samuel_parker

<p>I got my profile from Cathy today, so I guess she's up and running again - she didn't offer any explanation for the delay. Next time I need a profile, I will email her first to make sure she is available before I place the order.<br>

Anyway, I'm very happy with the quality of the pofiles. I'm getting excellent results so far.</p>

<p>That's what I was afraid of. I hope she gets better soon.</p>

<p>I'll post again when I hear from her.</p>

<p>Has anyone heard from Cathy's Profiles lately? I ordered a profile two weeks ago and have heard absolutely nothing, even after sending a couple follow-up inquiries. I'm concerned that she might be ill or something. Besides, she has my money - or paypal does anyway.</p>

<p>The only thing that might be damaged by the cold is the battery. Lithium Ion batteries can be permanently degraded by operation in extreme cold temperatures. See if you can find the operating temperature range for the BP5111s somewhere. That being said, I've used my cameras in freezing temperatures before and I've only had a problem with one battery that was already quite old. You can keep the battery warm in an inner coat pocket until you need to use it. That can help a bit.<br>

I've seen excessive red channel noise on long night-time exposures on my old 300D as well. I believe it is due to the batteries heating up. The noise was located on the edge of the sensor closest to the battery. Perhaps using the vertical grip/battery pack would aleviate this problem by providing somewhat more thermal resistance from batteries to sensor. Freezing ambient temperatures would also reduce this problem somewhat, but the temperature rise on the batteries can be quite high when they are near fully discharged.</p>

Try West Coast Imaging. They can print Fuji Crystal Archive off of a roll (I think it's 50" wide).

 

http://www.westcoastimaging.com/

If it is like the 30D, and I believe it is, then 1 is a cross-type AF sensor, 2 and 3 are vertical, and the rest are horizontal.

 

You can actually test it out by focusing on the pages of a closed book in indirect light.

Please do post a tutorial. This happened to my 50 f/1.4 a while ago. It would focus ok if it started from infinity and moved closer, but not at all the other way. I took it the Canon FSC in Irvine, CA. They fixed it for free - a "complimentary repair," not warranty. I was very glad, too, because it's about a $100 repair otherwise. Among other things - adjustments, cleaning, and such - the repair slip said they replaced the "mechanical chassis" which sounds like what you are talking about.

If you put in a card that you previously used in another camera, the new one will start with whatever number was next on the other camera (if it is set to continuous numbering). I found this out when I got my new 30D - I put in a CF card that I had formatted in my old 300D and the first photo I took on my brand new camera was number 9436 or something. One of many reasons the file numbering is not an accurate count of shutter actuations.

 

Even if you put in a brand new CF card, don't worry - they may have fired off a few frames in the factory before they packaged it. If everything is neatly packaged and nothing is missing, there's no problem.

I'm sorry you're having such difficulties. Which CFS did you send it to?

The majority of the comments I have read about Canon's service centers have been very positive, but I guess every case is different.

 

My experience with CFS in Irvine, CA was great. They were friendly and efficient, and they fixed my 50 f/1.4 autofocus for free. I dropped it off on a Friday, and received it via UPS on the following Tuesday.

 

Sorry about your problem...

Canon have kindly discontinued the older Tripod Mount Ring A (both black (~$90) and white (~$120) versions) and replaced them with the "new" (i.e. identical) Tripod Mount Ring A2. Both the black and white versions of the A2 are approximately $145, and are in fact currently out of stock at both B&H and Adorama. Maybe Canon is about to release an A3 which is identical to both the A and A2, but will be $200...

<p>The last time I installed Hugin (I can't remember which version) I had an issue where every time I tried to stitch anything it would cause a fatal error and quit. It turned out to be on of the "plug-in" applications it uses - either autopano/autopano-SIFT or enblend (I'm really sorry I can't remember which) Anyway I solved the problem by downloading an older (stable) version of the faulty application directly from its own project page on sourceforge.</p>

 

<p>Hugin should be able to do what you are attempting without any trouble. I have always been very impressed with the results I get from it. The Nona engine works just fine and it's definitely faster than PTstitcher. Enblend also works quite well within reason - best practice is to shoot panos in full Manual mode to make sure the exposure is the same for all images.</p>

 

<p>Here's an example of a panorama I stitched with Hugin:

<a href="http://www.samparkerphoto.com/gallery/v/yoswild/Tuolumne_Pano_W2.jpg.html">Tuolumne Pano</a>

</p>

I have the Tamron 17-35 f/2.8-4 Di. I have used it for a couple of years on my 300D and now on my 30D. It's equivalent to about 27-56mm on APS-C DSLRs so it's more of 'wide' than an 'ultra-wide.' It is a very nice lens - good build quality, great optics (some say it's as good as the Canon 17-40 f/4L). I don't know about the price, but B&H (www.bhphotovideo.com) is usually my benchmark for a good price from a reputable dealer (watch out for scams - if it seems too good to be true, it probably is). Tamron, Sigma, and Tokina also make some 'ultra-wide' zooms for DSLRs that are likely less expensive than the Canon 10-22, so you should look at those as well. Check out the reviews on www.photozone.de, and compare prices at B&H until you find a good price/performance balance for your budget.

Thats interesting. I have been using my 300D (heavily) for three and half years, and there are no signs of abrasion at all on the strap. It must vary from model to model (or even among samples of the same model).

I ordered a 30D as soon as I read the 450D announcement (the 40D is out of my budget). I'm upgrading from a 300D, so I'm no stranger to the rebel line, but I think that my needs now exceed the capabilities of those cameras. There were a few things that tempted me on the 450D, but they were not enough to sway me from the 30D. The 30D has the advantage in three areas that are important to me: Usability, Image quality (low noise), and battery life.

 

1. The 30D's extra controls and more ergonomic layout mean a lot to me. I shoot about 90% of the time in full manual mode, and under those circumstances, the rebel cameras are cumbersome (i.e. holding a button plus moving the control wheel to change aperture or having to scroll through autofocus points.)

 

2. If you look carefully at Phil Askey's review of the 40D on dpreview, you will find that the 40D actually has slightly more image noise than the 30D. It's not by much, but it is significant in that it means that improvements in low noise signal processing are approaching physical limits. Despite its higher photosite density, the 20D/30D sensor had less noise than the 10D sensor because of signal processing improvements (and microlens design), but that trend cannot continue forever, and it appears that there are indeed diminishing returns in that area already. Consequently, I think that the 450D, with even higher photosite density than the 40D (and the same signal processing engine) will have even higher image noise.

 

3. The final big advantage of the 30D over the 450D is battery life. I know the 450D has a new battery, but it's still small and it's rating is about 500 shots per charge vs. the 30D's 1100.

 

These three things were priorities for me, but you have to decide what your priorities are and choose accordingly.

Are you sure that save as selection is not what you want? That saves the "selection" as an alpha channel, which can then be copied as a layer mask to other layers. Alternatively, if you select the layer with the mask you want to save and go to the channels palette, you should see an alpha channel named Layer X mask (or something to that effect). You can copy that alpha channel and apply it to other layers. I suppose what I'm getting at is that selections, layer masks and alpha channels can be interchanged.

 

One other thing comes to mind - if you hold down the alt key and click on the layer mask, it will show in place of the image. You can then select all and copy it using ctl+a and ctl+c and paste it into a new layer mask.

 

I hope one of these methods will work for you. Good luck.

 

Sam Parker

www.samparkerphoto.com

Mpix Press also does nice calendars, and they are very fast. I placed an order on a sunday, and had it by wednesday of the same week (FedEx next business day was only an extra $5). I think their quality is a little better than Shutterfly, which I have also used in the past, and you get to customize quite a bit more. They are printed on heavy 100# paper stock with a production print press (as opposed to darkroom or inkjet photo prints), and they cost about $20 each (pricing depends on quantity).

I have had the same issue with wide angle lenses in the past. My working theory is that at those focal lengths, the depth of field is so great that minor differences in the actual infinity focus position won't really make any noticeable difference in the image. I'm not completely comfortable with that, but I haven't found a better solution.

 

Now, regarding depth of field and hyperfocal distance, it is my opinion that in many situations you are actually better off focusing at infinity as you are doing. The theory and mathematics of the hyperfocal distance are all correct, but the fact is that the assumptions about what is "acceptable sharpness" were made with early 20th century film and lens technology, and those assumptions don't hold up very well today. I recommend you read this article for more information on this subject: http://www.trenholm.org/hmmerk/DOFR.html

I have a 70-200 f/4 and a 300d. It does "work" on a tripod without the collar, but it is certainly not ideal. It puts a lot of stress on the camera mount, and you will find that unless you really clamp down hard on the head, the camera will sag a bit, so it gets really cumbersome to set up a shot properly. Also, without the collar or an L bracket on your camera body, you can forget about shooting vertical orientation. Even with the most solid tripod and head in the world, when you tilt the camera vertical, it will just start to twist on the screw that holds it to the tripod head. I thought I could do without the collar, but now I plan on getting one.

 

I have a Manfrotto 3021PRO tripod with a 308RC ball head. I also have a giottos MT9242 tripod that I use for hiking. The 3021 is a great all-around tripod, especially if you are tall. Giottos are nice for the money, but the quality is not quite as high as Manfrotto or Gitzo, or even Slik. I really recommend you get a ball head for nature photography, especially for wildlife. They are much faster and smoother to set up than pan/tilt heads.

Hi Phil,<br /><br />

 

Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner.<br /><br />

 

"Do you mean, for example, that you just set the default shaddow and highlight values for the levels and curves tools to these values?"<br /><br />

 

I'm not quite sure what you mean by 'default' but what you need to do is set the OUTPUT black and white points (slider at very bottom of levels dialog box or vertical range of the contrast curve).<br /><br />

 

"To send without a profile, do you just uncheck the "ICC Profile" box in the Save As dialogue?"<br /><br />

 

Yes, that's all you need to do. Alternatively, you could use 'Save for Web', but that will delete EXIF and IPTC metadata as well.<br /><br />

 

Hope that helps.<br /><br />

 

Sam<br />

<a href="http://www.samparkerphoto.com">www.samparkerphoto.com</a>

RC papers may not satisfy the elitist, but they are nonetheless real.</br></br>

 

In my own experience, Phil, Adorama does indeed make very nice quality BW prints. The Ilford paper they use has a nice weight and a beautiful pearl finish. Your stategy for making a test pattern is exactly the right thing to do. I did something similar, although I don't really soft-proof BWs. I found that the black and white points for Adorama's prints are at about 25 and 235 respectively, so I just back off on the output tonal range by that amount. By the way, my working space for grayscale in photoshop is Gray Gamma 2.2 (whereas I think the default is Dot Gain 20%, which is I think for prepress type folks), but I do not embed the icc profile in the images I send to print. Also, when you order from Adorama, make sure you check the box that says 'do not adjust my photos' or something to that effect. Otherwise they apply auto-adjustments (including sharpening) to your images before they print, and you certainly don't want that if you made all the adjustments yourself.</br></br>

 

I hope that answers your question</br></br>

 

-Sam</br>

<a href="http://www.samparkerphoto.com">www.samparkerphoto.com</a>

You need to synchronize the color management settings between Bridge and Photoshop. Set up your color preferences in Photoshop first, then load the same configuration in Bridge (North American Prepress is a good place to start, but if you customize it in Photoshop, I believe you can save the config file and load it in Bridge). The color settings dialog boxes in both applications will tell you if they synchronized or not.

No, not all contests are run this way. I recently entered a contest endorsed by Canon in which the winner must give permission for the sponsor to reproduce the image (in return for the prize, of course), but it explicitly states that the photographer keeps the copyright. Also, the sponsor only requests permissions for the winning photographs.

If you are running windows 2k/XP, then try right clicking on the desktop, choose 'properties', select the 'settings' tab, and click on 'advanced'. A new window will pop up, select the 'color management' tab - this is the mysterious 'profile chooser' mentioned in the error message. If you don't see your spyder2express profile in the list, click 'add' and select the file. If it is shown in the list, click on it and click 'set as default'. I had the same problem you mentioned, and this fixed it for me. I'm not sure why the spyder express software fails to set the default profile correctly. Colorvision has a software update on their website, maybe they have fixed this issue in the new version.

Be careful using a polarizer on super wide angle lenses. Not only is the vignetting an issue, but the polarization effect can look strange as well. This is because the effect of the polarizer changes with respect to the angle from the sun. When your scene includes a very wide area of blue sky, you will get a rather unnatural gradient from deep 'polarizer' blue to washed out sky blue. That's not to say you should never use a polarizer on a super wide lens, but you need to pay attention to what kind of effect it will have on the image. I have no experience with Cokin filters, so I have no comment on that.

If the Moire pattern is not visible at 100% or 50%, then it not likely an artifact of the image itself, but of the interpolation done to "fit to screen." It is essentially an optical illusion.