michael_ransburg2

<p>Hi all,<br>

<br />I'll go up along the western shore of Lake Michigan from Chicago through Green Bay and Sudbury to Toronto.<br>

I'm a passionate photographer. I do love nature and in particular wildlife, but I will take photos of anything else which impresses me.<br>

I'd be so honored if you could suggest great places to visit along my trip. I know that there are some national parks on the way, but I'm sure that there must be many more great places with nature and wildlife for taking photos.<br>

Thank you all so much. I'm really looking forward to your tips!<br>

Thanks again,<br>

Michael</p>

<p>Hi Bob and William!</p>

<p>Many thanks for your tips! I'll definitely go into Brookfield Zoo instead of Lincoln then. Awesome tips on places to visit in Chicago, many thanks Bob!</p>

<p>I think driving up there to the Niagara Falls is something I like more and more William. Can you suggest any nature highlights which I should at no possibility miss on my way up there? I'll certainly look out for lighthouses!</p>

<p>The idea of exploring a bit of Canada after the Niagara falls is also intriguing. I could check out Toronto/Ottawa/Montreal and some of the nature/animal parks up there. Can you think of any highlights which I just <strong>have</strong> to see up there?</p>

<p>Any further tips are most welcome!</p>

<p>Many thanks and all the best,<br /> Michael</p>

<p>Hi all,<br>

I'll be in Chicago for work end of June. I plan to extend my stay for some time (1 to 3 weeks - I'm flexible). I sincerely ask for your help to plan my trip, but first a little something about me: 32, passionate photographer, nature/animal/wildlife lover; technology and space enthusiast;<br>

I've been to the west coast several times; loved San Francisco and its sights (got awesome shots from the Golden Gate Bridge); went to all the national parks on my way to Las Vegas; death valley, hoover dam, great canyon were awesome; back to the coast to LA and up the scenic route back to San Francisco; awesome trip, did it twice.<br>

I've also been to the east coast. Loved NY and was impressed by the White House in Washington. Did Orlando including the everglades (awesome). Gatorland was cool; loved NASA!<br>

I don't know much about the midwest yet. I'll definitely go up the Sears Tower and I'll probably check out the Lincoln Park Zoo. Any other must-see sights in Chicago?<br>

The only other thing I know is that I've never been to the Niagara Falls and that I'd definitely enjoy that - I'll probably drive or fly up there.<br>

What are the must-see attractions/national parks/... in the wider surroundings of Chicago for a person like me? I plan to rent a car, so I'm flexible.<br>

Many thanks and all the best,<br>

Michael</p>

Hi!

I bought two Sigma 50-150 f2.8 lenses and both had front focusing on two different XTi bodies. I sent them to Sigma Austria for calibration and they came back better but are still front-focusing between 130-150mm (separate bodies, independent from the f-value). My current workaround is to only use them between 50-130mm which gives me very nice results.

Maybe I'll have them calibrated again, but I'm not sure if it will get any better given that the first calibration did not completely remove the problem.

All the best,

Michael

Hi Dave,

that's quite funny. I've had exactly the same experience with the discount photo store near Fisherman's Warf when I've been to the states in July this year. The employee used the exact same words when he saw me walking around with my XTi.

I would have never bought something there...looked too much like a tourist rip-off.

All the best,

Michael

Hi all,

I think all of you are right. There were definitely excellent and skillful photographers who shot great nature or sports photos before the benefits of today's systems were available. But on the other side, these benefits of today's systems help the knowledgeable photographer of today to get exactly such shots much easier than many years ago.

All the best,

Michael

Hi Alistair,

many thanks for the reply. I've one question, could this be caused by a particular lens or is it clearly a body / flash problem?

Many thanks,

Michael

Hi,

I'm using Sigma 18-50 mm f2.8 and Sigma 50-150 mm f2.8 for indoor (not only sports). I find this combo to work very well and the f2.8 is heavily needed for indoor (and in particular sports).

All the best,

Michael

Hi!

Sounds like I should clean my contacts. What should I use to do it, is there a suggested way?

Many thanks,

Michael

Hi all,

I've been shooting an indoor social event today with my XTi and my 430EX. I was

using my new Sigma 50-150 f2.8 wide open, in aV mode and mostly at ISO 800.

This got me shutter speed of 1/200 to 1/300 and I was using the 430EX as a fill

flash.

While shooting I noted something strange with the 430EX. Sometimes during

shooting, after autofocusing (i.e., shutter half down), it would suddenly

switch from E-TTL to TTL on the display. Any photos shot that way (that is, in

TTL mode) were hopelessly overexposed. Then with the next autofocusing it would

suddenly switch to E-TTL again. This strange switching (and corresponding

overexposure) happened for about 1/4th of the photos.

I do not have much experience yet with the 430EX. Is this a known behaviour? Is

it something which I did wrong? Could my new Sigma 50-150 f2.8 be the problem?

I'd really appreciate it if anyone could shed some light on this.

Many thanks,

Michael

Hi Ronald, all,

> All digital images need sharpening

this is not the first time I'm reading that statement. I'm very interested in the background of this statement. Can you point me to website / resources which further explore this?

Many thanks,

Michael

Hi all,

I'll be at the side court, so I'll be pretty close and my 50-150 f2.8 (corresponds to 80-240 on FF) should be more than sufficient for this. I actually think that I'll mostly shoot in the 50-100 range, after all it's volleball and therefore a rather small court.

At 100 mm this means: 100mm * 1.6 = 160mm * 4 = 1/640. Based on my concert / gig experience this should be doable at ISO 800 (if lighting is ok) or ISO 1600.

Thanks again for all your replies,

Michael

Hi Glen, Mark, all,

many thanks for your advice, which is very well noted. I'm really eager to shoot the volleyball game tomorrow. Any further advice is really appreciated.

It will be a pure fun event for me, no requirements and no expectations. I'm really looking forward to it.

All the best,

Michael

Hi Steve,

many thanks for the confirmation / clarification.

All the best,

Michael

Hi Peter,

this is very interesting and for my settings this amounts to 1/666. Sounds very plausible. Can you give me a reference where this formular is further explained and detailed?

Many thanks,

Michael

Hi Joseph,

this is true if you want to completely freeze the photos.

However, I'd like to get some motion blur to give some life to my photos. Additionally, often one wants to stop down a bit from f2.8 for various reasons, which would be another reason to clarify the shutter speed suggestion in the article.

Many thanks,

Michael

Hi all,

I've recently bought a Sigma 50-150 f2.8 (in addition to my Sigma 17-50 f2.8)

in order to shoot small concerts and gigs in bars and so on. This works really

well and I found that I can get very nice shots at ISO 800 with my 400D / XTi.

Tomorrow I get the chance to further use my new lens, because I'll be able to

shoot a volleyball game (their trainer is a friend of mine) from the side court.

I've read - with great interest - the sports photography article at

http://www.photo.net/learn/sports/overview but I still have some questions:

The article states as a rule of thumb that "The minimal shutter speed for hand

holding a lens is 1 divided by the focal length of the lens. ... A 300mm lens

should not be hand held at less than 1/300th of a second."

This is clear and well noted. It is also clear that this is not enough to

freeze the action.

Therefore, the article also states that "Generally, to freeze action, you need

at least two full shutter speeds if not more faster than the hand hold speed.

So for our 300mm lens, you will need at least 1/1200 to 1/2400 to freeze action

with this lens".

Here I'm a bit lost. I'm not sure what is meant by "two full shutter speeds

faster". I see that for the example the article implies to multiply the minimal

shutterspeed (1/300 for 300 mm) by 4 to get "freezing speed" of 1/1200.

Does "two full shutter speeds" mean to multiply the minimal shutter speed by 4?

Many thanks,

Michael

Hi!

If you are in Europe, get your stuff from Switzerland.

Canon 40D Body goes for 943,- Euros there minus the 70,- Euros cashback.

I found that Switzerland ist cheapest for Canon stuff in Europe.

All the best,

Michael

ps: Switzerland is not in the EU, beware of the taxes.

Hi Jay,

are you sure? The first review at your link says:

"Strengths: You can also fit this hood on a 70-300mm IS lens, too."

:-)

All the best,

Michael

Hello,

does the lens hood of the Canon 70-300 mm IS f4-5.6 fit on the Canon 100 mm

f2.8? Both have 58 mm filter size.

Many thanks,

Michael

Hi Chris,

no - it's not vignetting, just random inperfectnesses in my lighting setup :-). Thanks for the sympathy - it's really a hassle to jump in-between LR and PS that way (with creating copies of my photos). I do understand that my workflow of desireing to work on the negative may be different to other people's workflow - but for me it's a waste of disk space to keep the un-postprocessed raws.

All the best,

Michael

Hi Ellis,

I go back to lightroom (after cutting out the light grey areas in the corners, ... in photoshop) because I'm applying some final changes to the saturation, ... of the photo. I would also be able to do this in Photoshop, but I prefer to do as much as possible in Lightroom. Too bad there is no simple tool in lightroom to cut out light-gray areas (and to fill them with white), otherwise I would not need photoshop anymore.

All the best,

Michael

Hi all,

my (simplified) workflow for portraits from my studio is usually as follows:

1) Import photos from my 400D/XTi into Lightroom

2) Adjust exposure, levels, ...

3) Edit photos in Photoshop, in particular cut out grey areas from the white

background

4) Return to lightroom and export the photos as jpeg for further usage

The problem which I have with this is that it doesn't seem to be possible to

directly edit the dng/raw files from lightroom in photoshop. Lightroom will

always create a copy of the dng/raw file (a tiff or psd) which is then edited

in photoshop.

What I would like to do is to _directly_ work on (i.e., modify) the raw/dng

files (both in lightroom and photoshop) without creating any copies of them. Is

this somehow possible?

Many thanks,

Michael

Hi,

many thanks for your general reply. I'm aware of the useful information which you state in your reply, except for the reverse adapter. That sounds quite interesting and I'll investigate it.

The off camera shoe will probably be one of my first investments.

I always thought that the 180mm would be harder to handhold (not only because of its weight) than the 100mm because of the longer working distance? This seems logical to me ... hmm.

I'd be very interested in your experiences w.r.t. my original post.

Many thanks and all the best,

Michael