rob m

Hi guys, is there any way of 'foldering' the interesting people. IE:

creating a number of folders, so you can put your landscape faves

into one bit, digital imaging peeps in another etc. I've got a load

of people there and I don't have time to get through everyone - you

know how it goes, you get absorbed by each and every one and then 2

hours have gone past.

 

Cheers.

That will put a few spanners in some peoples works. Good plan, lets hope it works.

 

Possibly add another line something like "please try to rate properly rather than rate as a mate" - but then probably going too far, lets see if this thing works first, aye?

Read through that too - check my work for my lack of technical prowess, but even I can tell it is an average holiday snap with no real merit and certainly not a 'wow' or '7/7!!!!!!!' shot.

 

A prime example here.

 

I have had similar experience when rating people lower than they have come to expect. The only way forward, as described by the Mr Brian Mottershead is to talk to abuse@p.n (check out "Create a comments area on those who have no uploaded photos by Ray Wei (2004-06-21)")

 

I like the way everybody has gone in and offered very constructive criticisms on the shot after this post. lol.

The thing about charging people for it is that it would lose a lot of people who come here. There is also the debate on about subscriptions.

Admittedly it would be a nice idea, but you would again lose people if they could not come on and rate away on photos they like. This would also not stop the mate raters, as they would just have to limit their 7/7 ratings per day, but would still keep going back to their 'mates' whenever they did rate, this would then mean the particularly good works would not get looked at, less discussion on those works and less information gained for people who would like to use the site as the learning resource it is.

Ideall world and everything would eliminate this, but it ain't going to happen. I've decided to ignore it, check through the most recent request bit and see who the people, who's photos are really inspiring, have rated and commented on to find other good works.

Thanks for bring Mr Schildt's work into my life, hadn't come across it before and it is trully stunning. Agreed that there is just no comparison with the 'nearly good' shot talked about in the starting post.

Found the picture as the last one you rated. I gotta say that I don't agree with the mate rating there unless you count 107 people as all doing it. True it does go on, but you gotta remember why people rate in the 1st place.

 

You have people who have been in the game for a while and know the technical side of things, why a picture works, composition, lighting, colour - the whole lot, and they rate accordingly: originality in their wide experience and aesthetics from this technical standpoint etc. Then you have the amateurs like myself that haven't seen the world library of photos and think "I ain't seen that before" and rate it high on originality, and for aesthetics just work on the "thats a nice picture", completely leaving out the fact that the eye is led off the frame, the DOF is just a bit out, the saturation is just too high and looks like it was shot in 'glorious technicolor'.

Its a pretty nice picture, one that I'd be pleased with at any rate (but then check my folder lol), so I don't think that this is a good example of the m8rate. Just my opinion there though dude.

Can't find that picture or where you are seeing it, got a link?

 

I know that this topic has been done to death in the past, with a lot of people having a lot to say. The rules are clear and there is a ratings abuse email address for reporting such things, but the PN staff are way stretched as it is. Agreed that mate rating occurs, but as to how to stop it, I don't think there is any way forward, some posts are over a year old and nothing has changed. Possibly the only way is to educate people into not doing it and the reasons why, but then PN ain't a chat room and you can't force people to read the forums.

 

Possibly an email to all PN members from d'management explaining why people don't like it and to stop it, but then.....who knows? Not me.

Whilst I'm using the 10Kbps or so of valuable bandwidth to post this

up, I might as well go for it....

 

New to photography as a whole PN has opened the whole thing up for

me. And from rank amateur a few months ago, the advice etc given on

here has moved me up to the dizzy heights of just rank (no new

photos in my bit to justify this comment as yet).

 

Its not from the comments/ratings given in my area though that have

done this, its from looking at the tech specs and comments of other

much better characters. Richard van Hoesel (hope you don't mind me

using your name here) for example gives details on how he acheives

such wicked shots, so I plough through and try and find out what its

all about. The forums and people that comment in them are essential

and every question I've possed has been thoroughly answered and

debated, and emails sent to me personally offering greater insight.

 

This is much more useful than ratings, although they are nice (and I

know PN isn't here to make me feel good, but that doesn't make it

any less nice), and what make this such a t'rific place to come.

 

That being said I have problems with the payment method, I have the

cash constantly available but no accepted means of getting it across

the Atlantic to where it counts. As for the E-shops, if your

anything like me you want your new thingys right now and not after

it has made a global crossing at greater shipping cost, and might

also be a touch worried about your precision instruments travel

arrangements.

 

Is there any progress on updating the payment methods? A UK (greedy

me sorry, read: EU office) that will accept cheques etc? Are there

no UK based suppliers, such as DABs etc that you can use (I know you

have to get the affiliation thing sorted and it ain't that simple,

but thought it worth asking)? I've looked through all the affiliates

and they seem to be US based, hope I haven't just been blind.

 

So yeah, any news on this stuff? Want to contribute to the upkeep

but so far haven't given you dudes/dudettes a penny and feel a bit

of a bludger.

 

Whilst on the point, does anyone have any ideas for generating more

revenue for the site? Maybe allowing the sale of photos directly

from here and PN gets a cut? I've had a trawl through the rest of

these posts but I dunno if this has been discussed before.

 

Good work people, thanks.

I've never come across this problem. Works fine for me (luckily)

Not the right place for this, but..for the moderators of the site who appear to be looking at this thread:

I'd better hold my hands up in admittance for some of the 'dont' features here.

I haven't used a bogus account or done any retaliation rating, but blatant abuse at my own stuff a short while ago prompted me to respond in somebody elses portfolio, where upon we had a couple of paragraphs of debate on what was going on. I don't want to report it as abuse and obviously don't wish to report myself, but thought I'd put this in here and let you investigate as you wish, rather than have it come back and bite me later. (for the record we have not contacted each other in any way since and everything is dusted)

I'm now taking a much needed closer inspection of the rules.

Best rgds.

Thanks for all this guys, it going to set me in good sted for the future once I have saved up further.

 

I opted for the Tamron 70-300 f/4 - 5.6. That and a 62mm UV filter and the canon cable release cost me 123 pounds, so I figured just suck it and see, I can always change later. I can then learn something about that range in the meantime rather than just dithering around.

 

I'm going to start using it tomorrow (like a kid at X'mas I'm getting the right hump I can't play with my new toy now, waaaaaa) so will post up some shots and you can judge how good or bad the lens is then.

 

Take it easy and happy snapping ;-}

thanks for the response and advice guys, I gotta hear this sort of thing because I raelly am out in foreign territory at the moment, so I really do appreciate your time.

 

As for the 75 - 300 comment, I took this out of a different post that was talking about the canon 75-300, sorry I didn't make myself clear. I tried the Canon and the Tamron, and the Tamron just seemed to be better. I didn't get to field test it or anything, but it just seemed to win on all the things I did look at.

Went into Jessops, and the kind people there let me try a few lenses

on my own camera body. The 75-300 does seem a bit wafty, and they

didn't have the 100-300 to try, but they did have:

 

Tamron AF 28 - 300 Ultra Zoom XR, F/3.5 - 6.3 IF Macro

 

At 249 pounds it seemed rather good and did the 75-300 hands down.

 

Has anyone used this lens and is it a good build? I'm resigned to not

getting the most perfect image quality (although this seemed

alright), so build is going to be more important.

 

I realise the problem that may come later on with getting a third

party lens

 

thanks once again

Went into Jessops, and the kind people there let me try a few lenses on my own camera body. The 75-300 does seem a bit wafty,a dn they didn't have the 100-300 to try, but they did have:

 

Tamron AF 28 - 300 Ultra Zoom XR, F/3.5 - 6.3 IF Macro

 

?249. Seemed rather good and did the 75-300 hands down.

 

Has anyone used this lens and is it a good build? I'm resigned to not getting the most perfect image quality (although this seemed alright), so build is going to be more important.

 

thanks once again

Thanks Ron, any tips on the one that you would go for? I know they get rather expensive further on and I think I could stretch a bit more, so is there anything better that you'd recommend (but obviously not the real silly price/excellent quality stuff)

Thanks for all your responses, given me a lot to read and think about. take it easy.

Thanks mate. I had the 100-300 opened up as well from:

 

http://www.waltersphotovideo.co.uk/walters/productsearch.php?productsearch1=ef%20lens

 

but was a touch confused on what that 10mm difference was making.

 

Well I'll scratch those ideas, thanks. Happy snappin.

Ladies and gents, can anyone explain the difference between the below

2 lenses?

 

EF 90-300mm f/4-5.6 USM (BLACK)

 

EF 75-300mm f4/5.6 USM MK3

 

The 90 - 300 is about ?100 more expensive, but why? What is is

offering that the 75 isnt, apart from the obvious 20 mm focal length?

 

I've never bought a lens (or used one), but am trying to, although

keep getting confused. Everytime I think 'that sounds about right', I

read something else on the forums or in one of the retailer sites

that gives me something else to think about.

Sorry Ann I was using 'guys' as non gender specific, didn't mean to offend.

Many thanks for the responses - you given a lot of help....once again.

guys, I get the point of panchromatic film being sensitive to all

visible light ranges, slightly less on the green but much better than

orthochromatic. But what I'd like to know is..... panchromatic, is it

the term used solely for B&W film, or is it the actual ability to

sense all the ranges?

 

Bit of a dull question, but I need to know and lots of sites are

telling me lots of things except, is it specifically B&W film, or can

colour film be panchromatic also?

 

I'm thinking its just B&W as colour works in a different way, but I

need to be 100%

 

Once again turning to you groovers for help. My thanks in advance.

Guys, I knew I could count on you, thank you kindly for each response. On the downside, you've now given me about a weeks worth of net trawling following up on it all, LOL ;-}

 

Nick, I am new to photography in whole - I got my 1st cam end of November last year (Kyocera s5r) and have been buying about 5 mags a month to find out more about the whole thing. I work stupid hours at the moment and weekends, so I have only been able to go out shooting sparingly - so I'm not even sure what specific direction I'm going in, I just wanna shoot everything at the moment. I'll go somewhere and think damn I need a wide shot here, or be trawlling through the critiques here and get inspired by someones photos, try it out and realise I just can't pull it off with what I've got. So I've decided to do it in reverse, get the lenses and then find out where I'm going to be. I've also gotta learn bloomin PSP8/PS - arrg who would have thought it would take so much time?

I get made redundant June 30th and can't wait, I'm going to be out snapping everyday and have trips planned to Scotland and Wales, woohoo

 

thanks again people.

 

Be cool, stay slinky.

Morning boys and girls.

 

Can anyone give me some advice on lens buying. I have just recently

bought a EOS 300D and it comes with the standard 18mm - 55mm lens.

 

I want to get 2 more from opposite ends of the scale - a nice wide

angle lens and also a macro, 90mm or something.

 

The thing is, I have been looking for lens reviews on dpreview, here

and a coupla other places and can't find a lot (maybe just being

blind), so thought I'd try and enlist the help of you good people.

 

Any recommendations?

 

Another downside is the money tree is running dry after the initial

camera outlay, so as much as I'd like to spend a couple of grand on

one, it ain't gonna happen.

Guys, thanks a lot for the good info - I'll take a bit out of each of them. Appreciate your time ;-}

does anybody know if there are any PSP8 instructor lead training

courses out there?

 

Only really applicable to the South East England area (Kent/London).

 

I've dug through Google to try and find some, but no joy. I'm fairly

new to all this and haven't got a lot of time to indulge

(unforunately) so sitting in front of the PC trying to get to grips

with all of it is proving very long winded - and there is nobody to

ask questions.

 

I know there is a fair amount of E-Learn stuff around, but I can

learn out of the book with no problems and the good magazines out

there are always providing tutorials.

 

Any help - much appreciated.