This is an editorial of mine published in a local daily, The Wilkes Barre Times Leader on Sunday May 13, 2012. It is here in all its unedited glory.

 

Every spring around Earth Day, my family and I join a group of my neighbors on a Saturday morning to perform “roadside cleanup” along a stretch of highway that runs near our community in Mountaintop. 

We’ve been doing this for roughly 15 years. 

Because we’re creatures of habit, I suspect that each of us gravitate towards one particular section of road that we call our own.  I generally end up policing a roughly 200 yards section that runs along a fairly isolated part of the route. It’s a spot I suspect that people, knowing that they are unobserved, feel emboldened to toss all manner of garbage out of their vehicle windows and onto the surrounding landscape.

 Because of this, over the years I’ve noted several patterns involved in littering and dumping that make me somewhat cynical about my fellow-man.

Some things I guess are just ingrained in you.  I cannot imagine throwing anything out of a car window, or failing to comment negatively if a fellow occupant did.  Yet judging from the volume of roadside debris that I encounter each year, there are many others among us that feel no such restraint.

The piles of debris along our roadsides are sadly, too me, another indictment of this region’s people and their attitudes, in some ways as damning as those being handed down in our Federal courtrooms.  Travel for instance, to State College, the Hershey area, or out to Western Pennsylvania and the amount of roadside trash vastly decreases or just disappears. .  I honestly do not know whether this is because of more vigorous cleanup efforts occurring elsewhere in the state but I doubt it.  People in those regions I think, just aren’t as callous about their surroundings as we are.

 Over the years I have decided that there are three main categories to categorize those that litter our roadsides.

The first group is those who dispose of random objects tossed at the point on the drive when the food or beverage it contained is either consumed or no longer desired.  In an unscientific sampling from this year’s cleanup I would say the most popular item to toss is a coffee cup, followed closely by empty beer cans, generally brands that are so cheap, I haven’t even heard of them( malt liquors cans are very common).  You rarely see an empty Stella Artois, or a Magic Hat bottle alongside the road.  Not to be a snob, but I think this says something sociologically about people who throw their crap out on our roads.

I did find a lot of energy drinks this year, particularly the Monster brand of beverage so popular among the youths.  This does not bode well for the future. 

A new item in the last several years is quarter full bottles of water and sport drinks. This also discourages me.  It suggests that even people intelligent enough to be at least, mildly health, conscious, still think it’s OK to toss trash out of their car.  They are at least intelligent enough to leave some liquid in the container so that it can be lobbed reliably from their car to the surrounding woodlands.

I did find less this year of what was once a common phenomenon, the quart plastic iced tea bottle, filled with human urine.  This was certainly a welcome development.

Then there are the serial litterers.  For many years, in one 100 foot stretch of my assigned roadside I would find perhaps 40 of the same size coffee cups, of varying stages of decay, bought at a vendor whose closest store is in Wilkes Barre. One could easily imagine this thoughtless individual finishing the beverage in roughly the same place, every day on their way to work, and then adding the empty cup to our local landscape.   

This year, there was no such pattern.  It makes me wonder whether the closure of the nearby CertainTeed fiberglass plant recently, means that my coffee-drinking nemesis has lost their employment and no longer needs to travel that stretch of road.  Perhaps the plant closure also explains the loss of the urine bombs, said to be the spoor of over-the-road truck drivers. 

The last and most egregious group of litterers is the dumpers, who think our roadside is an appropriate place for their unwanted household garbage. I suspect that one reason that this problem exists here is for lack of municipal dumps, which elsewhere in the country, give people a place, maintained by their taxes, to discard unwanted items. We commonly find plastic bags full of family detritus, along with old tires, furniture, and inoperable electronic devices. This year, we found the carcass of someone’s dog in a plastic bag sentimentally discarded among the Mc Donald’s bags and Power Aid bottles.

“…Mommy, where’s Fido?”

At least some people have the courtesy to save their garbage until after our cleanup, placing their bags next to ours to await pickup.

So for several days at least, our stretch of road will be fairly neat and tidy. The white garbage bags will be collected, leaving only the emerging greenery of spring. In about a week as I drive past, the glint of a fresh beer can (or a fresh case of beer cans) along the road will once again catch my eye.

Thus is the cycle of life in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

I have an image on my den wall of a rhodora bloom.

It is a flower that grows in the scrub oak barrens adjacent to my community here in Northeastern Pennsylvania. I have been told by naturalists that this is an anomaly, because it’s only supposed to exist much further north.

I shot that image with a 4 megapixel Nikon Coolpix 4500, which some of you may recall, was the final high-end iteration of the original twist body Coolpix. I have printed it at 8”x11” and larger, and love the image. It looks good to me even 7 years after it spit out of the Epson 2200 that I used in those days. And I have become very critical of images over the years.

Now I have owned a large number of compact and bridge cameras over the years. I printed and enjoyed many landscape images captured with non DSLRs in years past. Nowadays, I am somewhat unhappy with using a compact camera for this purpose, even the so-called “premium” compacts such as my Panasonic LX 5. I get many less images nowadays from small imager cameras that I would consider using, let’s say, in an exhibition, whereas in the past, I have used such cameras to confidently decorate gallery walls (and make sales).

Given some discussions I have been involved in various photographic forums, I have begun to wonder just how much better off we are , in terms of small-sensored cameras, than we were in the earlier period in the digital photography, when there were less pixels on small sensors than now.

I shot over the years with many “bridge” cameras in those days, sometimes side-by-side with DSLRs in the 6 MP range. My memory is, that whether it was a Nikon Coolpix, 900/4500 (3 and 4 megapixels respectively), my 4/5 megapixel Olympus E10/E20 or an Olympus C 5050, the files (I shot in those days mainly JPGs) were usable for landscape images, and that the images were pleasing to the eye, even printed at 11×16” or even occasionally at 13x 19”.

Now it seems to me small sensors seem lousy, not only relative to larger sensored DSLRs but even compared to older imagers with half the resolution. I can’t tell if I’ve become spoiled by the likes of my D 700, or whether packing those tiny sensors with as little as 10 MP is having a deleterious effect on certain,  intangible measures of image quality.

Obviously, this discussion should be limited to base ISO. Even a 2/3” sensor such that came with the Olympus E 20, was horrible above ISO 200. A Canon S 100, LX5 and certainly the new Fuji X10, would wipe the floor with them at higher sensitivities.

But I do wonder whether there are other advantages of bigger pixels, even big old technology pixels, have characteristics that make up for the advances that have come since.

This is a 100% crop of an image shot with my Olympus C 5050 from a kayak in 2004. It makes a nice 11’x 16’ print, like many others from that camera. And, it was shot in RAW at ISO 200, miraculous for a bridge camera of that era. My other cameras at the time included a Fuji S2 pro. I often printed and sold images from the Olympus, again limited somewhat  in size relative to the Fuji. In this image I particularly notice the lack of noise, and reasonable detail.

Here are two images: one from my 2005 vintage Fujifilm E 900 which at the time was considered a marvel at high-resolution, High ISO (800 ASA max) shooting in a compact

.

It sports the same size 1 1/6” inch sensor as the LX5 which I used to take the other image. These were shot at ISO 400 in raw format, had the same exposure settings at f4, were corrected with the same settings in ACR, and sharpened with the same unsharpen mask settings in Photoshop.

I’m not saying that there’s no difference. I think the Fuji noise is coarser, and there could be a smidgen more color noise. Detail seems about the same. Now the E 900 sensor is 9 MP and of the so-called “SuperCCD” design, so famous in the F 30/31 Fuji compacts These were the cameras that arguably started the craze toward lower resolution, higher sensitivity sensors ( I still have one). I do feel however, that given the 5 years between models, the differences are modest. I’m pretty sure that the E 900 would compete nicely with many other modern imagers.

It should also be said the ergonomics of the LX-5 are significantly better than the older camera making it much more usable. Oddly enough the E 900 may have the first compact that disappointed me with it’s image quality (maybe because the size of the megapixels).  I did get some keepers( see December 2013)

Now that having said all that, the Panasonic can render details nicely, if shot right. Here’s a 100% crop of an image I took with the LX5 recently, also at ISO 400 .

What’s my point? I ‘m not sure there is one, except perhaps that as photo gear enthusiasts, we are seduced by the power of industry marketing,  which is aided at times by enthusiast websites who are connected to photo gear suppliers. Imagers are getting better, but perhaps more slowly than we think.

If you’re going to buy a new camera or camera body, make sure it functions better for you. Test it against the gear it’s set to replace. If it’s not truly more functional, don’t be afraid to send it back. And make sure that you buy  from reputable dealers that will allow you the privilege.

Also once in a while, If you have an older camera on your shelf, pick it up and shoot it. Print an image. You might be shocked just how much you like it.

Last spring, as sometimes happens; I developed an” itch” to
buy some new photo gear.

Now logically I really didn’t need anything new. I
actually could stand to sell something as I have several DSLRs I no longer
really use, and should probably place on EBay (anyone want a lightly used
D2x?). I have most of the lenses I want, and need, and the few I lust for seem
awfully expensive too me in these times of a weak dollar. I looked around the
web scouting for a decently priced used or refurbished D3x, but unfortunately
for me, they seem to be holding their value quite nicely.

So I waited. Because I felt as though that nothing I wanted
that I justify on price.

That’s when my lovely wife Cathy saved the day. She came to
me one evening and mentioned that our 16-year old son, Gus was showing an
interest in video and still photography and wanted to know what camera we might buy him.

Aha, I thought, the answer to my dilemma! I quickly and
generously offered to give Gus my Lumix LX3, which I explained to my wife, is a wonderful camera for a budding photographer/videographer

In truth, I had been eying up the new Olympus ZX1. I have
had a variety of Olympus cameras over the
years, and have had very positive experiences. I went on the B+H site and
ordered one with an extra battery. It was delivered in the usual B+H fashion,
the next day. I was particularly excited about the “Zuiko” branded lens, the
first on any of their compact cameras.

I kept it for two days. Now as readers know I shoot a
variety of equipment and am pretty adaptable, but compared to the  LX3, the controls of the ZX1 were poorly worked out, and much more “menu driven”. Maybe I never understood the camera, but things like changing the ISO, or bringing up the histogram on the display, seemed infinitely harder on the Olympus.

I packed the camera back up, and obtained a return authorization from B+H, at the same time ordering the upgrade to the LX3 the Panasonic Lumix LX5.

Compared to shooting the Olympus,
working with the LX5 is like falling off a log.

All of the familiar controls are there on the body of the
camera. One thing I really missed one the ZX1 was the switch for the aspect
ratio of the image, which on the Lumix cameras resides on the lens barrel. The
little stubby joystick controller on the LX3 was replaced by a clickable
control wheel on the LX5 making the controls more like the G- series
Panasonics. I do miss the switch on the LX 3 that puts it into picture review
mode; I like this better than the push button on the LX5.

As most of you know, the Leica Summicron–branded lens has
been upgraded in the new camera. It retains the former lens wide end at 24mm
f2.0 but now zooms out to 35 mm equivalent 90mm at f3.3. These are optically
beautiful lenses with out the silly long zoom capabilities that compromise the
optics of other compact cameras.

Some words about accessories. I was hoping that they would
be common for both cameras but to my chagrin found out that battery of the LX5 is new, and that the LX3’s filter adapter doesn’t work on the longer-extending LX5 lens. Oh well.

Then there’s the optional electronic viewfinder. I purchased
one shortly after buying the camera. I initially loved it. To me the LX5s
compatibility with this little gem might justify upgrading to the newer camera

Though not as big and bright as the EVf built in to my GH1, it was
more than adequate and allowed me to shoot with the camera properly braced against my face like one should. It allows you to see all of the camera data,
and particularly for me, the live histogram so useful in small-sensored cameras with limited dynamic range. I loved that it would pivot upwords.

Then one morning, it would no longer focus. I called B+H but
it was beyond their 14 day return period. They suggested I call Panasonic. When
I finally got through to them they were unsure just where I should send the
viewfinder for service. Several hours later they called me and suggested an Elgin, Illinois
repair center. I boxed it up, and sent it off.

Maybe a week later, it arrived back at my door. I unboxed it
and placed on the camera… only to discover that it still wouldn’t focus.

That’s when I found the note in the box stating that the Elgin facility couldn’t help me and that I needed to send
the viewfinder to a facility in Washington State.

Now in the past, I have had pretty good luck with Panasonic service (they fixed pretty quickly, my dysfunctional 45-200mm Lumix lens) but clearly they have a problem here.
Anyway, I’ll send it off again and we’ll see what happens.

On to image quality- In general I do think the LX5 a bit
better than the LX3, particularly at High ISOs. I think it’s even better still,
even in Raw, now that I have downloaded and installed firmware 2.0. Noise and dynamic range are claimed to be improved by Panasonic (maybe the latter because of the former). To me the image quality it’s a modest improvement at best, I
probably wouldn’t upgrade for the imaging improvement alone if I hadn’t given away my LX3.

Oh and by the way, the LX5 has 720p HD video but can now
shoot in the “AVCHD Lite” format as well as Motion Jpg. Firmware 2.0 has brought enhancements to this, particularly in terms of the functionality of the Optical Image Stabilization system with video.

It should be said, that there is no free lunch regarding
small sensors, even if they are as good as the LX5. I just shot a campaign event for a friend using my D700, D7000, and when I tired of carrying around the big stuff, the LX5. I shot raw and for the most part exposed carefully.

Yet on reviewing the images, there is a huge chasm, between the quality of the Nikon
files, and those of the LX5. Viewed at 100% even at ISO 100 there is luminance
noise present. This is typically less visible in prints but still on the
computer the difference is stark.

Nonetheless the Panasonic images will be very useful for my
friend’s campaign website and for modest prints.

I guess I’m just spoiled.

Because of these limitations, the LX5 and its competitors
are not great landscape tools. They are useful for event photography,
particularly if you want to keep a low profile. I will often come to an event with
my LX 5 in one suit coat pocket, and an Olympus FL-36 flash in the other. The
two are completely compatible and allow one to create some very pleasing bounce
flash photography.

Final thoughts: the LX5 is a fine upgrade of the LX 3 and is
a very useful enthusiast’s compact camera. Its image quality is somewhat
limited like all cameras of its type but nonetheless it can create nice images
in settings that other small cameras would flounder. The design and control
features make it a joy to use and quick to learn.

If you task it appropriately, and shoot it well, you will be
very pleased with the results.