peter

<p>I thought for a moment that these were taken in Surrey. But they are not they are from Devon. Still, close!</p>

<p>http://www.jamesravilious.com/gallery.asp</p>

<p>Every photo is an interpretation whether you know it or not. The photographer is a part of the photo and the photo says something about the person who took it.</p>

<p>I have the 17-55mm f2.8 and find it pretty quite - sometimes its so fast an so quiet that I do not think it has focussed at all. I have certainly not noticed any increase in noise with lens size</p>

<p>I should also say that if money is limited, get the D70s (I have extolled it virtues above and need say no more.) Put the money saved into lenses. This is what gets results. As they say in the golfing game - "Drive for show - putt for dough!"</p>

<p> Similar principle with cameras and lenses.</p>

<p>The point someone made about battery life on the D70s compared with the D200 is accurate. I had forgotten to say that the D70s has wonderful battery life (probably helped by its comparatively small LCD screen.) The D200 battery life is really very very ordinary by comparison. The d70s is good even without a battery grip ( which gives it 2 batteries) but I never the less bought an aftermarket battery grip for my D70s (Nikon did not make one) and I could then literally shoot for a week or more without thinking about battery charge. Great for short trips. When I got my D200, I had to get an MD-200 grip for the D200 as I found that the battery life without this camera is comparatively so poor that I was constantly worried I would run out. With it ,battery life is now dequate and the grip itself is very functional and well worth the cost. I especially like the way that the grip draws current from one battery first and when its dead switches to the other - very neat. And the D200 grip comes with a battery tray for AA batteries. If you do happen to be away from home without a charger and the camera batteries die then you can switch over to store bought cells although the drain on these must be pretty great and it would not be a cheap way to shoot long term. Oh and by the way the grip also adds nice balance too.</p>

<p>While a bad HDD is a strong contender, do not totally rule our a dying video card.</p>

<p>Mine died a few months back with much the same symptoms as you describe except I could not get it to fire up afterwards.</p>

<p>Do you have an Nvidia card? If sothen the video card is perhaps more likely. Read this ( and about a zillion other posts on the same issue) ........ http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/39045/135/ Do not believe the Nvidia line that its a limited problem affecting a few notebooks only - judging by the volume of complaints flooding the net, its much wider and does affect desktops as well. I am just saying do not rush to judgment about the source of the issue and check out all options. The following post says that Dell has increased its warranty on affected products so if you find that it is a video card issue (although its probably not) bear that in mind.</p>

<p>http://www.overclockers.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4198:nvidia-what-do-you-do&catid=60:videocards&Itemid=4266</p>

<p>I had a D70S and went to the D200 as my main camera. The D200 is the better camera in some respects but the D70s is still (even though its now quite old) no slouch. I would advise getting the D200 if you can afford it due to its build quality and later software.  I think the D70s jpgs straight from the camera look better (more in camera processing?) but I shoot RAW now and find that the D200 files are really very good as long as you are willing to post process a bit. Incidentally I still own the D70s and have no ambition to part with it. When I feel like taking out a lighter camera its the one I reach for.</p>

<p>Just make sure its a fast lens so that you can reduce the depth of field as much as possible. I mainly use a 50mm f1.4 (the 1.8 would do the trick if money is an issue.) Or I use the 85mm f1.8. Both work fine. I also like to use longer lnses for exterior work. I have for example used the 105mm f2.8 Micro lens satisfactorily.</p>

<p>Because these compacts have a small sensor the lenses are small too. And because the lens is small the aperture is small. F8 on a tiny camera like this is probably physically the size of f16 or f22 ( or something smaller ) on a 35mm format camera. This means f8 will give much greater depth of field than you would normally expect it to as DOF is driven by the physical size ofthe aperture - not its F number which is a relative measure.</p>

<p>The opposite applies too - go to a large fomat film camera and f8 would be physically much larger than in a 35mm format camera. This is why Ansell Adams the famous landscape photographer could get away with shooting f64 - the actual size was much larger than you would imagine.. </p>

<p>I would be very surprised if this camera did not give you the DOF you need. Incidentally the reason camera manufacturers do not make smaller apertures on these compacts is that because they are so small as described above if the camera lens had say an F16 aperture setting you would certainly get image degradation because of diffraction of the light passing through it. This is what happens when the "hole" gets smaller and is too close in size to the wavelenght of the light passing thru it.</p>

<p>In some senses I think digital is less forgiving than film. If you get the exposue just a little wrong for example it can have a big effect on the image. (Digital cameras have typically poor dynamic range - much like slide film in this respect although again different.) So be very careful about your exposure settings. This takes practice and you will have to relearn how to expose best for digital.</p>

<p>More over I am of the firm view that with digital you have to be prepared to undertake at least some basic post processing. No digital image is up to its full potential when it first comes out of the camera. You need to reduce noise, adjust tone, adjust color and sharpen EVERY image that you wish to make as good as it can be. Sorry but this is how it is. If you do not do this, then be prepared for mediocre results in most cases. This is a bit of a chore but the benefits of digital are many. It does allow you to shoot more prolifically and to get instant feedback. (This is not an invitation to "spray and pray" Quite the opposite.) If you are prepared to learn then you will become a much better photographer than you probably ever could be with film - most of us amateurs just do not get enough practice when shooting film so we do not advance as much as is possible when shooting digitial. If you are reflective and think about what you are doing you will get better. BTW you do not need photoshop for post processing if you do not wish to buy and learn it. You can downlaod simpler tools (free)from the internet and these will get you by.</p>

<p>Have you considered the Nikon 18-70mm lens? Its rated very highly by all reviewers I have read and any small shortcomings it has are not relevant to event photography. If you want something a tad longer (or cheaper) then I can recommend the Nikon 28-85mm f3.5-4.5 that is from the mid 1990s. The second version of this lens (do not get the first version) is a beauty. About its only real sin is a tendancy to flare readily. It can be picked up on eBay for around $150. Dirt cheap considering its excellent performance. Personally I do not mind that 28mm is not all that wide on a DX camera as I prefer something slightly longer. I have found 28 (which equates to around 42 in the FX world) to be quite OK for most purposes.</p>

<p>Paint Shop Pro has a 30 day free trial. To buy, its cost is about the same as Paintshop Elments give or take - they sometimes seem to have "cash back offers" that lower the price even more. In either event, its cost is much less than the full Photoshop.</p>

<p>Another example for you to ponder - shot with the Nikon 1.4. I like the colors and rendering of this shot that I grabbed as I walked past this display in a shopping arcade. Shot wide open I accidentally focused on the knee so the face is very slightly out of critical focus - there is a downside to faster lenses!<br>

(Sorry about the link - I do not understand why this site never works properly with the code that normally embeds an image in a response on other forums.)</p>

<p>http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o251/peterm1_bucket/_DSC0785.jpg</p>

<p>There is an alternative that I promote to newbies.<br>

Corel Paintshop Pro Photo X2 (which I still use in preference to PS - having tried it.) This product used to be regarded as Photoshop's poor cousin but that is now a bad underestimation of the software as it has been uprgaded tremensdously in recent years.<br>

It has lots of advantages for someone learning like yourself - see this thread here............ <a href="http://www.photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00UDRC">http://www.photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00UDRC</a> for an outline of what I think in more detail. Most of what you will learn in PSPPX2 is transferable later to Photoshop with trivial effort, should you then wish to when you have mastered the skills but until then, you will find the learning curve for PSPPX2 much more accessible than Photoshop.<br>

In any event both this tool and Photoshop Elements are available as a 30 day trial. Download them both and try them and work out which you prefer.</p>

<p>I still have my F801s. Its an relaible and well specced camera even today and is surprisingly compact compared with many of today's digital offerings whilst also being strongly built. It has the ability to shoot both MF and AF lenses and also has a quite effective matrix metering / centre weighted metering / spot metering option. Its only demonstrable disadvantage is that if used in AF mode it does tend to be quite slow by today's standards. Others recommend the F100. I would agree excpt on one criterion - price. The F801s can be found for almost nothing.</p>

<p>I still have my F801s. Its an relaible and well specced camera even today and is surprisingly compact compared with many of today's digital offerings whilst also being strongly built. It has the ability to shoot both MF and AF lenses and also has a quite effective matrix metering / centre weighted metering / spot metering option. Its only demonstrable disadvantage is that if used in AF mode it does tend to be quite slow by today's standards. Others recommend the F100. I would agree excpt on one criterion - price. The F801s can be found for almost nothing.</p>

<p>I have both- Dont ask! :^)<br>

As many will tell you the build quality of the f1.4 is better as befits its much higher price. But results-wise both produce excellent images. If I could only keep one it would be the 1.4 as I like shooting portraits wide open and the extra lens speed equates with narrower depth of field. Which I value. I have also often read that the bokeh of the 1.4 is better and this is my impression too although I have not done a side by side test. So another "tick" for the 1.4.<br>

I would put it this way. If price is an issue - get the 1.8 as it produces very sharp images that in practicla terms you will not be able to fault and is very inexpensive to buy. If you are like me and like to have the best you can afford, cough up the extra for the 1.4 - or do what I did, buy it second hand to minimise the cost difference.<br>

Now that I have the 1.4, I may eventually sell the 1.8 lens but to date the thing that has put me off doing this, quite frankly is that its a very good lens and if I sell it I just will not get paid what it is worth to me in image quality terms. So for now at least I keep it.</p>

<p>I have an older version (Pre Ai but converted) and notice that it produces very nice results on my D200. I think its got the same optical formula minus the multicoating. I tend not to prefer terribly wide angled lenses so a 35mm on a DX camera is not a bad choice for me</p>

<p>I changed to Paint Shop Pro X2 when my old copy of Photoshop Elements (PSE) 3 got lost in a hard drive crash and I could not locate the installation disk. Never regretted it. PSPPX2 has a broader range of features than Elements (even the later versions of elements) - and some reviews say it is between PSE and the full PS in functionality. I would agree.</p>

<p>The thing that I like about it is that it has a lot of tools that are wizard like and designed for easy use and easy learning. Much easier than PS at about the same cost as PSE in fact. As a result the learning curve for a newbie is no where near as steep as it would be with PS or perhaps even PSE. Having said that maybe I would not recommend it so freely for someone who is already experienced in PS. Whilst many advanced concepts are the same (eg layers, channels, selections etc) the commands and naming conventions differ a bit. With the result that there is a need to relearn some of these things if you already have a good command of PS. (But no more difficult than say getting into a European sports car after driving a domestic sedan model if I can put it that way.)</p>

<p>In addition PSPPX2 has some nice extras - as well as having all the normal options for converting to black and white (like channel mixer) it has a specific tool that does this based on a color wheel. Very nice. It also has special filters inbuilt like digital camera noise reduction, texture preserving smooth, and so on. There is also a local contrast filter called - clarify that does a wonderful job of cleaning up middle tones and increasing apparent sharpness. One tool I really like is the frames tool (found under the image tab) Most of the frames that came with the software are pretty kitsch and I would not use them but its a simple matter to make your own or download them and resave them in the correct format and directory in the system folder and they work just like the ones that came with it. Although you can create and install a frame manually using layers, its nice to be able to install a frame on your photo at the click of a button - it even resizes it to fit each image. If you look at my Flickr site everything has been post processed in PSPPX2 and you can see my affection for frames - although here mostly I use the same two or three styles.<br /> http://www.flickr.com/photos/80702381@N00/<br /> PSPPX2 supports almost all PS compliant plugins - download them, install them in the plugins folder and off you go! its as simple as that. It is also able to work with many PS file formats (like .PSD files) and a wide range of RAW files. (Oh and by the way it supports up to 16 bit images so no worries with working in extended bit mode before converting to jpg.)</p>

<p>So all in all its very professional and quite easy to learn. The only slight downside I would report is that it does need a reasonable amount of RAM to run well on a PC with larger file sizes and most internet downloadables, resources and tutorials are for PS not PSPPX2 - so some resources (e.g. like PSPPX2 scripts - their equivalent of PS actions) are a bit hard to find. But as most PS resources work in PSPPx2 thats not so much of a problem.</p>

<p>At the end of the day either PSE or PSPPX2 will work fine but I feel that the latter program helped me build my skills much more quickly than I could have if I were using PS or PSE which are not as user friendly.</p>

<p>I onw two - the early pre AI one and th eone you have. Both are fine performers and like all Nikkors of this era built like the proverbial brick outhouse. A nice lens to use that produces fine results.</p>

<p>This appearance is not unusual for shots straight from a digital camera - even a high end DSLR especially if its a tad under exposed. Every photo out of my Nikon D200 gets the following workflow - noise reduction (totally essential for any digital camera) tonal adjustment, colo adjustment and then sharpening. Once these for steps are carried out you have what I then regard as the makings of a good image. I then may apply more artistic / creative edits but only after the "foundation" edits are complete. (Experts say you should save sharpening till the very very last and this is true but it often does not matter in practice.) What I am saying is that you may be able to establish a quick and efficient workflow around these 4 steps. It may even be possible to create an Action in Photoshop to do it automatically for you in most cases-assuming they are similarly exposed and have similar issues. And these 4 basic edits are not too tought to learn. Understanding levels, selections, channels etc is useful but as long as you limit yourself to these steps then you can get by pretty much without them for now and concentrate on the job in hand.</p>

<p>OK. I have owned the 105mm f4 AIS and would say its the sharpst lens I have owned. I recently sold it to buy the 105mm f2.8 AF D as its more versatile. Will I regret it. It is too early to say. But i can say that while the f4 lens is not all that often up for grabs on eBay when you do find it it does for an OK price so its worth considering. From what I ahve seen the AF D version is good - whether its as good I cannot yet say. But you should consider it as the price is not over the top. I alos have the 55mm 2.8 AF and can say its an excellent genral purpose micro lens but as you think its too short I will not recommend it for you.</p>

<p>Download Fastone photo resizer. Its great. And free.</p>

<p>I like to explain it this way.</p>

<p>Imagine a rectangle (for the sake of the argument lets say its in portrait not landscape mode given we are discussing portraits.) And lets also imagine that the rectangle is filled with a head and shoulders image taken on an FX format camera - using any given lens, lets say an 85mm at f1.8 for the sake of the argument.</p>

<p>Now imagine another rectangle superimposed over the top and exactly 2/3 the size. The image was shot with the same lens and aperture. In this case only part of the original head and shoulders shot will be visible. This is the image area that would have been captured had the photo been taken with a Nikon DX format camera.</p>

<p>The image is effectively cropped to this smaller size becasue the sensor / film gate inside the DX camera is smaller. (The so called cropping factor)</p>

<p>But all else about the image is the same in the two photos . It stands to reason that this should be so - the same lens was used in both cases so it projects an identical image circle inside the two cameras - but as the DX format sensor is only about 2/3 the area of the FX sensor only the smaller part of the overall image circle is captured - nothing else is different except of course that to blow up the image to make a final print to say A4 size you must enlarge it that small amount extra.</p>

<p>To capture the identical shot with the DX sensor you must step back a couple of paces - which is why we think of the 85mm lenses behaving like a 132mm (approx) lens. But in reality it does not do so.</p>

<p><em>"Expose to the right is about correct exposure which obviously means, don't blow out highlights you hope to retain! Is that more difficult? I guess for some it might be. But there's no question that ideal exposure for a linear capture digital Raw file is to expose as close to but not clipping highlights you can."</em></p>

<p>My point is this. When you look at most tutorials on "exposing to the right" the histogram of the shot used to display the concept is a beautiful neat "bell curve" that sits happily over towards the right hand side of the histogram. Lovely - but a little disingenuous.</p>

<p>How often do I see such histogram curves outside of a studio - almost never? With the sort of photos I take the histograms are all over the place because of the nature of the scene I am shooting.</p>

<p>When you shoot in the great outdoors you may have the sky intruding. Or at least you have brighter areas as in these photos. In this case the histogram curve looks totally different - its at least spread fully across the range and often has a peak towards the right hand end of the curve when you shoot it even if you have manged to avoid blown highlights. In these circumstances its impossible to move the curve further to the right and NOT blow highlights.Effectively you are stuck with what you have got. In a studio you potentially have perfect control of exposure. Shoot to the right to your heart's content. In the field you are often whistling dixie.</p>

<p>This is why I am cirtical of people who chant this mantra without also saying - "oh but you realise in the real world its often impossible to do that!"</p>