louis_greene

Yeah, I will just have to see what the conditions are like. I have experimented a bunch and tend to try and get away

with the lowest ISO I can. It often amazes me that there have been plenty of time I walk away with a sharper image

using a slower shutter speed (and as I far as I can tell I did nothing different). Hence, I need to work on my technique

more!

 

I just also need to pay more attention to the shutter speeds as I am shooting. I usually shoot with Aperture priority

so it can change on me if I am not paying attention as the animal travels to different areas of light.

 

Thanks everyone!

 

Great polar bear shot, and that low shutter speed one of the bird was awesome! I Managed to get an owl fairly sharp

once in the Hoh Rain Forest at neary 4 seconds (was loaded with Velvia)! I sort of moved my foot around in the gravel

to keep him focused inspecting. I was amazed it came out decent!

Thanks for everyones input. Agreed, agreed, and agreed. I think I need to pay a little more attenetion to my shutter

speeds. I get all wrapped up in the moment and then when it's over realize I was was too slow to get the sharpness I

am looking for. I am getting more conscious while shooting but I still need to be more mindful.

 

Of course I agree animal activity is more interesting. I didn't mean to imply that I only shoot static creatures (but that

is how I worded it).

 

Seems like most agree a good target is 1/250th. It is also clear you can go a lot slower if it all works out well. Yes, I

do have a cable release and use it when I can. I also employ mirror lockup when the circumstances allow.

Well, I imagine I will be photographing both static and active subjects. I just notice that a lot of my shots taken with

an IS'd 300mm F4 with 1.4tele are taken at 1/90th to /1/250th. Usually I try and wait for the animal to be static but of

course that is not always possible. I realize that I need to improve my technique as the number of my critically sharp

imgaes are not as high as I would like. That being said I have super sharp images at 1/80th and soft ones taken at

1/500th. Obviously it's technique.

 

I was just wondering what others used as a target for this type of focal length. Also, I ususally have IS but not this

time (but I have an extra stop of speed). I think Rob is right, I need to strive for 1/250th or higher if at all possible. If

the action gets going move up from there. Once I know I have a sharp image then I can experiment and drop the

ISO/shutter speed.

 

Anyone else?

I realize that this is somewhat of a relative question and somewhat dictated by the circumstances. However, if you

were shooting bears with a 300mm F2.8 lens w/ 1.4tele (420mm) using a good support what would be the minimum

shutter speed you'd feel comfortable shooting at before you bumped up the ISO? How about shooting off a bean bag

on a window? Assume a static subject, then one moving about casually. Critical sharpness is the goal, except if

there is action and the choice is no capture or one that may be a little soft.

Is it common for certain pixels to be "hot" with a long exposure? I notice it is the same bad pixels in all the shots

even from differnent nights of shooting. Is this not some sort of sensor defect that it would occur in the same oixel vs

some aberant occurance?

I rarely got them with the 5D, What is "dark frame subtraction"? Is that the long exposure setting? If so doesn't that

require an exposure time longer than the original one? If so that wouldn't work well since once the Aurora gets going

you want to be able to crank otu as many exposures as possible back to back. If not maybe it is something I could

use. Anymore information on that technique from anyone?

Well I took some shots today. All were fine. I looked back and found the same hot pixels in other Aurora photos. I am thinking this is related to the longer exposure (4-16 seconds). Anyone else experience this?

This was one about 20 frames that were taken with periods of being off inbetween. Not sure if the are permenant I'll do some more shooting today and see if they are there.

I have nooticed on the last number of shots I took (which was in temps below freezing but not sub zero) that I have

several "stuck pixels" (never had this issue with my 5D). A green one here, a red one there, etc. They appear on

every frame in the exact same location. Anyone else experience this before? I did forget my CF card so the camera

wrote to the backup SD card but I don;t imagine that could be the reason. Thoughts? Am I looking at a warrenty

issue here?

Hey Pete, where'd you go?

Pete - that is exactly what I was looking for - thank you!

 

I don't have a 500mm but maybe I could look into renting one. I guess it'll be the 300f2.8 with a 1.4tele.

 

I was concerned about stability for shooting, room for tripods etc so I was actually leaning toward having a 300F4 with IS vs borrowing a 300 f2.8 without IS. Any thoughts on that? At denali often from the bus I am shotting out the window just braced and the IS is a big help. I though tI could always get the stop of speed from ISO.

 

I do have a 5D and a 1DsMK3 so I guess I will be able to have one with the 70-200 and one with the 300+ lens. Any other information or insight that you have would be awesome!

 

Thanks - Louis

static article - that's that's the one I was looking for. Thanks

I read that there is an archived article about Churchill/Polar bears here on Photo.net. I cannot seem to find it. Can

someone provide me a link or two for them (or others?). I will be going up there next week and am trying to finalize

my gear selection. Thanks

Sheep MTN lodge is near the Matunuska glacier I believe. You may want to rent some crampons as the glacier is easliy accessable (after paying the entrance fee) and explore. I have found that that valley has great light in the afternoon especially.

Steve, thanks for sharing your experience. Maybe I'll bring my 50mm F1.4 too.

 

Shun - monopod - excellent idea for the buggy. Yeah, it's not the 300 f2.8's size, but rather having to deal with all the gear. I want to "carry on" all the photo gear if possible so I need to fit it into a back pack.

 

Still up in the air about what to bring. IS would be nice for all the vibrationa nd people moving stuff. If it's that bad though maybe I'll just be handholding. I am thinking the IS will be more of a benefit. I can always bump up ISO one stop to make up for the F4. I just took some moose images at ISO 1600 and was quite impressed.

 

Dang, maybe I should bring my smaller travel tripod rather than the monster one I was going to bring.<div></div>

So you think the IS is not the bigger of the wants? ITrue, I can get one stop of speed (which can usually be done bumping ISO on the digital body) using the f2.8 lens. However, I can get handheld shots if need be with the IS. Just playing devils advocate here.

 

Other lenses I'll bring definately are the 24-105mm IS F4, 70-200mm IS F4, and a 1.4X tele.

 

Weight on the Tundra buggy is not the issue. Really it si the space and weight on the airlines. Additionally I think I need to take a puddle jumper (small plane) form the main city I land in to Churchill. I am sure weight and space will be a concern for them.

 

I'm on the fence. Just need a few more shoves to shift to one side..... thanks : )

Hi,

 

I am going to Churchill in Nov. The trip was planned by someone else and is not pure photographic. However

apparently a higher fee was paid by all on this trip so that it will not be filled to capacity. Hopefully that will allow

enough access to do some shooting.

 

Anyway, with weight (and size of carry on bags) being an issue for the airlines these days I am torn between lens

choices (Body will be a Canon 1Ds mark3). Specifically between a Canon 300mm f2.8 non IS lens or a 300mm f4 IS

lens. Don't think I want to take both. PArt of me says spped, the other part says lighter with IS in case it is really

windy, people are moving a lot, or there is just no room for the tripod. We will be on a Tundra Buggy.

 

I have no idea what to expect up there. What would you take? Anyone who's been there have other input or

thoughts?

For example, I was at Denali last weekend for 5 days and took over 1500 frames. It'll be interesting to whittle that down and see how many images I get out of them. I know for a fact I have over 100 images of the same sheep on a hillside..... you know, one looking one way in one shot, the other in the next, one's eye is closed,or jaw looks busted, etc. I am sure I'll pick 2 images out of the 100. Maybe I should have a "sort" catalog and export the top 10% to the main catalog?.

Keith, are you saying that the 2.o version is imporved so you'd only have one catalog (due to being able to use collections)?

 

Anyone else having the same experience as Tony?

 

Is it possible to use lightroom to sort and rate. Then move say all of your 3 or less ratings out of the catalog? (keeping track of them so you can then import them into a different catalog?) I like to sort and then maybe months or years later look back at images. It always seems like I find one or two that I wonder why I I didn't add intitally. That way you could have th ebetter and bests in one catalog and the "I'll look again some day" in another to help improve performance. Just thinking out loud.

Hey, well I just kicked out for Lightroom 2.0. So far it seems great. I am trying to decide on my filing though. It

seems that you can only search one "catalog" at a time, and if your catalog gets too big it slows things

considerably. So my question is, how many catalogs do you have and how did you break it down. I imagine people

that do wedings and such will do it by shoot. How about people more like me who are not making a living from this

but still take a decent amount of photos. Soem mose here, eagles there, landscapes and northen lights there... Are

you doing it by year, type of photo (landscape, animals, other) or just using your "my pictures" in it entirety? Just

curious on others hindsight and experience with this. Thanks

Cool exactly the response Iw as hoping for and expecting. I have not used LR yet (except for 5 mins last night after downloading the trail). I have been happy with DPP and PS. What I want is a good file managing system and thus my exploration into LR. I am sure I will use both but I was just amazed at how powerful, or should I say broadly useful LR is (or at least looks to be based on reviews and my limited use of it). Undoubtably PS is more precise and powerful. Though as far as I know it was not intended for Photographers, it just sort of filled a nitch and grew in that direction. Seems to me that LR is more photographic specific (but I am far from an authority on either). One won't replace the other because I think they are aimed at different audiences with a HUGE area of overlap. Just my 2cents.

Probably opening a bag of worms here but I am curious on what others think. I was basically looking for something to

better archive, sort, and deal with my images and learned more about Lightroom. After looking at it in more depth it

almost seems like if it grows a bit (or it already may be enough), PS may no longer be needed when working with

photograpic images. Seems like a pretty powerful tool. With the exception of Type and a few other (graphic like)

things, will Lightroom replace the need for PS for most (photographic) users??

I use Cobian's free backup at work (non photo related). I found out about it from an article in the paper a while back. Simple to use, many paramters, and yes it can be incremental. AT least worth a look.

 

http://www.educ.umu.se/~cobian/cobianbackup.htm

Ellis - thanks, it seems like you are in favor of the program.

 

David - uh, is that a yay nay? Do you use it? Thanks for the heads up on the trial though.

 

 

Question - assuming I do purchase this program. If I run it on my laptop in the field and assign ratings and key words would that carry over once I download the files to my desktop at home?

Can you fine folk tell me a little more about Adobe Lightroom? Since I just took 40GB of pics last weekend alone I

think I may be in need.....

 

Seriously, I have a good filling system, but a lot is based on my memeory and manual searching which is just not

gonna work. I like DPP for my intial sorting but after that I got nada (just us PS CS3 for images I use).

 

I just started using Bridge and I like the Keyword, search, and a few other factors. Seems like Lightroom has all that

+ more. However, I have Bridge and DPP. LR will cost an additional $300.

 

Why is superior? How do you use it? What do like and dislike about it? Any other thoughts or comments about it?