Climbing the Sound of Music | Kitzsteinhorn | Sommerstein | Persailhorn | Großes Wiesbachhorn | The "Austria-Weg" | Granatspitze & Sonnblick | Hochkönig

Click Here to View LargerPhotographing "Climbing The Sound of Music"

For this trip I decided to switch film to Kodak E100SW in a attempt to solve the overexposure problem that I was having with the old EKTACHROME in my Yashica T4 Super. Overall, I got the results that I was hopping for. The pictures in the Kitzsteinhorn story were taken using the old E400 and they are overexposed. The pictures in the Sommerstein story were taken with E100SW and the exposure appears to be fine. The warm saturation of the colors in the E100SW tends to give the pictures a golden hue that I find quite nice in mountain pictures. More important, the E100SW appears to not suffer from the super blue rendering of high altitude skies nor of the bluish hue on snow pictures that Fuji Velvia is notorious for. However, the warm saturation has its drawbacks. 

In interior shots, the E100SW renders flash light in yellow tones and this ruined some of my pictures (see this picture of Eduardo). I suspect that the problem would disappear using E100S, but nonetheless it is annoying to have to change films every time that you walk into a museum or a friend's party.

For the entire trip, we used the Yashica T4 Super. The camera definitely outperformed its $150 value (at B&H), enduring rain, snow, cold temperatures, dust, and the ill treatment of two climbers. We shot 19 rolls of film without any of the reported mid-roll-rewind problems. The 35mm/3.5 Zeiss Tessar lens seems to work best while operating at infinite-setting or for close-ups (2-4 ft.). The mid-range focus appears soft in some pictures and this is probably due to problems in the range finding mechanism of the camera.

One problem that I didn't anticipated was fog. During those early morning alpine starts, the camera had terrible problems focusing through fog, and this led to a number of bad shots in the Granatspitze-Sonnblick trip. Clouds also yielded the same problem as it was evident in some of the pictures taken at the summit of Großes Wiesbachhorn.

This time I won the war against the European X-ray machines with the help of  a SIGMA lead-laminated film bag (see Tuan's X-horror tale). I purchased the heavy duty model (i.e., for film up to ASA1000, $18 for the 20 roll bag at Penn Camera) and the film came out just fine. Furthermore, these bags are so commonly used nowadays, that the security personnel at Washington Dulles and Munich airports didn't even bother to open mine.

All PhotoCD services were provided by ADI. The conversion from PCD to JPG format was done using ImageMagick 3.8.7. In all cases the images were processed using the -sharpen 50 filter to remove the PhotoCD haze in the PCD files. Some images were adjusted (i.e., contrast, brightness, saturation, and hue) to look as close to the original slide as possible, when viewed in a SGI monitor.

The following is an incomplete list of 35mm Point & Shoot cameras. The original list was compiled by Bill Tuthill, and I have upgraded it to reflect some additional cameras and the prices at B&H. If you find anything in the list to be in error, I will upgrade it and credit you with the information.

Camera Remarks Focal Length Aperture Shutter Speed Weight Price
Canon Shot 60 Zoom n/a 38-60mm f4.5-6.7 n/a n/a $100
Canon Shot 80 TELE n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a $95
Canon Sure 70 Zoom n/a 35-70mm f4.2-7.8 n/a n/a $120
Canon Sure 105 Zoom n/a 38-105mm f3.8-9.9 1/500-2sec n/a $170
Canon Sure Shot A1 UW 32mm f3.5 1/250-2sec 300g $160
Canon Sure Owl n/a 35mm f4.5 n/a n/a $63
Canon Sure Z-115 n/a 35-115mm f3.6-8.5 n/a n/a $225
Canon Sure Z-135 n/a 38-135mm f3.6-8.9 n/a n/a $245
Contax T2 * 38mm f2.8-f16 AP 1/500-1sec 295g $850
Contax TVS n/a 28-56mm f*-f* AP 1/500-1sec n/a n/a
Konica Mermaid UW 35mm f3.5 +-1.5 1/360-7sec 353g $260
Leica Mini 3 * 32mm f3.2-f16 1/250-1/6 164g $160
Leica Mini Z2X * 35-70mm f4.0-f20 1/300-1/4 245g $280
Leica Minilux n/a 40mm f2.4 n/a n/a $700
Minolta Freedom Action Zoom n/a 38-60mm f4.3-6.4 n/a n/a $110
Minolta Freedom Zoom 90EX n/a 38-90mm f3.5-7.7 n/a n/a n/a
Minolta Freedom Zoom 140EX n/a 38-140mm f3.5-9.4 n/a n/a $280
Minolta Freedom Zoom Explorer n/a 28-70mm f3.5-8.4 n/a n/a $150
Minolta Freedom Zoom Supreme n/a 38-115mm n/a n/a n/a $230
Minolta TC-1 n/a 28mm f3.5 n/a n/a n/a
Minolta Weathermatic Dual 35 UW 35mm/50mm f3.5-f5.6 1/150-1/40 400g $200
Nikon 28 Ti * 28mm f*-f* AP 1/*-*sec *g $750
Nikon 35 Ti * 35mm f2.8-f22 AP 1/500-2sec 310g $550
Nikon Lite Touch Zoom 70 n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a $180
Nikon One Touch Zoom 35-70mm f4.0-n/a n/a n/a n/a $120
Nikon Zoom 500 38-70mm f5.7-n/a n/a n/a n/a $120
Nikonos-V (MFW) UW 35mm+80mm f2.8-f22 AP 1/1000-1/30 700g $655+360
Olympus Stylus n/a 35mm f3.5 n/a 170g $90
Olympus Stylus Epic
35mm f2.8-f11 1/1000-4sec 135g $140
*Olympus Stylus Zoom
38-70mm f4.1-f8.7 1/500-4sec 220g $100
Olympus LT Zoom 105
38-105mm f4.5-8.9 1/500-4sec 283g $300
Olympus Stylus Zoom 105
38-105mm f4.5-f8.9 1/500-4sec 269g $200
Olympus Stylus Zoom 115
38-115mm f4.5-f9.7 1/500-4sec 240g $230
Pentax PC 700
35mm f4.5 1/250-1/45 205g $90
Pentax IQzoom 80E * 38-80mm n/a n/a n/a $120
Pentax IQzoom 928 * 28-90mm f3.5-9 1/400-1/5 315g $200
Pentax IQzoom 90MC * 38-90mm f4.5-9.5 1/300-1/5 227g $160
Pentax IQzoom 90WR
38-90mm f3.5-7.5 1/400-1/5 455g $200
Pentax IQzoom 115 * 38-115mm n/a n/a n/a $220
Pentax IQzoom 140 * 38-140mm f4.1-10.2 n/a n/a $240
Pentax IQzoom 160 * 38-160mm f4.5-12 1/400-1/5 320g $290
Pentax IQzoom EZY * 38-70mm f4.8-8.5 n/a n/a $100
Ricoh GR-1 * 28mm f2.8-f22 AP 1/500-2sec 175g $350
Ricoh R-1 * 24mm/30mm f3.5-f8 1/400-2sec 150g $150
Ricoh RW-1
34mm f4.4 1/100-1/40 250g $85
Rollei Prego Zoom AF
35-70mm f3.9 n/a n/a $180
Rollei Prego 90 AF
28-90mm f3.7 n/a n/a $230
Rollei X-115 Zoom Q. D.
38-115mm n/a n/a n/a $250
Rollei Prego Micro
n/a fn/a n/a n/a $250
Rollei Prego Zoom 145
38-145mm n/a n/a n/a $320
Samsung AF 444 WR
35mm f4.5 1/125 210g $70
Vivitar A35 Splash
35mm f4.5 1/125 210g $60
Yashica T-4 Super
35mm f3.5-f9 1/700-1sec 200g $150

Remarks

  • UW = underwater camera suitable for diving
  • * = not even weather resistant or splash proof
  • AP = aperture priority mode to control depth of field
  • +- = provides plus or minus f-stop exposure override
  • MFW = manual focus and manual wind

Credits

  • Ramesh Mantha provided some of the information on Rollei cameras. 

Climbing the Sound of Music | Kitzsteinhorn | Sommerstein | Persailhorn | Großes Wiesbachhorn | The "Austria-Weg" | Granatspitze & Sonnblick | Hochkönig

Click here to go back...Pedro I. Espina©1997