The "Post a Picture You Took" thread

[DougO 5253]

36 minutes ago, El Diablo said:

Any tips on taking an outdoors family portrait type photo? Coworker is volunteering her family as guinea pigs. Lighting? Metering method? Not even sure what I need to be asking really.

Hope for a semi-cloudy day with fairly low diffused sun for non-squinty front lighting, or invest in off-camera light for fill flash to sync with the daylight. The more people and the further away the subject, the more difficult it is.

 

[El Diablo 4232]

1 minute ago, DougO said:

Hope for a semi-cloudy day with fairly low diffused sun for non-squinty front lighting, or invest in off-camera light for fill flash to sync with the daylight. The more people and the further away the subject, the more difficult it is.

 

Thanks. I've probably got a couple of weeks to figure it out and get a game plan. I was thinking of using your 180mm or my 85mm. The 85 is a f1.8. Not sure if I would need it set quite that fast though.

[DougO 5253]

4 minutes ago, El Diablo said:

Thanks. I've probably got a couple of weeks to figure it out and get a game plan. I was thinking of using your 180mm or my 85mm. The 85 is a f1.8. Not sure if I would need it set quite that fast though.

You will probably need something wider for a group shot. I doubt the 180 would be useful unless you can shoot from pretty far away without extra lighting gear. The 85 might be too much, maybe OK for tight head and shoulder type small group. Shoot with the small aperture to get everyone in focus, especially if they are varied depth.

[DougO 5253]

Look through the tutorials here:

 

https://strobist.blogspot.com/2006/03/lighting-101.html

[El Diablo 4232]

1 minute ago, DougO said:

You will probably need something wider for a group shot. I doubt the 180 would be useful unless you can shoot from pretty far away without extra lighting gear. The 85 might be too much, maybe OK for tight head and shoulder type small group. Shoot with the small aperture to get everyone in focus, especially if they are varied depth.

I've got a 35mm (50mm equivalent on my FX) and of course the 18-55mm kit lens (so ~27-82) that you have.

[El Diablo 4232]

2 minutes ago, DougO said:

Look through the tutorials here:

 

https://strobist.blogspot.com/2006/03/lighting-101.html

I'll do that. Thanks. The only lighting I'll have is ambient and the onboard flash for fill if needed.

[DougO 5253]

2 minutes ago, El Diablo said:

I'll do that. Thanks. The only lighting I'll have is ambient and the onboard flash for fill if needed.

A makeshift reflector or two can do a lot. The strobist will cover that as well. He's into doing a lot of stuff on the cheap with home-made items. An assistant can be a big help, holding stuff up.

[DougO 5253]

5 minutes ago, El Diablo said:

I've got a 35mm (50mm equivalent on my FX) and of course the 18-55mm kit lens (so ~27-82) that you have.

It's a really good little lens.

[El Diablo 4232]

I guess what lens I end up using will be somewhat determined by location/space. I've got a spot in mind down by the Hilton and of course there's areas in Cameron Park that would probably be suitable.

[El Diablo 4232]

16 hours ago, DougO said:

A makeshift reflector or two can do a lot. The strobist will cover that as well. He's into doing a lot of stuff on the cheap with home-made items. An assistant can be a big help, holding stuff up.

I spent an hour or so last night reading his Lighting 101, now it's got me thinking I need to buy a light kit, lol. Thanks a lot, Doug! 

[DougO 5253]

7 hours ago, El Diablo said:

I spent an hour or so last night reading his Lighting 101, now it's got me thinking I need to buy a light kit, lol. Thanks a lot, Doug! 

I have a bunch of lighting stuff acquired over the years that I never use. You just end up doing free portrait gigs that nobody wants to pay for and it becomes a pain.

[Patricio Swayze 17058]

[El Diablo 4232]

Couple of little fishes.

 

[Anton Chigurh 3319]

Got a new toy. A little Canonet QL17 G-III. I have wanted one of these little rangefinders for a while, since they’re supposed to have an excellent sharp lens on them, and I have never had a rangefinder.







Going to try to run a test roll of Portra through soon.

[Patricio Swayze 17058]

Took a quick 2 day trip to the high plains with my dad.  Never enough time to stop at all the places or do all the hikes.  Here are some shots I have edited so far, still quite a few to go through.

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[Hpara759 1780]

That old jail.................that's Clairemont Tx ???

[Patricio Swayze 17058]

That old jail.................that's Clairemont Tx ???

That’s the one.

[El Diablo 4232]

I really like the first pic. That tree has seen things.

[Patricio Swayze 17058]

Round 2:

[El Diablo 4232]

I went to the zoo yesterday just to get out somewhere away from this ugly ass apartment complex. Bright, bright sunny day. Took a couple different lenses with me and gave shooting with the 18/27mm a whirl. I've got work to do, lol. On the left of this first shot are some stylized braces under some type of arbor, a couple of closer shots of them follow. I didn't really notice the blueness of the shadows until just now and did a crude color edit.

 

[Zwylde 812]

Brazos Bend State Park yesterday.  Not great photos (iphone) by any stretch of the imagination but up close pics of gators are always cool in my book. 

 

 

 

[DougO 5253]

Finding a decent photo day was tough in November. Here are a few recent ones.

\

 

[hookem2010 2624]

Cool shot of the canyon wren. Where do you see those guys?

[DougO 5253]

1 hour ago, hookem2010 said:

Cool shot of the canyon wren. Where do you see those guys?

That was at Stillhouse Hollow Lake at the spillway below the dam. I see them sometimes around the quieter parts of the lakes where there are boulders on the side of a hill. Really cool bird, and they make some interesting sounds from shrill to beautiful.

[El Diablo 4232]

@DougO I was at the Extraco yesterday taking pics of a hunter/jumper horse show and was talking to the lady professional photographer that they contract with and her hobby when she's not working has become birding. She laughed when she told me she paid $250 to spend a day in a blind in S. Texas taking pictures of the birds and other wildlife. She said there were 7 other mofo's in there with her. Do the math, Doug.  

I think the place she mentioned was La Lomita ranch? Something like that, down near Uvalde. She said the spot they were on was only about 10 acres. It had been planted and landscaped to attract birds and provide good shooting for paying customers. $2K a day seems like it might be worth it to have some strangers invade the farm occasionally. 

She's the same lady I ran into back in June that was supposed to be going to Mongolia to live in a yurt and take pics of the mounted archers there. She said the trip fell thru because of unrest in Hong Kong airport and her flight that day was supposed to connect thru there. Trip of a lifetime and had to cancel it. 

She showed me a picture on her phone of a green jay she'd taken at the ranch in south Texas. Pretty bird, I'd never even heard of them. 

[Snow Dog 128]

[mention=378]DougO[/mention] I was at the Extraco yesterday taking pics of a hunter/jumper horse show and was talking to the lady professional photographer that they contract with and her hobby when she's not working has become birding. She laughed when she told me she paid $250 to spend a day in a blind in S. Texas taking pictures of the birds and other wildlife. She said there were 7 other mofo's in there with her. Do the math, Doug.  

I think the place she mentioned was La Lomita ranch? Something like that, down near Uvalde. She said the spot they were on was only about 10 acres. It had been planted and landscaped to attract birds and provide good shooting for paying customers. $2K a day seems like it might be worth it to have some strangers invade the farm occasionally. 

She's the same lady I ran into back in June that was supposed to be going to Mongolia to live in a yurt and take pics of the mounted archers there. She said the trip fell thru because of unrest in Hong Kong airport and her flight that day was supposed to connect thru there. Trip of a lifetime and had to cancel it. 

She showed me a picture on her phone of a green jay she'd taken at the ranch in south Texas. Pretty bird, I'd never even heard of them. 

Green jays are pimpadelic.

 

 

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[DougO 5253]

4 hours ago, El Diablo said:

@DougO I was at the Extraco yesterday taking pics of a hunter/jumper horse show and was talking to the lady professional photographer that they contract with and her hobby when she's not working has become birding. She laughed when she told me she paid $250 to spend a day in a blind in S. Texas taking pictures of the birds and other wildlife. She said there were 7 other mofo's in there with her. Do the math, Doug.  

I think the place she mentioned was La Lomita ranch? Something like that, down near Uvalde. She said the spot they were on was only about 10 acres. It had been planted and landscaped to attract birds and provide good shooting for paying customers. $2K a day seems like it might be worth it to have some strangers invade the farm occasionally. 

She's the same lady I ran into back in June that was supposed to be going to Mongolia to live in a yurt and take pics of the mounted archers there. She said the trip fell thru because of unrest in Hong Kong airport and her flight that day was supposed to connect thru there. Trip of a lifetime and had to cancel it. 

She showed me a picture on her phone of a green jay she'd taken at the ranch in south Texas. Pretty bird, I'd never even heard of them. 

If I had some good birding land like that I would consider such a thing. My family's land is mostly cedar and poor grass, though, not a lot of sought-after birds. I wouldn't pay for something like that, not that kind of cash. But the idea of a owning "Bird and breakfast" resort is something I fantasize about sometimes.

I would rather find birds honestly in the wild. I fished for striper with a guide with my dad once and I didn't really like it that much because it felt sort of like cheating. I think it's OK that other people do it, but it's not or me, unless it were something really rare and special and worth paying for.

[DougO 5253]

15 minutes ago, Snow Dog said:

Green jays are pimpadelic.

 

 

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My cousin has some ranch land down south with green jays on it but I have never been. I would kinda like to go but it's a longass drive, and I don't really like longass drives.

[El Diablo 4232]

Yeah, I know, it's over processed. 

 

[El Diablo 4232]

I missed the rider getting pitched but snapped this and as soon as I saw it I thought of a painting by Andrew Wyeth. 

 

[DougO 5253]

I have a cheap print of that Wyeth painting somewhere.

[DougO 5253]

21 minutes ago, El Diablo said:

Yeah, I know, it's over processed. 

 

Good action moment, though. You can probably tweak out the contrast quite a bit.

[El Diablo 4232]

On 12/8/2019 at 8:37 PM, DougO said:

Good action moment, though. You can probably tweak out the contrast quite a bit.

Yeah, I gave it another shot. 

 

[El Diablo 4232]

Dumb question amnesty time here... This chart is for crop sensor cameras, but not all crops are made equal, right? Following on that, do I need to multiply by my crop factor to find the right focal length to be looking at? I mean, I have a 35mm lens, so should I be looking at the 35mm column or the 50? Sure, I guess I could go out and shoot at both distances and figure it out but I figure I've got you brains to save me from that. 

 

[Anton Chigurh 3319]

No, that one is already converted, except that it still seems off. It will be different for Canon vs non-Canon too.

Also, I recommend the PhotoPills app. It has many tools, but a hyperfocal distance table is one. I used what I think your camera is.



It’s a $10 app but absolutely worth it.

[El Diablo 4232]

Okay, so in both cases it is referring to the focal length of the lens and not the effective focal length. Makes sense I guess, since the chart I posted is labelled as for an APS-C. 

What made me question the chart was the fact, that I mentioned, that the Canon and Nikon crop factors aren't the same so that chart couldn't be right for both. I'll probably get that app and learn to use it. I might still print out something to carry in my pocket because I'm old and that's how we do things.  

[Hornius Emeritus 12480]

Nikon is dying. Devastating numbers released a couple of weeks ago:


https://youtu.be/74oWUeRb65k?t=31

[El Diablo 4232]

57 minutes ago, Hornius Emeritus said:

Nikon is dying. Devastating numbers released a couple of weeks ago:


https://youtu.be/74oWUeRb65k?t=31

They've been so slow to move into mirrorless, I'm not really surprised that they're doing poorly. It'll be a slow death though, they're just too pervasive as a brand to disappear anytime soon.

[Hornius Emeritus 12480]

57 minutes ago, El Diablo said:

They've been so slow to move into mirrorless, I'm not really surprised that they're doing poorly. It'll be a slow death though, they're just too pervasive as a brand to disappear anytime soon.

 

Their revenue is way, way down, from almost 600 million in 2015 to 220 million (projected) in 2020.  As phones get better, there's less of an incentive for people to carry the low-end cameras that drive sales/brand recognition and the bottom line. 

[El Diablo 4232]

1 hour ago, Hornius Emeritus said:

 

Their revenue is way, way down, from almost 600 million in 2015 to 220 million (projected) in 2020.  As phones get better, there's less of an incentive for people to carry the low-end cameras that drive sales/brand recognition and the bottom line. 

And they've been slow to move to the mirrorless market for those interested in dedicated cameras.

I'm hoping to cash in on the mirrorless trend with cheaper used Nikon glass hitting the DSLR market  (hopefully prices come down).

[El Diablo 4232]

22 hours ago, Anton Chigurh said:

No, that one is already converted, except that it still seems off. It will be different for Canon vs non-Canon too.

Also, I recommend the PhotoPills app. It has many tools, but a hyperfocal distance table is one. I used what I think your camera is.



It’s a $10 app but absolutely worth it.

I downloaded that app and played with it a bit this evening. I like it. One of my brothers had some interest in photography years ago and I was talking to him on the phone tonight telling him what all it could do and he was pretty blown away. I was too. Thanks for telling me about that! 

[DougO 5253]

Lots of birding in the past week, culminating in Saturday's local Christmas bird count with my group.

 

 

 

 

 

[El Diablo 4232]

Pretty birds, Doug. The blue skies we've been having do make for nice backdrops so they're good for something.

[El Diablo 4232]

More dumb question amnesty needed. I have a couple of questions about tripods and monopods. 1) How does a monopod attach to the camera? Do they come with a quick release base or just use the standard 1/4-20 screw? 2) Large lenses that have a tripod collar, how do they attach to a tripod? I've looked at plenty of pics of these lenses and I'm still not sure exactly what the foot on the collar has that attaches to the pod. TIA!

[DougO 5253]

1 hour ago, El Diablo said:

More dumb question amnesty needed. I have a couple of questions about tripods and monopods. 1) How does a monopod attach to the camera? Do they come with a quick release base or just use the standard 1/4-20 screw? 2) Large lenses that have a tripod collar, how do they attach to a tripod? I've looked at plenty of pics of these lenses and I'm still not sure exactly what the foot on the collar has that attaches to the pod. TIA!

Monopods generally just have a 1/4-20 screw, sometimes a springy type screw inside a screw that offers two different sizes. Some put a quick release deal on them if they're going to switch a lot.

The big lenses attach with the same type of screw into the bottom of the L-shaped collar attachment that keeps the weight closer to center balance. You never want to attach a camera with a bigass heavy lens to a tripod into the camera body. But it basically works the same way, just in a different place on the lens.

[El Diablo 4232]

21 minutes ago, DougO said:

Monopods generally just have a 1/4-20 screw, sometimes a springy type screw inside a screw that offers two different sizes. Some put a quick release deal on them if they're going to switch a lot.

The big lenses attach with the same type of screw into the bottom of the L-shaped collar attachment that keeps the weight closer to center balance. You never want to attach a camera with a bigass heavy lens to a tripod into the camera body. But it basically works the same way, just in a different place on the lens.

Thanks for the info. Do you know if the quick release plate/gizmo that Nikon uses is universal? Is using quick release setups normal on a monopod or attaching one to a lens collar? Bad idea?

[DougO 5253]

59 minutes ago, El Diablo said:

Thanks for the info. Do you know if the quick release plate/gizmo that Nikon uses is universal? Is using quick release setups normal on a monopod or attaching one to a lens collar? Bad idea?

I wouldn't use a quick release on a monopod unless I had some some big bulky gimbal thing or something that I'm unlikely to ever want to use. I sometimes use a tilt head if I'm shooting upwards with a heavy leans, like with an airshow or sometimes with flying birds. But I usually hand-hold. I use one like this, which doesn't totally tighten up hard, you set it to be as loose as you need to adjust.

https://www.amazon.com/Manfrotto-234-Monopod-Tilt-Replaces/dp/B000KHZ8AA

As far as I know Nikon doesn't make a quick release system. They just use the standard camera/lens screw mounts, and quick release adapters are made by third party manufacturers, as well as replacements for some of the removable lens mount systems to make them more efficient.

Edited December 18, 2019 by DougO

[El Diablo 4232]

31 minutes ago, DougO said:

I wouldn't use a quick release on a monopod unless I had some some big bulky gimbal thing or something that I'm unlikely to ever want to use. I sometimes use a tilt head if I'm shooting upwards with a heavy leans, like with an airshow or sometimes with flying birds. But I usually hand-hold. I use one like this, which doesn't totally tighten up hard, you set it to be as loose as you need to adjust.

https://www.amazon.com/Manfrotto-234-Monopod-Tilt-Replaces/dp/B000KHZ8AA

As far as I know Nikon doesn't make a quick release system. They just use the standard camera/lens screw mounts, and quick release adapters are made by third party manufacturers, as well as replacements for some of the removable lens mount systems to make them more efficient.

I didn't know if Nikons stuff was their own or not, my tripod is Nikon branded. So I guess the plate/gizmo is a standard of some sort, just not sure which. I've seen "Swiss Arca" a lot of places but I don't know if that is the same as what I already have. I wouldn't mind getting another plate. I keep the one on the D7500 all the time and if I had a spare I'd put it on the D3200 just because. I just ordered a used Manfrotto monopod off of Adorama. 

Are quick release gizmos/plates a separate combo item? And then they just bolt onto the camera and pod/swivel head? Sorry for all the dumbass questions. 

[Snow Dog 128]

It’s all about juxtaposition.


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[DougO 5253]

22 hours ago, El Diablo said:

I didn't know if Nikons stuff was their own or not, my tripod is Nikon branded. So I guess the plate/gizmo is a standard of some sort, just not sure which. I've seen "Swiss Arca" a lot of places but I don't know if that is the same as what I already have. I wouldn't mind getting another plate. I keep the one on the D7500 all the time and if I had a spare I'd put it on the D3200 just because. I just ordered a used Manfrotto monopod off of Adorama. 

Are quick release gizmos/plates a separate combo item? And then they just bolt onto the camera and pod/swivel head? Sorry for all the dumbass questions. 

You can get fancy expensive release gizmos that fit in more high end tripods with a pretty standard bolt on deal, but I think most consumer brand tripods have their own buit in system in various sizes and shapes. Even the same brand has different ones to fit their particular models.  When you find a great deal on a used tripod at a pawn shop or thrift store, usually the quick release plate is missing, and therefore useless, until/unless you can find the exact same plate for that particular model. And it's usually kind of expensive, because people always lose their plates when they forget to put the back on the release deal after they're finished using it.

But I really don't mess with them much since I rarely use tripods. The landscape/scenic photo guys here probably know a lot more about it. My experience with the usual consumer branded tripod quick release systems is are kind of a pain. They're sorta clunky and difficult to get tight and level and all that, sometimes hard to put on or take off. And I'm too cheap to buy a fancy tripod and a pro level release system that I will rarely use.