hans_eckelman

I use the turbo battery on a 550ex and love it! I can shoot all day and never have to worry about the flash not recycling in time or not having enough juice. I highly recommend this battery to anyone who is looking into a battery pack for their flash.

If it is going to be real dark, I would just go with manual focusing which will automatically disable the autofocus assist light. I would also go in P mode which will prevent the flash from coming up unless you tell it to come up.

I use Acdsee 5.0 for viewing and organizing my pictures. It is customizable, quick and allows you to keep notes on the pictures.

I have both the 10D and an older A2E. Before I got the digital camera I scanned in most of my negatives. What a pain! Since I've gotten my digital camera my film camera has just gathered dust. I do miss the eye control, but the digital camera gives me instant feedback as to how the picture turned out and allows me to make on the spot adjustments to the settings in order to get the exact picture I want. And if I need to shoot fast? Just set the camera to program and take the pictures. Most of them are going to be close enough that just a few minutes in photoshop will give you the shot you were looking for. To me that is priceless. Besides, removing dust and scratches from negatives gets to be a royal pain.

 

As for the costs, I figure it is saving me about $5-10 every time I shoot 36 pictures.

You done do be seeing the prices correctly.

So make sure you post some examples so we can see how good the lens is!

The flash will not adjust for an 80mm on the 10D because it doesn't need to. The lens is still 50mm. The picture gets cropped as if it were shot with an 80mm. The flash still works just like it should. The flash will also still fire no matter how long your lens is. The results might be a little unpredictable, but if you are shooting digital you should be able to check and modify exposure as you shoot.

 

I have the 550ex with a 10D and a Quantum turbo battery pack for the flash. The battery pack is a real monster! Took 700 shots with it and only used 1/4 of the power according to the meter on the battery. I highly recommend it. I don't recall the 420 having the connector for the battery pack, but I could be wrong. The quantum site (www.qtm.com) does not show the 420EX using the same connector.

 

The 10D also shoots pretty well at high ISO speeds which might allow you to take pictures without any flash at all. Might be worth a try especially with those fast lenses of yours. There are some new programs out like Neat Image that can clean up a lot of the noise you get when shooting at high ISO speeds.

Well, going back through my pictures I did find one that I took at -1 that I then had to adjust in photoshop. The noise is quite pronounced, but not too bad. Same dim monkey house, but different monkey. This is another handheld shot at 1/180 f5.6 ISO 3200 at -1 ev with the same 75-300 IS lens at 285mm. Not sure what I was thinking about when setting the camera to these settings. They don't make much sense. I think I was just fiddling around to see what it could do. If you want the full size file, send me an email and I will email it to you.

I have quite a few batteries (around 9?) that I have purchased on Ebay for 12.00. To date they are all going strong and give the same life I get out of the official "Canon" batterys I own.

This was not taken at -1, but it was taken handheld at 3200 in very dim light at 1/20th and F4 at 75mm with a 75-300 IS Canon lens. I've been very impressed with the low light capability of the camera and the ability to pull information out of the shadow detail with photoshop.

Most people have a hard time seeing the IR focus assist light. The light on my 550EX is very hard to see even up close but makes a huge difference in low light autofocus.

I upgraded my D60 to a 10D and consider the price difference to be worth it. The AF is definitely faster in low light and the lower noise is noticable at higher ISO speeds. One of the best new features, IMHO, is the ability to zoom in 10X to check focus and detail.

I use a 10D, so I can see right away if the metering was good or not and if I need to bracket and which way. And if I don't like the exposure I can usually correct it in photoshop. Most of the time, however, I find the 10D to underexpose a little.

As long as you don't hold regular (i.e. every two days) pledge drives like PBS I am up for it. Just subscribed. =)

There is a problem with waiting for new technology to come out. The problem is that there is always the BBD (Bigger Better Deal) on the horizon. If you allow this to paralize you, you will never receive any of the benefits of any of the new technology. Even if you do wait for the mysterious 3D or the successor to the 10D, who's to say the improvements are going to be worth the wait? And once they do come out, how long are you going to have to wait on a waiting list before you get your camera? IMHO it is better to go with what you want now and enjoy it and look at upgrading down the road than it is to wait for the next generation.

I also switched from the D60 to the 10D. Several very noticable improvements are:

 

Much improved AF especially in low light

More AF points with 7 AF points instead of 3

Improved picture review with 10x viewing (VERY handy!!)

Much lower noise at higher ISO settings

Better colorspace in Adobe RGB

 

I have not regretted getting the 10D and selling my D60. I considered the $200 upgrade cost well worth it especially since all the extras I bought for the D60 like the vertical grip worked just fine on the 10D.

 

From what I can tell there were no "problems" with the D60. The 10D was brought out to address some shortcomings in the D60 design. I loved my D60 and took many outstanding pictures with it. The 10D just takes a good thing and makes it better.

http://www.qtm.com/ is the link to Quantum's web site. They make the QFlash. If you get it, post what you think. I am curious as to how it would work on a 10D.

The grip would remedy the situation nicely since the batteries are accessed through a dropdown hatch on the back of the grip, not the bottom. Even if the bracket interferes with the door opening, the two batteries in the grip last such a long time that you shouldn't have an issue if you ever do have to change the batteries with the bracket on. I can usually make it through an entire day of heavy shooting on one set of batteries.

 

I have the Pro T on order and it should be here on Monday. I will reply back with what I find about the bracket and the battery door on the grip.

What about the Sigma 500 super? It is suppose to be a copy of the Canon 550EX including E-TTL and all the functionality. I have the 550EX and love it, but it is pricy. The 500 Super is the same price range as the 420EX. Anyone out there have one they could comment on?

Your sensor definitely needs to be cleaned. Follow the instructions in the manual carefully. Nice pic BTW. =)

I have a Canon 10D with a 550EX and the vertical grip. I get those

annoying shadows to the left whenever I rotate the camera to take a

shot. I know there are flash brackets out there that will allow you

to flip the flash back up to vertical when you rotate the camera.

Anyone have any good suggestions for make or model of flash bracket

to use? Or any other suggestions for getting rid of the shadows?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

There is a VERY noticable difference on my D60 between the built in focus assist light and the one on my 550EX. With the 550EX attached I find the D60 focuses a lot quicker and more accurately than with the focus assist light on the camera. I will go through the trouble of attaching my 550EX in low light even though the popup flash would work just fine.

Um.... I thought the preflash and FEL flash used by the camera is a fraction of a normally fired flash. Since the studio lights would fire as well during the exposure lock, I think you would get a grossly underexposed shot since the camera would see much more light than expected from the flash. You might do better to get an external incident meter to figure out proper exposure.

I've done 10" x 15" professional prints using the JPG format of the camera with beautiful results. I've seen 20" x 30" pictures printed from the JPGs that started to show some artifacting, but hardly noticable unless you were looking close for them.

I think the answer Karlie is looking for has been missed so far. A comparison to the Nikon Coolpix shutter lag is what is desired. You didn't state what Coolpix you have, but from browsing various sites it looks like anywhere from .5 to 2.5 seconds shutter lag. The difference between 500 millisecond lag to 100 millisecond lag is very significant and noticable. There is a world of difference between the standard point and shoot digital cameras and the Canon 10D and you should be pleased with the 10D shutter lag (or lack thereof) compared to your Coolpix. You will be going from noticable shutter lag to a shutter lag that you have to use a machine to notice or measure. I would call that an improvement.