ronb

<p>Per Craig p3:<br>

"Here is a thought experiment: In a controlled studio environment, with a stationary tripod, shoot a scene using the same 24mm f/1.4 lens at f/1.4 using both FX and DX cameras. Print the resulting images at, say, 20x the size of the sensor. Then crop the FX print to match the narrower framing of the DX print. How do the two resulting prints differ?" (Answer - not much, at least in DOF)</p>

<p>...and not to be argumentative: the depth of field is dependent on focal length, aperture diameter (not recalculated f-number), and distance to the subject only. Cropping part of the picture out (either after the fact with scissors, or at the time of exposure with a smaller sensor) doesn't change any of these 3 things. A finer resolution sensor or slow film could make a difference in the circle of confusion, but this would be small. The DOF preview button stops the aperture down so one can eyeball/estimate it before shooting.</p>

<p>Regarding the original post: <br>

"First, while 135/2.2 is still impressive for portraits and sports, the exotic 24/1.4 becomes a boring 35/2.2 on crop camera." (Answer - it becomes a 24/1.4 which has had the top, bottom, and sides cut off.</p>

 

<p>What Craig said several pages back. Do the experiment.</p>

<p>Babat,<br>

As others have said, new lenses will not improve your vision. Practice with one or two primes (maybe add an 85mm or 105mm), attend some workshops. Ask yourself "What if I...?" (...changed my position, changed the exposure, changed the aperture, changed the cropping or framing, etc.). Try different things and see what results appeal to you. You are wasting your time and money buying extra "glass" at this point. There are no shortcuts.</p>

<p>You should look at the Sigma 17-70mm f2.8-4 DC OS. It has good range, image stabilization, and close focus. I had the Nikkor 16-85 and while I liked it, it wasn't significantly better than my old 18-70 so I got rid of it. Don't miss it at all - too slow and expensive for what it gave me.</p>

<p>To me, a perfect 3 lens prime set for DX would include the 20mm f/2.8, a 35mm f/1.8 , and a 60mm or 70mm micro. </p><div></div>

<p>As above...I know it is manual focus, but look at the Nikon 100mm Series E f/2.8 lens. I love mine; you can pick up an excellent one for $100 or so. Small, light, and sharp. Creates a nice look for portraits in my opinion.</p>

<p>D300, 16-85</p>

<p>I've always liked using 35mm lenses on film bodies, so I recently purchased a 24mm AF non-D Nikkor for my D300 - the images were soft and lacked contrast. Even at f/4 it was easily outperformed by my 16-85mm AF-S. Fortunately I was able to return it. Maybe there is a lot of sample variation; who knows? Perhaps I'll try another.</p>

<p>Took a spring trip to the beach last week.</p><div></div>

<p>D300 w/16-85 @85mm ISO 200 1/8sec f/22 Handheld</p><div></div>

I had the same difficulty getting accurate purples in my shots. I got good results using the preset white balance function on my camera (with a gray card).

Ginkgo in Bloodgood<div></div>

I had the 50mm f/1.4 AF-D but it was less sharp at f/2 than my old Series E 50mm f/1.8 lens. Less contrast too. Maybe sample variation, but it was a dog; I returned it and got a 50mm f/1.8 AF-D. Love it.

The highlights were not overexposed according to the histogram. I know it doesn't make any sense; that's why I posted the shot. The question is did I get a bad sample or is this typical? I'm going to take the same shot in raw to see if there's any difference.<div></div>

Thanks for all the input.

I know it's a worse-case scenario; I'm not likely to take a shot like this to frame on my wall. I was interested in whether the D300 would remove this CA or fringing (the shots were in JPEG) and it did not. And I was interested in whether the old lens had as bad a CA - it's about the same or less - more magenta than purple.

And I know the 1.4 is said to be soft wide open, but compared to the Series E lens at f/2 it was surprisingly bad. It'll probably go back to the store.

I meant to say I thought this (lateral CA) was supposed to get worse on stopping down, but the purple I'm seeing in this shot is less by f/2 and is gone by f/2.8.

By the way, I just tested it against my Series E f/1.8 50mm lens and the old one is much sharper and shows considerably better contrast at f/2. There is really no comparison... even my wife could see it clearly. So I may try the 50mm AF f/1.8 just to compare sharpness and contrast w/the old lens.

I bought a new AF 50mm f/1.4 lens to go with my D300 and took some test shots the other day. It is quite soft at

1.4, though I can see where the shallow DOF would be nice for portraits and some other shots. There is

pronounced (obnoxious) purple fringing at 1.4, however; I thought this was supposed to decrease (or is that for

lateral chromatic aberration) at smaller apertures/stopping down, but it goes away at f/2.8.

So the questions I have are these: is a large amount of purple fringing normal, and is everyone's copy of this lens

soft at f/1.4? Does anybody have experience with PF the the AF 50mm f/1.8? Thanks.<div></div>

My K10D backfocuses with my 21mm lens but not the kit lens or the 70. When I correct it

with the services menu then the other lenses are off. Pentax said if I send the camera and

lens in they will fix the focus, and that it will still focus properly with my other lenses; so I

plan to do that soon. It is disappointing they don't allow users to fix it.

How difficult is it to install an alternate focusing screen?

If you love your FE you'll like an FA. The matrix meter in the FA really does work, and

I like the convenience of aperture-priority, shutter-priority (both with intelligent

override), manual, and program modes. It does not have AE-lock like the FE/FE2 but

doesn't need it with the matrix metering. The FA also has a viewfinder blind and a

shutter which is, to me, quieter and with less vibration than the FE and FE2. It is

difficult to do fill flash with the FA. The FE2 has the advantage of longer manual

shutter speeds than the FA.

Ginkgo/Bloodgood

Years ago some wiseguy at Epcot made a snide remark to his companion after he saw

me use my Chinon Bellami with the flash to take a shot of distant lights. I had forced

the flash on in order to have the shutter not use autoexposure but to use a fixed

shutter speed of 1/60 or whatever. The slide came out perfect.

I picked up an FA in great condition. It is a good complement to an FE2. The program mode is surprisingly useful...and shutter priority is used more than one would think. So-called cybernetic override is a well-designed feature. The mirror movement is well-damped. Finally, it has center-weighted and AMP (matrix) metering. Recent tests on slide film demonstrate how surprisingly accurate the AMP is with a variety of subjects. It does not have exposure lock or manual speeds over 1 second, but that's where the FE2 comes in.

I recently asked myself a similar question, but speed isn't that important to me: I ended up with the 28-50mm f/3.5 AIS zoom and the 105mm micro f/2.8 AIS. Reasonably wide, normal, short tele, and macro. If I want really sharp wide angle shots with no distortion I'll substitute the 28mm f/2.8 AIS.

Andy, how does one change the printer head setting on a 1280? Is it possible to do so on an Epson 1200?