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This is somewhat off-topic, but I'm hoping the other rangefinder enthusiasts here won't mind. I really don't know another place to ask/discuss the topic. Lately, I've been considering how the early, fixed-lens rangefinders differ in a positive way from the SLRs I'm accustomed to shooting. It's apparent the rangefinders are less obtrusive due to their quiet shutters, but is there anything directly related to photo quality or technique that otherwise justifies owning and maintaining these older models? For me, this question points to the issue of daylight fill-flash, but in a context I have never seen approached in tutorials on the Web or elsewhere. As I'm sure everyone knows, daylight fill-flash is typically used for filling in the foreground when the background is too bright. It's an alternative to simply opening up the exposure a couple stops, a technique that usually causes the background to wash out. I have also used fill-flash to minimize shadows on faces and other subjects outdoors when the sun is too harsh. However, my SLRs have a severe limitation regarding daylight fill due to their slow maximum flash sync of 1/125 sec. This limitation becomes especially apparent when I want to work with portraiture, because it is nearly impossible to open up the lens in daylight in order to blur the background. This limitation can be overcome to a certain extent through the use of neutral density filters. However, the window of available shutter speeds remains rather small, and every shot must be carefully considered, planned and executed as a compromise between proper exposure and the possibility of motion blur or camera shake. The problem is particularly acute if, say, a 135mm lens is used. In that case, handholding the camera permits only the speed of 1/125 second if reliably sharp results are desired. A shorter lens relieves this somewhat, but then requires an even larger aperture to produce the same degree of background blur. In contrast to my SLRs, a Yashica Lynx 5000 offers a top flash sync speed of 1/1000. Its aperture can be opened to f/1.8, sufficiently large to produce an appealing background blur. Of course, a Lynx 14 and a few others are usable at f/1.4, but the additional background diffusion gained at this aperture seems of miminal importance. In addition, all such cameras (to the best of my knowledge) incorporate shutters limited to a maximum speed of 1/500. Compared to an SLR, that's a good thing, but compared to 1/1000, it's a full stop lost in terms of fill-flash exposure versatility. I would certainly appreciate any ideas on this topic from anyone. In particular, I'm wondering if anyone here has experience with this technique or knows of an online tutorial. Everything I've read on the subject of daylight fill-flash is geared toward SLRs and focal plane shutters, with lenses and flash set for f/8 or so. Nothing I can find discusses daylight fill in the context of leaf shutters or fast sync speeds. Can anyone help? |