Pregled posta

Marketing

On the train (Dehradun Shatabi) from Delhi to Dehradun I was really bored. I finished a book, an entire Time magazine, hung out the side of the train. This was a self-portrait shot in the mirror of the sink on our car.

I'll use this space to express my disappointment in the trip.

I was so excited to get to the Nikon "DSLR Zone" in Connaught Place in Delhi (Dass Studios) to get my lens, filters, and sensor cleaned. I've grown tired of trying with no luck to clean them myself and I have dozens of spots that I have to painfully remove from most my images (anything with a sky).

I get there and first the men manning the Nikon booth acted like they had never touched a camera in their life! I didn't care that they didn't speak English, but it unnerved me that they didn't seem to have a clue about the products they were selling. Finally they brought over another guy who could communicate in my language (I haven't been a good practicer of Hindi...) and I explained to him my problem with the spots and desire for them to professionally clean my camera. He simply looked through the viewfinder up at the ceiling and glanced at my lens and declared, "It doesn't seem very dirty at all, it's fine."

What.

After I repeated that his looks deceive him he finally shared that they had no resources to clean the camera on location, it would have to be sent somewhere else.

What.

I'm so dissapointed in that store and Nikon themselves for heralding the place on their website. I don't want to leave it to the tiring adage: "Oh, it's just India." But I could walk into any Nikon dealer in the States and have my equipment cleaned in no time on site.

I was even more unnerved when I asked him about cleaning it myself.

He showed me his idea of "the best way." He breathed on the lens and wiped it with a chammois. When I pressed further he explained they don't have any camera cleaning kits in stock either.

Determined to get some use of the store I asked them about a new lens hood. Mine gets in the way with my 18mm and I was hoping for one that would allow me to shoot with the hood on all the time.

They looked at me with puzzled faces. I pulled out my lens hood to explain, still hopeful they would have one.

Nope.

So I was completely shot down and my excitement to finally have my camera cleaned dashed.

What's even more annoying is that I wandered through Palika Bazaar, a huge underground (both literally and metaphorically) market beneath Connaught Place and found a camera dealer who carried on with me in fantastic camera talk. He even knew that the green thing on the top of my camera is a level! I bought a cleaning kit AND lens hood from him. He even showed me a good selection of lenses to consider upgrading to (that are compatible with the D40).

Any Delhians know of a place that offers reliable profesiional camera cleaning in town? I'll be back there in two weeks.

Thanks for listening. Hope my Indian friends take no offense, the events just discouraged me.

this Leica M3 was on loan to me for this photo shoot :)
i hav never wanted a Leica...not until i held this camera, crank and fire off the shutter...then i suddenly realise why so many people are in love with the M3 :)
its a beautifully made camera, everything feels rite and solid

this particular piece belongs to a used camera dealer, its his personal camera, not easy to find a M3 in this mint condition :) the chrome is still in its original color without any wear or fading