Messages

391

United States / Re: Traveling abroad with photography equipment

« on: September 08, 2011, 10:42:21 PM »

I've flown around with lots of gear, and customs agents are actually less likely to ask questions when they see equipment laid out in travel luggage designed for photography, as it is logically very unlikely that you flew to another country and then suddenly decided to invest several grand into not only camera equipment but all the accessories that go with it as well (cleaning kits, remote, filters, etc.).  it's good to see that folks in transportation security still do use some basic common sense when screening.

The only case where you might get quizzed is if you live in a country where it is very expensive to buy gear.

I remember, many years ago, pricing some prime lenses while I was still living in South Africa, and it would have been cheaper to buy an air ticket to Hong Kong and buy the lenses there than to buy in a South African retailer.  So you could have a holiday in Hong Kong, plus buy your lenses for the price of what they would have cost in SA, and then possibly even have some spare change.  Customs were of course wise to this, and you did stand a good chance of your camera gear getting inspected, especially if you were carrying a SLR.  In fact, my entire film SLR kit was sourced overseas - I only bought equipment when I or a family member was traveling.

I think globalisation has seen much more levelling of prices between different countries, so you are less likely to see a premium of a multiple being charged in countries like South Africa any more.

More recently I spoke to a customs agent in SA while registering my gear, and at the time he indicated that they weren't really concerned as long as you were within the limits of 2 mobile phones, 1 laptop and 1 camera.  (That was somewhere around 2005.)

392

United States / Re: Why a shutter curtain?

« on: September 08, 2011, 06:57:19 PM »

The short version while you can 'turn on' a sensor to start a capture, when you turn it off you have to read the photons out as electrons.  That process takes a finite amount of time, and if photons are still hitting the sensor during that time, your exposure is not what you think it's going to be.  So, an electronic first curtain is possible, but shutterless is technically challenging.  In fact, the higher-end dSLRs with a silent shooting mode use an electronic first curtain.  The time it takes to read out the sensor also impacts the max shutter speed - it's faster to shut off the light with a second curtain than read out and clear the photosites over the same area.  P&S cameras have a shutter that is analogous to the second curtain of a dSLR shutter, so the sensor can read out in darkness - and that's with the faster readout time of a CCD sensor (which are read row by row, instead of pixel by pixel for CMOS).  So, bottom line, if you like your fast shutter speeds like 1/4000 or 1/8000 s, you need at least one curtain.

The 1D (mark I) did also have an electronic shutter, but that still required a physical shutter (2nd curtain) in order to leave the sensor in darkness for readout.  the 1D did also have a CCD sensor, unlike the 1DmkII which had a CMOS sensor.

Another concern is that the electronics for an electronic shutter take up real estate on the sensor, using up space which could otherwise be used for photosites - i.e. higher noise.

I suspect we may eventually see fully electronic shutters on a CMOS sensor, but that is a long way off, and a lot of development work would be required.

393

EOS Bodies / Re: Having Multiple Camera Systems

« on: September 06, 2011, 11:37:40 PM »

Depends on proximity to the stage, I suppose, but I'd say the 135L is probably best suited for stage action (or the 200/2L if money is no object, yeah, right...), assuming you want to capture an individual or two.  The 35L does very well for an ensemble, wide enough FOV that even wide open, DoF is not too thin from that distance.

What I was thinking, if you want to go a little wider than the 135L, the 85 f/1.2L may be a problem due to the slow autofocus - geared down for precision.  Would the 85 f/1.8 be a better bet in your view?

394

EOS Bodies / Re: Having Multiple Camera Systems

« on: September 06, 2011, 10:44:30 PM »

85mm f/1.8 - great for portraits of family, great for low light. Why not the 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II?  I have that lens and love it...on my 5DII. On APS-C, it's too long indoors, and for stage performances, f/2.8 just isn't fast enough. IS doesn't help much with action, you need a wide aperture to stop action in low light. The 135mm f/2L is also great for that, but much more expensive and too long for convenient portraits on APS-C.  For $75 more, you could get the 100mm f/2 instead, almost a twin but I'd recommend the 85mm.

Out of interest, which lenses would you recommend as the ideal ones for stage action? 

[/quote]
Funnily, I've hit a creative limitation with the 430EX (we have the original version) in that when working in portrait orientation you cannot bounce the flash behind you because the head won't rotate past 90 degrees.  Admittedly that is starting to become an esoteric requirement, but a lot of photographers rely on being able to bounce their flash behind them.  This may or may not be an issue, and the 580EXII is considerably more expensive.

395

EOS Bodies / Re: will there ever be CFast in DSLRs?

« on: September 03, 2011, 07:11:37 PM »

film size is not relevant, grain would be ASA / ISO to same and still misses the point -- film is inherently many times better resolution than digital and will be for a very very long time

If you don't understand this - get an enlarger, enlarge a 35mm film negative out to 3 ft by 4 ft - then try doing the same for digital at 9600 dpi -- you could kind of stitch this together with a gigapan but that gives the game away; to do this in digital you have to take many many shots and stitch them together

Please can you back this statement up with some quantitative analysis of the subject.

While a lot of criticism has been levelled at the comparison between the 1Ds and Pentax medium format on the Luminous Lanscape (http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/shootout.shtml), some other comparisons have shown a slight edge on the part of the "next size up" film format.  For instance, read http://www.luminous-landscape.com/essays/Cramer.shtml which compares medium format digital with large format film.  In this instance, the large format film had a slight edge, but it wasn't large.

Digital cameras are and always were convenience cameras; that is their reason for existence (raispn d'etre)

Yes there are people selling digital images - printed at 300 dpi on special papers and inks so they last more than a few years; no these really do not match a similar film picture in quality but that isn't the point

Please back this up with facts.

Yes film sees 10 - 11 f stops while digital sees only 4 (which is why we have HDR programs to fake more by combining pictures)

It is pointless getting into a debate about the usable dynamic range of film vs digital, but this is one of the last areas where film still wins over digital by a clear margin.  Digital cameras just do not have the dynamic range of film.  This is not proving a major impediment, although it would very useful to have better DR available in digital.

What all this is getting to is this: digital is not for professionals if you are looking for quality but so few are (think! The iPhone is the most widely used "camera" these days, smart phones with cameras vastly outweigh all other cameras. But this is NOT about popularity, it is about quality)

Yet again - back this up with some facts please.  Show us some verifiable statistics about the percentages of professional photographers who use film vs digital.
Off the top of my head, the main area I can think of, not backed up by facts, where film is still king is in large format landscape photography.  The likes of Ken Duncan just have no choice but to use film for that kind of work.

If you can't come back with some verifiable facts, I will just have to assume you are trolling.

396

Canon General / Re: An article Canon should read.

« on: August 30, 2011, 07:56:12 PM »

....

If in the future, Nikon or Sony even had 1/2 the vision of Apple (which I doubt they ever will), Canon in all their conservatism would fall like a house of cards, just like what Apple has done to their numerous competitors.

Time to play devil's advocate...

• With the AE-1 Canon led the charge to mass-market adoption of SLRs.  Supposedly the AE-1 was the first camera with an embedded microcontroller.
• Canon introduced the world's first inkjet printer.
• Didn't Canon lead the market to the adoption of a full electronic lens interface?  (EOS 650 and EF lens mount in 1987)
• Canon led the market for full frame studio professional DSLRs with the 1Ds.  (It wasn't the first full frame pro DSLR, but it was a major departure in terms of utility.)
• Wasn't Canon the first company to market an enthusiast-level full frame DSLR?  (5D Classic)
• Wasn't Canon the first to release HD video in a full frame DSLR? (5D mkII)
• Wasn't Canon the first major camera manufacturer to launch a 70-200mm image stabilised lens?

Canon has made some daring bets -

• abandoning the FD lens mount and unseating Nikon as the undisputed leader in the pro SLR segment in the process.
• Cannibalising the market for the 1DsIII with the introduction of the 5DII

I'm sure I have missed a few.

Canon may be managed conservatively, but I don't think we can accuse Canon of not having vision.

Canon has made some innovations which have fallen flat - like the use of a pellicle mirror, or eye-controlled auto-focus.  But Canon has also led some ground-breaking market changes - the AE-1, EOS 650, EOS 300D and EOS 350D immediately come to mind.

I will grant that Canon have not introduced any tectonic shifts in the market place lately, so time will tell whether they might lose the edge on innovation.
As for Canon and Nikon being non-entrants or late entrants (Nikon) into the CSC market - I would contend that that is a market which has not proven itself to have given customers a great product yet.  Nikon seems to be entering that market reluctantly - Canon may too.  Time will tell whether either of them can introduce the "iPad" of that market - to tell the truth, most products in that market at the moment are the equivalent of the Apple Newton.


... Time to don the flame-retardant suit... 

397

Canon General / Re: Post a cool B/W!

« on: August 30, 2011, 03:04:50 AM »

Some fun with the old EOS 650:


http://flic.kr/p/agKsiC on Flickr

Canon EOS 650, Kodak Tmax 100, 50mm f/1.4, Speedlite 430EZ

398

EOS Bodies / Re: According to NL 5Diii is a late 2012 camera at the very earliest

« on: August 29, 2011, 11:09:07 PM »

If the 5DIII and 1DsIV will use the same sensor and the 5DIII improves substantially on the 5DII's shotrcomings (mainly AF), I would bet the 5DIII will be released a year or so after a 1DsIV, so the two will be differentiated by time.  If they are temporally close, or the 5DIII is released first, there will have to be a BIG feature gap, and I suspect that will mean a crippled 5DIII rather than a super-enhanced 1DsIV. 

So, which would people rather have?

1) A 5DIII that uses the same sensor as the 1DsIV and has a much better AF system than the 5DII, but is not released for over a year after the 1DsIV?

...or...

2) A 5DIII that offers a couple more megapixels than the 5DII, a slightly better AF system, and maybe 0.5 more fps, and is otherwise the same in most respects as the 5DII, but comes out this year?

While I agree with most points you all have made I think these are the central points.

Canon's issue is that they will absolutely sell more 5DIII bodies and cannot afford to lose them. At the same time they cannot further mess up their market segments. As noted, Canon also still needs to find a reason to make someone pay $8k for the flagship.

I agree the 1D(s) bodies will be first, but they will lose all the market momentum especially if Nikon drops the D800 soon. The D700 was stiff competition for the 5DII already with regard to pure stills. The 5DII sold as well as it did because of video. I think if Nikon adds nice video in the short term, then Canon may well lose many sales.

We seen to all be making the assumption that Canon needs to sell lots of 1Ds bodies.  That may indeed not be the case.

Another view of things may be that Canon needs a flagship studio body that satisfies a small niche and provides bragging rights, and a popular full frame body that makes all the profits.  5Dx bodies sell many times more than the volumes of 1Dsy bodies.  Canon needs to sell lots of 5Dx bodies in order to make a profit.  Canon needs to sell a small number of 1Dsy bodies in order to hold a small number of leading light photographers who influence the masses and a small number of busy pros who have very demanding needs.

I don't think a lack of differentiation between the 5Dx and 1Dsy necessarily hurts Canon.  It could even all be part of Canon's plan. After all, the 1DsIII has proved to be a niche product and the 5DII a huge money spinner.  That has been a success recipe for Canon.

Maybe Canon does not need or want to sell large volumes of 1Ds bodies - which would especially be the case if the margins are low.  Even if Canon could sell a few times as many 1DsIIIs as they are, they would still not approach anything near the volumes of 5DIIs sold.  I would thus suspect that the margins on the 1DsIII are much lower.  (Here I mean the margins for Canon, not for the channel.)  Thus, it may make a lot more sense for Canon to focus on making the 5D series a success, even at the expense of 1Ds sales - which would especially be the case if the margin on the 5DII is better.  Given volumes and the lower tolerances and build quality of the 5DII, I suspect that is the case.

We are all quick to assume that Canon are kicking themselves for cannibalising 1DsIII sales with the 5DII.  We may be wrong.  Canon may have achieved exactly what they set out to do.

399

EOS Bodies / Re: According to NL 5Diii is a late 2012 camera at the very earliest

« on: August 29, 2011, 06:17:09 PM »

There is no way the 5D3 will be as delayed as end of 2012…

Now, that statement smells to me as coming from some poor soul longing for a 5DIII.

I have never bought into the idea that Canon will release a 5DIII before a 1DsIV.  The latter is older, more in need of an upgrade, and will likely be released first.  If (a big IF) we se an announcement for a 1DsIV coming out soon, that puts the 1Ds line on a 4-year replacement, so if that gap trickles down to the 5D line, late 2012 makes perfect sense.

I think also, if Canon could have their way, they would probably like to put a year's gap between the 1DsIV and the 5DIII.  That would be a simple way to maximise 1DsIV sales before the 5DIII comes out.  In a competitive market, however, Canon may not be able to afford to do that.  Back in 2007/2008 Canon was leading the full frame enthusiast segment by a country mile.  That is no longer the case.  Canon will need to take much more account of what Nikon and Sony do.

400

Canon General / Re: EF 300 & 400 f/2.8L IS II Shipping to Selected Dealers

« on: August 25, 2011, 09:08:20 PM »

argh!  why are these lenses so expensive??  I recently installed a new engine in a friends S10.  We paid $2100 for a brand new GM 2.2L engine, NEW, from the local GM dealership.  Think of how much metal, engineering, etc is in an engine.  For the price of ONE lens, we could buy three new engines!

I do not understand :-/  The time to precision-grind glass?   Umm...

LOL, I still want one!

Optical glass (high clarity glass) is not a cheap thing, and there's a lot of glass in these things!

Soon we will see lenses being sold by weight by karats if this glass will keep getting so expensive... or maybe this are the signs of something called monopoly, price fixing between very few players?

The economics of the markets for super-telephoto lenses and car engines are very different.
I suspect that there is not much demand elasticity in the market for super-telephoto lenses - the people who buy them are, mostly, people who have to have them for their work, pretty much regardless of price.  That means that if Canon decreased the price, there would be no corresponding increase in demand.  Similarly, if Canon increase the price, there is little or no decrease in demand.

As you also imply, Nikon is literally the only other game in town, so there is no real competition.  For most users of super-telephoto lenses, jumping ship from Canon to Nikon or Nikon to Canon is not really an option, so Canon and Nikon don't really represent competition to each other.  The only potential for real competition is from Sigma and friends, who haven't yet convinced professionals of the quality of their lenses.

Thus, there is no pressure on Canon to price competitively.  In fact, there is a lot of incentive for Canon and Nikon to mirror each other's behaviour - notice that I did not say "collude".  Even without active behind-the-scenes collusion, Canon and Nikon will closely track each other's behaviour and will only make a break when there is a real strategic advantage to be gained.  It's a bit like the tactics employed in cycle racing.

401

EOS Bodies / Re: 1Ds Mark IV & 5D Mark II Merry-Go-Round

« on: August 25, 2011, 07:43:29 PM »

The only "massively popular" lens that comes to mind is the long awaited and often rumoured 24-70/2.8L replacement. I guess the other lens, "a more specialised lens" could be the rumoured 35/1.4L replacement.

I'm just hoping the new 24-70L has an Image Stabiliser. If not, there's little reason for me to sell my existing stellar copy!

The 24-7- f/2.8L seems plausible, but I doubt Canon will include IS. One of the main uses of the lens is event photography (e.g. weddings) where the subjects are typically moving - which means keeping shutter speeds higher - depending on the situation mostly over 1/80s.  That means that IS will not be a big benefit.  I know my wife would not pay the price premium for an image stabilised lens at that focal length (assuming the price premium is similar to the premium on the 70-200mm lenses).  The story is entirely different with a 70-200mm lens - to be sure to get a shot at 1/80s at 200mm, you need IS.  That is why the 70-200mm f/2.8 USM IS II is so popular.  I suspect that the market for 70-200mm lenses is probably much bigger than for 24-70mm lenses, which is why Canon can bring to market 4 L series variants.
In the 24-xxx focal length range, for image stabilised lenses, I would hazard a guess that Canon would get a better return on investment by upgrading the IS in the 24-105mm than by adding IS to the 24-70mm.

402

EOS Bodies / Re: 5D Mark III & The Rest [CR2]

« on: August 24, 2011, 06:35:31 PM »

It's plausible that the 7D could carry on whilst the 650D & 70D get new higher MPx sensors (22-24 range) - remember the AF is the key selling point with the 7D along with a degree of user compatibility with the 5DII.  A leapfrog crop chip (25-28 range) could come 12 months from now for a 7D with a trickle down to a 700D and 80D !  Gawd, did I just blow a whole year of two model ranges away in one sentence !  Point being, the 7D is a pro camera, it isn't sold on the same headlines as the lesser models.

Conversely, could a dual 7D/1Dv be sensible for launch to tie into the 2012 games ?  Both are aimed at fast action sports.

There are merits in either marketing strategy, and it depends on the market you are playing in.  Car manufacturers, when they launch a new model, often leave the high performance variants until last in the release schedule - for instance, when VW launch a new Gold, the GTI and R models after often delayed.

Canon are probably in a bit more of a pickle with APS-C sensor cameras, as the 7D is not really due for refresh, but expectations in the lower end of the consumer market may force their hand with a higher resolution sensor.

On the full frame side, they could launch the 5FmkIII first in the hope that pros will buy it and then upgrade when the 1DsIV or 1DV is launched, or they could launch the 1DsIV or 1DV first in the hope that pros who migrated to the 5DmkII will go back to a 1D or 1Ds.

Either way, I suspect a lot of people will sit on the fence until the successor to the 5DmkII and 1DsIII have both been launched and the support for them is available in Lightroom/Aperture and friends before making a decision.  That will allow them to make a decision that is appropriate to their needs, and get a camera (as has been pointed out before) that fits into their workflow.  (There is not much point in having to use DPP to pre-process photos to get them into Lightroom, because lightroom can't support your camera properly.)

403

PowerShot Cameras / Re: PowerShot Announcements.

« on: August 23, 2011, 08:20:16 AM »

There've been a few rumors about a new flash coming from Canon.  Just like the 'new cameras in August' turned out to be PowerShots (and not even an S95 replacement, did I mention, yawn?), maybe this is the rumored special and awesome new flash from Canon.  A whopping 30' range.  Wow.  It's even wireless (ok, it's an optical slave, but still...).  Double yawn.

It may be a yawn for DSLR users, but it is intriguing that Canon are positioning off-camera flash as an option for P&S users.  Yes, I understand most users will just use it for extra flash power, but it has the possibility to be used more creatively as well.  I wonder if it will succeed as a product - most of the target market have probably never heard of the existence of off-camera flash.  I will be intrigued to see whether it really turns out to be usable and whether it sells.

(OK, the HF-DC1 wasn't exactly a killer product, so I wonder if the HF-DC2 will follow in its footsteps.)

404

PowerShot Cameras / Re: Tonights Announcements [CR2]

« on: August 22, 2011, 07:12:26 PM »

I can't find Canon putting it's latest innovation into a model where neither most users don't care about it nor it is neccessary. As far as I recall the 1D series where the ones to receive the new processor with (I think) the 50D beeing an exeption (1D III came shortly after)

True - and as has been pointed out, most P&S don't need anything more than the DIGIC IV at the moment.

Things probably point to a new processor in a 1DV or 1DsIV.  I doubt we would see the 5DIII before at least one of these is launched.

If the rumours about a full frame 1DV are true, then an interesting approach would be for Canon to launch the 1DV, which would give sports shooters and studio pros what they need, but allude to something bigger coming, and launch the 1DsIV a few months later, then a 5DIII after the dust has settled.  Of course, we are all just speculating.  If you add a 7DII after the 5DIII, that gives Canon a year's worth of high end DSLR announcements and the opportunity to create a lot of hype.

405

PowerShot Cameras / Re: August 23 is Announcement Day [CR3]

« on: August 21, 2011, 09:22:16 PM »

So, Nikon will give us one, maybe two FF dSLRs, with 'big megapixels.'  Canon will give us big megapixels, too, but they'll be crammed into a sensor the size of a pinhead, so they can market a super-mega-ultrazoom, say 50x, without needing a lens the size of, well, a cannon.  Where's the 1DsIV love?

How sure are we about the Nikon announcements.  It looks like it is also mainly down to speculation as to what Nikon will announce on the 24th.  The main consensus seems to be that their mirrorless system will be announced - which will still be a big threat to Canon.
Whether or not Nikon will announce more DSLRs still seems to be a matter of speculation.  If they do, that may force Canon's hand.  So, I guess if Nikon do announce a new DSLR (or two) it is good for everyone, as Canon would have to follow soon after.