harry_akiyoshi

I don't know what Lee means. What you're describing shouldn't normally occur. Are the marks on both sides of the film?

Are you using bulk film stock in reloadable cartriges? If you are, shoot a roll of normal film and see if the marks still show up. In any case, if it's only on the edges of the film, I wouldn't worry about it. If it shows up in your actual pictures, then I'd worry. It's possible and easy to replace the foam seals on the back, but it seems odd that it would be necessary. The design of the FM-10 is such that you'd probably notice a condition that would lead to a light leak; the back wouldn't close completely, or it would be bent at the hinge, or something like that. I've never had a problem with mine. Good luck.

What sort of artwork? Like, what size? If it's small, you'll need a macro lens, and not many macro lenses would be useful taking surfer photos; they're just not long enough. From where do you want to take these surfer photos, incidentally? From the beach? People routinely use huge, multi-thousand-dollar lenses for that sort of thing; at surfing competions you see some really big lenses, 600mm or 800mm long. There aren't many lenses versatile enough to to both macro work and long telephoto sports shots; maybe the Sigma 50-500mm with an extension tube? It might be better to buy two lenses. As you're using an F50, I'm betting you don't want to spend too much money. . . the Vivatar 55mm 2.8 would be excellent for photographing artwork, and it's cheap. It's also made mostly of plastic, so don't hit it on anything. Then for telephoto work you'd have something like a Tokina 400mm f/5.6, which is quite respectable on a tripod.

 

If one lens absolutely must do it all, you're more or less stuck with a macro zoom, probably one of the 70-300mm ones. It would make passable portfolio shots, and passable surfer photos, at least at closer distances. I think the Nikon 70-300 F/4.5-5.6G currently goes for around $125 on *Bay. It's not a bad choice, really, but the quality will be a little disappointing compared to either the vivitar or tokina lens I mentioned. But then, it's also cheaper, and you can more or less leave it on your camera.

I have that same zoom lens. It's quite excellent; the Nikkor 80-200 f/4.5 was the first widely available pro-quality zoom ever. Lenses before it, like the 43-86mm zoom, were largely dismissed as incapable of delivering sharp photos; that 80-200 zoom changed the world. It's reasonably sharp at all distances and all apertures, which was unprecedented. Even by modern standards, it's not at all bad.

 

For macro work, you may have to have it tightened up a bit. Most of those lenses are pretty old -- I think mine probably has about 20 years on it -- and they get a little loose. With the lens pointed downward, the zoom setting will gradually drift out to 80mm. Shooting macros from a tripod, that can get pretty frustrating. It's true that the lens is really great with close-up diopters, though. Zoom drift is a fixable thing, if you care to have it done, but it costs a bit.

Try <A HREF="http://www.berezin.com/3d/camera.htm#Timer">this.</A>

 

I've never used one of these, but it was the first result when I searched for it. You could always give it a try.

The 55mm 2.8 micro is a terrific lens. Unless you really need the extra working distance, it's probably not woth getting the 105. 105mm isn't long enough for most birds, really -- I think 300mm is just about the absolute minimum -- and it's not that suited to insect photography either. It would work all right for large insects, but the large insects that people really like to photograph (butterflies) are too shy for that short of a working distance. You really need a 200mm lens unless you're willing run around a lot.

 

You can take interesting insect pictures by reversing a wide-angle lens. Anything wider than 35mm would do the trick. I'm not suggesting that you buy a wide-angle lens just for this purpose, but if you already have one, you can buy a reversing ring for about $15 that will let you attach it to your camera backwards. It's very difficult to photograph things this way, and the results won't be as sharp as with your 55mm lens (few things are, after all) but you can get 2x or 3x or magnification this way, which is enough to photograph insects pretty well. However, be advised that the working distance is very, very short.

The reason I think the FG isn't an unqualified work of genius is that you can buy an FE for only a little bit more money than FGs typically go for. I prefer the FE, which, although it lacks some flash capability, is much more solidly built and fits better in my hands. I found one with a lens for $125 in excellent condition (meters perfectly) a few months ago. The FE and FM just feel good to me, I guess. The FG doesn't have the same quality of ruggedness.

 

Like I should talk about ruggedness. I gave the FE to my girlfriend and now shoot with an FM-10.

The 50mm 1.4 is a good lens. I don't like it much at 1.4, compared to the lenses of a few other manufacturers, but it's not bad. If you need a fast Nikon standard lens, it's the best option--a reasonable balance of speed and performance. When I'm going to shoot in low light, I usually end up shooting with a rangefinder, so the standard lens on my Nikon is usually a micro-Nikkor 55mm 2.8 AIS, which is completely on the performance side on that balance I mentioned earlier. It all depends where on that speed/performance continuum you want to buy. For most people, the 50mm 1.4 isn't a bad choice.

Things like this vary a lot from case to case. My best advice is to go out and shoot a test roll of very high-contrast scenes -- if you see a lot of flare, you need to return the lens. I've never seen a mark like that affect color reproduction, and they generally need to be pretty well obvious and over a large section of the lens surface before they start affecting resolution. Flare is the thing to look for. Smears of this nature can actually be much worse than scratches; believe me, I have enough damaged lenses to know. (Not my fault, incidentaly.) Good luck!

Unless you're set on the idea of a ball head, I'd try something like the 3047 "Deluxe Three-Way Pan Head." The RB isn't tremendously suited to working quickly, which is mostly what ball heads are good for. Most of the time, when I work in medium format on a tripod, it's because I want to work very precisely, and a good pan head can be a lot easier to work with precisely than a ball head. The 3047 is also superior because it uses Bogen's larger quick-release system. I like those small QR plates for my 35mm work, but they don't feel as secure on larger medium format stuff.

 

You really need to get your hands on a couple of different tripod heads and see what feels good. What works for me might not work for you. Tripods are very peculiar that way. . . people have lots of opinions. Still, I think that the 3262 is at most barely capable, and I'd recommend getting a head that's got a bit of redundancy to it.

You can use other heads on a bogen tripod. The 3021 has a standard 3/8" thread mount, so get something that fits that specification (most do) and you should be fine. Heads that take more complex mounts are generally worth more than the tripod and need the extra stability anyhow; you've got to stick them on a Satchler or something before it becomes worthwhile.

 

The bogen heads are mostly fine. They're not stellar, but they're solid and pretty durable. I use the 3262QR, which is a small-to-medium-size ball head with a quick release, and it works well. It's as solid vertically oriented as horizontally, for most practical purposes. If you've got a long lens mounted on the camera and no tripod collar, it will twist the whole camera around on the quick-release plate. I don't usually have problems with this.

 

You might consider getting something slightly larger in the Bogen line -- most people recommend getting a ball head that lets you modify the tension. If you can, borrow a tripod with a ball head from a friend and see if it suits you. If you like to work a little more methodically, a three way pan/tilt head might be the thing for you. They're generally cheaper, but more stable for the money.

 

People are fanatically devoted to certain kinds of tripod heads, and I'll leave it to them to debate this exactly. I've not used them all, so I'm a poor example. Do a search on the archives here; I'm sure there are plenty of arca/kirk/fova comparisons. Bogen is by no means the only vendor you should be considering.

No. I have that head, and I wouldn't use it with an RB system. Well, you probably could, in a pinch, but you'd be better off with something a little more solid. If you can afford Mamiya RB gear, you can probably do better than a $40 ball head. :-)

Yeah, I'd go for it. The FG was never a terrific camera, but it's fine for what it does, and that's a good price. They're one of the smallest Nikon bodies ever, light and simple.

The 3021 isn't that heavy, as tripods go -- it's kind of average. Mine is perfect for what I do. I probably wouldn't go with anything much lighter in this price range; some of the carbon fiber ones are terrific, but I'm not sure you can get a lighter aluminum one without sacrificing either a lot of rigidity and stability or convenience.

 

It's a pretty good general-use tripod. It's not bad to hike with, sturdy enough for light medium format equipment or 35mm w/ telephotos up to 300mm or so. I use mine with a 400mm f/6.3 with good results.

 

I'm pretty sure you can get spiked feet for it, but I've never bothered and never needed them.

All lenses, but especially macro lenses, effectively transmit less light to the film area when they're focused towards their close limit. If it displays f/5.6, that's probably the effective aperture at 1:1 (it sounds about right). The change to f/5.6 is actually an indication that the metering will work correctly, if anything, even with flash.

Just as a side note, none of us think that we can analyze a sound clip and get accurate results for shutter speed tests. It's certainly not going to be dead on, it's just a simple way to see whether you're in the ballpark. I was playing with an old Yashica-mat the other day, and my exposure tests (metered meticulously and shot on Provia) confirmed that the audio analysis method can be accurate to within 1/3 of a stop or so even at the higher speeds--which, frankly, is really all I needed. I just wanted to know whether those top speeds were dragging by more than say, a stop. Then I was unsure of my results and shot a test roll, and it corresponded remarkably well with the audio data. So I think the method is practical for rough estimation and troubleshooting.

Checking shutter speeds with a sound card and a microphone seems to work all right up to about 1/250 or so. It seems to work better with leaf-shuttered lenses, which generally emit simpler sound patterns than focal-plane shutters. That's my experience, anyway.

That's right: Andrew Pitman, Man. . . of . . . GENIUS!!! I welcome your humble toadying.

 

(But my 50mm 1.4 IS bad. My 55mm micro-Nikkor is so much sharper it's not even funny.)

Yeah, yeah, "mostly suck," was flip thing to say about a Nikkor 50mm 1.4. They can still make great pictures. I know. I have one. It's just that they're not as good as equivalent lenses produced by some other manufacturers at the same time, especially wide open.

 

It used to be very important to have that 1.4 aperture, because films were slower; now that there are good 400- and 800-ISO films, it's not as necessary. We mostly might as well shoot with the lighter, sharper, higher-contrast 50mm f/1.8 or 2. Besides, if we were concerned about low-light performance, we'd all be shooting rangefinders with no mirror slap and easy focusing. :-)

It's fairly difficult to reduce shutter vibration, unless you want to try weighting your camera body with sand bags. Talk to the people on the Pentax forum -- their huge 6x7 cm shutters can cause problems this way. Personally, I use flash for macro work -- seems to do the trick. No mirror-lock up, doesn't matter whether I use a cable release, I get good depth of field whenever I want it by flipping a switch--yup, life is easy.

Oh, sorry -- misread your post and thought you were writing from personal experience about the "meter fault." If you don't already own an FM-10, there are other cameras. . .

 

The FE is very nice, for the money. Harder to repair than the FM, though.

 

If you want a really cheap manual camera, buy a minolta or a pentax. You can get great deals on excellent student cameras. This is probably taboo on the Nikon forum, but if you're not planning on buying autofocus lenses and moving up the Nikon line later on, it's not really worth buying into the Nikon system as a beginner. Some of the old Minoltas are built like tanks, and Rokkor lenses (stick with primes) aren't bad. For student use, the difference between a Rokkor and a Nikkor is so minimal that you might as well save money. The downside is that the Nikon people will make fun of you, but you might be able to live with it, given that you've saved a pile of money and your pictures are as good.

The FM10 really only meters down to EV 2 or so with 100 ISO film. Well, in practice, mabye 3 or 4, although it's better with my 50mm 1.4 than the zoom it came with. If you try to use it in lower light, it won't work. Simple as that. You can make great photos with an FM-10; if you already own one, I don't see any reason you should buy another camera. Oh, and incidentally, the Nikon 50mm 1.4s mostly suck. Don't even bother unless you feel that the difference between 1.8 and 1.4 is more important than resolution, flare-resistance, constrast, size, light-fallof characteristics, and bokeh. I did, but much later discovered Fuji NPZ and now no longer care. Besides, if you want a really good 50mm f/1.4, you ought to buy into Pentax instead of Nikon.

 

The FM-10 is a fine camera for a student. You just need to learn how to use it instead of thinking that it's faulty. If you're trying to meter, and what you're photograph is pretty dark, and your meter is going crazy, it's a good sign that you're exceeding the limitations of the camera. And believe me, most of these cameras aren't going to be that much better. There are a few that are really great for low-light photography--the FE comes to mind--because in auto mode, they meter off the film plane to give very accurate exposures out to a couple of minutes. But the majority of cameras, like the FM or FM2, aren't going to be an incredible improvement.

Sunpak 383 Super. It's a more recent design than the old 283, with similar specs. You can pick them up for about $70 from Adorama. It's probably the best non-TTL hotshoe flash one can buy for that kind of money.

 

If you want to go really cheap, buy a Vivitar 283 or 285 on eBay -- just beware that buying electronics on eBay isn't always the best idea. If you've got the money, buy new.

If you shoot mostly telephotos, the small sensor is great. Not only do you get magnification, you're also using the center, the very best part of the lens, which means that you'll have less distortion and light fall-off.

 

If you shoot with wide-angle lenses a lot, it starts to be expensive. If you used to use a 24mm, all of the sudden you need a 16mm. However, given that you don't seem to want to shoot wide-angle stuff much and you'll continue to work with your film body, which will come in handy when you do, I don't think I'd worry about it.

 

There are problems associated with small sensors in general -- in theory, you get more meaningful data out of your pixels when they're a little farther apart -- but for the cost of a 10D versus a 1Ds, I don't think they're worth worrying about. Realistically, the 10D looks like a great buy for the sort of work you do.

Aside from manually blurring in Photoshop to match the look of narrow depth of field, not much can be done. Converters won't help too much. With a converter, you end up shooting farther from your subject than you would without one, so the effect of the longer focal length is limited to a narrowing of perspective.

 

I was pretty sure I had the theory right on this but I thought I would test it and make sure:

 

If I fill the frame with a subject using my 50mm 2.8, I get a given amount of depth of field. If I fill the frame with the same subject and my 100mm 2.8, I get the same amount of depth of field.

 

So it looks like you're more or less stuck. Converters will help in some cases, but those are mostly situations wherein you'd need the extra magnification anyway.