andys

Whilst you don't really mention the purpose of this trip so it's difficult to suggest what to take I'm with Julian on this, I would not cart all the gear most people are suggesting.

I would take 1 SLR film body, and 3 lenses. From your selection I would take the 17-40 f4L, 50 f1.4 and the 70-200 f4L. I would also look for a good quality fixed lens compact point n shoot style camera (my choice is a Ricoh GR1s (or V) but they can be tricky to locate). I find point 'n' shoots invaluble when you don't want to stand out at all.

If something fails, then stay somewhere for a few days and get someone to ship a replacement from home.

I might be tempted to switch the 50 for an 85, then add an extension tube set or close up filter for macro work, and a 1.4II extender to give the 70-200 a bit more reach.

To take or not to take a tripod is a good dilema. If this was a short trip, I would say yes, but as you intend to be away for a year I would leave this at home and find a bean bag... fill with dried pulses at whatever destination you go to.

Why not take a digital? Personally I'd rather not spend a whole year traveling with the extra's that digitals to require, and always be looking for a secure place to store all that extra stuff when out and about. Have you considered the amount of work required to sort and process and print a years worth of digital files? I also like the fact that the 3 has some degree of weather sealing that the 10D does not have. I also think I would have a lot of trouble storing a years worth of digital data on whatever storage I took. A dvd burning solution would be a good Idea, but then a laptop would be required, and that's more stuff to cart around the world.

If you where travelling for only a month or so, I would consider switching the EOS 3 for a digital body.

Pick up film when and where you can, develop when you stay in a city and post the results home. I see no need to try and cart around up to a years worth of film and photos.

Try putting together some of the solutions people suggest, and carry them around wherever you go for a week or two to see if it is manageable for you.

I'm starting to waffle now so just One more bit of advice from my own experince. Take plenty of snap shots too. I've come back from trips with some good photo's but they don't really catalogue my experience's.

Your'e going to be blitzed with recommendations for the 70-200 f4 L, so I thought I'd get mine in early.

I have the 24-85, and the 70-200 f4 L, and for the money I think this has to be one of the best combinations you can get. They even share filter size so that saves a few pennies. You will find loads of recomendations of this tele-zoom if you search for it, not sure if i have heard a bad thing said about one. The only thing I don't like about this lens is that it is an L and now I want all my other lenses to be L too...

I'll let others mention the merits of IS, as I don't have an IS lenses.. yet...

A similar question was posed a while ago.

these are a couple of pertinent links

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=006qER

http://www.pcworld.com/howto/article/0,aid,111467,pg,3,00.asp

The upshot is that other components will more than likely fail before the CCD.

What Puppy Face says,

I've put lots of film through my EOS 5, never had any problems that where not my fault. Not pulling the leader far enough occassionally.

AndyS

A little off topic but, Did you buy the EOS 1V off the seller you saw on EBAY on the 12-December? A thread was started about it being a scam or not.

AndyS

The 24-85 f3.5-4.5 USM is an extending retracting type. It is shortest physical length at 24mm and will open to f/3.5 here. At 80mm it is at it's longest and opens to f/4.5.

I have a quick additional question.

This lens was produced for the APS SLR, and had a silvery finish. The lens sold today is sold in a black finish. Are there two different versions of this lens, or is it just a change of plastic.

AndyS

.....Can anyone help me out ..... Starting with the command wheel

I can.

Starting with he command dial.

The idiot modes are fairly easy. The "idiot" modes don't let you do much

with the buttons on the back, and the Custom functions don't operate either

( I think). All these modes will pop the flash and fire it if they think

they need it.

Sports - Fully auto, the camera will select a reasonably high shutter speed

( think it may always try to stay above 1/ focal length). Uses AI focus (it

tries to track motion), film advance is High speed.

Macro - close things, selects a small aperture. Probably one shot AF and

single frame advance.

Landscape - Moderate aperture. One shot AF single frame advance.

Portrait - Selects a wide aperture, AI focus Multi frame advance

Green Zone. - This is auto everything point and shoot, AI Servo (this mode

intelligently jumps from one shot AF to AI Focus if it detects movement in

the scene) Single frame advance (i think)

L- Lock (Off). Always press the little button on the top of the command

dial when moving out of Lock to minimize the risk of the often quoted weak

command dial problem (my EOS 5 is about 7 years old and still ok - I press

that button whenever I rotate the command dial).

P - Program - Shiftable auto exposure. The program looks at the lens you

have on and the image in the frame and is supposed to select a suitable

Aperture and Shutter speed for what it thinks is the desired effect. Will

not pop up flash automatically, it might warn that it thinks it wants one.

Tv -Time value - Shutter Priority.

Av - Aperture value - Aperture priority

M - Manual - Manually set aperture and shutter speed to get the correct

exposure. If you have a EOS 5, you get to see in the view finder if you

exposing correctly and little arrows to say if you are way under or over,

with an A2(E) you have to look on the top LCD.

Dep - Selectable depth of field. Focus on the nearest and furthest points

you want in sharp focus, the camera works out the Aperture needed for this.

Some think this is a gimmick, I quite like it.

X - X-sync mode. Lets you set the shutter speed for flash synch.

CF - allows you to set Custom functions to get the camera working how you

like it. There are lots of these and it's best to find a manual to see what

they do. (Things like Mirror Lock up, leaving the film leader out on

rewind, 2nd curtain flash, moving AF off the shutter button, AF assist etc

are in here)

Cal - this lets you set up the EOS 5 for eye control. 6 positions, off and

Cal-1 to Cal-5. To enable eye control it needs to be enabled and

calibrated. If a setting blinks, then it has no calibration. To calibrate,

select a positon (with control dial) look at the red focus point and half

press the shutter, when it beeps look at the new red point and half press

the shutter. When it beeps again, calibration is complete. Calibrating the

same poisiton again is a good idea, the EOS 5 refines the setting and gets

better. I get best results after about 3 calibration attempts.

If you wear glasses, contacts or such, use more than one position. I tend

to use this only for the DoF preview (little box in top left of the

viewfinder), as the eye control tends to make me look at the focus points

rather than the scene in the viewfinder. I can't remember if the DoF

preview is on a Custom Function.

The Flash button

The flash button does make the flash pop up, press it again and you get

Flash Exposure Compensation. Use the control wheel to dial in FEC. It seems

to be ok to press the flash head down, mine still works, though it will pop

down if the camera is turned off. One of the CFs forces flash under

exposure for fill in (I turn it off and use FEC manually)

Then on the back

Back buttons. press the button you want to change and move the control

wheel to change the setting

Drive button - Three settings. Single frame advance, mulit frame advance,

and High speed frame advance. Actual fps depends on achieving focus and

correct exposure, which depends on the mode the camera and lens is in.

AF button - One shot, locks focus with exposure, if the subject moves then

you have to re-focus. AI focus, the EOS 5 attempts to track any movement of

the subject.

Metering button - The one with the dots and brackets. - three settings

again. Empty little box - centre weighted. Dot - spot metering - meters

from about 2.5% of the frame, default is the middle AF point - A CF can

link it to the active AF point (this is only if you manually select the AF

point though). Dot and two brackets - Evaluative, the EOS5 looks at the

scene and works out an exposure based on what it sees.

Other button.

Film speed - can set or override the film speed.

Bracketing - set the amount to bracket 2 stops either way in half stops.

Red eye reduction. - flash drains the battery by pretending to be a torch.

(eye control is somewhere else - we'll come to that)

Multiple expose - set how many frames you want to expose on the same bit of

film.

Broadcast symbol - stops the camera going beep

a smallish dial ... .and then a comedy large control wheel on the back.

Small dial turns the control wheel on and off. The comedy control wheel is

used for program shift in the creative zones, and aperture in manual mode.

I hope that answers all of your immediate questions. There is much more to

the EOS 5 than we have covered here. I would consider finding a manual

essential. (I still use mine to work out what CF's do what).

Other buttons. not mentioned.

Recessed in hand grip. Mid roll rewind. use with a CF (7?) to leave the

leader out.

* button. Exposure lock. This locks exposure so you can recompose.

(annoyingly dosn't combine well with CF4 which moves AF to this button).

other thumb button. User selectable AF point. I use this in preference to

the Eye Control Focus - though I leave ECF on to use the DoF preview in the

viewfinder.

Timer Button. 10 second self timer. Can change to 2 sec with a CF.

AndyS

Depth of field can be a little tricky to see if have previously not had a camera body that allows you to preview it. (At least it was for me on my EOS5).

What you have to remember is that the the image you see through the view finder is with the lens Wide open. (ie a small aperture number). This make the scene much easier to view as it nice and Bright. When you take the shot, the lens closes down to the aperture that you set or the camera calculated. The depth of field button probably can't be used whilst the camera is focusing as the AF likes nice bright images to focus on, and in some modes the camera is still working out the aperture.

You can play around with your camera in Av mode to check Depth-of-Field.

Find or set up an image with lots of detail in the in the foreground and background, set the camera to a low apertue number and focus the scene on the background. Hit the DoF preview and not much should happen. The lens is already wide open and shouldn't stop down, the foreground detail should remain blurred as the shallow depth of field is way out where you focused.

Then set the aperture to a High number and re-focus on the same point. The image will look the same as the lens is still wide open, when you hit the DoF preview, it all goes a bit dark as the lens closes down, but if you carefully check the foreground details they should now sharply focused.

You can see the lens closeing down by loking at the lens front on, you should be able to see the iris close a bit. (on an EOS5, you need to switch the DoF Preview to the ae-lock with a custom function to get the DoF preview to a button).

Also, because the lens stops down with wide DoF, it lets less light through, and the shutter must stay open for longer to expose correctly.

By all means waste some film on working out how Depth of Field operates. It's better to waste a few shots now than waste a good photo later.

I have a Hove foto book for the 1000/F.

If you still need some user guide drop me a personal Email.