Messages

31

Lenses / Re: small primes to go with SL1?

« on: March 26, 2013, 10:10:13 PM »

given that Canon did design a 22mm f/2 STM pancake for its new M mount, I wonder how hard it would be for them to upscale it slightly and make a similar 22mm f/2 for the EF-S? anybody with optical/manufacturing experience able to weigh in on that?

They're completely different lenses.  The short 18mm flange focal distance of EF-M means that 22mm doesn't need to be a retrofocus design, which is generally harder to pull off well & needs more glass.  EF-S pushes the rear element of EF's normal 44mm flange focal distance back a bit to something like 38mm (hard to find the exact data), but it still has to clear the reflex mirror so there's only so much that can be done.

32

EOS Bodies / Re: Buy, Wait, or Switch? If Canon's next crop body releases don't improve sensor.

« on: March 26, 2013, 04:45:50 AM »

If you don't shoot fast-moving things much, get a 6D.  If you do your part, the images will blow you away.

Too bad you sold your 7D, it's an awesome camera when you need that high-speed shooting & tracking capability.  Its replacement will likely feature a lot of the AF improvements from the 1DX.  Different horses for different courses, but if you've got a 6D & a 7D (II) then I can't think of any situation your bodies can't handle.

33

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: Considering buying a D800 or H4D-31..or full set of canon primes ?

« on: March 25, 2013, 04:45:13 PM »

One other suggestion:  push your 5DIII as far as you can.  Rent the best lenses on the market, try them out, work with the system as though it were medium format.

I'm talking about lenses like the 17 & 24mm TS-E II wide-angles, the best Zeiss ZE primes (some are not that great), the EF-mount Schneiders, the 100L macro, 135L, 200L, etc. etc. etc.  Lenses that are really the best-of-breed available for the EF mount.

This won't fix your DR or flash sync complaints, but as far as resolution goes you should probably get used to working with your existing EF system as though it were an MF system & squeeze every drop of accutance from it before you move up to something bigger, if for nothing else just to be sure that you're comfortable with the painstaking effort it takes to get good solid MF images.  Sounds like your "option C" in your original post...

34

Third Party Manufacturers / Re: Considering buying a D800 or H4D-31..or full set of canon primes ?

« on: March 23, 2013, 08:10:14 PM »

You might also take a good long look at the Leica S system...  It seems to me to be a very nice middle ground between MF images and SLR handling.  It'll certainly give you all the flash sync you need.  Pretty much the same cost ballpark as getting into a Phase or Hassy system but the lens performance is good enough that they should outresolve your grandkids' sensor <grin>.

& besides the obvious Phase choice there's always the Pentax 645D.  That's really an MF camera with close-to-SLR handling too, & certainly priced a lot more reasonably.

35

EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: 5D2 refurb or new 7D as backup to 5D3?

« on: March 23, 2013, 02:10:25 PM »

I gave the 6D another hard look.  Anyone who own it - is the lack of thumb-multipoint control tough to get used to?  I love the thumb multi-control.

It took some getting used to, but the multi-control thingy pretty much does the same thing as the old multipoint button does.  I must say I prefer the multipoint button but the 6D's setup is fine once you get used to it.  Switching back & forth between boides might take a little more patience though.

Oh, something that bothers me about the 6D is the 1/4000th shutter, but even more so, the 1/180's X-Sync for flash/strobes.  That could be a problem as 1/200 is already rough.

yeah, I have wanted to use 8k sometimes in bright light (my 40D could do it...).  I just push it down to ISO 50 instead & that helps a bit...  Haven't messed with flash much but at least they only took away a little bit of flash sync.  1/125 would be really annoying but 1/180 isn't too bad.  I understand why building an 8k FF shutter is hard, but I don't get why everything can't just do 1/250 flash sync though...

I am impressed with the 6D's noise vs. 5D2.  Obviously, smokes the 7D.

Yep, that's why I bought one.  This is really the first digital camera I've owned where I can really say that it easily handles whatever lighting conditions I throw at it.  I've been shooting MRAW the whole time so I don't have to go out & buy 2 more hard drives and the files work really really nicely in Lightroom.

One thing I have noticed is that you really need to turn off the "silent shot" drive mode if you're shooting longer exposures.  I haven't tested to see exactly where it starts, but so far at anything over about 1 second it doesn't get the mirror out of the way fast enough and 1/3 of the frame is black.  It's not really a big deal though, just something to remember.

I've also noticed that I really use the word "really" a lot when I'm tired :-)

36

Lenses / Re: small primes to go with SL1?

« on: March 23, 2013, 01:53:11 PM »

funkboy, it's funny that you mention the nifty 50's focus ring turning too easily, one of the few things that annoys me about my 50mm f/1.4 is that the manual focus ring is very gritty and often snags

That's strange; when I had a 50mm f/1.4 USM the focus ring was decently damped & smooth.  Maybe you should have it serviced?

37

Reviews / Re: Most Objective and Less Objective REVIEWER?

« on: March 22, 2013, 08:42:09 PM »

I think that Michael Reichmann at the Luminous Landscape does great reviews.  Of course he doesn't review a whole lot of gear & he doesn't do technical reviews, which is what I appreciate.  He's really unique in taking a camera & kicking the tires, getting a really good feeling for the handling and practicality of the thing, and talking about it in a way that one can relate to.

38

Lenses / Re: small primes to go with SL1?

« on: March 22, 2013, 11:23:40 AM »

The Voigt 20mm makes a great "35-like" lens on APS-C (it also has the advantage of being FF compatible); the smaller sensor is mostly within it's "sweet spot".  They've also recently released a 28mm f/2.8 pancake.

The new Canon 40mm pancake is also really really nice for the money.  It seems that the new IS wide-angle primes are great too, but I'm not ready to pony up that kind of cash for an f/2.8 lens in a focal length already well covered by my 24-105 f/4L.  If you don't have an F4 or better stabilized standard zoom then the argument may be different for you.

Unfortunately I've found that the old micromotor lenses are basically useless with contrast-detect AF (at least on my 6D).  My nifty 50 just hunts all over the place & often gets false confirmations.  I get the feeling that the contrast-detect AF's feedback algorithm just doesn't work with the slower micromotor.  Using the focus ring in manual mode is also not much fun as it isn't damped & turns too easily as a result.  My USM lenses work well enough for 6D video though.

Personally I think Zeiss should have delivered their classic 45mm f/2.8 Tessar pancake in EF mount while they had the chance.  Now that Canon has a good inexpensive 40mm f/2.8 pancake it's a little late for them to fill that gap.

39

EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: 5D2 refurb or new 7D as backup to 5D3?

« on: March 21, 2013, 08:33:07 PM »

I'd say use a 6D as a backup unless you also want a camera for sports or other telephoto/action type shooting (like birding).

But if you're looking for something with equivalent crop factor and IQ to your 5D3 then the 6D is the way to go.

Of course I'm a bit biased...

40

EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: Picture quality questions 6D.

« on: March 17, 2013, 03:19:45 PM »

You can get "Velvia" like results in a jpeg strait out of the camera on a digital SLR.  But I don't recommend trying.
It involves getting the "picture style", white balance, exposure, etc. exactly right at capture time.  It could be done with a lot of trial & error if one were patient.

But IMHO the main creative advantage of digital photography is being able to post-process so that you can concentrate on getting a well-exposed sharp RAW image while you're shooting & deal with the details later, just as one needed learn to work in a chemical darkroom in order to really be able to get your images the way you want them.  You'll need to bite the bullet & get Digital Asset Management software like Adobe Lightroom 4, Phase One Capture One, or several others out there (those are the most popular among professionals though).  You can even shoot tethered from your computer & see what your camera's sensor is seeing (the 6D even does this over wifi, if you have plenty of batteries on hand :-).

A great website for learning digital photography techniques is Luminous Landscape.  I suggest reading Michael's article on how digital camera exposure works & what it means for your photos.

My experience with Lightroom (can't speak for C1) is that if you learn & understand the concepts that its tools manipulate, you can do far better than just "Velvia".  It gives you the ability to really tailor the image to the subject matter in ways that could never have been done in a chemical darkroom.

If you're worried about the time that post-prod takes, make your most commonly used settings into presets & apply them in groups; you can really plow through piles of images in a hurry.  Load 'em up, sort 'em out (& delete rejects to free up space), apply presets to the keepers in batches, look 'em over & tweak the best ones, publish to pretty much any web or print service you like (there are plenty of plugins out there), and yer done.  Once you master digital asset management, you might look into getting yourself a pro-grade inkjet printer if you have more than an occasional need for prints (especially large ones).

Personally, having recently moved up from my trusty old 40D to a 6D, I can say that it's really pushed me to rediscover my love for photography, as *there just aren't any situations it can't handle* (within reason), and with the 40mm pancake it really becomes a "throw it in your bag & take it with you everywhere" camera.

41

EOS Bodies - For Stills / Re: Picture quality questions 6D.

« on: March 17, 2013, 02:44:42 PM »

Just as a sidenote, if you were planning on getting an ultra-high resolution digital medium format back, methinks it'd be easier to tear your hair out in advance.  Here's what Joseph Holmes had to go through in order to get the quality levels he expected:  http://www.josephholmes.com/news-medformatprecision.html

(skip to the end for the jaw-dropping results though :-)

42

6D Sample Images / Re: Photographs taken OF the Canon EOS 6D

« on: March 12, 2013, 05:10:56 AM »

Chuck Westfall would be proud.

Well, except for the Planar 50 probably, but the rest, Proud Indeed :-).

43

Software & Accessories / Re: RECHARGEABLE - POWER-EX - ENLOOP - IMEDION

« on: March 12, 2013, 04:17:32 AM »

For sessions where I'm using a lot of flash, I've been using the house-brand ULSD batteries from greenbatteries.com & they work quite well...

44

Software & Accessories / Re: RECHARGEABLE - POWER-EX - ENLOOP - IMEDION

« on: March 11, 2013, 09:40:15 PM »

Interesting thread.

I was always interested if the new PowerGenxi NiZn batteries would kill my 550EXs.  Evidently they recycle so fast they'll take a Nikon SB900 to thermal shutdown after 15 shots or so...

At the moment for environments where I want a flash with me (especially now that I have a flashless 6D) but don't plan on using it much I use non-rechargable Energizer lithiums as they last forever & are about as light as AAs get.  They really help keep the weight down in the 270EXII so I never take it out of the bag to save weight.

45

Software & Accessories / Re: Discoverd LAB color Sharpening, Never going back to traditional sharpening.

« on: March 06, 2013, 07:20:44 PM »

Used to work in LAB all the time long ago before Lightroom came out.  Also works great for noise reduction.

I believe Lightroom uses it internally for a bunch of stufff...