JAPAN GRABS - Hakuba Blog 2013 / 2014
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Cameras for the snow
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For the purposes of this blog, I’ve been researching different cameras and I thought I’d discuss my findings.
I’m looking for something small and light with a photo quality close to DSLR levels. I want to be able to snowboard with either the camera in a pocket, or in a smaller backpack. The main focus of the day is to have fun snowboarding, and if a photo op comes up, be able to capture the moment.
I have two DSLR’s, along with pro-level lenses, that I can use for professional shoots, so I’m good for days where shooting is the main priority and snowboarding is a means to get to the spot. However, even on those days, a lighter kit would still be welcome, especially for days spent in the backcountry. On the day I took this photo, my backpack was so heavy, it felt like I was carrying a bear on my back!
I’m stoked I got the shot, and it got published, but on the way down I hit a large patch of ice running across the entire chute. As I tried to sideslide over it, I lost my balance a touch and the pack did the rest, bringing me down on my back, starting a death slide. I eventually stopped but let me tell you, I felt some raw fear that day. I also lost a piece from my tripod which cost a bundle to replace. Ok, ok, maybe blaming my fall on the heavy pack is a bit much, but hey, if I can make the pack lighter in any way then I am very interested.
Ok, so the four categories are: 1)DSLR 2)mirrorless 3)point & shoot 4)phone camera
Let’s check out the pros and cons of each.
1)DSLR
Hands down, you get the best image quality from this category. Great! Discussions over! ....hang on, let’s hear the cons.
Well, here you have the greatest weight, highest cost, and due to the higher price, you’ll likely want to be more careful with the lenses. Here you’re doing more shooting than riding. Also, I have this category covered, so let’s move on!
3) Point & Shoot
I’m going to skip 2) since it’s the juiciest category. Ok, point & shoots - lots to choose from here. You’ve got everything from the cheapie cheapies that you won’t care if you lose or break, the waterproof/shockproof lot, and then the higher end ones with the most functions. I want to take nice action photos so I ruled out the first two types. It also needed a decent viewfinder as sunny days in the snow usually mean you can’t see the lcd screen on the back very well. How can you frame a shot you can’t even see??
Canon point and shoots have a great reputation, and from personal experience, these were the ones I was drawn to. I was careful to look at the newly replaced models which were on sale, and to compare the new features with the old, to see if it was worth the upgrade.
The Canon S110 was an early contender, as it is tiny but still has great specs. This would be awesome for the mountain as you could ride with it in your pocket no problems at all. The lens is great, however it does get slower at the long end of the zoom.
Enter the Canon G15. You get the same sensor as in the S110, but a better lens (F.18 to 2.8). The size is considerably bigger, however it is quite smaller than older G series cameras. I think this could be pocketable, depending on your jacket.
I found both the S110 and G15 on sale,but they were closeouts are long gone now. (I’m only speaking about the Japanese domestic market here. Things are likely different in your home market. I do know my brother just picked up an S110 in the states).
Of course, if you look at the newer S120, and G16, you’ll have even better quality. They have better wifi capabilities and it would be awesome to be able to just upload the photos to facebook or boardworld, without having to deal with a computer. You could even do it while sitting on the lift!
In general, I find that the the higher end point and shoots have great jpgs straight out of the camera and could easily be posted straight away. Actually, if you can get them onto your phone, apps like Snapseed let you do loads of edits which is quite handy.
Of course, there are many other point and shoots out there, but those are the ones that were contenders for me.
4) Camera phone
I have an iphone 5 and have been happy with the quality of my ‘snapshots’. Check out this photo I posted earlier on this blog:
Not bad at all and if the conditions are favourable, the camera phone can save the day in a pinch. I always have on me and can ride normally with it of course. Ultimately, this was a major reason why I ended up not getting a point & shoot.
CONTINUED BELOW…
2) Mirrorless
Ok, so I since I saved this one for last, it must be the best, right? Not necessarily. The draw of mirrorless cameras has to be the smaller size, and the claim to be close to DSLR quality. Nowadays, there are so many different systems within the ‘mirrorless’ heading that it’s getting a little convoluted.
I find that mirrorless cameras are priced as high, or even higher than consumer DSLR’s, and with most of them, you’re just paying for the smaller size. Well, smaller sized bodies. Once you add a zoom lens on them though, the size-savings become less apparent. They definitely won’t fit in a pocket, and you will still have to lug around a bag when you go out.
The newest mirrorless cameras have DSLR-like quality apparently (dynamic range, iso, etc) but they are also priced the highest. Don’t forget to check out the smaller DSLR offerings from Canon and Nikon - the size isn’t so different, and the quality is better for the price. If you already own some lenses from one of those, just adding the newer smaller body will be more cost-effective for sure.
As I mentioned before, looking at year old models is a great way to save some money if the feature set hasn’t changed too much.
So, the leading contender here for me was the Olympus OM-D EM-5. It’s small and is DSLR-like. It shoots at 9 frames per second and has been used for magazine shots. It has now been sort of replaced by the EM-1, which means, the price is dropping! And since it’s part of the micro 4/3’s group, it takes Panasonic lenses too!
My wife’s cousin bought one and brought it over, so I got to play with it for an hour. Well, it was okay. It’s small and light, but I found that with a zoom lens on it, I would still need to treat it like a DSLR. The ISO was okay, and so was the overall handling except for the lug for the strap that gets in the way of my shooting hand. Actually, that lug did bug me a lot in hindsight. A camera definitely has to feel good in your hand, otherwise you won’t use it as much.
However, it would definitely be good to have for the snow as it is weatherproof. If I didn’t have a camera, I would choose the EM-5….. but I do and investing heavily into a new system that will not replace my dslr’s didn’t get me too excited.
Lastly, to get the best lenses for it, it would cost a mint -> $750 for the 12-35, $730 for the 7-14, $430 for the 100-300 (all Panasonics).
So, my fever for a new camera cooled off.
Recently though, I was suggested the Nikon 1 series, and while initially viewing it with disdain, I’ve come around to it in the last couple of weeks.
Ok, so the Nikon 1 cameras have a smaller sensor than micro 4/3’s, and other companies, like Sony, are using DSLR crop sensors (and now, full frame sensors!). So why even consider the smaller sensor??? Well, apparently, the image quality isn’t too bad and more importantly, the smaller sensor means that smaller lenses can be made for it. My big problem with mirrorless was the large lenses wrecking all the pocketability touted in the advertising. The Nikon 1 series has a 2.7x crop, which means the small 30-110 lens is the equivalent of a 81 -297mm lens ... yet smaller than my 50mm lens!!!
By adding the FT1 adapter, you can use regular Nikon lenses and with the 2.7x crop, they will give you a crazy reach. The 70-200 turns into a 189-540!!!
So, you have a point and shoot body with point and shoot sized lenses with crazy reach and 15fps (with continuous focus)!! Sounds like it’s exactly what I was looking for. The small size will not only be great for snowboarding, but should be perfect for family outings and vacations. Instead of a DSLR with 35 and 85 primes in my bag, the Nikon 1 V2 with the 10-30 and 30-110 will easily fit in my wife’s purse - and she can carry it too ha ha.
So, it sounds good, right? What could be bad about it? Well, the biggest question mark for me is the picture quality. I’m really hoping it’s better than a point and shoot and decent indoors. Unfortunately, I won’t know this until I buy it.
The other downside is the price. The Nikon 1 series is overpriced for sure, but prices have dropped a lot here in Japan. In the US, they haven’t though, so it isn’t world wide. Maybe Nikon will do like Canon and only release it’s next mirrorless camera in Asia.
Lastly, the smaller sensor makes shallow depth of field very difficult. This, I think, I can make do without.
To sum up the Nikon 1 V2:
Pros:
-reasonably priced on sale (in Japan)
-small & light
-lenses are small & light too
-takes Nikon lenses with adapter
-fast autofocus
-15 fps
-2.7x crop so you have more reach for action photography
Cons:
-price
-shallow DoF is harder to achieve
-(for me) picture quality is unknown
So, I think I will be buying the Nikon 1 V2 when the price drops a touch more, and I will post updates on it’s peformance.
Feel free to shoot over any camera questions - after all this research, I may as well share!
I rode happo banks last year. Sooooo much fun. Great photos.
This thread is making me extremely jeleous. I really wish I was there this season.
Bring on 2015
What dates are ya lookin at in 2015, DJS?????
Honshu or Hokkaido?????
Probably Hokkaido this time Mizu.
Looking at sometime in Feb at the stage
Probably Hokkaido this time Mizu.
Looking at sometime in Feb at the stage
Well most probably cross tracks then????? 
Hopefully mate 
This time Sunday I’ll be just arriving in Hak!!!!
Bring it.
Nice mate. Have you looked into the Nikon AW1 at all? could be a good choice when the price drops due to its ruggedness
Yeah, K2, the aw1 was my first choice due to the waterproofing. It would make for sick follow cams on pow days. BUT
-it just came out so it’s pricey
-no viewfinder
-only the 10-30 lens is waterproof. So adding a different lens would compromise the waterproofing
Thought it had a 10mm prime to other was waterproof.
Yeh didn’t think about no view finder. I don’t really like shooting the point’n'shoot style anymore
I am glad I am not the only one who think the viewfinder is important!
My sister (a professional) was like - “Viewfinders are obsolete get over it!” years ago!
I only use the screen on my DSLR if I wanna look at an image that I’ve just taken, or if I’ve got the camera on the ground or above my head!!!!!
Maybe if I were to shoot video I’d use the screen also, but I’m yet to do that with it!!!!!
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Nikon V2
Well, as I posted last week, I was interested in getting the Nikon V2 but I was holding out for a drop in price. In the meantime I missed out on a number of photo ops where a small camera would have been perfect. So, I caved in and bought the damn thing! So, I bought the Nikon 1 V2 double lens kit, and a telephoto zoom separately. My three lenses are: 18.5 F1.8 (50mm equiv), 10-30 F. 3.5-5.6 (27-81mm equiv) & 30-110 F. 3.8-5.6 (81-297mm equiv).
So, I now have a 27-297mm range, with a 50 prime for portraits or when I need a shallow depth of field.
Here is a miniscule review.
First off, I’ll talk about what I like about it so far:
1)size.
This thing is so light that I can carry the body and 3 lenses (10-30,30-110, 18.5) and it still feels like my backpack is empty! It does not hamper my snowboarding in any way, but the camera backpack I’m using does play a part in that.
I now have loads more room in my pack! That’s a small ICU in a F-Stop Loka. If I space out all the lenses then it only takes up half! That day I had packed a D200 with fisheye, and a flash too.
Another good thing about the size: it totally doesn’t look like a serious camera 
This can be a good thing at sporting events or concerts - nobody will think that you’re getting good shots with your toy camera.
2)15 fps with continuous autofocus!
Yep, you read that right, 15 frames per second! This is better than Nikon’s top sports camera, the D4 (only 10fps)! This is awesome if you want to spray-and-pray (but it’s always better to train yourself to nail the shot with one frame). I found it useful yesterday when shooting a guy doing a pillow drop. On pillows it’s hard to decide before hand which will look better: as the rider goes off the first pillow/ in the middle/ or landing, with the spray all around and the destroyed pillows in the background. It only took 3 seconds for the drop but I now have 45 frames to choose the best action from. One negative to this is having 44 extra 14 megapixel shots that have to be deleted afterwards.
I sometimes just shoot at 5fps so it doesn’t get too ridiculous (with unwanted frames).
3) controls
The controls are quite intuitive and the camera is easy to use. Pushing the ‘F’ button gives you instant access to all the important settings you might need to change on the fly, eliminating the need to dive into the menus to change ISO for example.
4) photo review IN the viewfinder!
This should be number one on the list I think. Outside, in the snow, reviewing shots on the lcd is always really hard on my DSLR’s. Now, I can check the shots in the viewfinder, and can even zoom in too! It’s so good in bad or bright weather!!
5) viewfinder/lcd
One of the reasons why I chose the V2 was for the viewfinder because I find it helps me compose shots better. However, when it’s snowing out and I don’t want to take my goggles off and push my helmet up, composing with the lcd is quite useful!. It’s also useful when handing the camera off to someone. To them, it’s just a point & shoot.
The negatives:
1) controls
The dials turn too easily and just pulling the camera out of the camera bag can result in the shutter speed or aperture getting changed.
2) picture quality
I’m still evaluating this, but properly exposed shots have noise in the shadows, even at base ISO (160). Totally fine for web use though, and looks great on facebook. Should be fine for family/ trip photos. C’mon Nikon, make a camera this small have DSLR quality and great ISO, and you’d blow the market away.
3) no blinking highlights, questionable histogram
I like to know when my highlights are blown and I’m disappointed they didn’t put this feature in the V2. Not sure about the histogram. I had some shots that looked ok on the histogram but were blown out. Still evaluating. Need to sit down and compare shots on the lcd and on the computer screen to decide how accurate the lcd is. For example, on my DSLR I have the lcd screen on -2 brightness to match my computer screen.
That’s all I’ve got for now. So far, so good. I mentioned the picture quality being questionable, however, all the colour photos from this post were taken with the V2. The black and white’s were with a Nikon D200.
https://www.boardworld.com.au/forums/viewthread/14928/P210/#232482
Here’s a shot of my daughter at ISO 3200 that turned out well. The grain doesn’t look too bad, and it looks sort of film-like.
The next step is to print some out to see how they look.
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Weekend at my local resort in Toyama
We had a storm coming in for the weekend and I was constantly checking the weather updates to see where the most snow would fall…well, same as every week
Amazingly enough, it looked like Toyama would get the most, so I decided to kill two birds with one stone: ride the best pow AND keep the family happy.
Toyama has a wetter snowpack than Hakuba, Myoko, Nozawa etc and usually the day after it snows, the snow gets heavy and lumpy. This was actually really good for the current conditions as rain had hardened the resort snow to bulletproof status and the light new snow in Hakuba just brushed away easily (so I heard). The heavier Toyama snow stuck to the rain crust and instantly made a softer base.
TL:DR version: We had great snow in Toyama!
The highlight of the weekend was finding this pillow line and hitting it twice.
The pillows were super soft and there was a nice landing. I wanted to do it again straight away but as many locals tend to do, they (a guy & 2 girls) wanted to take a break. 
I grabbed my camera bag and found that they were still breaking and didn’t look to be moving any time soon. That’s when I ran into a guy from work. I thought, perfect, he can be my camera man, and off we went.
It started snowing hard though and I decided to take him into the trees for a spicy run. It’s a bit of a maze in the trees and I missed the open zone I had wanted and ended up taking him down a super narrow gulley. I gopro’d it but the footage looks meh. Just didn’t have a smooth run, but at the bottom I was surprised to run into three kamoshika who were just hanging out. I instinctively stopped but then remembered the gopro and tried to get closer - but they ran off. It would have made awesome footage if I aired over them…and even better if they were waiting for me to headbutt me. Anyways, I had to wait for my co-worker to make his way down because he didn’t know the way.
After getting out of the forest, co-worker went home with tired legs and I ran into Yusuke, a local ripper.
He agreed to take my photo and off we went to the pillow line.
Just getting to the line there were four drops…which I had forgotten. It was lunch time and I was hungry which usually means I don’t function very well. I got over the first two and then was surprised by the third, veered off course. I tried to stop on the toes and fell off a pillow backwards. I landed on a chunk of ice and thought I had broken a rib. Snow started sluffing on top of me and so I had to interrupt my feeling-sorry-for-myself and scrambled out of there quickly. My ribs weren’t broken, just bruised and I made my way down to the pillows. Again, they were exquisite.
We did a quick loop and I shot Yusuke before I headed to get my daughter from snowboard school.
Yusuke landed it for a second but then slid out
All in all, it was a great weekend!
All photos were shot with the Nikon V2 in heavy snow conditions. 1/1000 F5.6 ISO 200