The Ricoh GR digital menu system is fairly straightforward and easy to use. One simply presses the button in the center of the dial on the back of the camera and scrolls the options with the up/down and left/right buttons.

It's pretty well laid out and easy to learn. You can save two lots of settings and the camera starts up with the last settings you have chosen. Unfortunately I can find now way to name the settings files so I only have the choice of either 'settings1' or 'settings2'. This is a bit annoying because I want to have for example; 'low light settings' where I have a faster standard ISO and 'normal daylight settings' when ISO is 64 or 100. I could also have a batch of settings for spot metering called 'zone settings' and one for 'flash settings'. I'd like to see this improved if possible.

Confusingly, under the IMG SET option you can chose Normal, Hard, Soft or two custom image settings also called 'settings1' and 'settings2'. These options refer to contrast, sharpening and colour depth. Again, after saving your own settings you have no way of remembering what the settings were for. I will probably stick with normal or soft and leave sharpening until PhotoShop.

I never use the ISO AUTO setting because I prefer to be sure of what I'm getting, but in playing with the camera I have noticed that in this mode the ISO chosen by the camera is not displayed during playback. The only way to find out what the camera chose is to look at the EXIF file information in PhotoShop. I will never use this setting but I'd like to know what the camera recommends and how it decides what to chose. Another one for the firmware page.

The dial on the back of the camera that is called the ADJ button is normally used for changing the shutter speed in manual (M) mode. However, it can also be pressed inwards like a button to gain quick access to four menu options of your choice. I like this feature because I can quickly get access to ISO, metering and exposure modes and I'd like to see it expanded to hold more options. The only thing I'm not too keen on is the action of the dial when pressed. It feels a little scratchy and cheap.

I'm starting to get the hang of the controls and the playback of images. Soon I'll get the familiarity I need to use this camera quickly and intuitively. Macro, flash and self-timer options can be accessed by simple button presses and images can be viewed as thumbnails or full size. You can even zoom into a picture to check if it's sharp.

I like the fact that the self-timer can be set to either 10 seconds or 2 seconds. I often use the self-timer on my FM2 instead of a cable release when shooting on a tripod and I have to wait longer than I'd like each time. Its nice to have a fast timer for this kind of thing to save me buying the Ricoh cable release!

A Trip Down the Vallee Blanche: 17-4-2006

I decided to take the GRD with me on a snowboarding day to the Vallee Blanche in the Chamonix area of France. The Vallee Blanche is a huge glaciated valley that offers amazing skiiing for those of us daft enough to want to go there. Almost every year a skier is lost to a crevasse.

Chamonix has had a lot of snow this season and not too much sunshine. However, we chose a good day and the sun blazed down as we headed up to the famous Aguile du Midi station. At the top I got out the GRD to take some pictures of the view and noticed the battery level to be on less than half! Oh dear I'd forgotten to bring the spare. Its going to take me a while to get used to this problem. I've taken my old manual film cameras for granted for a long time.

Throughout the day I took various pictures of our descent of the Mer de Glace. I was using the multi-segment metering with multi-point autofocus in 'still image' mode. The ISO setting was 64 and for the odd shot I increased the exposure by 0.3 EV to compensate for the intense glare.

I passed the camera to my partner at various points so she could take some shots of me.

The picture quality/size was set to 'F 3264' which gives a fine JPEG file of 3264 x 2448 pixels using low compression resulting in a file size of about 3MB. I was pleased with the results given the conditions and the difficulty in reading the screen.  All the images have been reduced for the web.

This is a difficult shot for any camera but the GR digital has coped quite well.  Lens flare is to be expected without a hood and exposure is not too bad.  Those black cigar shapes to the left are not actually UFO's.  They are cable cars bringing skiers from the Italian side.  Exposure settings: (hand held, AF multi, still image mode, ISO 64, 1/870 sec @f10).

Here's one of myself, I'm afraid. Taken by Nina.

It's always difficult for any auto exposure system in these conditions.  Ideally,  I'd have given this one an extra 1/3rd of a stop or bracketed.  Dark clothes against dazzling snow is a recipe for disaster but it's a pretty good effort really.  Besides, what does snow really look like?  I can't take my goggles off up there because its just too bright and hurts my eyes!  Perhaps the snow could be less blue and a little more exposure would help?  But with PhotoShop it probably only needs a color tweak.  The reality is that most photographers use polarizers and tweak on the computer until they get an image that 'looks right'.  But,  the final image looks how it does when you're wearing sun glasses or ski goggles,  not how it does with the naked eye.

At lunchtime we were approaching an area called the 'Salle a Mange': the dining room.  This is a flatish area of the Mer de Glace where it's relatively safe from avalanches and hence a good place to stop for lunch.  Just before the Salle a Mange we passed the junction of two tributary glaciers and had to stick to a treacherous narrow path, constantly aware of the danger of hidden crevasses.  The people we saw below us in the following shot were told by a passing guide that where they were was not a good place to be. (still image mode: 1/810th sec @ f10.9, ISO 64).