The Professional Photography and Photoshop Thread

[ae_productions]

These are great tips! Thanks for the help!

[Major Focker]

Lensbaby finally came out with version of the Composer on micro fourthirds mount so I immediately got one for my Olympus Pen. It also came with a tilt adaptor for use with Nikon lenses which affords a selective slice of focus. Unfortunately, I have yet to get a Nikon lens, so for now I'm just toying with the glass it came with which gives a circular sweet spot of focus you can move around the frame. It's also a decent portrait lens as it is 80mm f1.6, but more interestingly the shape of the bokeh can be changed with a aperture discs that come with star or heart shaped cutouts, or you can design you own.

So I put some Christmas lights against a dark background, dialed down to ISO100 and shot in bursts to catch the lights on the blink, and voila! or rather kira!

some Sheryl love:

Edited October 25, 2010 by Major Focker

[eugimon]

nice shots. Love the use of the lights.

[wizartar]

It's been a while, here's two of the model kits I've finished recently.

top by Wizartar, on Flickr

Real Grade RX-78-2 by Wizartar, on Flickr

RG RX-78-2 Finished by Wizartar, on Flickr

[Major Focker]

thanks eugimon.

wizartar, wow those look sharp, both the models and the photos. what do you use?

[wizartar]

thanks eugimon.

wizartar, wow those look sharp, both the models and the photos. what do you use?

It's taken using a Nikon D60 with a Nikkon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G IF-ED AF-S VR DX. ISO-100 using a tripod and Infrared remote to take the picture, so no camera shake.

Edited October 26, 2010 by wizartar

[Major Focker]

need some advice, particularly from those who shoot sports or events.

i'm heading to sydney this december to watch the U2 concert and was hoping to try out telephoto shooting. tacky i know, i should just enjoy the concert, but still i'd like to have some shots as a souvenir.

i estimate i will be half a field away, so my question is, at that distance what focal length (in 35mm equivalent) do i need to have full body shots of the performers to nearly fill the frame?

i'm using an Olympus PEN (micro 4:3 format with 2x crop factor) and considering either the Olympus 40-150(80-300mm eqv) and the Panasonic 45-200(90-400mm eqv), both are f4-5.6 although the latter is half the price but twice the weight. will either of these lenses suffice? or do i need to go longer? there is the Panasonic 100-300(200-600mm eqv) but not sure if it will be available in singapore by early december. which of the 3 to get? thanks

It's taken using a Nikon D60 with a Nikkon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G IF-ED AF-S VR DX. ISO-100 using a tripod and Infrared remote to take the picture, so no camera shake.

thanks. i also use a tripod and timed shutter release but never get that level of sharpness. guess it boils down to lens resolution. can't wait for a micro4:3 HG lens

[eugimon]

what sort of shots do you want? The stage, the band or face shots? I'd go for the panasonic 100-300mm. Reach is one of those things you just can't cheat.

And make sure you set the light metering to "spot".

[Major Focker]

what sort of shots do you want? The stage, the band or face shots? I'd go for the panasonic 100-300mm. Reach is one of those things you just can't cheat.

And make sure you set the light metering to "spot".

i'd be happy with just full body shots, though half-body would be great! will 600mm afford me that? sorry, i really have no idea when it comes to telephoto. my longest lens right now is only 84mm equivalent so i really can't imagine how the field of view will look like at 3x or 6x that length.

thanks for the advice. i googled a bit more on the panny 100-300 and it seems to have a release date of nov8 on amazon. i wonder how long after that when it becomes available in singapore?

[eugimon]

just remember though, at that range the slightest movement on your part will introduce motion blur. You're going to want to brace the camera against something, a bag or something draped over the seats in front of you, etc.

Well, I'm really not sure what "half a field" means. If you mean it's around 50m, yeah, a 300mm lens will get you body shots.

[Major Focker]

sorry, i meant football field, so yeah around 50m. but was just basing that off the venue seatplan. it's a stadium and we got the lower seats a bit to the side of the stage. now that i think about it though, i'll probably be farther than that when i consider the offset of the field to the seats as well as the elevation. so i guess i'll really have to go for 600mm.

thanks for the tips. i'll be sure to bring at least a monopod, or a tripod if i can sneak one in.

[mickyg]

You'll need to figure how much light that lens will let in, and conversely, how long an exposure you'll need to get a shot. If the lens is too slow, you'll need a pretty long shutter speed to get a good esposure. Long exposure and people (especially a rock concert) = blur. I'm not up on the micro four thirds specs at present but the pro gear 600mm lenses (think big canon lenses at sporting events) are f/5.6 (I think). If you can get that speed and shoot at high ISO and a shutter speed of... (what is it for camera shake - 1/focal length X crop factor and 4/3 is 2x crop factor, so 1/1200) about 1/1000 a second, then it should work.

Just some food for thought. If you can get all that stuff sorted in the lens you're after, go for it!

Edited October 31, 2010 by mickyg

[VF-19]

One other thing: Make sure BEFORE you bring your camera with you that the venue allows cameras to be brought in. Some do, some don't.

[eugimon]

You'll need to figure how much light that lens will let in, and conversely, how long an exposure you'll need to get a shot. If the lens is too slow, you'll need a pretty long shutter speed to get a good esposure. Long exposure and people (especially a rock concert) = blur. I'm not up on the micro four thirds specs at present but the pro gear 600mm lenses (think big canon lenses at sporting events) are f/5.6 (I think). If you can get that speed and shoot at high ISO and a shutter speed of... (what is it for camera shake - 1/focal length X crop factor and 4/3 is 2x crop factor, so 1/1200) about 1/1000 a second, then it should work.

Just some food for thought. If you can get all that stuff sorted in the lens you're after, go for it!

at that range a fast lens is pretty worthless though. A low f stop would help with the low light but the focus range would be so shallow it would be really hard to get anything in focus, especially in a chaotic concert environment.

An f stop of 5.6 will should be fast enough as long as you're using spot metering and using the stage lights to get your shots exposed.

It's definitely possible though. I took this shot with a slow lens and it was hand held.

[mickyg]

You managed to freeze that one pretty well! What sort of stuff did you shoot that with?

Also, I was under the impression that depth of field increased with distance. When I shoot with my el cheapo f/1.8 50mm canon lens, the closer I am, the shallower the depth of field. If I'm far enough away, even with the aperture wide open, I can usually get a whole person's face in focus. Whereas if I'm close, It's more like a few mm that's in focus.

Edited October 31, 2010 by mickyg

[eugimon]

You managed to freeze that one pretty well! What sort of stuff did you shoot that with?

a nikon d90 with the 55-200mm f/4-5.6dx kit lens. I sat on the seat with my knees up and put my camera bag on top and used it to brace the camera.

To get any sort of action shot you're going to need to keep your shutter speed around 100 at a bare min. So try to keep your F stop as low as you can while still being able to keep focus and play around with your ISO to find what's tolerable for you.

Also, I was under the impression that depth of field increased with distance. When I shoot with my el cheapo f/1.8 50mm canon lens, the closer I am, the shallower the depth of field. If I'm far enough away, even with the aperture wide open, I can usually get a whole person's face in focus. Whereas if I'm close, It's more like a few mm that's in focus.

Nah. Given everything else is the same, at 50m with a 200mm lens, your depth of field at f/1.8 is something like 12 feet. At f/5.6 it's around 30 ft.

At the range we're talking about here.. 150ft with a 300mm lens. The depth of field at f/1.8 is only 5 ft while at 5.6 it's 17ft.

Edited November 1, 2010 by eugimon

[Major Focker]

You'll need to figure how much light that lens will let in, and conversely, how long an exposure you'll need to get a shot. If the lens is too slow, you'll need a pretty long shutter speed to get a good esposure. Long exposure and people (especially a rock concert) = blur. I'm not up on the micro four thirds specs at present but the pro gear 600mm lenses (think big canon lenses at sporting events) are f/5.6 (I think).

the panny lens i'm considering is f5.6 at 300mm(600mm equivalent) so it shouldn't be an issue. theoretically speaking, the m43 format is stronger on the long tele end because of the 2x crop factor, a boon in this case, but a bane on the short end ie. need to go really wide angle (9mm lenses) for landscapes or very fast (sub f2) for shallow DOF/focus isolation.

[Firefox]

I think by now the F-15 should evolve into something like this. My latest photoshop creation. The original pic can be found in Airliner website.

[Firefox]

VF-25 over an alien landscape.

[Kicker773]

Screwed around with the lighting..

[Rabidweezil]

some advice from the experts please

I have an old Minolta Dimage Z10. In it's day it was a pretty good camera. It was not simple like a point and shoot, and not as complicated (or expensive) as a DLSR either. A bit of an inbetween camera. I liked that I could tweak the settings a bit to suit my needs.

So I'm looking for something similar, but new.

I take mostly indoor shots of figures and stuff but occasionally do outdoor shots from time to time.

Right now I have my eye on the new Canon G12.

http://www.amazon.com/Canon-G12-Digital-Stabilized-Vari-Angle/dp/B0041RSPRS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1289849058&sr=8-1

Thoughts?

Thanks!

[eugimon]

I love the G series but they're not the best for indoor stuff.

If you want to go with canon the powershot s95 is what I would suggest. It has a bigger sensor and handles low light fairly well.

For something a little more in the G series range, check out the panasonic/lumix LX series cameras. They're lower res, around 10MP, but that gives them better low light performance.

[Rabidweezil]

Thanks for the input Eugimon.

Sorry if this question is stupid, but for most of my indoor shots, I normally use some sort of a lightbox. Does that still make it lowlight indoor shooting?

Thanks!

[eugimon]

Oh, no. If you're using a lightbox or other sort of lighting then low light shooting isn't going to be an issue for you.

Get the G then. It's a fantastic camera.

[Rabidweezil]

Awesome thanks! I'm going to keep an eye out for any holiday sales on the G12. Even if I cannot find it cheaper, I'll end up picking up one anyway. It seems to have gotten pretty good reviews just about everywhere.

I'm also looking at The Digital Photography Book Volume 1 and 2 by Scott Kelby for some beginning photography assistance

[mickyg]

It's going back a few pages but I mentioned I was looking to take some photos of my collection (toys and models) and try to get some projects together that would attempt to make them look "real" in a scale sense. I ran into some problems with quite a number of things though, not the least of which is perspective and lens choice. It seemed to me, that in order to get the best perspective for making something look photographically real, you really need a fairly wide angle lens. I mean if you're shooting a full size bird at an airshow, for instance, and you want to be reasonably close (20-30 feet away?), you'd need a fairly wide angle lens to fit it in. My theory is that you'd need the same for shooting a model, only in scale distance (instead of 20-30 feet, you'd want about 4 inches from the model). So to fit the whole model in the frame, you'd still need a fairly wide angle lens.

I'm not sure I'm making a lot of sense because everytime I try to reason this out, I end up a bit lost. So I took some photos to see if I could "see" the fakeness in terms of perspective. I don't know that I can! Here's 8 examples, with my camera on a tripod and controlling the distance only (within reason, the tripod was not on a track). I took photos at 35mm, 50mm, 60mm, and 100mm (these were all done on my 18 - 135mm zoom lens). Why 50 and 60? Simple, I want to get a macro lens and these are fairly "wide angle" for macros. I'm considering either a 50mm f/2.8 Sigma, a Canon 60mm f/2.8 or a Tamron 60mm f/2.0. I wanted to see if I could see much difference between the two focal lengths, and the 60 might make a good portrait lens when not being used as a macro. And because 100mm is another popular length for macros, I thought I'd try that too (the value was actually 113mm but it's close).

Here's the comparisons:

Side view

Angle view

What became immediately obvious is that for focal lenghts shorter than 50mm, a macro lens is a must for my dSLR - to fill the frame with any 6" average toy/model, you've got to get reasonably close. My minimum focus distance on my lens is not small enough at 35mm to get the toy in focus (you'll notice it's blurry). 50mm and greater starts to get a bit more reasonable. But what if I want a close up of a certain area on the model/toy? Again, a macro lens is going to be a must, unless I want to crop the photo (which is what I normally do but it's extra work and you loose a bit of detail in the photo that way).

So I'm still thinking a macro will be very helpful. But what focal length? If you can scroll between 35 and 50, you'll notice the length of the nose on the angle pics looks like it changes a fair bit. I have no idea which is the more realistic look in terms of perspective, but to my eye, the 35mm shot looks the most "wrong" and distorted.

Anyway, comments and suggestions are welcomed!

[wizartar]

Recently picked up a Nikon D7000, so far very nice and a big step up from the old D60 I was shooting with. Haven't played around with the video much.

These are two long night exposures from a couple of nights ago.

[MacrossMan]

Recently picked up a Nikon D7000, so far very nice and a big step up from the old D60 I was shooting with. Haven't played around with the video much.

These are two long night exposures from a couple of nights ago.

Congrats on the upgrade! D60 to D7000? I am certain you can appreciate the upgrades. I have friend that purchased the D300s in October and can't understand for the life of me why he would not return it for the D7000. It's a much nicer camera in my opinion.

[Vegas]

random shot with the 70-200mm 2.8 IS lens about two weeks ago

data by デストロイド, on Flickr

[MacrossMan]

random shot with the 70-200mm 2.8 IS lens about two weeks ago

data by デストロイド, on Flickr

That's a pretty slick fade of DOF on the grass Vegas!

[Vegas]

That's a pretty slick fade of DOF on the grass Vegas!

thanks, the swirling bokeh is awesome too

[Saburo]

I am resurrecting this thread (last updated was 2010) because there is large amount of useful tips here for the new gen MW photographers, I myself included.

Thank you to all the MW members that contributed to this thread.

Edited August 3, 2015 by Saburo

[mickyg]

Ha! I remember this! I thought it got morphed into the 1/72, 1/60, 1/48 thread.

Good stuff!

[Saburo]

Haha... I found this thread back when I started taking photos and there was quite a bit that proved very helpful to me and I hope it will help others too.

@mickyg I saw your posts from way back.

[seti88]

Shucks i didnt know this thread existed! Seems to be the appropriate thread to be posting in my latest time fillers!..

Warping in from Windemere...

 

Bombardment from chaos and walkure colors!

Pardon the stand inclusion, didn't want to edit it too much. Mainly shot against the monitor, adjusted and applied filters in photoshop..

my other shots of the draken are in the draken thread...