alvinyap

<p>Hi all!<br>

It's been years since I posted here, and I'm hoping the more experienced photogs could give me some equipment advice. I have been very happily shooting with my D300 during this time, so much that it's physically quite worn out - the mount is giving me issues, as is the battery compartment. Most of the rubber on lenses and camera is either worn smooth or have just plain fell off. Heck, my 16-85 lens barrel is held together by sticky tape. So, I'm thinking this might be a good time to move to a new camera, or even a new system. I'm down to one dx zoom and a few fx primes, so I'm open to switching brands.</p>

<p>Things I'm looking for in my next camera - Able to have the same/similar Af-On focusing. A dpad of sorts for selecting/resetting the focus point fast is important. Good flash system - I use the sb600 in nearly every daylight shot for fill, its awesome.<br>

<br />Would be nice to have something that weighs less than the D300 - budget max about 2k usd for body + 24-135mm (equiv) lens. I'd like to keep the sensor size at APS-C (or larger but will defo consider m4/3 if the AF is up to par with the d300), don't really care for megapixels, less than 12 would be great. Video: not important. Weather resistance ala D300: would be nice.</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

<p>I'd much rather have a 10 megapixel dslr with high sync speed. 16 megapixels is really overkill for facebook.</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

Juxtapositions of any sort! Color, mood, life, light, size, shape,

type of fruit. Go wild!<div></div>

<p>@OP: Bottom line is, your photo, your vision. If it meets your vision or what you want to express, I think that's it. There is no need for post once you've got what you've wanted down pat, be it screen or paper.</p>

<p>tldr: I think post allows oneself the freedom of expression.</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<blockquote>

<p>17) should</p>

</blockquote>

<p>+1</p>

<p>I used the 55/2.8 AIS Micro, 60/2.8D and 60/2.8 AF-S, my experience is the 55/2.8 focuses well from 1:2 to infinity, the other two seem mostly optimized for close up work; infinity was quite soft on both of my copies. Both are sold. I did not test portrait ranges for the last two, but I've done portraits with the 55/2.8 and it's delicious, ignoring the difficulty of MF on a dx camera.</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>Am using the RF 602s as well, 2xSB28, 1xSB600. Works perfectly, apart from the loss of HSS. Alternatively, if this is in a dark-ish place, how about using optical triggers?</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>Hi Adam,<br>

Here's something I noticed, please don't take it personally. If one has a strong desire for something, but does not have the strength to carry it out, it rarely ever comes true. Part of it is having faith in yourself. The belief, if I may add, that one has the capability to achieve what what wants. Anything good, is never easy.</p>

<p>If this is something you think is important, keep at it, but at the same time understand that we are not perfect. It makes life alot easier.</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>I am not sure how using A/S/M or even P will relate to under/over exposure. So long as you understand how the meter works e.g. A/S using exposure comp - M just set the iso/aperture/shutter so that the meter reads the way you want. Unless of course something like setting the shutter to 1/2000, and obviously in S mode, there isn't an aperture wide enough in low light for you to open up to....</p>

<p>Personally, I shoot mainly with A, 'cause I want to control my aperture, exposure comp for well, exposure comp, and then use my iso to regulate shutter speeds. M is usually for panoramas and indoors with flash. Can not remember the last time I used S. or P. Maybe nikon could install a custom function to remove unwanted auto exposure modes :-)</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>Hi!<br>

I'm using a 55/2.8 AIS Micro Nikkor for macro usage, it's good and affordable, and goes down to 1:1 with an appropriate extension tube. It is manual focus though, and you won't be able to meter with your D5000 (use the histogram for exposure). Not a fan of the 60/2.8 AF-D or 60/2.8 AF-S, tried 'em both not my cup of tea (color shift issues, sharpness at infinity etc)</p>

<p>Tele wise, what's your budget like? I have the 70-300VR as my VR tele-zoom, it's reasonably priced, good weight and well useful. I also use a 300/4 AF-S, it is awesome for shooting people - backgrounds melt - but the standoff distance is very annoying. A 70-300VR or perhaps the more affordable 55-200VR may be better bets.</p>

<p>My 2p.</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>Matt, thanks for the suggestion, and the CSS tip is nifty!</p>

<p>Update: Talked to some of my web developer friends, and they suggest for what I need, a full fledged cms like drupal etc may be overkill and to look at wordpress instead. Did that and I think it should suit my needs perfectly.</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<blockquote>

<p>If you ask me, the VR is an unnecessary, expensive option. More gimmicks if you ask me. The 600mm f/4 AF VR is an umbelievable $10,000. And I bet my next paycheck that my $4000 600mm f/4 AIS will provide just as sharp an image when it too is mounted on a tripod. Hand holding a 300mm lens is usually not a problem, and anything over 300mm should be used in conjunction with wither a monopod or tripod.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I'm in the VR camp, would love a VR'd 300/4, sadly this doesn't seem to happen (glares at the canon ppl with the 300/4IS). Sometimes, in low light every bit helps - I've had shots taken with my 70-300VR that I won't bother with my 300/4 because I know the VR is that good at lower shutter speeds. Also, if nikon had a 300/4VR, with the TC it would be 420mm/5.6 - stabilized.</p>

<p>Also: Tripod. I haven't used those with a long lenses for several reasons - first, a tripod is cumbersome. second, my preference is to shoot at subject eye level. Since I shoot alot of critters, that's relatively quite low. Basically I am almost on the ground. 3rd, if you are shooting say, wild deer, my experience is that it will not be possible to shoot them with a tripod - I need to leopard crawl in, staying as low as possible. Everytime I get on my knees, they bolt.<br>

When I was at Donna Nook for the seals, I used a beanbag with my 300/4 + 1.4xTC since the eye level of the seals are just inches above ground level. I doubt any small tripod can go that low.</p>

<p>My 2p :-)</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>Hi Marcy!<br>

Welcome to photo.net! Since you currently use a D60, I'm inclined to recommend the D7000 since you'll be able to use your existing lenses. What kind of budget do you have, and do you have other lenses?</p>

<p>D7000 seems like an option - has HD video, AF is good (can't really tell the difference between that and my d300) and is seems to perform superbly in low light settings. If you are shooting alot in low light, you may want to investigate a fast lens as well.</p>

<p>What exactly is link the camera to laptop? Do you mean tethered shooting?</p>

<p>HTHs!</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>I'm using a DX body, and I have the 300/4 AF-S and TC14EII, I don't use that combo too much - way too challenging and not many of my shots call for it.</p>

<p>Hence, 400/4VR? Not... to keen. I'd bet the birders would love it though - canon's 400/5.6 seems like a popular favourite. Friends learnt the hard way that the minimum focus distance on the 400/5.6 is quite close though ;-)</p>

<p>Personally, I'd be up for a 300/4 AFS with VR! VR on the 300/4 would be the perfect long prime to bring about.</p>

<p>Also, did you see the news on Sigma's 100-300/2.8 OS? I can't wait to see how it performs, if it's half the price of the 300/2.8VR, may consider it.</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>This is a long shot, but are you panning correctly? I.e. rotating the camera along the nodal point/optical center? I say this because I have experienced with other software packages that using lower res images can stitch shots that are not well aligned. I'm not sure if CS can do this, but what I do is align using the low res files, if that goes through, I'll just replace the same files with their hi-res equivalents, then stitch up.</p>

<p>I use http://hugin.sourceforge.net/ by the way. I've also used the technique above for the Brenizier Method and had people leave the frame after I've shot them.</p>

<p>Regards,<br>

Alvin</p>

<p>Hi Sarah,<br>

Try shooting at high iso in a scene where there are both darks and lights area, you'll notice that the noise tends to be more obvious in the darker areas - hence if the photo is underexposed, it moves the subject matter into the darker region - more noise. However, I'd usually take a noisy shot that has no blur, vs a cleaner shot with subject blur. Noise imo isn't such an issue, it's the decrease in dynamic range that annoys me.</p>

<p>I like using noise ninja (it's built into Bibble 5, the raw converter I use) to remove the chroma noise, and none of the luma noise - that tends to resemble the jpeg output from the camera, though the camera's high iso jpeg outputs have coarser noise patterns. HTHs!</p>

<p>John - ACR is Adobe Camera Raw. Can't tell you more as I can't use photoshop :-/</p>

<p>I think the photo is underexposed - this will cause more noise to show up in the shadow areas. If not, IMO it looks about right for iso 1250.</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>Just an update, I found two pieces of software, Drupal and Joomla that seem up to this task. Will I actually finish this website? :)</p>

<p>Alvin</p>

<p>Most of my photos are for posting online, and though they are quite small in size, certain aspects like DOF control are still visible. More importantly, I relish the speed and control functionality of a slr.</p>

<p>Alvin</p>