Unless you buy used gear, there's no point reading other people's opinions at all. All you need to do is to buy whatever you fancy from B&H and evaluate/ form your own opinions yourselves. If it doesn't works for you, return it back to B&H within 30 days. The point is to dare to use your reason.
Danner wrote:
It's got the copyright notice on it, it's publicly hosted on KR.com, and there is no economic gain or loss involved. No copyright issue.
Yeah, but that ain't exactly cool.
There are some pretty good shots (though yeah, to me too, way oversaturated) on his site and at least he posts pics. Most of his stuff looks like family shots and stuff taken on vacation, which most people do.
While I scratch my head at somethings he says I still read it occasionally. I admire the fact that he marches to his own beat, that's refreshing. If you don't want to do a ton of post work. My hats off to you.
Good for him, he's been doing it so long there are freaking film camera reviews on his site.
I also really like that for the most part he does not rip on anyone else.
I would like to see more stuff about photography and not cameras on YT and elsewhere anyway.
KR's crusade against what he called "mud brands" (Sigma and Tamron; for some inexplicable reason he was extolling the Tokina lenses) was at times hilarious and at other times irritating.
I'm reading his site from time to time but I'm often wondering if every opinion bit he writes is actually sheer misdirected comedy like his "Leica man" sketch (at least the bit about him declaring only Leica lenses worthy of being put on Leica cameras was tongue-in-cheek; I saw it being quoted in this thread somewhere).
I like Ken. He and I have very different opinions of good photos, very different tastes in the "look" of our photos, and use cameras very differently. But he provides tons of info on cameras and the history of development that you can't get anywhere else, and he does an excellent job of providing lens recommendations that you may not have known about, or varying recommendations based on what body you have or what type of photos you want to take. That may seem like obvious stuff to experienced folks, but it's not at all common knowledge to beginners and the reviews really help highlight what aspects of the gear have an impact on different types of images.
He does not claim to be a pro or have a typical taste in images, but you can't really argue with the quality of the information or the reviews. One of the most comprehensive photography resources on the internet IMHO
Not sure if this was mentioned in earlier comments, but KR is an excellent resource if you are into vintage lenses and looking for technical information along with high-res pictures. I have used his site exactly for those pictures of vintage lenses, comparison charts of different versions of same lenses (nikon mf glass enthusiasts will understand how crazy that ca be) and price range.
He makes exaggerated and over the top observations about image quality but in general if he says so and so lens is the best ever made in the history of mankind, rest assured that lens will be good enough.
And honestly, I just like the old school, simple text image text html pages he has rather than fancy webpages with complex elements that bring Chrome down to it’s knees.
Well, Rockwell is pretty absurd. That he only shoots JPEG is just one example. He friggin shoots JPEG even with Fujifilm GFX.
He also often already has "review" pages on products before he gets his hand on said product.
At least he has example images; this property alone puts him far ahead some other "reviewers".
I visit his page from time to time for entertainment, just to check out his newest riddiculous statements. For example an all time favorite of mine is Rockwell claiming the current iPhone would offer better IQ than Fujifilms XF10. His argument is that base ISO of the iPhone is ten times lower than that of the XF10. Unfortunately of course even if this line of argument was actually true, the sensor of the XF10 is 20 times larger than that one of the iPhone.
Rockwell aint no good source on old lenses except you can look up if they exist and how they look and such. The main problem here is that he's one of the very few available sources.
Thern wrote:
Imo the best reviewers are those who tell us what we want to hear
Danner wrote:
It's got the copyright notice on it, it's publicly hosted on KR.com, and there is no economic gain or loss involved. No copyright issue.
What? A copyrighted image was stolen from one site and posted on another without permission. Yeah, that is a problem. The OP should have posted a link.
Danner wrote:
It's got the copyright notice on it, it's publicly hosted on KR.com, and there is no economic gain or loss involved. No copyright issue.
No economic gain is not sufficient for it not being a copyright infringement. Neither is the fact that it's publicly hosted. But its use as a kind of citation within a review is probably a legitimate and legal use of a copyrighted picture.
AcuteShadows wrote:
No economic gain is not sufficient for it not being a copyright infringement. Neither is the fact that it's publicly hosted. But its use as a kind of citation within a review is probably a legitimate and legal use of a copyrighted picture.
Agree. Gain has nothing to do with it.
I am sure Ken would trade the use for free publicity.
KR is very useful for a 30-second, bottom line assessment for gear. He is one data point out of many for those who are doing the research on new gear. No more, no less.
I rather start with someone concise over another who recorded a 20 minute video. Most of the videos are fluff in nature anyway.
LeifG wrote:
This thread is far more civil than I expected.
I used to use online web site reviews to buy goods. I once bought a liquidiser recommended by the Good Housekeeping Institute. It was the worst POS I’ve ever bought and cost a fortune. I gave it to a charity shop. What HiFi reviews sound brilliant, but I couldn’t make head nor tail of them when I tried to work out what they meant. I find owner reviews useful, they tell you about the niggles that appear after a few months, or the reliability issues. Forum threads here are useful. KR is one person with one opinion. As is that big hair chap. They make controversial statements to get traffic. Fair enough. There are a few online reviewers worth trusting IMO, such as Hogan, but even he annoys me at times! ...Show more →
I can’t stand any of the gear head reviewers. None of them are photographers. Any of the interchangeable cameras sold today are capable, the weak link is the ape behind the viewfinder. With that said, check out Steve Perry’s work and reviews. A master photographer. When he says something, I listen.
Nov 18, 2019 at 10:11 PM
imagesfromobjects Offline • • • • Upload & Sell: Off
He's fine, way less aggressively controversial than the current YouTube tribe, slightly less prone to hyperbole than Steve Huff. Occasionally says unfounded and disparaging things about certain brands (Voigtlander, mostly) but all in all, you could do worse. He's really good for lens version history and GREAT if you want to know filter sizes.
I rely much more on Flickr to tell me what I need to know about the rendering of a lens, and Fred and Philip Reeve's crew when I'm looking for strong, highly technical and objective gear reviews.
Sauseschritt wrote:
Well, Rockwell is pretty absurd. That he only shoots JPEG is just one example. He friggin shoots JPEG even with Fujifilm GFX.
Lots of (pro)photogs shooting JPEG only for various reasons.
Nothing wrong with that.
RAW gives a bit more leeway but depending on one's goal it may be not worth the effort.
Thern wrote:
Imo the best reviewers are those who tell us what we want to hear
Sauseschritt wrote:
Well ... then what about the truth ?
Yeah, what about 'THE' truth..
Simple answer, there is NO absolute truth.
That's the very problem with a lot of (if not every) reviews, they're biased by the typical applications and preferences of the reviewer.
A Z will be loved by a macro shooter, detested by a sportsshooter.
A D5 will be detested by a macro shooter loved by a sportsshooter etc. etc.
I consider most reviews to be informative, nothing more nothing less.
Just two guys outthere who I trust, Brad Hill and Steve Perry.
Nonetheless I won't just 'swallow' their reviews as THE truth. (despite I really think they earned my trust over the years)
So it boils down to this..
A review is as good as the viewer/readers ability to view/read and assess the provided information against his own needs for his personal application(s)
KR is informative, doing specs-reviews a lot of time and if one's able to see through his different view on gear his site is usefull (somewhat )
Sauseschritt wrote:
I was mainly complaining that many reviews are either thinly veiled advertisements, or are useless for other reasons.
There aren't even ads on his site. The only thing he promotes are three (occasionally others) major retailers who send him a tiny referral if one uses his links to make a purchase. His site doesn't even generate traffic driven income (pay per click). I find nothing wrong with someone who wishes to be compensated for his time and effort, and if he can squeeze a few dimes from those retailers, more power to him. Most of us use them anyway.
