john_mauser

Good stuff to know. Now I can sleep tonight!

It only rotates around the lens mount, no left/right or up/down wiggle. Your thoughts on making the metal mounts have a slight bit of play makes total sense. It was freezing outside when I felt the loose fit in the mounts. I wonder how the fit will be in the middle of the summer? I feel a whole lot better about the whole subject. Thanks,

John

J C,

Thanks for the response. You told me exactly what I wanted to hear...that most of them do it, new or used. Thanks, I feel a bit better. John

I just got a 70-200 f2.8L the other day. When I put it on my tripod

and attached my 10D, I noticed a little bit of looseness at the lens

mount. The body and lens will rotate less than 1mm clockwise/counter

clockwise. The contacts always make contact and I have recieved no

error messages or had any problems with shooting. I went back and

tried some of my lighter lenses and found out that they do the same

thing although much less than the big lens (or maybe I'm just

noticing it more with a bigger heavier lens). I did a few searches

and found out that this is the case with most canon shooters with the

70-200 and they they don't worry about and it causes no problems. I

was just curious how many other shooters out there have had the same

problem? Does anyone know why the canon lense mounts can have that

tiny bit of slop? Thanks, John

I did it several times this weekend with no refraction from the edge. I was actually using a grad ND but used the edge for a hard line. These were all flat horizon shots, mosty ocean sunsets.

Okay, we'll just say it's an experiment ;)

Right now I consider myself a strictly B&W photographer when it comes to 4x5. So I don't plan on buying any new Velvia. I was going to shoot the velvia just for fun anyway so maybe I will just go shoot one and have it processed to check. Thanks to the both of you, John

Yes it's sheet film. I could shoot one for a test. I guess I was wondering if anyone had any experience with it before I went out and tried it.

A year ago I bought the last box of Fuji Velvia 4x5 from a local

shop. I didn't own a 4x5 yet but was trying out a friends. I shot

half the velvia and put the rest back in the fridge. Since then

I've bought a 4x5 but I only shoot B&W. I was thinking about

shooting the rest of the velvia for the heck of it, but I saw this

morning that the exp date was 10/2004. So it was pretty much

expired when I bought it (somehow I missed that a year ago!). Is it

worth shooting or should I trash it. I don't want to spend the time

and money to go out on location, and to pay for processing to get

back something less than velvia saturation. Thanks, John

Goodluck! Keep in mind that usually the wider the angle of the lens the closer the two standards will be together. John

Thanks for the info Bill. I take it you've done this quite a bit. I hope I get a chance to visit Africa some day. John

I've never had a problem focusing a 90 on my tachihara. Once you open the camera pull the front standard about halfway back until the ground glass comes into focus and then fine tune it. If that doesn't work, I can get the exact number in inches for the rear and front once I get home. Let me know if you need any more help.

John

I read that he took a lot of the shots from 10 feet away. I guess if you have cajones big enough to walk right up to a lion, then you deserve to get a coffee table book published!

I couldn't believe that all of those photos were shot in only 4 years from 2000 to 2004.

He shoots 120 film in a Pentax 67. I emailed him and he said he shoots fast lenses wide open and that he used a few other tricks that he kept to himself.

Hi all,

I bought a book last night that I was so impressed with I wanted to

share it. It's a coffee table book called "On This Earth,

Photographs from East Africa". It contains 66 photos of African

Elephants, lions, leopards, giraffes, etc. The photos are more like

old time portraits than nature shots. Most of them are shot within

10 feet of the animals with normal or wide focal length lenses.

There is a lot of selective focus in these B&W images which makes it

much more of a fine art bok than a nature book. To see some of the

photos, check out www.nickbrandt.com.

Thanks David, I went on the sites for some publishers who I know have published decent photo books in the past. All of their submission guidelines were geared towards literary books, not photo books. I ended up emailing them for photo submission guidelines. Hopefully I'll get a response. John

All of the good printers I have looked into in the past were way out of my range(I'm not talking about places like lulu or mypublisher). On top of that I think that selling this book without the help of a publisher is something I don't have the spare time to do. If you know of some decent print presses that can make high quality coffee table books and cater to self publishers...please let me know.

Thanks again, John

Self publishing will be my second option. For a while I was seriously considering it as my first option. I just can't afford to go out and get a loan for the money to self publish and then fight to make my money back. I'd rather try to find a willing publisher first, even if I see little to no profit in return. Thanks, John

Coffee table books are expensive to publish, and there is no shortage of landscape photos in the world

 

Oh, please be assured that I have no false hopes. I've spoken with a few published photographers and I know how much of a battle it is.

Thankfully, I'm presenting a book for a certain audience, not just propsing a book of "my favorite photos".

What are your thoughts on a package to approach book publishers

with. This package would accompany a proposal for a coffee table

book of black and white landscapes. Would you try to send a handful

of 8x10 hand prints, a cd of 50 image scans, both, etc.? What do

you think would catch their attention? Thnaks, John

By the way Paul, your English is perfect.

It's better than most Americans.

Thanks everyone for your opinions, I'm leaning towards the Canon f4 since I will use it for outdoor photography most of the time. I can put the difference in price towards a 1.4 extender.

I've been wanted a 70-200 L glass lens for quite a while and I had

settled on the f4 due to my starving artist lifestyle;) I can't

afford the Canon f2.8 but have been considering the Sigma 2.8 for

$100 more than the canon f4. I was wondering if anybody has had a

chance to compare these two lenses or knows where there is any

comparison on the web. I was wondering if there was a big quality

difference in the canon and sigma, if not I was thinking it may be

worth my while to go with the faster Sigma for an extra $100. I

could always paint the sigma white...lol

John

Another photographer who uses tilt shift lenses for a similar effect is Mark Tucker. Check out marktucker.com, and look at the Miami and Louisiana portfolios to see examples of the tilt shift technique.