Digital Camera & Photoshop tips

[apocrypha]

A prime is a good idea yeah, but I find myself wanting a longer lens than 30mm most of the time. I do shoot full frame, granted, so I'm eyeing up an 85mm atm, but I'm caught choosing between that or a set of studio strobes, so I dunno. My reasons for wanting a prime aren't the low-light capability of an f1.4, they're the quality and the ability to blow the DOF if I want.

I've linked both of these before, but if you wanna think about going down the off-camera flash route then check out the LP160 which is a very cheap manual flash and Strobist for how to think about using them.

As for gear websites, DPReview is kinda the king. Take their review conclusions with a pinch of salt, as with all of these things, but they have very good technical data and test very thoroughly. Their new lens review system is excellent and really lets you compare lens qualities. DXOMark also have a plethora of lens + body information if you wanna get downright geeky with comparisons.

Edit: I used the word but waaayyyy too many times in that 1st paragraph 

[K9]

Yeah, I have read strobist when you have linked it before, but I end up getting down a wormhole of fascinating things that ends up way over my head and me loosing a day of work  I'll give it a more structured peruse though, as I think I have a better idea what I want.

Don't buy the 55-200. There's a new 55-300 coming out to replace it, which chances are will be better than the 55-200 in most ways. Better to wait and see.

I also wouldn't get the 18-200 VR. The 18-55 and 55-200 cover the same range, will produce better looking pictures, and due to the physics the 18-200 doesn't always function as a 200mm lens.

I'd really recommend buying the 35 1.8. Nothing will improve your photography like a prime lens. You stop thinking about 'zooming' and start thinking about perspective, space, framing, etc. Combining the low-light capabilities with it's price makes it awesome. For outdoor low-light photographs like at a BBQ, nothing I can think of will beat a prime lens with a bit of fill flash. A zoom lens with VR would also be useful, but in my past experience the kind of shutter speeds you need are too slow even to get people to stand still (unless posed).

If you're looking for just a bit more range in zoom I'd recommend the 16-85 or 18-105 VR. VR is really worth it's weight in gold for these kinds of lenses, don't go without it.

This 18-105? I somehow missed it earlier, but this would actually be about right for me. The 55-300 is probably too much, but a mid-range zoom lens would give me room to practise before stepping up. I also figure that if I look after the lens I can always re-sell it for a reasonable price.

So I guess my options are the 18-105 or the 35mm. What else is the prime lens good for other than low light? Could it substitute in for the 18-55 kit lens for day to day, out and about snapping, or is it less practical than the zoom? Does it have any particularly interesting applications?

Thanks again for all your helpful comments and advice.

[tgr]

I don't know about the 35mm, but sigma's 30mm f/1.4 is pretty good as well (at least I think so).

Alternative to the 18-200 could be http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/28200g.htm, but I don't know. 28 is a bit far off for my liking for a proper all-round lens. I'm lazy, I don't really like having to swap lenses if I don't have to. It's bad enough when I have to swap between the 180mm macro and 150-500mm sigma or the 30mm, if I shouldn't have to swap between a 18-55 and a 55-200 as well. But it's a bit pricy, I'll admit.

[Mosesandstick]

Yup, that 18 105. It's cheap and produces good quality photos for what it is. The main reason people get a prime lens like the 35 1.8 is for the 'bokeh' and having a narrow focus region (though the bokeh can be a bit 'nervous' at 1.8).





The 35 1.8 rates pretty much as high as you can get for a budget prime lens. The other advantage of a fast prime lens is that you can stop it down and get near unbeatable image quality, and still be at a relatively fast aperture.



Just as a reminder, the light difference between a lens like 35 1.8 and a kit lens, i.e. the 18-55 is ~f4.5 @ 35mm (if I remember correctly), is around 3 stops. That's the difference between ISO200 and ISO1600 =P

[Merusk]

The 55-300 is probably too much, but a mid-range zoom lens would give me room to practise before stepping up. I

I bought This one because it was a 300mm zoom and I don't regret it.  If anything there's times I wish I had just a little more zoom.  Of course, I doubt you're going to be taking detail shots of private houses or multi-story buildings from a sidewalk on a regular basis like I do.  It does let you get right up on the animals at the zoo, though.

[Merusk]

Just going to toss this in here instead of the pic a day thread because it's the tips thread.  I'm struggling to get good, clear pics in general.  Most that I take look good when reduced down 3-4 times from their original size, but look blurry and indistinct at 100%.   I think I'm not adjusting my shutter speed and ISO quite right and as a result I'm getting this blurring effect.  It's particularly noticible on shots I take with the telephoto lens that aren't in bight ultra-intense sunlight.

Very large pic I took at the zoo recently, but I'll attach it at full-size to show what I'm talking about. It's a nice shot when downsized but it looks awful at full scale.  Any tips or, critiques for me?  The camera's only a D60 but I've seen better shots than I'm getting out on the web using the same machine.  I'm going with "its a poor craftsman that blames their tools" here.

[TripleDES]

Try to widen the aperture and increase the ISO to 200 or 400. This should increase shutter speed quite a bit. At 185mm at 1/60sec, it might just be shaking. At least the way the whiskers are blurred might suggest that.

[tgr]

The whiskers isn't where I'd look to for confirmation on this, as it might very well be in motion. I'd rather point out the grass, where it seems to be a bit harder to see.

I'd wager that it's more a case of slow shutterspeed (the tiger's moving, after all, you can see that on his front paw), combined with possibly a bad lens as well. What kind of lens is this, and can you go out and take sample pictures of something with the same settings but different lenses (just to test/eliminate/confirm the lens)? i.e. same/similar focal length, same shutter speed, aperture, ISO and motive.

I had a friend of mine finally realize why his pictures sucked so much ass, after I pointed out his lens was giving him pictures that were generally just slightly out of focus, but he didn't have the potential problems that stems from a slow shutter. I'm not saying it IS the lens, I'm just saying it's something you could test if you have another lens on hand.

Finally, if that doesn't expose the lens, then yes, dropping the ISO should allow you to up the shutter speed. Stopping down the apertue a bit might also help with sharpness (most lenses tend to be a bit soft around max aperture), but that's probably more something to think about at a later date.

[Mosesandstick]

The rough rule is your shutter speed should be 1/focal length, though that's to account for hand shake. If you've got a lens that is VR, then you can usually go to around shutter speeds 4 or 8 times slower. If you're photographic moving subjects, you usuallly want to shoot between 1/50 and 1/200. Fast moving subjects like sports and you want to be at around 1/250 or higher. My advice, if you're shooting moving subjects, shoot in shutter priority mode, or shoot manually with as fast a SS as possible, wide open aperture, and then ISO high enough to get a bright photo.

[apocrypha]

Yeah that's motion blur. As Moses says 1/focal length is a good guide but it depends on how good you are at hand-holding. Balancing shutter speed, aperture and ISO is hard to get right and depends on a lot of things. Faster shutter speed means less motion blur, but the trade-offs can be wider aperture which means shallower depth of field and thus more blur and/or higher ISO which means more noise.

I'm pretty bad at hand-holding and it doesn't help that I wear glasses - means it's harder to jam the camera up against your face to steady it. You do get better with practice though - think of it like firing a rifle! You want a stable, steady shooting position. Get your legs apart a bit, drop down to 1 knee, lean against something. You want the camera and lens and yourself all well braced. You want to hold it very firmly but also be relaxed. I actually hold my breath for 1/2 a second when shooting too.

A tripod is always good too! And of course shooting with flash means you can freeze motion very effectively. A full-power pop from a hotshoe type flash is about 1/1000th sec, but that's a whole other way of shooting.

[TripleDES]

I don't know about the 35mm, but sigma's 30mm f/1.4 is pretty good as well (at least I think so).

I like my Sigma 30mm f1.4 (especially since I like playing with shallow DOF), but sometimes, when doing random urban photography, I feel I could need a wider lens. I'd like to try 35mm f1.8 on a full-frame or something for that. A 5D MkII would be nice to have, but still way too expensive.

[Merusk]

Thanks guys, you've given me a bunch to consider.

tgr, the lens I was using was the 70-300 I linked in the post right above the question.  I was hand-holding and IIRC, relying on the N60's "P" setting to give a proper combination of aperture and stop based on what I selected.  I wasn't paying enough attention I guess, because my sister had also warned me about hand holding at 1/60 or slower, particularly with a longer focal length.    

I didn't know about the 1/focal length tip, thanks I'll keep it in mind.  I'm always hesitant to lower my iso because it seems like the sensor on the N60 adds a lot of digital noise.  Perhaps it's just because I'm always using shutter speeds that are ridiculously long because I don't compensate with iso. I'm a noob, after all. The way the tiger enclosures are set-up (with a good 4'-2" wall in front of you) I just need to take my tripod and try next time and see if I still get bad results, I suppose.

I don't think the flash would work, apoc, because the tiger was between 75'-100' away.  If that's not the case, then a hotshoe will be my next purchase for certain.

I really need to stop relying on the automatic stuff and play with full-manual more.  I'm getting comfortable with it after having my first SLR camera for a year now, but it still makes me nervous thinking I'll completely screw up a nice shot.

Whoops it's the "P" setting not "S" as that's shutter priority.

[TripleDES]

I practically only shoot in aperture priority and manual modes.

[tgr]

I practically only shoot in shutter priority mode, or manual mode. I care more about the shutter speed being predictable, than the aperture being predictable. About the only time where I consistently control both is when I do macro photography.

My career began with the canon 350d, which decided to eat tons of my pictures until I decided that the camera did, in fact, not know better than me in most normal cases, and should not be allowed to set a ridiculously small aperture AND ridiculously long shutter speed (think 1/10th and f/30+ on a bright summer's day, I forget the exact settings).

[Mosesandstick]

I thought the N60 was a film camera?

One (more) thing to remember is that the 70-300 VR allows you to hold your lens at slower shutter speeds then you usually need, but VR doesn't stop the subject from moving. If you look at the picture you took, everything's blurry which indicates that the SS was too slow to properly handhold, but if you look at the tiger (particularly the front paw) it's even more blurred. The tiger's moving too fast for you to take a proper shot at that speed. My advice would be bump ISO until you get a decent picture. Assuming you're using a D60, the noise isn't fantastic, but when you downsample a photo a lot of that noise just goes away. If you plop your camera on a tripod and stabilise it properly, you should turn VR off. If you shoot at SS > 1/250s, then VR needs to be turned off again.

The 35 1.8 will only show a full image on a full-frame camera at close focuses. At longer ones you can always crop. Or there might be a new Nikon 35 1.4 FF that you can buy (I guess) for around 1000+ bucks 

If you shoot in aperture/shutter priority modes you've got to learn to tackle your camera's exposure meter modes (more to think about  ).

It's actually kind of rediculous the amount of small, niggly things you have to do to get a 'perfect exposure'.

[Merusk]

It probably is.. I'm more tired than I thought as I have a D60, not an N60.    Early to bed tonight.

[apocrypha]

I don't think the flash would work, apoc, because the tiger was between 75'-100' away.  If that's not the case, then a hotshoe will be my next purchase for certain.

Yeah, I kinda meant generally, not for that specific picture. Would be possible... but damned difficult to set up and arrange and we're into the realms of pro photo shoot and getting silly then 

[Bunk]

Yea, ok, so you shot that at 185 mm at 1/60th. That's camera shake you are seeing.
The farther in you zoom, the more dramatic the shake.

I have no idea how good or bad the auto setting is on my current body - I've never used it. Don't get me wrong, I still screw shots all by myself, but at least then it's my fault and not the camera's.

[TripleDES]

I'm planning to upgrade from my EOS 400D by end of the year, but I still ain't sure whether I should go 60D or 7D. I don't really need all the mongo much AF points, nor the dual DIGIC, but it has micro-AF, which is nice to fix these Sigma primes with. 

I'd like a 5D MkII, but that's kinda completely out of budget. 

[Bunk]

I really don't even want to know what those models are. As soon as I buy a new body (50D last year) I stop looking at the sites for at least a couple years, to preserve my sanity.

[TripleDES]

Got myself a 550D today.  The upper models didn't cut it after all. 60D is a lackluster and the 7D is overspecced for what I do.

Video is nice to have, tho. Never thought I'd say that. Gonna try it tomorrow on a bike park visit. Sadly I was so stupid and bought a class 4 SD card only instead of a class 6. But apparently turning off audio saved my ass for tomorrow, since the camera doesn't do a buffer overrun after 10-15 seconds anymore with sound disabled.

[Mosesandstick]

Was playing with a friend's 7D's video during our martial arts session on Saturday.  Holding a DSLR like that for an hour is really tiring  . Controls are a bit fiddly, especially with a lens,  but the quality is pure, unadulterated joy.

[Khaldun]

Got a Nikon d3100 w/the kit lens last week. Spent three hours on the weekend just taking the same shot of an interior at different aperture and ISO, camera resting on the arm of my chair. Was instructive. Have a lot to learn.

Gonna need a tripod. Also have to build lightbox for one of the uses I have in mind.

[Mosesandstick]

If you can spare the cash, buy a good tripod and be happy for the next 20 years of life.

Saw this article on street photography in the beeb and found it quite interesting. Street photography has always fascinated me, but it's not something I'd ever do as I can't bring myself to take photos of people I don't know without their permission.

[TripleDES]

I noticed that lens hoods have a huge influence on other people's perception of you and your DSLR. Especially the tulip ones.

Unless you're carrying around a 500mm tele, then they're always suspicious.

[Merusk]

I find myself doing this while out taking photos on my own and it's probably more enjoyable to me than buildings or scenes.  Finding an old lady reading on a park bench, or a couple that's just chatting away while out for a walk. Or the crowds at events, just so you can pick out individual moments and make-up stories later.  I've always been a people watcher, though. 

[Khaldun]

Bought tripod, lights and inexpensive light box.

[OcellotJenkins]

Just placed an order for my first DSLR, a Canon Rebel T2i with an assortment of 3 starter lenses.  B&H is unbeatable with their free shipping and no tax.  I've enjoyed this thread, you guys have inspired me! 

[Mosesandstick]

A few of us have already talked about the benefits of shooting in RAW, namely how much you can adjust the image. I just came across a piece of software called photivo. It's not that intuitive to use, but I think it's even more powerful than ACR, the software used to adjust camera RAW files with photoshop. This software basically allows you to adjust colour, B&W, contrast, saturation, etc. It probably works with jpegs as well (haven't checked), but it works best with the RAW files from your camera. Oh yeah, it's free!

I've also been trying out HDR and stitching software, including some free ones. I'll write a bit more when I've found some good solutions.

[OcellotJenkins]

I don't know how I managed to go so long without trying Adobe Lightroom.  This is a fantastic piece of software.  Building or downloading presets saves so much time as does not having to go into full blown photoshop for most adjustments.  The only downside I've experienced is with trying to keep catalogs on a desktop and laptop synced (works, but it's a bit sloppy).  Regarding HDR, I've tried a number of plug-ins for both Lightroom and Photoshop but nothing has come close to touching stand alone Photomatix in terms of ease of use and quality of results.

Loving the new camera gear by the way.  The video quality of the T2i is ridiculously good.  I'm also surprised at how well these relatively cheap canon lenses are working.  The 50 mm f1.8 lens ($100) has eliminated my need for a flash.  Lowlight portraits of the wife and babies are stunning with this thing.

The most challenging thing I've tried to do so far is photograph the night sky.  I setup a tripod on my deck with hopes of catching some Leonid action but wound up struggling to get any clear pictures at all.  Does anyone have any suggestions?  I seemed to have the best luck with f5.6 and about a 10 to 15 second shutter speed anything slower blurred bad.  I concluded that part of my blurring problem resulted from some very slight movement of my deck in the night breeze.

[K9]

Weight your tripod? I'm planning to try and shoot some stuff at night soon, so I'm interested in tips for this too. I'm not sure what exposure length you have to be considering before the rotation of the earth starts to be an issue, but I suspect it's pretty long.

[apocrypha]

10 seconds or so is enough for the Earth's rotation to be an issue. Problem is that stars are point sources so they show up any movement at all very clearly.

You can always build yourself a tracking device to compensate for it, but that's getting in a little deep.

[Mosesandstick]

Hm, pre-finding focus, wider angle lenses, bumping up the ISO are all the easy solutions I can think of. Going somewhere with less light pollution?

[OcellotJenkins]

Come to think of it, the lens I used for the night sky the other night didn't have image stabilization so that could have been part of the problem.  Next time I'll try the kit lens at a wider angle since it has IS.  I was curious about the earth rotation issue as well and am surprised to hear it can be noticeable in 10 seconds.  Light pollution is pretty bad where I'm at but made worse with the moon right now.  Apparently the next two year's Leonids are during periods of new moons.

[apocrypha]

Don't use IS when you're tripod-mounted, I've been told it fucks the IS up!