wsmith96 said:

I recently got a large rouge flashbender with a diffusion panel. It's very portable and works well.

Good luck!

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I got the "blanc" version a la eBay, but I'm having trouble using it for fills and catchlights. Did you use it for these purposes? How'd yours hold up?
I am wondering if the reflector in mine isn't up to the mark. The build is pretty good otherwise.

Mt Spokane Photography said:

It is a general rule of thumb, that if you want border to border sharpness, f/8 is going to be best.

Many high end lenses will be sharpest in the center, but weaker on the edges and corners at wide apertures. That's not a issue for many images, but for those needing sharpness across the frame, f/8 is a good place to start.

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Thousand Thanks, my Dear Teacher, Mr. Mt Spokane.
Yes, To day my Day of Learning from Every CR. Members, include You too, Sir. The Sharpness that we want , at Center up to the corner of The Photos start from 1 stop down from the wide open of F. Stop to , Maybe 1 Stop, smaller hole from 8.0---That Depend on the Shallow DOF that we want
Have a great day, Sir.
Surapon

wickidwombat said:

dcm said:

I placed an order for it on 4/1 from BH so I'd have plenty of time before a July trip - haven't heard anything yet. Status is still "On Order". I wonder what the current lead time is.

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there is a quite a backlog for them as they are super popular

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Mine's been on order since 3/11. I had actually originally ordered it in February but was going to be out of town the week of their estimated shipping date (I got in touch with their customer service to find that out), so canceled my order. I should have asked if they could move me back in the queue instead. Oh well.

That's a good price on the 24-70 and unless you need IS or carry the 24-105 by itself and use the 71-105 focal length a lot, I'd say go for it. The 24-70 II is an amazing lens.

There are a couple of things, its likely that their is some internal damage, there are some wipers inside the lens that send position information to the lens, and if they were bent or not making contact, then the lens does not know what position its in.

The camera sends a command to the lens telling it where to focus something like move to focus at 5.2 ft. The lens compares the position of the wiper on the resistor by measuring the resistance, and findsthe point where the internal data table says "X" resistance is 5.2 ft. (I've simplified the process to give the general idea). If the circuitry cannot read the resistance due to dirt or a damaged part, it will hunt.

There are several other things that can make this happen, the flexprint that moves is also a frequent failure point.

The plastic case can be replaced for a few $$, but the lens glass will almost certainly be out of alignment, and AF accuracy will be off.

Maybe if we give him even more advice he'll come back!

Thanks privatebydesign & wickidwombat.

Dan46 said:

* Full-frame such as 6D for way better ISO.

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No doubt, but it also has a shallower dof (given the same framing). That's why I don't mind having a 60d crop backup: with my ff 6d and two models - I'm doing a log of pet/person shots - it usually requires ~f11 to have both eyes in focus even if I attempt thin dof posing. For run and gun shots on a wedding, you might also not be able to use open aperture and thin dof unless your're a real photog wiz.

privatebydesign said:

That could well be your problem, BIF in good light, as per cervantes settings, are about as far away from a tuned AF set up as you can get for a model runway shoot in poorer light.

The beauty and problem with modern AF is it is so customisable that settings for one subject and situation will be very bad for another. The "twitchiness" he is inducing in his custom settings do not make so much sense for runway shooting. The Accel/Deccel setting isn't appropriate for runways, the model's speed is comparatively uniform, and the Tracking Sensitivity is the opposite of what makes sense for runways.

I'd reset to factory and work methodically from there, indeed I'd expect factory to give you a much higher keeper rate than the 30% you are getting.

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Good points and I totally agree on the customizability can be a trapdoor to problems. I've given the body a Factory Reset + Custom Functions Reset, and will go out tomorrow evening to give it a new try.

I think the automatic selection AF vs Zone AF mode setting (p 74 in the manual) have been messing with me, as it seemed to auto-select the AF points, despite I had selected a single AF point.

Thanks to PBD as well as mackguyver and Menace over in the 300mm thread for suggestions. I'll keep you posted on my findings.

I'll try the 61-point "full auto" selection and the manual 1/5/9-point AF modes for comparison.

Hi there,

First up, it is nice to hear from other members experiences with their home studio kit building as I also am currently looking into setting up a small studio kit for shooting still life and portraits.

As for comments on the images you provided, they show that you can go a long way without much kit. The pistol in particular looks good to me, and that is even though I'm not really a gun lover. In general, I'd say they are nice pictures, but the devil is there, lurking in the details...

A few examples I could point out. First, the lights appear to be clearly visible as reflections on the shot glass base in a few pictures (first and last for example) and these attract attention away from the subject and make the images a bit weaker. Some images also are a bit canted to the side it seems. Finally, in the first and last image, depth of field makes the bottom of the glass fuzzy, but may be not enough to make it clear if it was intentional or accidental. I'd either go for full blown out of focus at the base or in-focus everywhere.

Worth noting is that the second images makes a good job of leaving the lights reflections out and managing the DoF, although there might have been a bit of an over correction of the canting...

These are just my opinions and reflect what I would try to correct if these images were mine. Feel free to disregard my comments if you don't agree.

Best regards,

hahahahaha free advice…..

ajndesign said:

In what way is the RX100 not really pocketable? its tiny! or do you mean the RX10?

I have ordered one of these over an RX100 2 because I find the Sony far too small! People keep banging on about the size of the camera, but I want something that feels substantial, with good image quality without the need to swap lenses, so this really is ideal for me. I find the smaller cameras too fiddly and not comfortable to use.

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Sorry, of course the rx100 is pockatable, but whilst it is small the lens does still protrude a bit so I know I would never shove it in my jeans pocket. I've tried this with a Rioch GR which is not much bigger.

thatguy_photography said:

check out some photographers that shoot with the a7r. 14 bit sony probably has good dynamic range. The a7s isn't for you if you only want photography but I think all of my first post was about video and in that since it is amazing. I will be selling my markii and two L series lenses and invest in a Gh4 or sony a7s and use that until canon comes out the 3d or 7dii and proves it is at least somewhat directed for people wanting the video aspect.

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That might have been true if they didn't compress the sh!t out of it in camera and never actually deliver more than 8 bits of information, which begs the question when is a RAW file no longer a RAW file?

http://diglloyd.com/blog/2014/20140214_1-SonyA7-artifacts-star-trails.html

300mm is a good focal length for piggybacking a camera on a telescope with a tracking equatorial mount. I use an older 300/4L, but there are problems when shooting with a modified camera body due to CA. Halos around stars, for example. If the Samyang 300cat lens is sharp, it would be worth a try for the right price. A niche lens to be sure, but they do have their uses.

I've used it on my 5d2 & 5d3, no problems at all. Unless you get the bleeding edge Alpha, it's generally pretty safe. Even the bleeding edge Alpha I've heard usually won't b0rk your camera, although it may not be stable.

metacove said:

So after reading your responses I ended up ordering the 135L. I thought you all might find it funny that I just pre-ordered the 50mm Art today. The 135 is an amazing lens.

Looking forward to the new art. I hope I'm not too far down the pre-order list.

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Awesome. I hope you are blown away by it... I am in the 85L camp right now, but I'm always willing to consider something else... though I think my next lens is going to be the sigma 24-70 f2... if it ever exists.

The Refurb items sell at a fantastic pace. I also think that some buyers snap up certain items by the dozens to sell on ebay for a profit.

BL said:

early adopter tax

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Indeed.

I like the lightfield concept. They have increased the "megarays" by four fold with the new design...I'm curious how that will affect the results.

Amazing creatures. I'm surprised they're so friendly. Glad there was a link to the still frames. They really turned out better than I thought.

neuroanatomist said:

tron said:

Don Haines said:

so it should be any day now

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Geologically speaking. Like the world was created in 6 days ;D

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So you're saying the 100-400 II will require a supreme being to will it into existence?

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Or a few centuries of accumulated lore to convince us that we could have it now if only we believe in The Holy Canon.

Or do we click our heels three times...I forget.

Dylan777 said:

I thought I have enough cameras and lenses to shoot most situation. Last week, I even talked myself out of buying the Canon 600mm f4 IS II. It should be a happy moment for not spending $10K on a single lens that doesn't get use often right?

Well....it's not that easy. I saw this photo, posted by Neuro: http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=9791.120

I'm now heading to flash photography. I'm not sure what will come after flash?

Wish me luck guys

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"I'm not sure what will come after flash?" - That is an easy one: 2nd flash, 3rd flash.....

mb66energy said:

Before I forget: I found an interesting patent about a dual photodiode per pixel architecture which is used to increase the DR to 120 dB called "Dynamic-Range Widening in a CMOS Image Sensor Through Exposure Control Over a Dual-Photodiode Pixel". They have a pixel split into a L shaped photodiode with 75% area and the 25% area which complets the L-shape to a square (might be not available at the moment due to a web site update):
http://www.researchgate.net/publication/224611868_Dynamic-Range_Widening_in_a_CMOS_Image_Sensor_Through_Exposure_Control_Over_a_Dual-Photodiode_Pixel/file/e0b495219bbfda2524.pdf

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Aye, I read about that. There are a few other patents for similar technology as well. They all use a different exposure time for the luminance pixels, though, and the way they achieve that is to extend the exposure time for the luminance pixels across frames. The majority of these sensors are used in video applications, which is the primary reason they can employ the technique. They can expose luma for two frames, and blend that single luma value into the color for both. (I cannot actually access the patent article you linked without an account, and they require an institutional email to sign up, however based on the abstract it sounds pretty much the same as other patents that use exposure control for DR improvement.)

Yes, Dear Friends and Teachers.
This Sunday Morning at 9:00AM, Bright sun shine at my Left shoulder, I take my Canon EOS-M with Canon EF 17-40 mm F/ 4.0 L USM with Both Cir. PL HOYA , and Heliopan to test.
Yes, Sir/ Madam, I find out :

1) As Mr. Mt Spokane teach me that : use my Finger form as the hand gun , poit the point finger to the subject, and the thumb at the sun location = we will get the maximum PL, Effect/ Dark blur sky with out use the cir. PL. Filter/ by natural effect.
2) For Hoya = the White mark at the Outer ring are great for the Maximum PL. Effect if the White Mark point to the location of the sun.
3) For Heliopan filter = The Maximum PL. Effect ( make the most dark blue sky) at Number "1" and at Number "26"-----If I trun the outer ring start from Number 2 to number 12, at number " 12 " the sky will be the most light blue, and start getting dark if I turn from 13 to the most dark blue sky at number " 26"-----Yes, Sir, I now Agree with our friend Mr.Phil that These Numbers from 1 to 26 on Heliopan are " WOW " Factor of high cost German made Cir. PL. filter that we can remember to use in the future shot ---Not to Light and not to super dark---Just perfected exposure in our creation/ our Idea of the look of the photos.---Yes, My number are 6 and 18.

Thank you, Sir/ Madam to all of my friends and my teachers--------In CR Posts, If we do not understand any things about photography ---( Ha, Ha, Ha, our life too---Ha, Ha, Ha)--Just ask our friends, And we will get the right answers and learn the new IDEAS, which we will get smarter in the near future.

Have a great sunday, Sir/ Madam
Surapon

PS, the Photos below are not Post processing, Just reduce the size of the Photos to fit the CR. requirement.

CliveB said:

gshocked said:

Any news on the 622-tx? The Nikon version is out but according to their Facebook page, the Canon version is still in development and will be out soon.... That was posted a few months back.

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I am expecting the YN-622C-TX to be on sale in May, but that is just my reading of bits here and there. Some lucky people do have pre-production samples to test, so it is close to release.

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It's an interesting product... When it works! I shot a wedding a few months back the the two 622 transceivers were playing up. I set them for manual mode and the one on the flash wouldn't stay on the setting I wanted.

I just came in from a two month trip. In the jungle of Thailand, Hala-bala. I only have the 1D mark IV and the 7D. I love the 1D series camera. But, after some frustrating long shots with the ID-IV + 1.4 T.C. I finally put the 7D and 1.4 on my 500 mm lens. Honestly, I loved the results. So much so when in that situation I always put the 7D on the lens. Long shots AF was fine. Depth of field was pretty deep and I never missed a shot. With the mark IV I was not happy at all. The 7D saved the day.

Also shot some close shots with the 7D and mark IV. I much preferred the ID camera.

This is with the 7D + 1.4, after a frustrating time with the mark IV.


I have many many shots with the 7D and Mark IV. More with the IV for sure. It is a piece of heaven for me. But the 7D is still in my bag. I personally could care less about the tests and the technical details. I can say, for me it made a big difference.

www.flickr.com/photos/avianphotos
www.birdsthatfart.com