henry_minsky1

I found the 300D and 20D image quality to be about the same, except for the high ISO (800, 1600) where the 20D is quite a bit better.

 

What annoys the hell out of me was the slow startup time on the 300D, that is a large part of why I sold it and got the 20D. I also like the ergonomics better on the 20D, the nice dial instead of the little arrow buttons.

 

The 20D also has this new viewfinder with a matte screen, which is marginally better than the 300D, but if you are coming from a full frame viewfinder, you're going to be disappointed in the small dim viewfinder you get on these cameras. I just cannot reliably manual focus in many cases, I really miss the split screen focus and bright viewfinder on my Pentax film camera.

Manual with the 420EX, about 1/125 shutter, and f5 to f8 will give you some depth of field. If the camera is in auto mode, it will expose for the background, which will be dim and give you a slow 1/60 shutter and a large aperture.

 

I usually use 1/250th second down to 1/125 second, manual exposure, and as small an aperture as possible, I take a test shot and see if the flash (bounced from ceiling) exposes the histogram enough.

 

Unless I want a shallow depth of field, in which case, I still want a fast shutter. The 420EX is powerful and if bounced from a white ceiling illuminates most rooms very nicely.

Is there a URL for the viewmaste site? All I can find is consumer products with pre-made reels.

I would like to make Viewmaster stereo reels, and I am wondering if it

is possible to digitally create an entire reel, with the sets of

stereo pairs all placed and rotated, and have it printed on a single

large piece of film from a digital film printer. Then I could just cut

the whole thing out as a single circle, and place it in a cardboard

carrier, like mounting a single large slide.

 

Has anyone heard of anything like this being done? What service bureau

could do this. The file would be pretty large if it was a JPEG, but

maybe as a Postscript file it would be only be about the size of the

individual files combined.

I am looking at a Canon 620 for sale on eBay, and it says it uses the

2CR5 battery. But I saw someplace else on the net mentioning that

batteries for the 620 might be hard to find. Typing that part number

into Google gives lots of vendors for that type of battery. Is there

some issue I don't know about that would make it hard to get a

compatible battery for the EOS 620?

 

I'm going backwards in time here, I have bought the 300D, and the 20D,

and now I want to have a film body to turn my 50mm/1.8 lens into a

normal lens, and my 28mm into a wide angle.

I had the 300D for a year and then bought the 20D. I used the Russian firmware, which worked perfectly.

 

The bottom line is that image quality is almost identical between 20D and 300D.

 

 

However, the features I wanted included instant turn on time, faster frame rate, faster write to card, big dial instead of silly little buttons

for control on the back.

 

The ISO 1600 is noticably better on the 20D, which lets me do more

available light photos with my existing not-too-fast lenses.

 

Was it worth the extra $800 ?

 

Yeah, I guess so. Although I eventually sent the 20D back to Canon to try and adjust an autofocus problem I seem to have. Otherwise I like the 20D but I wouldn't feel at a disadvantage with the 300D either.

I have been using a 50mm/1.8, 28mm/2.8, and the new Sigma 18-50/2.8 lens.

 

I'll post some before/after photos when I get the 20D back from Canon service.

 

The problem was pretty consistent over a large number of photos, most obvious in portraits, where I am accustomed to focusing on the eye, and all the images come out with stuff forward of the eye being in sharp focus (hair, fabric on collar or sleeves) , and the eye being just out of the sharp area. My photos from the 300D were much more consistently in focus in the same situation.

Once you experience that sinking feeling when you hear the drive clicking uselessly trying to seek, you'll know the answer (I have been there). The failure rate of CF cards is probably an order of magnitude lower. If you're in a situation where you can re-take the photos, then maybe the microdrive is OK, but for images that need to be reliably stored, I would put my money into solid-state storage.

As other people have said, the real question is whether you will be satisfied with what effectively will be a field of view that doesn't go much beyond what 50mm would look like on a regular 35mm camera.

 

IS works nicely, and people have gotten very good results from this lens. I have one which I took on a trip to Paris, and it worked great but I often wished I had a wide angle with me. Well, I had the 18-55 EFS, but I loathe that lens for several reasons.

 

I ended up buying the Sigma 18-50/2.8 zoom lens for my wide angle lens needs, it has great color, and pretty low distortion. But the 28-135 is good for low light situations especially where I need telephoto, like outdoors at dusk. I actually like the effect sometimes of slow shutter speed with IS, to get a sharp background while handheld, but allow motion blur of moving subjects at the same time.

You should buy the lens *for me*.

 

Just my opinion.

I just sent my 20D camera in for adjustment, as I have a pesky back focus problem that was not present on my 300D. Same lenses, but on the 20D the AF puts the focus always just in front of the face, instead of on the eyeball where I put it.

I didn't get a chance to try this firmware before I sent it. I wonder if they silently addressed this, as it seems to be a lot of people complaining about the same problem.

 

I'll post some before/after shots if I ever get it back from Canon.

I upgraded from the DRebel, which I had for a year, to the 20D. I am not so happy with the results. Looking back over my thousands of photos with the DRebel, I got better results. There is something just not quite right here. I can get better performance using manual focus, something I never needed to do on the DRebel. Doesn't matter if I use the fabulous 50mm/1.8 or a Sigma zoom lens, I still am not getting the focus nailed via the autofocus.

 

I am going to see if Canon service can help here, it is just getting too frustrating.

You can't go wrong with the 50/1.8, it is so inexpensive yet has wonderful saturation, contrast, low distortion, etc etc.

 

I hated the EF-S 18-55 and I don't like what I have seen from the 18-75 either.

 

I use the Sigma 18-50/2.8 mostly these days. I haven't felt the need for anything longer than 50mm for a while, given the 1.6x factor of the 20D.

I got the Sigma 18-50/2.8, which I like a lot. I sold my 28-135 IS, but I do regret that from time to time. But I use the 18-50 most of the time, and I use the Sigma 18-125 when I think I will need some longer reach. Where I miss the Canon 18-125 is when I need to shoot images quickly without time to stabilize myself for a shot. The image stabilizer was something I relied upon a lot, but I really need the 18mm and the f2.8 more than I need the IS.

 

If the 17-85 IS were a better lens, it would be my choice, but I prefer the Sigma for its sharpness, color, and lack of aberrations.

I have the Sigma 18-125, and I do not have the 17-85, but I did have the 18-55 EFS, and the examples I have seen from the 17-85 look sadly similar to the 18-55. I found the 18-125 had less aberrations and was sharper and more pleasing than the 18-55, by a large margin.

Yeah, that's where the 1.6x crop factor on my 20D really becomes a nuisance. I find that the 50mm lens is already pretty narrow field of view and then when cut in half for stereo, you really don't get much into a stereo frame. That's why I was hoping to be able to get a wider angle and then correct for distortions in software...

I'm going to try prying the mirrors off of the pentax and adding some shim under them to get the angles slightly different... then I'll see if I need to correct the perspective in software for keystone, etc.

another one

Here's an example of the pentax adapter on the 28mm lens. The overlap of the two frames is not good enough, only a narrow strip...

I have been trying to get a good stereo adapter for my 20D. I tried

the Loreo thing, which is gives acceptable results, but it has these

tiny awful plastic lenses, so the images are really pretty marginal. I

was experimenting with an old Pentax stereo beam splitter on an 18-55

lens, but the optics don't quite line up to give enough stereo overlap.

 

Now that we have photoshop and image processing tools like the Pano

tools, it seems to me like it ought to be possible to build something

very simple with some front surface mirrors, and get the basic framing

correct, and then fix all the keystoning and other positional errors

using software. I was wondering if anyone who knows some optics might

be able to suggest a very simple design for something like this, to go

over a Canon wide angle lens like the 28mm or the Sigma 18-50mm zoom

lens.

Is the image you've posted taken from a RAW image and post processed using Canon's DPP software?

 

There seems to be a bug in their algorithms, I hope they update the software. I had exactly the same problem. I primarily shoot JPEG anyhow so it's not a big problem, but I would like to hear about any update from Canon on the DPP software.

Thanks that's a great resource!

I own a Canon 20D and a 420EX flash. I own the Canon 50/1.8, 28/2.8

and a 18-50 2.8 Sigma zoom lens. I am interested in getting more

interesting lighting, to try to achieve something like the lighting in

this photographer's gallery:

 

<p>

<a href=http://www.pbase.com/luminous>http://www.pbase.com/luminous</a>

<p>

Can anyone with lighting experience tell me if there's a single piece

of equipment I could get which would do the most to help me achieve

this kind of effect?

 

Thanks

Wouldn't curved aperture blades make the bokeh much better on the 50/1.8? The annoying pentagon shape you get now could be much more circular I would think.

My theory is that it is a bug in their RAW conversion software. Have you seen the problem when you take JPEG-only shots? I am wondering if it is only the external converters that have the problem, I didn't notice this problem yet in JPEGs which are straight from the camera, only those that I converted using my PC and Canon software.