Contax TVS III 35mm Film Camera
- Film Type: 35mm
- Zoom Lens: With Zoom Lens
- Camera Type: Point and Shoot
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The Rolls -Royce Point & Shoot
Pros
a superbly built, use-friendly P&S camera
Cons
It costs an arm and a leg
Recommended it?
Yes
A LUXURY POINT N? SHOOT THAT?S WORTH IT
By Frank Van Riper
Professional photographer, author and photography columnist for
Too many of today?s point n? shoot cameras share a common trait with many of their full size 35mm counterparts. They just don?t feel like cameras anymore, or at least not the kick-ass cameras of my youth, like the multi-pound Nikon F2 and motordrive, the tank-like Beseler Topcon, the rugged yet sensual Leica M2, or the imposingly clunky Alpa 6.
The new Nikon N80?loaded with electronic goodies though it may be?is a perfect case in point. This plastic marvel [made mostly in Thailand, not Japan, by the way] is so lightweight that I thought at first I was holding a plastic dummy of the real thing. This was not a camera, I thought; this was my VCR remote.
Still, I couldn?t keep ignoring the appeal of lightweight, user-friendly cameras, especially point n? shoots. Even I didn?t lug an F5 or a Hasselblad with me all the time. So I kept looking for a P&S that was simple enough for an amateur to use yet had enough features and in-your-face attitude to appeal to a professional like me.
Finally I found it in the drop-dead gorgeous and quietly gear-laden Contax Tvs III [List: $1550; Street: $999]
When I compared this camera with Leica?s premier amateur model, the C1. [List: $479; Street: $429 $] frankly, there was no comparison. The C1, elegant though it may be to look at, is just another run-of-the-mill point n? shoot camera?with a woefully slow 38-105mm lens to boot [a myopic f.10.5 at full zoom!]. It feels as flimsy in the hand as any other such camera and has had a history of development problems which now appear to have been solved. Ironically, given the vast difference in price between the Tvs III and C1, the pricier Contax may be the better value for the serious photographer.
What immediately appealed to me about the Contax was its agreeable heft. By no means a heavy camera, it nonetheless had the reassuring feel of a well-made car: think of closing a door on a high-end Mercedes and then on an economy Ford.
The damn thing just felt wonderful. Part of the reason for the camera?s 320-gram weight is that the body is made largely of rugged and beautiful titanium, not polycarbonate plastic. Remember too: metal bodies take a hit better than plastic ones. Those polycarbonate bodies are meant to bounce back after impact [like car bumpers] but too often they do not provide good protection for the delicate computer parts sitting just under a camera?s thin skin. And speaking of protection, even though the soft black leather carrying case of the Tvs III probably works no better than one made of plastic, it only adds to this machine?s luxury aura.
On a more serious note, a wonderfully retro hinged door that folds down automatically when the camera is activated provides lens protection on the Tvs III. I?m much happier having this built-in metal lens cap than with having a thin plastic eyelid covering my lens, a la the C1 and God knows how many other point n? shoots.
And speaking of the lens, the one on the Tvs III is a very sharp 6-element Carl Zeiss 30-60mm Vario Sonnar (f. 3.7 to an acceptable f.6.7 at full zoom.)
A word about zoom lenses on point n? shoots. In most cases, they are the camera?s weakest link, mainly because amateurs seem to love the idea of having big zoom lenses that poke provocatively from the camera body, saving the photographer the excruciating labor of having to walk a few feet closer to his or her subject. Because amateurs also want their point n? shoots to be lightweight, and because smaller, lightweight lenses tend to have less light-gathering power than big front-element professional zooms, the zoom lenses on point n? shoots tend to be awful. Happily the lens on the Tvs III is acceptably fast simply because it?s not much of a zoom (only medium wide 30mm to near-normal 60mm). Still, if you want a faster, fixed focal length Contax P&S, check out the Contax T2.
In my view what really sets the Tvs III apart from the usual run of mediocre, uninspired point n? shoots is its raft of manual features. To be sure, in full auto mode, this camera works just about like any other. But it also offers a highly user-friendly bag of manual tricks that might even justify the manufacturer?s claim that this little point n? shoot offers virtually the same array of features as a full blown high-end 35mm camera.
For example, this is the rare P&S that allows for full aperture selection, if desired. It also lets you manually focus, with an external passive system that registers focusing distance in the viewfinder down to a half-meter.
Shutter speeds range from a whopping 16 seconds to 1/1000 of a second?certainly in the conventional 35mm camera range. [Though there is no manual selection of shutter speeds.] The viewfinder even offers diopter adjustment [find THAT on most point n? shoots] as well as internal exposure compensation of plus or minus two stops.
If I could find one flaw in this camera, it would be in its red-eye reduction mode. Since, like all point and shoots, the Tvs III has a direct [ie: non-bounce] flash, red eye will always be a problem in dark rooms. Some point n? shoots deal with this problem with a rapid strobelight beforehand to close down a subject?s pupils, making them less susceptible to the red-eye effect; others make more sense with a bright continuous light to achieve the same end before firing the actual flash. The Tvs III makes an odd compromise. It fires the flash twice?the first as a way to shine bright light at the pupils, forcing them to contract, then the second in conjunction with the actual shutter release about one-half second later. That seems like a recipe to confuse one?s subjects?and for you to miss shots as your subjects assume, incorrectly but with reason, that they already have been photographed.
But this is a minor drawback at best. The Tvs III easily may be the finest point n? shoot currently on the market.
Questions/comments? E-mail me at fvanriper@aol.com
Also: Check out my latest book, Down East Maine/A World Apart.
By Frank Van Riper
Professional photographer, author and photography columnist for
Too many of today?s point n? shoot cameras share a common trait with many of their full size 35mm counterparts. They just don?t feel like cameras anymore, or at least not the kick-ass cameras of my youth, like the multi-pound Nikon F2 and motordrive, the tank-like Beseler Topcon, the rugged yet sensual Leica M2, or the imposingly clunky Alpa 6.
The new Nikon N80?loaded with electronic goodies though it may be?is a perfect case in point. This plastic marvel [made mostly in Thailand, not Japan, by the way] is so lightweight that I thought at first I was holding a plastic dummy of the real thing. This was not a camera, I thought; this was my VCR remote.
Still, I couldn?t keep ignoring the appeal of lightweight, user-friendly cameras, especially point n? shoots. Even I didn?t lug an F5 or a Hasselblad with me all the time. So I kept looking for a P&S that was simple enough for an amateur to use yet had enough features and in-your-face attitude to appeal to a professional like me.
Finally I found it in the drop-dead gorgeous and quietly gear-laden Contax Tvs III [List: $1550; Street: $999]
When I compared this camera with Leica?s premier amateur model, the C1. [List: $479; Street: $429 $] frankly, there was no comparison. The C1, elegant though it may be to look at, is just another run-of-the-mill point n? shoot camera?with a woefully slow 38-105mm lens to boot [a myopic f.10.5 at full zoom!]. It feels as flimsy in the hand as any other such camera and has had a history of development problems which now appear to have been solved. Ironically, given the vast difference in price between the Tvs III and C1, the pricier Contax may be the better value for the serious photographer.
What immediately appealed to me about the Contax was its agreeable heft. By no means a heavy camera, it nonetheless had the reassuring feel of a well-made car: think of closing a door on a high-end Mercedes and then on an economy Ford.
The damn thing just felt wonderful. Part of the reason for the camera?s 320-gram weight is that the body is made largely of rugged and beautiful titanium, not polycarbonate plastic. Remember too: metal bodies take a hit better than plastic ones. Those polycarbonate bodies are meant to bounce back after impact [like car bumpers] but too often they do not provide good protection for the delicate computer parts sitting just under a camera?s thin skin. And speaking of protection, even though the soft black leather carrying case of the Tvs III probably works no better than one made of plastic, it only adds to this machine?s luxury aura.
On a more serious note, a wonderfully retro hinged door that folds down automatically when the camera is activated provides lens protection on the Tvs III. I?m much happier having this built-in metal lens cap than with having a thin plastic eyelid covering my lens, a la the C1 and God knows how many other point n? shoots.
And speaking of the lens, the one on the Tvs III is a very sharp 6-element Carl Zeiss 30-60mm Vario Sonnar (f. 3.7 to an acceptable f.6.7 at full zoom.)
A word about zoom lenses on point n? shoots. In most cases, they are the camera?s weakest link, mainly because amateurs seem to love the idea of having big zoom lenses that poke provocatively from the camera body, saving the photographer the excruciating labor of having to walk a few feet closer to his or her subject. Because amateurs also want their point n? shoots to be lightweight, and because smaller, lightweight lenses tend to have less light-gathering power than big front-element professional zooms, the zoom lenses on point n? shoots tend to be awful. Happily the lens on the Tvs III is acceptably fast simply because it?s not much of a zoom (only medium wide 30mm to near-normal 60mm). Still, if you want a faster, fixed focal length Contax P&S, check out the Contax T2.
In my view what really sets the Tvs III apart from the usual run of mediocre, uninspired point n? shoots is its raft of manual features. To be sure, in full auto mode, this camera works just about like any other. But it also offers a highly user-friendly bag of manual tricks that might even justify the manufacturer?s claim that this little point n? shoot offers virtually the same array of features as a full blown high-end 35mm camera.
For example, this is the rare P&S that allows for full aperture selection, if desired. It also lets you manually focus, with an external passive system that registers focusing distance in the viewfinder down to a half-meter.
Shutter speeds range from a whopping 16 seconds to 1/1000 of a second?certainly in the conventional 35mm camera range. [Though there is no manual selection of shutter speeds.] The viewfinder even offers diopter adjustment [find THAT on most point n? shoots] as well as internal exposure compensation of plus or minus two stops.
If I could find one flaw in this camera, it would be in its red-eye reduction mode. Since, like all point and shoots, the Tvs III has a direct [ie: non-bounce] flash, red eye will always be a problem in dark rooms. Some point n? shoots deal with this problem with a rapid strobelight beforehand to close down a subject?s pupils, making them less susceptible to the red-eye effect; others make more sense with a bright continuous light to achieve the same end before firing the actual flash. The Tvs III makes an odd compromise. It fires the flash twice?the first as a way to shine bright light at the pupils, forcing them to contract, then the second in conjunction with the actual shutter release about one-half second later. That seems like a recipe to confuse one?s subjects?and for you to miss shots as your subjects assume, incorrectly but with reason, that they already have been photographed.
But this is a minor drawback at best. The Tvs III easily may be the finest point n? shoot currently on the market.
Questions/comments? E-mail me at fvanriper@aol.com
Also: Check out my latest book, Down East Maine/A World Apart.
