Walking the streets of Porto with a camera like the Hasselblad is no easy task, its a heavy camera , it’s not easy to ‘point and shoot’ which means you need to be more aware of your surroundings to capture special moments.
For ease I use the 35mm lens, as its lighter and easier and yes it distorts but thats easily fixed in post. Also in my bag is 70-100mm lens which is very heavy, but it takes a cracker of a shot, but I don’t often take it out.
I love the colours and texture of the Hasselblad, and Phocus offers good post solutions, however I must say I still prefer Lightroom, probably because I am more familiar with it.
Taking pictures that are not posed seems more difficult, as there is a split second that the key emotion or moment exists for, and thats what your instinct needs to tell you, press the shutter at the exact moment or miss it.
The ISO is not great on this camera, and the lenses are also not fast, so you really cant in my view shoot in ‘low light’ situations that easily.
Can you believe Hasselblad released the H4D50 in 2010 for 19,995 euro’s – thats a small fortune for a camera I have to say. And ten years later you can find the camera body for between 2’500 euro’s and 5’000 euro’s depending of coarse on the condition. Thats without a lens! So putting a kit together can be a challenging experience.
The question is : Is it worth it?
Sadly, my view-finder broke through transit, so its with Hasselblad in Sweden being fixed and then more imagery can be captured, and more stories told.
I must say when I am lazy, I just pop my IPHONE from my pocket and grab an image to, and its almost always a good shot.
With the HASSELBLAD, I love the challenge, and the experience of shooting with it, and the excitement of getting home and downloading the shots and seeing the beauty of this incredible camera.
Bruce Mac (from Porto THE CITY OF ANGELS)
FEATURE FILM DIRECTOR 