I was invited to Friday Harbor in the San Juan Islands recently. Barbara Cox, the owner of Photokunst, a photographic fine arts marketing firm, had arranged an event to support a new photography museum. While there I had the good fortune to meet Michael Adams and his wife Jeanne, the owners of the Ansel Adams Gallery in Yosemite. As you might imagine, Michael is the son of the seminal photographer. Michael spoke about nature photography and about Ansel. I was delighted to hear that Michael thought Ansel would have embraced our new digital tools just as he did the tools of his darkroom.

They are a delightful couple, well-versed in the photography of the natural world and completely gracious. They invited me to place some of my prints in their gallery, and of course I was honored to accept. Ansel Adams’ career, melding artistic pursuits with environmental messages, has been one of my lasting inspirations.

Phase One P 45+ Medium Format Back

My friend Kostas Mallios loaned me a Phase One P 45+ digital back for a week, a full-frame 39 megapixel capture system I tested with a Mamiya 645 body. The resolution and dynamic range are astonishing. It’s not just that the files look creamy smooth, but the dynamic range approaches that of the human eye, far exceeding other technologies. As my friend Scott Stulberg says, it’s yummy.

Operating a digital medium format system slows you down. I felt as if I was using my old 4 x 5 view camera again. It’s a much more deliberative process, and by slowing down, the compositions are better considered with fewerof the small flaws I would catch later. With the resolution so high, I can get away with a shorter focal length lenses by cropping quite a bit without losing much in terms of resolution and nothing at all in terms of dynamic range.

My SLRs are more flexible, lighter, quicker, and offer a much wider range of lenses. The best of them surpass medium format film in my opinion. For my work, they’re indispensable. However, if I were a fine art photographer looking for the last iota of definition, the nearest approximation of perfection, I would be sorely tempted.

I forgot to mention the last, greatest, and for me only significant disadvantage. For the price of a Phase One P 45+ camera system including a couple lenses, you could buy a luxury automobile. A fast one.

PS I am afraid to try a P 65. A man can only take so much temptation.