P3D Credit Where It's Due

[fotoschack@xxxxxxxxx (Gary Schacker)]

Many of you may know Joel Alpers of "Rocky Mountain Memories".  One of
the many fine products and services he offers is the twinned Olympus
XA-2 rig.  Now there's two ways in which you can get one of these.  You
can buy it ready made from Joel, or you can supply the cameras and he'll
twin them for you.  Both at very reasonable prices.  I chose to go the
latter route.   When using auto exposure cameras for stereo, there is
always the possibility that the exposures chosen by the cameras will not
match.  Being aware of this, I was careful to at least listen to my two
examples to be reasonably confident that they were choosing similar
shutter speeds under various lighting conditions.  I sent them off to
Joel who did a very neat job on them and also supplied a high quality
custom bar for them to sit on.

Much to my chagrin, the first two test rolls were at least two stops
different from each other!  The cameras were indeed choosing similar
speeds, it was the apertures that were different!  Joel assured me that
this was a rarity.  Usually if they sound the same they are the same, or
close to it.

So why am a telling you all this?  Because even though this was really
my screw up, Joel was kind enough to take them back, open them up,
adjust and test them until they were a good match.  I'm sure it took
plenty of time.  He even sent back test shots so I could see how close
the exposures are.  All at no extra charge.

When you do business with Joel, Dr. T, and others on this list you often
get more than you expect (or deserve).          

Gary Schacker


------------------------------