eugimon

Sweet, 1 day in customs and now my new joy is here. If anyone out there is afraid of the heat shield... seriously much ado about nothing, pops up and stay up easily. And the new elbow design, with the slight side to side articulation, Fraking sweet!

Those kurosawa figures are awesome and I love the diorama you built for them.

Well, I'm sure we can send two white people there to kill all the infected.

yup, the rise of MDR-TB in africa should be a major wake up call.

Yup, this from the channel that pimps it's "Black in America" to no end but the second they get they're out their sharpening pitch forks and readying the torches when it suits them. I recognize that informing the general population of a new strain of influenza is in the public interest but the way CNN and some countries have turned this into a power play by running with xenophobia is just really sickening.

Wanna save money? Look at the tamron versions of the 18-55 and the 28-75. You get the f/2.8 (minus the IS or VR) but at a 1/3rd the price. image quality is pretty good as well. I have the 28-75mm tamron on a d90 body, if you want to see samples, shoot me a pm with the sort of stuff you want shot and I'll send you some raws to look at.

Well, I'm not going to argue that the critics are going about it the right way because I agree that they aren't. But that doesn't mean we should automatically shut down the discussion. If they have something legitimate to say, they should be given an opportunity to do so.

if the general focus of the photography discussed is on taking pictures of our toys... it's kinda toy related... right?

I wouldn't worry about it. Just like any large community you'll get personality conflicts and little cliques. I would be encouraged by the fact that we're willing to take time to discuss these issues and that there are members who genuinely care about the culture and climate here.

fever is a symptom of the swine flu, you should look into that.

woohooo, package of goodies at US customs in SF... it's only a matter of time now!

Duuuuuude, those are sweet. I like the 2nd one as well. Honestly, those are some of the most striking shots I've seen in a while. Better get back to it Vegas, folk are catching up to you!

this is after they dropped a nuke on him. I really liked the Ultimate universe when it first started. A way to clean off the slate, update characters and reign in some of the ridiculousness around the more popular ones... but man...

I agree with what you're saying but I would just like to say, that in the same way you obviously care about the culture here other people care just as much but that passion manifests in different ways. In the case of Ryno, a lot of members here are friends with the guy, both on board and through real life, it's perfectly understandable that they would go to bat for their friend. Did it go to far? Or was it not handled in the appropriate way? That's open to debate but lets be fair, there was plenty of hash being thrown from both camps. In the same way you got to express your views, other people have that right as well. I think it's wrong to expect that the thread should have been locked just because the voices that echoed yours got their say.

Aw, thanks man. So, UI is just user interface. The d40 uses the big LCD panel on the back to clearly show the settings and metering, so it's easy to spot what the exposure is, shutter speed and aperture. And auto focus motor is probably what you're thinking of. Basically some lenses (AF-S for nikon) have a built in motor for the purpose. Older lenses require a motor in the camera itself to push/pull the mechanics of the lens for auto focus to work. Honestly, most modern lenses come with this feature. This is really only an issue for legacy lenses or if you're looking to buy older lenses off of ebay. So, the single most important thing is to know what type of photography you're going to be doing. You mentioned in the other thread that it was primarily going to be family gatherings and then shots for your toy hobby. Okay, so then you'll want to know if your family get togethers are during the day and outdoors or primarily evening affairs or indoors. If it's going to be out doors, the standard kit lens the nikkor 18-55mm f/3.5 - 5.6G is a decent lens. This will give you a modest wide angle shot and zoom in for a pretty good portrait shot. The "f/3.5 - 5.6" describes the aperture or how wide the lens will open up. The lower the number, the wider it gets which has two effects. The first is speed. The wider it is, the more light it allows in which allows for faster shutter speeds. The 2nd effect is the depth of field. This is basically how much of your picture is in focus. If you look at my shots, I typically shoot with a low depth of field so only a specific part of the image is in focus with the immediate foreground and background not in focus. Shooting with a higher 'f-stop' restricts the light but puts more of the image in focus. The kit lens (this is gonna be true for both the nikkor and cannon lenses) has a variable f-stop. This means that depending on what level of zoom you're on, the f-stop has a minimum value of f/3.5 - 5.6. Other lenses will have say just "f.28" or what have you and that means that no matter what zoom you are dialed into you will always have that minimum f-stop available for use. There's some lenses where this isn't true but I won't bore you unless you really care. So, if you're going to be shooting outdoors, during the day, then the nikkor 18-55mm is a decent lens to start off with OR if you don't mind using flash for indoor/night time shooting. Proper flash usage is a field of study in itself, one that I know next to nothing about only that I hate the way flash looks. So, if you think you're going to need a faster lens and you're on a budget, I would look at the prime lenses. A prime lens means that it has a fixed focal length. No zoom. So if you want more things in frame, you need to back up, or move forward to tighten your composition. The pluses are numerous though. One, these lenses are FAST and cheap the nikkor 50mm f/1.8 is around a hundred bucks. The 50mm will give your shots that "portrait" look since with the cropped sensor it will look slightly zoomed in. Also, the primes are SHARP, you'll get results that have little distortion both in geometry and in color. So... I would either just get the D40 kit or if you can swing the extra money, get the 50mm prime on top of it so you'll have some more flexible options for shooting indoors.

The problem with buying a used body is you don't know how many times it was used. The internal mechanisms only have so many uses that they're rated for or just if it was abused in general. the D40 is a good transition body. It's pretty easy to use and the UI is almost universally praised. However, the one big thing about it is that it doesn't have an auto focus motor in the body. This will limit the lens selection unless you don't mind manually focusing. Not a big deal if you're buying newer lenses only but there are some bargains to be had on slightly older lenses that don't have internal motors.

apparently ultimate wolverine doesn't even need a body http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=360237

loads fine for me in Chrome

If people really want the thread, yeah, should be there... since that's where the cars, guns and computer discussions lie.

kit lenses are fine for shooting in daylight or in well lit rooms. But if you're shooting at family get togethers you'll find that the it's just not fast enough without having to resort to really high ISO or flash. I hate flash. But if you're mainly going to shoot static objects, a 50mm prime is much better, being faster you can play with the depth of field more, less distortion and noticeably sharper. If you're set on a a zoom walk around lens, I strongly suggest looking at Tamron. A little more than a kit lens but FAR cheaper than the equivalent lens from either Nikon or Canon and very comparable IQ. edit:: I use a Nikon D90. I love it. It handles high ISO like a champ, arguably among the top performers for a cropped sensor. At times I find myself wishing I had bought the D300 instead for the more robust AF but I can live. Besides, that thing is a heavy monster and I'm not sure I want to be carrying it around my neck all day.

Aw, but not my photos? If you want to start off at a budget, pick a nice body, either nikon or canon and then get a nice prime 50mm prime lens. Both the nikon and canon prime are around 100 bucks and sharp as a tack. The only draw back is you have physically move to get things in frame rather than zooming in or out but if you're primary subjects are going to be toys and what not, than a good prime will serve you much better than a 150 dollar 15-50mm kit lens that won't give you near the sharpness or the speed of a good prime. A 50mm prime on a cropped body will give you a slightly zoomed in shot that works well for portrait photography as well. Going this route will let you save some money and buy more specialized lenses like a wide angle or zoom lens as you need them rather than buying a 'jack of all trades' lens that you'll quickly find is rather poor at everything.

Actually it's now considered that the Spanish flu may have caused hundreds of millions of deaths, deaths not reported in asia and parts of middle and south america. The healthy young people that died were the early deaths in Mexico, not the kid in texas who did have pre-existing conditions. the highest known cases of H1N1 in the USA are in NY and not Texas. The 1976 mass vaccination caused around 500 cases of a neurological condition called Guillain-Barre Syndrome paralysis. It's where the body over reacts to a foreign antigen and ends up attacking healthy nerve tissue. This is an extremely rare condition, 1 out of every million vaccinations. edit: aw, got beaten to the punch.

sweet. What camera were you looking at? Even though I love Nikon, I'd have to look at the Canon 5D or 5D mkII.

yup, don't buy from them, they're scam artists. A lot of bait and switch there's a bunch of companies who basically run the same scam. They post super low prices and when you order it will be back ordered or they'll try to get you to buy their "camera bundles" which will be obscenely expensive. If you don't buy it then your order will never ship, they won't answer the phone or emails and you'll have to get you CC involved. Buy from Amazon, they have low prices and work with reputable retailers. And just buy the body and pick out a decent lens yourself. The kit lenses universally suck. Remember, if you shoot a lot, a body will only last around 5 years. A good lens will last decades. If you're starting out, best to pick an affordable body and spend the money on a good lens. And think about whether you want full frame or cropped when buying lenses. A lot of lenses are made specifically for cropped sensors and won't work right on a full frame sensor. Something to consider.

sweet. That's a nice camera... for a canon. (I'm a nikon kinda guy) And with good skill and some nice glass you'll get awesome photos out of it. Can't wait to see the deluge!