johnw436

February 13, 2013

I have the WG2.

Yes the 'ring light' LEDs work underwater. You turn them on in the menus. They work well for critters who swim right up to the camera, which depends on the critter. They will in no way take the place of real underwater lights, but you knew that. For close ups of coral, anemonies, small animals, etc? They do a remarkably good job. Again- you're talking about things two inches from the lens.

There are two modes for macro on this camera. Macro, which does a surprisingly good job, and the Microscope mode which will blow you away (for what it is) but I think the resolution is set to 2MP. I can photograph the edge of a knife blade during sharpening and actually see the wire edge and toothiness in the steel. To the naked eye it looks like a mirror-polished edge. DOF is nil, so it's really only useful for 2D flat surfaces. You want to see the spider on a dollar bill? Abe Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial on a penny? Microscope mode is great for that.

The camera is durable, the image quality is pretty good- about what you'd have expected from a digital point and shoot from several years ago, and as good as any other ruggedized point and shoot from today. Any 100 dollar digicam today takes phenominal pictures, lets be honest. These ruggedized cameras are little behind the curve because you are shooting through a protective window for one thing, and the focus is internal to the body for obvious reasons. In short, neither is optimal for image quality. BUT, you're talking about a rugged camera good to 40ft underwater, in the cold, and crushproof. That's the point of this camera. And it's got a snazzy little ring light built in- which is pretty darn cool within the limits of what it is designed to do.

I bought mine for its ruggedness and underwater ability. It's my always-at-hand boat camera (offshore sailing) and great for swimming with the kids. It does movies with sound, too. I think it will be fine for what you want to do. You can save a good chunk of change by foregoing the GPS. If you are interested I will post some pictures from the camera.

August 28, 2012

It can be tough to do in bright sunlight because you need a long shutter time. As you said, you make up for this by stopping down, and sometimes you don't have enough f/stops to get there. That's why the other responses suggested a Neutral Density filter. Think about the exposure you're going to need and choose your film speed based on where you need to be to control the exposure.

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<td >From <a href="https://picasaweb.google.com/john.jwphoto/PuertoRico?authuser=0&feat=embedwebsite">Puerto Rico</a></td>

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August 26, 2012

Bruce, those high iso shots are fantastic considering they were shot at 12,800! I'm seriously considering moving from my K20d to the K5 now that the K5 successor is in the wings. Have you made any prints from these to see if the noise shows? I've found that prints tend to fare a little better than screen images with my K20d. To me, it's all about the print. Can you see much difference from the K5 in many shots?

August 24, 2012

Honestly, for my purposes the .jpg images coming out of the new point and shoots is plenty good enough. The little Samsung TL-500 / EX1 that I bought has a ton of options for setting up the image properties. It offers RAW and I never use it. If I'm that worried about an image I'll break out an SLR.

July 9, 2012

Michael, I share your hatred for Phillips head screws. Why on earth we still use any fastener that won't stay on the end of the screwdriver is beyond me. I have torn more components out of backplanes to find dropped screws than I want to remember. I can't imagine the frustration those astronauts faced. Especially now that almost everyone is using apex bits the use of slotted and phillips head screws is fairly maddening.

July 9, 2012

Thanks, Scott.

I keep going back to the shot you posted to start off the thread. That could be a promotional shot for Converse. I see a campaign, "Converse. An American tradition." That shot is wonderful.

July 8, 2012

I love those photos that come to us in spite of our best laid plans. I was just shooting some random night shots and a truck goes by... without the truck the shot wouldn't have escaped the trash bin.

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<td >From <a href="https://picasaweb.google.com/john.jwphoto/NightPhotography?authuser=0&feat=embedwebsite">Night Photography</a></td>

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Doing long exposures really sets you up for those happy surprises. All I wanted was the street scene so I could remember Verona, Italy.

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<td >From <a href="https://picasaweb.google.com/john.jwphoto/NightPhotography?authuser=0&feat=embedwebsite">Night Photography</a></td>

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July 8, 2012

Hubble is am interesting topic. It allows us to consider techology that we consumers think of as new. Consider how long spy satellites have been in orbit. To my knowledge, no satellite that ever stayed in orbit used film. Satellites have been shooting digital pictures and transmitting them to Earth longer than many of us have been alive. (Cuban missile crisis, anyone?) Yet we think of digital cameras as a fairly new concept.

My understanding is that Hubble is a Keyhole satellite turned around to look up instead of down. So the working platform for telemetry and image stability was already figured out long before it became a scientific telescope.

Travel compact for a Pentax user · June 7, 2012

Matt, my feelings exactly. Like you, I don't plan to sit around watching POV videos all the time either. No desire to upload to YouTube. But I need a camera to take on the boat, and having the ability to do video would be great. Being able to fall in the water without ruining the camera: priceless. Doing some POV would be cool, though, like watching the kids learn to sail. But a GoPro isn't a good enough still camera for me to get one.

I *had* the Samsung EX1, which is a fantastic camera. I took it on a float trip and had it in a dry bag. The dry bag wasn't as dry as the manufacturer claimed. Having a brand new camera drown really bites.

June 7, 2012

An interesting story on CNN's website today. Nikon cancelled a photo exhibit of Japan's WWII comfort women. An obvious sore spot in Japanese history, but history none the less.

<a href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/05/world/asia/japan-comfort-women/index.html?hpt=hp_c2">http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/05/world/asia/japan-comfort-women/index.html?hpt=hp_c2</a>

Travel compact for a Pentax user · June 4, 2012

Sorry, meant Optio above.

Travel compact for a Pentax user · June 4, 2012

Has anybody used the new ruggedized Option WG-2? I was going to pick up a GoPro, but the Pentax ought to take much better stills, not to mention without the fisheye effect. The Pentax does video too, making it an almost-GoPro if the marketing hype is to be believed.

May 21, 2012

I would love to buy Pentax products. The problem is I had to go to Sigma for a kit-level 70-300. I went to Sigma for the 10-20 because the Pentax offered no more value for twice the price. I went to Tamron for a 28-75 2.8 because Pentax did away with their 24-70.

May 21, 2012

I'm with R.T. At the risk of being burned at the stake, exactly what is the obsession Pentax has with 50mm lenses for APSc cameras? 1998 called to say what a great idea a new 50mm lens is.

I have the DA40. Great lens. But I would trade it today for a lens in the 20 to 30-ish range of equal quality. Because Pentax will not address this issue, the Tamron 28-75 2.8 has become my defacto walk around lens and the Sigma 10-20 when I need to go wider than 28.

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May 21, 2012

I agree with Peter E. I liked the photos and found the commentary pathetically ignorant.

May 20, 2012

Tom Cheshire, as a fellow Floridian I agree with you. Notice, however, that demographic information is never published in the articles that report FCAT scores. We all know you can go to large cities in Florida (let's say Miami as an example) where there are 3rd generation residents who cannot speak fluent English. There are entire enclaves within cities where English is not used. Even here in Tampa, at most of my favorite restaurants I have to use Spanish to order my food, and my Spanish is only slightly better than hand gestures. This problem is very common anywhere south of I-4.

Add to this problem that public schools in Florida just aren't very good on the whole. I live where I do primarily because I want my children in a specific school.

May 20, 2012

Dostoyevski's characters in the flesh. Great photos.

May 18, 2012

I'd be shocked if 90% of the assembly isn't already automated. The only way I can see them justifying a human is for the small percentage of assembly where the housing has to be manipulated in some oddball way necessary to wiggle some internal board or wiring into place. The hardest part of robotics is often coming up with the jigs / tooling necessary for consistent placement. Machine vision systems have done wonders for allowing robots to handle minor exceptions such as offsets or piece-orientation.

As far as robots taking jobs, a robot can only do perfectly repetitive tasks. If a robot can do a person's job, that job is the ulitmate in simplicity and repetition. Where robots shine is repeatability and speed. They do not shine in functions that require a human to solve complex challenges such as fishing a wire around a bend and up through a hole. A six-axis robot can do basically what you can do with one arm while you stand in one place. For assembly work, a robot is usually a 4-axis pick-and-place machine. You only need 6-axis for manipulating the tool or the work for complex movements, i.e. what you can do with your wrist.

May 16, 2012

Gee whiz, Rob. Seems you have some sort of stake in Li-Ion batteries and contrary opinions make you sad. Please cheer up, Robbie. Everything will be okay.

May 16, 2012

Rob, the only evidence I have is my own experience. I have Li-Ion batteries in everything from cameras to computers phones to tools. The evidence is quite clear to me. Li-Ion is better in almost every way but they are not perfect. I have a sneaking suspicion that much of it also has to do with battery chargers. I no longer use car-chargers for my phones and battery life in my last several phones improved dramatically.

May 16, 2012

Tom, DVD writer? It's obvious that giant box holds tons of CF cards. Pffft. DVD writer....

May 16, 2012

Are you letting them completely discharge once in a while? Partial / frequent charging will kill their longevity. I know Li-Ion was supposed to change all that, but I haven't found any batteries that wouldn't lose life from partial charging.

May 9, 2012

What puzzles me is why this photograph is valued (monetarily) this highly. It's an interesting image, but it is a studio shot. I have to agree with Nathan Gardner that had it been taken on an actual battlefield it would be a moving shot. If it were real, it would have value because it would be one of a kind.

It's a studio shot. For a lot less money than $3.6MM it could be reproduced in another studio and would just as legitimate as the orginal shot. This isn't the Hindenburg explosion. It's a still-life.

More power to Jeff Wall. I'm not hating, just confused by the valuation.

April 25, 2012

Just don't tape your second camera to your body. You don't want Oliver Stone making a movie about you...

April 24, 2012

Sekonic L308. Small and

durable and you will likely

never need anything more.

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Posts posted by johnw436