I just made my business buy me a much awaited Ricoh GX-100. My original intent and justification was to put it on top of a carbon fiber pole to make better aerial photos. A DSLR is a really too heavy for an handheld pole; the GX-100 is a good option for a lightweight aerial camera and is sufficiently expendable. It have a short 5s interval shutter, real time video output and a remote release – with a ridiculously short cable, but it should be hackable.
But I haven’t yet all the pieces to use it on a pole yet, so I tried it for real estate photo. The lens is a 24mm equivalent, the wide angle converter makes the lens a 19mm equivalent for a 85*63° field. It’s the only wide agle compact available new. And it got manual exposure modes and a flash hot shoe. First results are OK:
I use it with a little 2*AA flash offered with an olympus trip 35 from the junk sale:
I think I’ll get a mecablitz 20-C2, small but with a bounce head; or better a Sunpak DS-20 with a slave function, but not available in europe. Unless the Ricoh seems really too small with a Nikon SB-24:
And it can be used with wireless triggers, too:
It seems possible to use the Nikon WC-E68 adapter to get the wider field of a 16mm lens (94*71°) with a 43-46mm step-up ring.
The advantages are the compactness of the camera, and the relative affordability : the whole system costs 500€ exc.VAT, against 1000€HT exc.VAT for a D40+sigma 10-20+SB-600. It is possible to give one for each co-worker.
But there is limitations too: the automatic modes aren’t enough without a TTL flash for an average person, using the manual exposure modes and relying on a not so good against another light source 1960s photocell isn’t really great. Trial and error is better. And you lose the compactness if you pick up a tripod.
Discuss.