All About Pocket Knives

brian or any of you folks who can help.
trying to find a suitable camera for net work especially shots close up of tang stamps etc. am considering a rehabilatated konica minolta z1/z2/z3/z10
at an attempt to hold price down. i also will be using it on travel etc. is a 4.1 megapix sufficient or should i go for more. thank you for any help you may offer. also any complaints about overstock.com.
thanks again
mossdancer

Hi Mossdancer,

I don't know much about cameras, but I can and will share my limited experience with you...

I have a 3.1 mega pixel Kodak easy share camera. It has 4X optical zoom, and has been more than enough camera to do everything I need to do with it. As a matter of fact, I usually turn the quality down to get a smaller image when posting things on the internet. (digitally, not physically). With this in mind, I would say that 4.1 megapixels would be plenty. One thing I do know is that optical zoom is superior to digital zoom, so if you have an option, and it doesn't cost a ton more, go with optical zoom.

Bryan

HEY BRIAN,
THANKS FOR THE INFO, I HAVE IT NARROWED DOWN TO THE MINOLTA DIMAGE 3 OR 10. AGAIN THANKS FOR THE ADVICE.
HAVE A GOOD EVENING
MOSSDANCER

HI!

I am going to try and figure out how to share the information I recieved from Mark at Knife world magazine on how to photograph knives. I think that it may be a good article to have as a full time item on the list. More soon

GREETINGS
THANKS FOR THE HEADS UP, I WILL BE WATCHING FOR IT.
AS AN ASIDE, AS A NEW MEMBER, NOT RECOGNIZING YOUR
MONIKER, YHE FIRST TIME I READ ONE OF YOUR POSTS I THOUGHT
FOR AN INSTANT, MY GOSH I HAVE FINALLY RAN ACROSS THE FATHER
OF ALL KNIVES.
THANKS AGAIN
MOSSDANCER

OH, I would like to think that I am sometimes, but as a matter of truth, I am always learning. This has been a great place for me to satisfy my thirst for knowledge. Bryan, Bill and many others are wonderful teachers. WELCOME

Here is the article. Please give credits due where needed.


Shoot That Knife
by B. R. Hughes
If you’re a knife collector you’ve probably had an urge at some time to make a photographic record of one or more pieces from your collection, and many of the working knifemakers in our reading audience have doubtless yearned to make photographs of some particular knife to send a prospective customer.
Rest assured that taking a decent photograph of a knife is not in the same league with brain surgery, and with a few basic guidelines, virtually anyone can come up with a passable picture. Please note that you should not expect to match the work of professional knife photographers such as Doug Box, Gary Long, the incomparable Jim Weyer, or the late Sid Latham. Furthermore, if you’re a knifemaker, and you want some truly good pictures for use in one of the knife publications, hire a pro!
Let it be known at this point, and said loudly, that I am not a professional photographer, and I pose no threat to any of those who are. But, for all of that, over the past 30 years or so I have received payment for literally hundreds of published pictures that I have taken, and while many were only so-so, some were actually pretty good, if I do say so myself! Thank goodness no one will ever know how many I threw away! To sum it up, I don’t know as much about knife photography as some, but I do know more than most!
To launch my lecture, let’s discuss equipment, and we’ll begin with choosing a camera. Don’t for a minute believe that you can buy a “point and shoot” 35 mm at the local discount house for $49.95 or so and get acceptable knife pictures. You must have good lenses, and you must have the capability of focusing as close as a foot or so, and preferably less. You also need manual control of the various camera settings. This does not mean that you must rush out and spend $1000 or more for a quality single lens reflex (SLR) with a zoom lens, although there may be poorer ideas. But unless you’re an experienced, talented amateur photographer, you need something that is rugged and relatively easy to use, and if you’re talented and experienced, I question why you’re reading this!
There are several good cameras on the market that will do the job, but I would recommend the purchase of a Pentax K1000 camera body. This one has been around for years, and the cost is quite modest. You could spend as little as $129 plus postage for one if ordered from the big mail order camera firms that advertise in all of the photography magazines. Or you might spend $179 or so from the local camera shop. Or, you could perhaps spend a median figure if purchased from a national discount chain store, say $159.
Let’s talk briefly about the advantages and disadvantages of each. If you know exactly what you want, and if the merchandise is in stock, there is nothing wrong with ordering from one of the firms that do nationwide advertising. But if you need advice and guidance later on, you’ll get little from them! They’re in business to sell! Too, if you experience problems, the local camera shop may not be too eager to help since you didn’t buy it there. At the discount chain stores, the person working in the camera department probably knows less about photography than you do! The plus is that you can save a few bucks and if the camera breaks down, they will probably give you a new one with few questions asked. The local camera shop will charge you more, but they will also provide the most service, and the personnel there represent a knowledgeable source of information. It’s sad but true—in this old life, you generally get just about what you paid for.
Summing up the “where to buy” quandary, if I could buy it from a good local camera shop for within $30 or so of what I could get it elsewhere, I’d do it. Later on, as you become more knowledgeable about photography, you may want to take advantage of some of those discounts, but in the early going, sound advice is a precious commodity.
So, now we have a Pentax K1000. Nothing works automatically, and that’s exactly what you want. What’ s wrong with an auto camera that sets your lens at the correct readings? Nothing for most shooting, but the bright surfaces of the blades tend to dazzle the meter and give false readings. More of this later. Now, we need a lens. This is even more important than the body, since the lens determines the quality of the picture. If you have a $1000 body and a $100 lens, you have a $100 camera. Since we want to obtain one lens that will almost “do it all,” at least for a while, I strongly recommend a zoom, or variable power, with a range of perhaps 35mm to 70 mm, and with a macro feature. Greek? Not really. With the lens set at 35 mm, you will see objects through the rangefinder at about two-thirds the size you see with your eye. At 50 mm it will appear about the same size, and at 70 mm the object will be magnified about 1-1/2 times. The macro or micro feature simply means that you can focus down to within a few inches of whatever it is you’re trying to photograph.
What will it cost? It depends. The major camera firms such as Canon, Minolta, Nikon, Pentax, and Olympus all make good lens. So do firms such as Sigma, Tamron, Tokina, and Vivitar. If you stick to that list, you won’t go wrong. Do not buy a lens made in Korea, and do not buy an “off-brand” lens. If you mail order it from one of the big photography houses, plan on spending around $125 to $150. Most discount houses won’t stock what you need. Add another $25 or so if the same lens is purchased in a local camera shop. It’s safe to say that you should have $250 to $300 invested in your new outfit.
Don’t worry about a flash, at least for taking pictures of knives. They’re great for birthdays and vacations, but you won’t need one insofar as this narrative is concerned.
You’ll need film, and you must decide if you want to take black and white or color pictures, or color slides. The same general guidelines will apply, so let’s assume you’re going to take color prints. For shooting in dim light settings, you should probably use something like ASA 400 film, which is considered “fast”; for shooting outdoors in bright light conditions, a “slow” film no faster than ASA 100 should be employed. For what we’re going to be doing, let’s compromise and shoot ASA 200.
Finally, we’re ready to take a picture. Here’s my prescription. Choose a day for shooting when there is a rather modest overcast, shading the sun—not a dark, gloomy day by any means. Try to do your shooting outdoors when the sun is directly overhead. Do not try to shoot in bright, direct sunlight, even if it means putting off taking a picture until another day. You’ll need a background for the knife, and I recommend a plain, untextured surface that is a shade of grey or tan, although others will do. Do not shoot from immediately above the knife, otherwise, you’ll generally discover a splendid reflection of the camera showing plainly on the shiny blade. Place the object of your photography so that the point will be in one corner, and the handle in the opposing corner. A major mistake of beginners is that they don’t get close enough to whatever it is they are shooting. Try to fill up the frame. Experience is the best teacher.
In order to get the settings right, have someone place a hand in front of the lens, and take your meter reading off the hand. Don’t do it on the blade, or even the background. You simply can’t beat human flesh. When you’re shooting on the beach, you might want to keep that in mind.
What you want to do is to juggle the figures between the shutter speed settings and the f stops so that the camera’s light meter’ s needle is balanced. Keep in mind that one f stop is equal to one step on the shutter speed. When it comes to f stops, the smaller the number, the larger the aperture of the lens. Thus, f 2.8 is very wide, while f 22 is quite small. You really pay through the nose for zoom lens which go all the way to f 2 or f 2.8, so I suggest purchasing something with a bottom limit of f 4 or f 4.5. We’re not going to be shooting in dim light, and later you’ll thank me for the money I saved you!
I like to shoot with an f stop of f 8 or f 11, if at all possible, and with a shutter speed of no slower than 1/125th of a second. Go much slower than that, and you’ll need a tripod. We’re almost ready to trip the shutter. Now, very carefully frame the knife in the viewfinder and carefully focus the lens so that the maker’s mark is razor sharp, and without moving the camera, release the shutter, but ever so gently.
You’ll soon find that if you’re rather close to the knife, you can probably get good pictures with the zoom set at 35, but if the knife is on the ground and you’re standing, you may need to set the zoom at 70. Should you care to shoot something really close, you’ll want to use the macro, or micro attachment, and this is quite simple to do. Just turn it until this image is focused.
Don’t be disappointed with your initial results. Shoot a lot of film—it’s relatively cheap-and don’t have any enlargements made until you get the “feel” of things. I’ll wager that if you follow the guidelines I’ve laid out for you, by the time you’ve shot eight to ten rolls of film, you’ll be taking pictures that are literally “good enough to publish.”

HELLO PA KNIVES,
THANK YOU FOR FINDING AND PRINTING THE ARTICLE.APPEARS THAT IT WILL TAKE SEVERAL READINGS TO GLEAN THE KNOWLEDGE THAT IT OFFERS.
THANKS AGAIN
MOSSDANCER

I use and older Sony 10x Optical Zoom MVC-FD75
takes a 3.5 floppy. pop it in camera and then pop in the PC. handy!

Not bad overall. See pics at my site. Now there are some really great pics I see from time to time so I knows theres better camera's I paid $450 for mine like 7 years ago.

thanks hawke and to all the rest of you
just took delivery of a minolta dimage z2. from first glance, i might be able to turn it on in a couple of weeks
thanks again
mossdancer