Seeing a little wider

For a long time as a photographer, I loved the 40mm focal length. I loved the idea that as long as I was pointing the camera in my direct view. I was most likely seeing the same thing. It made things a lot easier for me while shooting events. So for all three of my setups Crop, FF, and Medium format digital I had a -/+40mm lens. 27/50 for my Fujis. Until I got this Fuji x70 point and shoot. It’s got a 18.5 mm (28mm) lens and I was always feeling like that was just too wide for me. But it was going to be my new everyday carry so I just made do. I shot a few pop ups with it. it’s an olde camera but for shooting something for socials, 16mp is plenty when viewed on a screen.

I realized that the slight distortion from being wider is what I’ve been missing. There’s a character there that you don’t see when things are starting to compress a little. And shooting with flash, the distortion gives a nostalgia that you’re not even fully aware of. But mimics the point and shoots and disposables we played with as kids. For parties and events ive been shooting my R5 with the RF28mm f/2.8 and the Godox IT-32 handheld flash. And frankly, I went from hating this camera to absolutely loving using it. On top of that, this lens is a little punchier in the contrast and I love that.

On a side note, I’ve been playing with my flashes differently lately and I realized that I didn’t really have much concept of what my flash power was. I’ve been trying to do more daytime flash. High contrast, hard direct light into backlit situations. It’s my favorite, but I couldn’t quite grasp how to make it work without using an ND at 6 stops. I learned a few new tricks and Im real excited to get them going.