition A-1 The camera pictured on the left  (click for larger pic) was described as "Extremely good condition". I have no arguments with that, if anything it is an undersell. The owner has treasured this 30 year old camera and looked after it well.

Excellent condition A-1

In contrast, the camera pictured on the right  (click for larger pic) was described as "Excellent condition". Really? In what context can that be described as excellent condition?

Either the seller's day job is  as a real estate agent, or it is excellent as in "Excellent, it still looks like a camera after several hammer blows".

Leica Correspondent limited edition.

Leica Correspondent

In collaboration with Lenny Kravitz – the musician, actor and designer– Leica Camera AG, Wetzlar, presents a special camera edition.

Don McCullin's Nikon F

Larry Burrows' Leica

A correspondent's camera bears scars from the situations in which it it has been, a correspondent bears scars from the things they have seen. 


No Lenny Kravitz, artificial wear and an inflated price is nought to do with photojournalism.

Lomography Belair X 6-12 City Slicker - First impressions.

Boxed Lomography
Belair X6-12 City Slicker

Lomography have shipped their first batch of  Belair X 6-12 Cameras. Pictures and specifications of the camera can be found at the Lomography Belair microsite.

Here are my first impressions of using the City Slicker with the 58mm wide angle lens;

• It is delivered in a nice cardboard package with the body, 2 lenses (58mm and 90mm) and matching viewfinders.
• The viewfinder is very approximate, particularly at less than 5m focus range.
• The 58mm lens is really soft at f8. As you would expect it gets a bit better at the f16 setting.
• Focus fall off from the centre is quite severe on the 6x12 format (this lens would be better with the 6x6 and perhaps 6x9 formats)
• There is a stop or two of exposure falloff from the image centre to the edges (for that lomo vignette effect)

Here are two sample images from the first roll;

Stone shed. Kodak TMax 400, Lomography x6-12, 58mm @ F8

A girl and her dog. Kodak TMax 400, Lomography x6-12, 90mm @ F8

However even with its flaws,  all in all it is a very light & fun medium format camera.