Messages

1

Lenses / Re: 70-200 Choices

« on: June 12, 2013, 09:49:11 AM »

Second hand 70-200 F2.8 L IS will be at that price as well, you can find a lot of those from everyone who didi the upgeade to the version II.

2

Street & City / Re: How to not get beat up when photographing public places?

« on: June 03, 2013, 03:31:06 AM »

Not really sure how this went from street photography to rights and wrongs of the police...but ---

My bad 

To get it on track again, I did play around with a 100D this weekend and they are so cute with the 40mm pancake; A lot better suited to street photography than the 5 or 7 series with grip. It looks like a point-and-shoot, so I'm guessing you could get away with taking pictures at a lot more places with that one (and am very tempted to get it as well, but I do miss the fact that you can't enter the color temperature in Kelvin by hand as I do mostly jpg

3

Street & City / Re: How to not get beat up when photographing public places?

« on: May 30, 2013, 09:25:45 AM »

But seriously how did taking a photo get connected to crime?

Watch any crime show and the killer usually has a stockpile of photo's on a blackboard complete with a diagram of how to do the kidnapping/murder/whatever. It makes it visually easy to show the viewer what the main antagonist was up to, so it now gets associated with being up to no good.

Having said that, I once had my car break down on a busy freeway and since I had to wait for the repair service to come pick it up, I found a safe spot between the two directions of freeways which was not accessible to pedestrians and sat down there with a book to read to pass time.It Didn't take long for the police to show up to question me what I was doing there either, so I guess the police just looks for unusual behaviour.

Taking pictures of schools, armed transports, military installations or kids does seem to fall under those categories. On the other hand, those stereoptypes can also be used to your advantage, try pinning on a badge (like those from the Umbrella Corporation for example) and carrying a clipboard and pen as if you're marking something and people will really try to pretend not to notice you in order not to get asked any questions. The one downside is that if you do it in stores, you get people asking you where they can find a specific product : )

4

Lighting / Re: Would this be original lastolite hilites?

« on: May 13, 2013, 05:12:04 AM »

Very nice. Mine is still en route. I noticed that they are no longer available form amazon itself now. So either their stock is gone or they wanted to get rid of what was left in their warehouse.

5

Lighting / Re: 270 ex ii or 430 exii for vacation

« on: May 10, 2013, 04:08:12 AM »

I would go for the 430 because it does HSS. If you take the 270, the shutter speed won't go below 1/200 which will be too slow to stop action. (but yes, I get your point as I also dearly love the 270 for its pocketability, just remember turn it off when stopping action and when there is a lot of light as otherwise you end up with very bright pictures  )

6

Lighting / Re: Would this be original lastolite hilites?

« on: May 10, 2013, 04:03:02 AM »

Mine is now in status "We've started preparing your parcel for delivery and it should leave our facility in the next few hours to a few days. "

So I'll keep you updated as well.

7

Lighting / Re: Would this be original lastolite hilites?

« on: May 08, 2013, 05:39:56 AM »

I ordered one to see what they are going to send. it's like a really expensive kinder surprise egg now : )

8

Software & Accessories / Re: Alternatives to Adobe Software

« on: May 07, 2013, 10:09:43 AM »

Photoshop elements, lightroom and paintshop pro seem to be the most common alternatives although elements and paintshop are more graphic editing whilst lightroom is more photographers tools.
GIMP (tried it, but never really liked it)

For Apple: Aperture or Photostudio (and after working with windows 8 for a while, I must confess that that platform becomes more tempting by the day)

9

Lighting / Re: Would this be original lastolite hilites?

« on: May 06, 2013, 10:00:34 AM »

It's become #1 bestseller in Photo Studio Backrounds now. 

10

Lighting / Would this be original lastolite hilites?

« on: May 05, 2013, 06:05:16 PM »

Hi guys, I've been trying to do high key pictures with the help of normal living room curtains as a kind of cheap option, but I noticed that amazon itself has the lastolite 5x7 hilite background for 90 UK pounds (equivalent to 140 dollars), which is less than 1/3 of the normal 300 pound (450 dollar) price as far as I am aware.
Would there be any chance that these are not the original lastolite products or could this just be a really really weird price setting?

Link
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B000UAV4TQ/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Regards,
Kristof

11

Lenses / Re: Need advice taking pictures of jewellery

« on: May 03, 2013, 12:45:43 PM »

One of the things I used to do when taking pictures like this was focus stacking. use a tripod and shift the focus bit by bit That seemed to result in prettier images than decreasing the aperture all the way down did.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Focus_stacking

12

Canon General / Re: How do you buy equipment?

« on: April 17, 2013, 06:29:15 AM »

I hear ya and I do the same thing pay off my credit card every month and haven't paid interest on either card. Guess I should as for a raise haha. What do you mean pay yourself at variable interest rates?

It means that on months when there is a lot of money left, i repay more, on months when there is less left, I repay less. In the end, I repay a little more than I took, so my savings account ends up with a net profit. (it's kinda linked to what my wife looks good in and how much the latest drresses cost as well

13

Canon General / Re: How do you buy equipment?

« on: April 16, 2013, 09:19:59 AM »

Lend myself the money from my savings account and repay myself at variable intrest rates. 

14

Canon General / Re: Why do you do Photography?

« on: April 16, 2013, 09:08:39 AM »

For memories. I only have a few pictures and wirtten cards of my grandparents and little memories, their graves have been removed  and I so often wish I had more pictures of how their lives were and wished I could hear their voices one more time. So when my wife and I had children, I started taking pictures  of the thousands of little things that attracted my attention and video fragments of their family and grandparents so that when they grow up, they can look back on them.
I also shoot lots of other stuff, but that's the prime reason. When we're no longer around, at least some of the pictures will be. They will probably not be that good or special, but it's like memories which you can still touch or see moving.

15

Portrait / Re: First paid photo shoot - DATE: 23 March 2013

« on: April 03, 2013, 06:57:39 AM »

They are better than my first attempt of doing something like this anyway, so congratulations on your work.
In hindsight for the following images
1) removing the flowers in the top right as they draw attention would give it more balance.
2) having sunlight reflected (something like a foldable reflector) onto them to brighten the couple up compared to the background.
4) the green is a bit overpowering. maybe desaturate the colors a little more to give it a more subdued look?
6) same as others remarked, the branch is too attention-grabbing
7) someone snuck up on you and is visible in the frame, so maybe some recropping.

Having said all that, I'd have been perfectly happy with a picture like number one and three and the sepia ones. so I'd say very nice work.