Wedding Second Shooter Duty: Contax G1 – Zeiss 45mm f/2 Edition

Addendum: Red line in image issue mentioned below has been resolved. More below.

Along with other image capturing devices I also brought along an analog camera.

Sigma dp2 Quattro — Contax G1 and Zeiss 45mm f/2

Brought along B&W and color film and left the choice up to the groom. Groom’s choice was Fujicolo r XTra Superia 400.

Excellent choice. I did not finish the roll, however. No ding on the camera, lens, or film. Just had other compelling options available that day. I did manage to work in a few shots, however.

One question may come to mind. What is with the red line? Not sure actually. I Googled a bit to see if I could confirm the source of the issue. Was it the film, the scanner, the camera? Not sure. After some Googling I did rescan the negatives while turning off Epson scanning software’s Digital Ice option. As a result some scans were improved and no longer have a red line and some keep it. So… I am not sure yet what the root cause is yet. Still see the red line above? For some reason even though I updated the source Flickr image the previews here were not updated for some even after updating the link. So click the image and you may see a better result.

Also reminds me why I find myself pivoting to more digital shooting recently. With more compelling digital lenses available now I do not find as strong a pull to film. Some 35mm digital lenses rival medium format results for me. But more on that later.

Anyhoo.

Red line or not I like the results.

-ELW

Addendum:

Red line in film mystery solved. Tested older negatives and confirmed what many that I had asked suspected. That it was the Epson V600. After some Googling I found a thread on Flickr that had the solution. There is a calibration area on the glass at the start of the scan area. If dust gets on it a line will appear. The fix is to wipe that area at the start of the scan on the top and bottom glass with a dry cloth. Tested it. Problem solved. No more red lines.

So I get to keep my scanner and spend no more money… on scanners anyways.