I figured I'd take the opportunity on night shift to get a few shots of a moonrise along the beach. Does anyone have any advice on when the best lighting would be for reflections on the ocean (i.e., how long after the offical moonrise)? Any other advice that you could offer too would be appreciated (besides bringing a tripod) such as color temperature settings, wide or narrow aperature, etc. I know it's going to be a waining crescent, so light is going to be minimal. Camera and lenses are limited to what is listed below (no high ISOs for me).

Hi all,

Long-time reader, first time poster here looking for some advice.

I've recently started and am in the process of building up my kit of lenses, specifically primes. My big question, is there much of a difference between 24mm and 28mm lenses? what about 100mm and 105mm? I've picked out the other focal lengths I'd like to pick up. If anybody has any comparison pictures that would be awesome.

For a bit of context, I do mostly video work, with the occasional bit of still stuff when I'm shooting events. My main body is a 7D, but I'm also looking to jump up to a full frame as well in the near future.

Thanks

We've got a total solar eclipse next Wednesday morning (14th November) in Northern Australia. Does anyone have any good suggestions for photographing one? Any special filters or preferred lenses that you'd suggest?

There are 1200 of these in the lower 48:



http://michaelhodgesfiction.com/

http://michaelhodgesfiction.com/

I know that the 550ex is one of (if not) the largest flashes that Canon has made. I see several of them on Craigslist for a great price (around $250.00) but are they "compatable" with the 7D, 5D2, etc... I know they will "work" but would I be better off with a 580exII or 600?

Just curious...

D

Hello,

I am thinking of purchasing a 50mm. The thing is, I don't know which one. I have heard that the Canon is all right, the Sigma is pretty good, and I know the Zeiss is very good. The thing is, I don't know if I should spend $750 on the lens.

Any advice anyone?

Thanks,

littlepilotdude

I took advantage of the blackout and took some long exposure shots of the city last Wednesday. The 1 train was running to 34th, so I took the train down and road my bike around with tri-pod in hand. Spent a good six hours photographing! All shots were taken with a Canon 50D with 17-40 and a 10-22. I should have brought my 70-200 too! Constructive crit is always fine. If you are curious about exposure detail or any other geekyness, just ask.







To take a look at the full blog post, check out my blog at: http://jamesandrewphotography.blogspot.com/

Thanks for looking!

PS, this was my first post on the forum.

While film doesn't really occupy front of mind for many of us any more, this is an interesting view into the last days of the film industry:

http://www.wired.com/rawfile/2012/11/robert-burley-disappearance-of-darkness/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Top+Stories%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Personally, I only started my migration to digital just over 12 years ago, so I still have boxes full of negatives packed away.

It also makes me think of the fond memories of slide shows, which formed the central event of many get-togethers with friends when I was a child. - My father still has an entire cupboard full of slides, covering a period from the early 1960s to the late 1990s.

What is also interesting is to see a generation growing up who have never known film. One thing I do hope to show my children when they are a little older is how my wife and I used to take photos before the arrival of digital photography.

Hello all,

I've been eyeballing getting the Canon 50mm L lens, the f/1.2 one.
Reading the reviews on Amazon.com...I seen references about the lens having a problem with backfocusing.

Can someone explain this to me...what it is, why it happens?

Have others experienced this with this lens? Is it a bug through all of these lenses, or does it happen here and there?

Is this a reason to avoid this lens? If so..why hasn't Canon fixed this?

Thank you in advance,

cayenne

I've recently developed an interest in nature and landscape photography after working in weddings and journalism for some time. I'm considering a new lens, but am struggling to decide what I would get the most use out of. My current glass setup is as follows:

17-35/2.8
28/1.8
35/2.0
50/1.8
85/1.8
100/2.8 macro
70-200/2.8
2x teleconverter

I'm considering a fisheye (15mm/2.8 ), a tilt/shift (most likely either 24 or 90) or something longer (400/2.8, 600/4 etc.). What do you feel would have the broadest application? (Not limiting it only to nature/landscapes but other areas as well)
Thanks for the help!

With the EOS 7D, all 19 AF points are cross type, but the blurb states that:

"for enhanced precision, the central AF point features extra sensitivity when used with lenses having a maximum aperture of f2.8 or faster" (taken from Canon's official EOS 7D brochure)

Does this mean the centre AF point is double cross type or have an additional horizontal / vertical line activated at f2.8? Or is it just a more sensitive standard cross type sensor? I can't find anything in Canon's literature or in the likes of dp review that clarifies it.

Thanks!

So I got my feedback request e-mail for the 5D Mk. III from Canon today. Thought a couple of questions were interesting. Firstly:

How desirable would it be for you to have the following features in your future digital SLR? Please rank your first, second and third most important features:

1. Higher resolution (more megapixels)
2. Higher dynamic range (shadow/highlight detail)
3. Faster shooting speed
4. Bigger buffer memory
5. Wider ISO speeds
6. Larger/brighter/more shooting information in viewfinder
7. Faster Auto Focus (when shooting by viewfinder)
8. More accurate Auto Focus (when shooting by viewfinder)
9. AF performance (when shooting by liveview)
10. More Auto Focus points

Click to expand...

Second interesting question:

How desirable would it be for you to have the following features in your future digital SLR? Please rank your first, second and third most important feature.

1. More compact & lightweight
2. Built-in Flash (with wireless flash control)
3. Vari-angle LCD screen
4. GPS
5. Touchscreen LCD
6. Wireless communication function
7. Better weather resistance
8. Performance of LCD (size/resolution)

Click to expand...

I guess it's Canon sussing out the perception of the competition, but it might give some idea as to the future of the 5D. Make of it what you will.

Was wondering if anyone else loved using their 16-35mm on their crop cameras. I used it the first time when my wife had dropped my 50mm and no longer af. I knew I loved that focal length so this was a temp way to get it. 16-35 on FF isn't super useful for portrait sessions but on crop at 56mm I have started to really enjoy it.
Wondering if anyone else has found this useful?
Also this is kinda making me think it might be worth looking at the 24-70 which would be much high quality. But similar focal range instead of the primes I have been thinking about....

I haven't posted anything here for ages, and thought someone might like this shot. This is of Wyaralong Dam in the Scenic Rim of QLD, Australia.

5D2, Ef16-35 lens @16mm

Hello,

I bought recently a Canon 18-135mm IS lens with the matching Canon EW 73B hood. To save space in my bag initially I was used to screw in the hood in reverse, so that the petals would lie along the lens. Unfortunately that required an unusual amount of force, so after a few times I gave up, and now I screw it (in the right way) on the the lens only when I have to use it. I noticed later that my lens suffers a lot from creep, and that the inner shaft (pardon me if the technical term is different) is a little loose, meaning that it can move slightly also off axis. It seems obvious to me that lens creep is a consequence of the loose inner shaft.

So, here it comes the question: do you think that I damaged my lens by applying too much torsion with the hood screwing in the wrong way?
Does the loose inner shaft compromise image quality?
If the answer is yes to either of the above, is there something I can do about it, possibly not too expensive?

Any help is highly appreciated!

So I've decided to keep my fujifilm x100 which i adore and buy 6d with a couple of primes.
there is a question that has been bugging me though

in my x100 i have built-in 3-stop ND filter. that comes might handy when i want to take f/2 photos in bright day light or even above average light. although the x100 goes up to 1/4000 i still found myself using it a lot.

I can only imagine whats going to happen on a 6d with 1/2000 and a f/1.4 lens

So what do you usually do in these cases when you just dont want to use smaller aperture (the reason you bought the lens in the first place) in bright day light.

do you carry a 3-stop nd filter for every fast lens and keep taking it off and on?
do you just leave it on until nightfalls?
keep a cpl on all the time?

To any interested Forum Readers/Writers an open question!

Is there any need of adding a screen protector to the LCD screen to the new 5D Mark III?

I search this forum about the need of screen protector to the new 5D Mark III and I tried to find out if there is any real need for to add a screen protector to the the LCD screen on the 5D Mark III that seems to be gorgeous?

OTOH Canon has used hardened glass protector in front of the LCD with anti-reflective coating to 5D Mark III, - so I started to question/doubt IF there is a real need, to add a additionally screen protector of good quality to a new 5D Mark III?

I would appreciate some thoughts and opinions about this need, if someone had dug into this minor detail of the need of screen protector?

(A short note - I think I do prefer thin protective film if there is a real need instead of a more "ugly-looking" bigger plastic LCD-protector type.)

All the Best wishes to you all!

/C

These are a very good past time

I just heard that we will be seeing a new 70D and 7D mkII!!!
Here is the timeline I was told

present:
The 7D and 60D will remain current

year 2015 still current

year 2018 new sensor tech announced

year 2025 70D and 7D mkII receive a long awaited upgrade and have digic VI processors and an 18MP hybrid sensor with phase AF for continuos focus in video mode! Also, the power of the new processor will enable 1 full stop better high iso when shooting jpeg.



seems about right to me...

I am looking for a lightsensitive lens for indoors use.
I have some lenses i.e. 135mm f/2 L that are lightsensitive but very often its focal length is too much.

Personally I like the flexibility of having a zoom when taking photo's indoors since not always I know how much space there is. And, the lens should be easy to handle from size and weight point of view (so my 70-200 f/2.8 is less convenient here)

My budget is max. 1000 euro

The Canon 24-70 MK II L is not an option from pricing point of view. Neither is the Canon 85mm f/1.2 L

I am considering either the Tamron 24-70mm f/2.8 VC or the Sigma 85mm f/1.4
I know I know, I already own the 24-105 but this lens is my outdoors walkaround lens. So I don't mind overlap

Can anyone share his/her experience about the Tamron and/or the Sigma?
And, what would you do?

Just got a new 24-70 II and I must say that my initial images are, well, disappointing. I was hoping for something along the lines of the ridiculous sharpness of the 70-200 II. Sadly, what I'm seeing is much closer to my 28-135.

If you look at this .cr2 file in DPP (http://home.comcast.net/~sal6/BY5R6357.CR2), you'll see the focus point is the white and purple cluster of flowers. However none of the flowers in that cluster are what I would consider remotely sharp -- this was taken at 70 mm, 1/320 sec, with f/2.8, ISO 100. With those, I don't think it's the lack of IS.

All of the photos I've taken are like this, without regard to shutter speed (even up through 1/2000 @ f/2.8 (ISO 150)) -- also, this is actually one of the sharper ones.

Maybe AFMA will help. But I'd (naively?) expect an AFMA problem would mean that something, somewhere in the image would be sharper. I suppose it's possible that there's nothing at the right depth...

Thoughts?

Shawn L.

Hi I am hoping some of you guys could help me out!

I currently have the following equipment, canon 60d,Tokina 11-16mm f2.8, Canon EFS 17-55 f2.8, Sigma 50-150mm f2.8, canon 50mm f1.4, 580exii speedlite and a 430exii speedlite.

My question im hoping you guys can help me with is if i move to full frame i.e 5dmkii or 6d i will only be able to afford f4 lenses 24-105 or new 24-70 f4 and then a 70-200 f4 is to cover all the focal lengths i generally use. I have recently shot at a few weddings and have more interest from people to do the photography at theirs next year, however when in low light situations and not allowed to use flash in churches etc id like better noise performance. I find that iso1600 is the max i like to use on my 60d to achieve a decent shutter speed and a reasonably clean image, so this would become iso 3200 on a full frame camera using f4 instead of 2.8 right? So will i have cleaner images on the FF camera or will the extra stop of iso on f4 glass even out over a stop less on APSC using f2.8? Also will focusing become any different form the 60d with 2.8 glass to lets say the 6d with f4 glass?

Many thanks in advance your help and advice is very much appreciated!

Out of a session of roughly 200 photos all taken with my 5D Mark III (firmware 1.1.3) within 20 minutes, one or two of the files are corrupted on the SD card. This has happened to me a few times now with my 5D Mark III while doing paid work, and I've only noticed it happen randomly when using SD cards. (i.e. I have never witnessed this happening when using my CF cards.) For example, this morning I had this issue while using my SanDisk Extreme 32 GB SDHC Class 10 UHS-1 Flash Memory Card 45MB/s (SDSDX-032G-X46). The card was freshly formatted in-camera just before the session. Upon review, I discovered that the 184th and 185th files were corrupted, which could be readily seen on the camera's LCD. I brought them into Lightroom 4.2 to be sure, and the same problem could be seen.



When I tried to load up the most badly discolored image, Lightroom reported the following error:



So far, I've been able to just ignore the problem, delete the image, and move on, but I'm afraid this is going to bite me badly one of these days, and I can't figure out what can be done to prevent the issue. I think when I first got the 5D Mark III, I also had a video get corrupted such that it looked fine during the recording, but on playback, the video could not be displayed even though there was still audio (and the resulting MOV file was still huge). But there were too many variables for that project, so it's probably not helpful to try to draw any correlations.

If anyone is interested in inspecting the actual corrupted CR2 files, they can be downloaded at:

http://www.kennethphotography.com/files/canon/IMG_6034.CR2
http://www.kennethphotography.com/files/canon/IMG_6035.CR2

Thanks for any thoughts. I'd love to learn tips for preventing the problem or repairing the CR2 files.

it seems all of canons sharpest lenses have no IS.
is this co-incidence or is it because the addition of an IS system somehow negatively affects image quality?????