I use the tripod mount, and I also have a magnetic base meant for antennas, but it uses the same mounting screw size to it works as a tripod base.

And don't forget cable ties.... very versatile.... get the black ones as they are less prone to snapping than the white or colored ones. They are also UV resistant.... but then you won't be using one long enough for it to matter. A safety lanyard can come in handy if things go wrong.

Then we have my magnet mount onto a stunt kite.... Two VERY strong magnets sandwitching the kite fabric and a small sheet of plastic (for rigidity).... camera tie wrapped to the bottom magnet.... As has been said, if you can't do it with Duct Tape or Magnets, then it's just not worth doing

Waterdonkey said:

I think this is an "In a Pinch" solution.
It worked for my 7d and a 10-22mm I had. But I have to agree Clean them proper when you get home.

Click to expand...

It's not an "in a pinch solution".... you can seriously damage the pins VERY easily.

The use of erasers to clean contacts goes with cleaning the contacts on printed circuit boards..... and you do remove the plating... clean them a few times and you can clearly see where the gold is worn away and the copper is showing. On the printed circuit board the contact is flat and easily plated.... not so on edges of materials... like pin ends. When you clean a circuit board connector the contact is over a much wider area than the tip of a pin so the pressure per square inch, and abrasiveness, is much less. The use of an eraser is destructive cleaning, I can't say it any plainer.

If you are spraying anything.... do not spray directly on the contacts as the solvent will also splash around either the camera body or the lens.... spray on something outside of the lens or the body and then use it to clean the contacts.

If you use a cleaner... you need to use something that will not leave a non-conductive residue. Things like WD40 will make electrical contact problems worse.

rdespy said:

so you don't have to pay for return shipping in case you got the bad copy.

Click to expand...

Amazon doesn't take return shipping fees (I just exchanged a bad 17-40L copy), but for the Tamron I'll indeed buy it at a local store where I can return it immediately w/o waiting for a few days. At least testing the 17-40L with a chart and reading these threads I am confident I can tell if it's a "good" or "bad" copy.

Menace said:

Well done. Like them all

Click to expand...

Thank you!

Richard

http://www.dustinabbott.net/2013/02/i-believe-i-can-fly/

To able to do this all myself with the razor thin depth of field of the 135L is pretty amazing. I would have had a nightmare trying to execute this concept with my 5DII

Losing the IS might suck, though. A used 70-200 f4 IS might not be too much more expensive and will be cover all bases, IMO. And you can always slap on a 1.4x third party TC and still get better images at 300mm@f/5.6 than the 70-300.
Also, the AF speed and noise of the 70-300 was a big bummer for me. I sold it to get the Tamron, which was far better.

Should be interesting - they need to atleast match Canon's quality and be much cheaper to have any chance of success with this lens.

Well done.

I feel like they wouldn't have presented it to a scientific journal if their claims weren't accurate.

I'm always very excited to read about these kinds of breakthroughs.

Dylan777 said:

Your lens is coated with UV layer. I have B&W Clear Filter on my lenses:

Click to expand...

Practically speaking, for a dSLR there is no difference between a UV filter and a clear filter - my advice is to get whichever one is cheaper. That does vary based on size, vendor, and geography. For example, here are some prices from Amazon.com today:

• B+W 77mm XS-Pro MRC Nano Clear 007M - $115
• B+W 77mm XS-Pro MRC Nano UV 010M - $73
• B+W 82mm XS-Pro MRC Nano Clear 010M - $126
• B+W 82mm XS-Pro MRC Nano UV 010M - $253

So, if I wanted to purchase from Amazon.com, for a 24-70mm MkI which takes 77mm filters, I'd get the UV filter and save $42, and for a 24-70 MkII which takes 82mm filters, I'd get the Clear filter and save $127.

I'm guessing canon is involved and am curious if they will test bodies already on the market. I have family who are fairly high up the ladder there so ill see if I can get more info

neuroanatomist said:

[quote author=Canon Customer Disservice]
Dear Ryan Williams:

We appreciate your continued interest in Canon products

After further investigation and inquiries with our engineers, we have discovered that we cannot tell our asses from our elbows. This issue has been ecsalated to the janitorial staff, so they can squeegee our eyeballs and vacuum our ears, in the vain hope that our observational skills and ability to listen to customers will be improved.

Please let us know if we can be of any further assistance. Thank you for choosing Canon.

Sincerely,

Anonymous
Technical Support Representative

Click to expand...

[/quote]
+1000 ;D

That is good news from Canon. I experienced a similar issue with my 1DX and an EX580II flash. During my last outdoors senior portraits photo shoot, I noticed that my flash was struggling to give enough light for my shots no matter how much I cranked up the FEC or how close I got to the subject. I had to do quite a bit of correction in post production.

A few days later I did a test with my 1D4 and my 1DX and I noticed that with the EX580II flash externally shot inside a softbox on a stick with radio poppers as triggers (always use them), the 580/1D4 combo exposed the scene perfectly and the 580/1DX was waaaaay inconsistent with many under exposed shots. Switching back and forth produced the same results (1D4 was perfect and 1DX was way off).

I now need to figure out what settings or combos are causing this but for now I am shooting all off camera flash with the 1D4. Glad I didn't buy that second 1DX and kept the 1D4.

Canon has made an important annoncement on this topic:

http://forums.usa.canon.com/t5/EOS/5D3-AF-assist-beam-slower-focus/m-p/13547/highlight/false#M1486

Thank you for mentioning CLP I forgot all about it I wonder when the 5d3 will go on there

Can someone identify the gear used here?

http://www.wimp.com/birdsproject/

I've reread my post and my LOL falls flat. Sorry. Why not buy the 100 IS USM L Macro and after using it for awhile you
will know if you want more from a lens. you have been given lots of suggestions to research. Macro Photography is a fun
learning experience. With the 160mm focal length on a crop sensor it will make a great portrait lens for Portraits of people and pics of Flowers. My research on the 100 mm L Macro makes me think it's a must have lens. The 70-200 2.8 ll is another very popular lens. Although 77 mm filters are more costly to buy. I like my 70-200 F4 IS USM and usually mount it on my 7D before going out to take pics. As BIF are my first priority, I want to be ready to shoot. I have C1 set for this. C2 for Flash and C3is going to be set for bracketing for HDR.
Spring isn't here yet so there is still time to do more research before you buy.

Lovely pictures - well done

this guys reviews are really bad

hmm would 54mp results in +- 150-170mb raw files?

Gonna take a toll on the buffer ,

I think with the latest computers and some good cards, it should be no problem to handle...
The d800 files didnt slow me down at all..., ( only when viewing files on the pc when a slow sd cards (30mb/s) was in there.

billmarsh said:

Thanks for the replies.
I always use the center focus point when shooting BIF so would I really need 61 AF points on the 5D MK3?
Does the MK3 need to lock on with the center point first before it will track the subject? Also, if the AF point drifts off the subject and is picked up by another point will it lock on to the closest part of the bird like the outer wing causing the head and body to be out of focus.
Thanks Bill

Click to expand...

Well, I'm no expert, but I've been using a 5d m3 for the past 6 weeks or so, trying my hand at BIF.
1) In general, depending on what settings you have and how you tweak them (and there's a lot to play with in the 5D), the 61 points are handy for BIF.
2) Depending on what objects are present around the bird (foreground / background), I switch from 61 points to 1, 5 or 9 points in the center, which is easy to do in the 5D (can't speak for the 6D).
3) It makes sense for the camera to focus on the nearest object, be that the body or the wing. It doesn't know what you consider important. But, in most cases (and I've only had a few), it's more luck that the camera happens to be in focus on the body (or the bit I want in focus), since the time frame I'm dealing with the bird is around 1-2 seconds

Just my 2 cents worth

Well you have all types of options

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/post/50715221

http://www.ebay.ca/sch/i.html?_trksid=p5197.m570.l1313&_nkw=Meike+MK-14EXT+Macro+TTL+ring+flash&_sacat=0&_from=R40

I think the 8-15 fisheye is plenty sharp. One of my funnest lenses.

I had high hopes for this lens, as I'm not 100% in love with my 24-105. I read with disappointment Roger at LenRentals confirmation of the very poor image quality at 50mm, and just now read the new detailed review at SLR Gear, which pretty much put the nail in the coffin for me. Even at the other focal lengths, the full frame blur plots don't have the edge sharpness I would expect in a brand new state of the art, high dollar "L" lens. The other big concern is the lens they did the analysis on was the best of three they tested, the other two were far worse.

Key takeaway from their review "the lens' performance at 50mm stands out as unacceptable, especially when you consider the lower-priced option here still costs $1,500."

http://slrgear.com/reviews/showproduct.php/product/1573/cat/11

Aha. I see. Yeah. The 5D mkiii is more for reference rather than sync. And unless they come up with some magical update, it is pretty much just a marketing scheme