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john_chambers

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Posts posted by john_chambers

    Scanning 35mm Negs - Need Help

    in The Wet Darkroom: Film, Paper & Chemistry

    Posted

    HI Michael,

     

    My suggestion would be for you to buy one of the dedicated 35mm film scanners priced at or near $200. I myself had been using a Minolta Dual Scan III until it died recently and I'm also now in the market for a new scanner. My Minolta had a resolution of 2820 dpi and I figured that it gave me the same or similar resolution as a 10 mega pixel DSLR. That had been far exceeded by the new scanners. If you would like, I can send you a full resolution scan that you can check out and even make prints of so you can see if it's something you want to get into. Just email me privately if you want to take me up on that offer.

     

    One thing about scanning that you should know is that it can be tedious. You will spend a significant amount of time cloning out little scratches and dust specs. I always laugh at digital shooters who obsess over hot pixels.

     

    Good luck!

     

    John

    Light Meter - which one for natural light portraits?

    in Lighting Equipment

    Posted

    Hi Faye,

     

    Beautiful portrait!

     

    I use the cheapest (that's relative) polaris incident meter. It reads incident, flash, multi-flash, and reflected, and I find it does all that I need it to do. I've never felt that I should have spent more.

     

    Regarding the difference between your 1.8 and 1.2 lenses, have you tried taking a reading with the 1.8 and then using that exposure with the 1.2? It could be that the 1.2 needs to be checked by Canon.

     

    John

    5D with hot pixels

    in Canon EOS Mount

    Posted

    As someone who scans film, I can tell you that dealing with hot pixels is such a minor thing compared to cloning out scratches and dust!

     

    Before I started using Lightroom I was a Raw Shooter Premium user. Raw Shooter had, in it's noise reduction settings, a hot pixel setting. My experience in using that was that it only took a setting of 1 or 2 to remove all hot pixels. Since Raw Shooter was acquired by Adobe, I thing we should all demand that Adobe add this function to Lightroom!

    Client wants images right from my cards.

    in Business of Photography

    Posted

    Jeff,

     

    Brenna's original post said that the client re-wrote the contract specifying that they (the client) would own copyright. There is a difference between allowing use of images immediately for a specific purpose as Craig describes and giving up copyright (which means forever.) Personally, I think the content would be the determining factor. For example, if the photographer were photographing a manufactured product then I could understand them wanting to retain copyright. On the other hand, for a PJ covering news events,... try to imagine Steve McCurry handing over the rights to his images. I don't think that's gonna happen.

     

    I'm not a pro or a PJ but I provided a link to a pro/PJ who does have an opinion on this...

    Client wants images right from my cards.

    in Business of Photography

    Posted

    The best reason NOT to do this is because it hurts the profession. I don't claim to be a great photographer, but I think what does make a great photographer is being able to see or notice things that other people don't seem to see or notice. If you can't do that then you won't know what to point your camera at. These people seem to be saying that after you've used your vision to "notice" and then used your skill and sense of timing to "capture" a series of images that you should just "dump" them. They are trying to convice YOU that you are nothing more than a camera driver, but in reality they know that you are more than that, otherwise they could shoot their own damn pictures!

     

    Something to read and ponder, Mark Louny's columns on the digital journalist web site. Every month he cites the Good the Bad and the Ugly, kind of along these same lines.

     

    http://digitaljournalist.org/columns.htm#loundy

    Best MF kit for a small budget

    in Medium Format

    Posted

    Hi Victoria,

     

    Since you said you want big enlargements I am going to suggest you go for a Mamiya RB. Go to the KEH website and look at prices for a "kit". You can get a body, lens, 120 back, and waist level viewfinder for a package price. What I would recommend is the Pro-S body, it's one back from the current Pro-SD so is a bit cheaper in price but still not too old. If you want to do portraits and tight landscapes get the 127mm C lens. It's a fantastic lens for head shots and head and shoulder portraits.

     

    One of the reasons I would recommend 6x7 to you is that it is called the "ideal format" you don't lose much from cropping when you print at 11x14, 16x20, etc. because the aspect ratio is already close to what you're going to print.

     

    People will tell you you can't use the RB hand held, but I have been albe to shoot at 1/30 sec with the 127mm lens. Yes, it is a big heavy camera, but for portraits and big enlargements it can't be beat. Also, it's a camera you can grow with; lots of options for later when you want to add to it.

     

    For metering, get yourself a hand-held incident meter.

     

    Well, I hope this helps. Let us know what you decide to get or if you need more help or opinions. ;)

     

    John

    Digicam with low shutter lag?

    in Mirrorless Digital Cameras

    Posted

    It appears that I have upset you. I apologize; that was not my intention.

     

    The "sigh" comes from frustration on my part. Because I wanted to help you and I was not able to. Partly because you didn't "get it" but mostly because I was not able to adequately explain. So, let me try once more.

     

    First, let's not use the words "manual focus." Instead let's call this "pre-focus." I believe you can try this on your Olympus D40 without spending any money. I was able to download a PDF version of the manual for the D40 from the Olympus website. If you will look at the top of page 31 it tells you how to set "manual focus." Sorry, they use the term, not my choice, but it's really describing how you can "pre-set" the focus to a certain distance. I recommend setting at 6 feet or 2 meters for shooting a toddler. You set it and shoot away shot after shot. The camera doesn't spend any time focusing, so you cut all that time from the so-called shutter lag (which is really auto-focus lag.) Don't worry about the exact distance because with a small sensor and the correspondingly short focal length of the lens, you will have a huge depth of field. Just set the zoom to wide (35mm equiv.) and you'll be fine.

     

    Try it. I'm CERTAIN it will work. I use this technique myself.

     

    BTW, I also see in the manual that the D40 also has the "MyMode" feature. So you could save all these types of settings once and recall them later at any time.

     

    I hope this helps.

     

    John

    Digicam with low shutter lag?

    in Mirrorless Digital Cameras

    Posted

    I can see how one would think manual focusing with a digicam would be useless. After all there is no good way to "see" what you're focusing on.

     

    But what I'm talking about is something different. e.g. presetting an aperture in aperture priority mode, then presetting the focus at the hyperfocal distance for that aperture. It DOES work. And it DOES cut shutter lag to a small fraction of what it would be otherwise.

     

    Too bad more digicams don't allow you to save settings like the Olympus "My Mode" does. Somebody please correct me if Canon, Nikon have this feature.

    Digicam with low shutter lag?

    in Mirrorless Digital Cameras

    Posted

    Hi Michelle,

     

    I think what you really want to look for is a digicam that allows 1.) aperture priority AE, 2.) manual focus, and 3.) the ability to save all of the cameras settings and recall them when wanted.

     

    The Olympus C7070WZ and many other Olympus models do this. The current SP-550UZ probably does, but I don't care much for the uber zoom. Olympus calls this "My Mode." Goofy name but it's a great feature.

     

    With these capabilities, you set the camera's zoom setting to say a 35mm equivalent, set to aperture priority AE, and set the focus to the hyper-focal distance. As has been said above, most of the shutter lag is actually time spent in adjusting focus, so if you eliminate that, your shutter lag is quite short. If you want to see some photos made this way with the C7070WZ, look

     

    <a href ="http://www.pbase.com/johnchambers/c7070wz">here.</a>

     

    Good luck on your search.

    K10d - Raw Shooter Premium

    in Pentax

    Posted

    Wait! There is another way.

     

    Go to the Adobe website and download the free utility that converts various RAW formats to DNG. Adobe is updating this utility and will continue to do so. If that utility will convert the K10D files, then you can work with DNG files in RSP.

     

    John

    Classic SLR suggestions

    in Classic Manual Film Cameras

    Posted

    Several people mentioned the Pentax Spotmatics but no one mentioned the K mount Pentax. There are two models that may fix your needs; the Pentax MX is an excellent all manual camera, very small, very well built, elegant, feels great in the hand. The KX is larger, also all manual, with the added bonus of mirror lockup.

     

    K mount lenses are not as old as screw mount lenses and therefore are less likely to have fungus. (I have lots of experience with both.)

     

    Besides Pentax, I second the opinion for the Leicaflex SL too.

     

    John

    Using ASA to find correct exposure (Olympus Trip 35)

    in Olympus

    Posted

    Hi Jukka,

     

    Look <a href="http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00CqUJ">here</a> to see some pics of an Olympus Pen repair. It is similar to the Trip in the functioning of the meter. Both use trap needle metering.

     

    You should see the aperture open up as you press the shutter, that's assuming light levels are low. If you don't see this behaviour, then your aperture is probably stuck. This is the most common problem with these cameras.

     

    Hope this helps. Sorry for the late reply. I don't look at this forum very often.

     

    Good luck,

    John

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