Shooting with the 65:24 custom ratio - XPan images on the Lumix S5

I can't afford a Hasselblad XPan  - who can nowadays? Here in New Zealand they can go for as much as $7000.00! But hey - that's with a lens buster! If, that is, you can find one. Rare as hen's teeth they are. People just don't want to part with them. And that's because they are:

1. A Hasselblad
2. An XPan - a camera that managed to be something not many other cameras are - truly unique.

I'm fairly sure I'll never own one, and for a long time I wasn't sure I wanted to (but oh, I do!). Because the XPan's image ratio is what sets this camera apart from most others (certainly in the 35mm film space). Its 65:24 'panorama' view could almost be seen as a gimmick. Or just plain weird. And that's what I thought when they were first introduced in the 1990's - the love-child of Hasselblad Sweden and Fujifilm Japan. The camera you didn't know you needed, until you saw one.

How many photos do you want to shoot at an extreme 65:24 aspect ratio? Isn't a bit of a novelty isn't it? A bit like a fisheye lens point of view. Get's old real fast. Am I right?

Nelson Waterfront. Lumix S5 in 65:24 aspect ratio with S 20-60mm . f/8 @ 125th, ISO 100

Nope. Turns out I'm wrong! Dead wrong. It looks like those clever Swedish/Japanese engineers knew what the hell they were doing when they designed the XPan. Shooting in the 65:24 aspect ratio is not only a whole heap of fun, but amazingly helpful when composing an image. And fortunately for me - even though I don't have an XPan, I do have a Panasonic Lumix S5, which just so happens to shoot in the 65:24 aspect ratio (amongst others).

In a recent trip to Nelson, my wife and I took a stroll along the waterfront in the early evening, hoping to get some half-decent photos of the boats and wharf. It was a lovely evening, with some very nice light. BUT, there wasn't much in the way of cloud action in the sky, or foreground action either. I shot for a while in the usual 3:2 aspect ratio, and wasn't digging the results. But then I thought to myself - 'self, what would it look like if I got rid of the foreground and bland sky, and shot XPan style'.

Boatshed Cafe, Nelson. Lumix S5 in 65:24 ratio with S 20-60mm . f/8 @ 1/50th, ISO 100

Boom! Instantly better photos! Well at least I think so. The Panoramic-style format has not only allowed me to get rid of the bland sky and foreground, but it also suits the horizontal composition of the building jutting out into the water. It 'accentuates' to horizontality (is that a word) of the subject - and I love it. And far from being the 'only' composition I could use it with, the opposite seemed to be true. Everywhere I looked there were images crying out to be 'XPanned'!

Fishing off the Wharf, Nelson. Lumix S5 in 65:24 ratio with S 20-60mm. f/8 @ 100th, ISO 100

Now I know what you're thinking. These aren't really 'XPan' images. They're just full frame 3:2 images 'cropped' in camera to produce the look of the 65:24 ratio. And of course, you'd be 100% keerect. But when you look through the viewfinder of the S5 in 65:24 ratio, that's what you see. And you can compose accordingly. A bit like when you switch the camera to shoot mono and you get to 'see' in mono through the viewfinder. It elevates the user experience in a way that 'pre-visualising' can't.

And just like shooting in monochrome, as long as you are also capturing a RAW image, then you are still retaining a colour 3:2 full-frame image. Actually - that's just given me an idea.... How about using the 65:24 aspect ratio and setting the camera to monochrome, for that truly old-school film shooting feel. I hadn't thought of that! (Note to self...)

Boat at Dusk, Nelson Harbour. Lumix S5 in 65:24 ratio with S 20-60mm lens. f/8 @1/25th, ISO 100

Sure, it means that you are 'throwing away' about half the megapixels in the image - but with a full frame camera and 24MPs they still end up being a decent size and have plenty of detail to work with in post.

And speaking of 'post' - I've made a huge change recently to my post-processing. I've dumped my Adobe Photography subscription and moved to something else for all my RAW processing and photo editing. What did I go with? I'll let you know in the next blogpost.... 😉

Serenity. Panasonic Lumix S5 in 65:24 ratio with S 20-60mm. f/8 @ 1/60th, ISO 800

I loved photographing Nelson Waterfront in the 'Hasselblad XPan' 65:24 aspect ratio. I had an absolute blast. And it proved to me that the 65:24 aspect ratio isn't just a gimmick. It's a bona fide choice for really strong compositions - with the right subject.

Is it enough to make me want a Hasselblad XPan? Yeah - it kinda is. It's certainly shown me that it wouldn't just sit on the shelf gathering dust. Will I ever use one 'for real'? Nah. Probably not. It's a bit like the Leica conundrum. Yes, I'm sure they are nice. But for that price, I'd rather have a couple more lenses for my Panasonic and change left over! Dreams, however, are free.....