buck_cochran

Folks - thanks for all the advice! Its very helpful. I think I am going to try and keep it as simple as possible.

I am an amateur photographer helping out the local homeless shelter by taking

shots of their various locations for their website and other publications.

While taking some shots at the shelter for single moms and their kids last week

several of the moms asked me if I could take some photos of their families.

Talking to them more I began to realize they don?t have many pictures and that

a family portrait would really mean a lot to them. I said I would and I need

the forum?s help on basic equipment and techniques to do a decent job for these

families.

 

I am doing this out of my pocket so I can?t spend a ton of money and rental

equipment is no longer available locally. I am shooting with a Nikon D200 and

have a nice lens selection. The photos will be taken inside at the shelter. I

am assuming that a basic moonlight kit is the way to go and probably could

afford to spend $300-500. I could use a recommendation on a kit as well as a

good book or video for instruction.

 

Any other advice is welcome. Thanks for your help.

I'm doing a project for the local homeless shelter and would like a

recommendation on what lens might be best suited for the typical situations I'm

encountering: indoors with low/poor light. The body is a D200 and I have been

using a couple of fast AF primes I have had for a while (50/1.8 and 85/1.8).

They are fine for many of the shots but end up being a tad longish and I find

myself needing something wider when I get in close. A zoom would be helpful in

these situations and I guess something with VR might be useful as well. Thanks.

Is there anyway to save the info on different lenses so you don't have to change it each time you switch a manual focus lens?

Is a slow or sticky stop down lever usually the result of sticky aperture blades? If have several older lens where this is also becoming a problem. Is there something easier to try before disassembling the lens?

I?m giving my daughter my F3 and would like to buy her a decent, yet

not too pricey, zoom telephoto to go with it. I already have a

number of good primes for her to use. I was thinking about either

the Series E 75-150 or one of the early version Visitor series 1 70-

210 f3.5. Any thoughts? Are they about comparable as far as

sharpness and contrast?

Jon, on the back of the drive there is a film counter. Is it on the red dot? It needs to be for the drive to fire. You can use the counter to shoot a certian number of frames on a roll. when it gets down to 1 it stops. Needs to be set on the red dot.

Does anyone have a suggestion on what to use for a sorting tray for

bulk loaded film cannisters? Adorama has one for 50 cannisters for

$10 which I�m sure will do but I�m wondering if anyone is using

something commonly found that would work just as well. thanks.

Thanks everyone for your thoughts and suggestions. The one thing I failed to mention is that below each valve (obscured in the photo by the back of the sink, another picture is attached below that shows it more clearly) is a tee that routes water to the valve and to a two handle faucet at the other end of the sink. I�m able easily set the handles on that faucet to settings that allow a mix of hot and cold that holds pretty stable temp over significant periods. We have a large hot water heater and I have not noticed any fluctuations when others in the house are using different systems. I�m sure I should have check valves but I don�t believe that is the problem.

 

Jonathan � thanks for picture. You�re right about it taking a long time to see changes at the hose because of the filter. I�m going to play around with it and see if that may be the problem.

 

I think from the input I have received and thinking about the design I suspect one of three things:

 

-the valves as Nige suggested may be right for the job, or

-there is something about the tee that supplies water to each valve, or

-there is something about the tee were the hot and cold come together that does not allow for even mixing.

 

Any further thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks for the link to the system on eBay.

 

Buck

Are there any plumbing experts out there who could help me with

this? A year ago I built my own darkroom and I built a water supply

panel to control water temp � nothing automatic � just something so

that I could open the hot and cold water valves to settings that

would allow me to wash film in the recommended temperature range.

But for some reason this setup does not work. It is impossible to

get it to hold a temperature. Usually I�ve tried turning the cold

water on and than creeping the hot water valve open to bring the

water temp up to around 70F. Invariably the temp does not change

much and then shoots way past what I wanted or can use. What is it

about this design that is wrong and are there any modifications I

could make to get it to work.

 

Thanks � Buck Cochran

I got some from B&H recently. Are they out?

Gerald:

 

I am a new Yashicamat owner but I'll share what I know in case you don't get a response. I received a set of Spiratone close up lens with my 124g I purchased recently. On the threads I've seen in the past these close up sets (and the telephoto lens for that matter) have not gotten high marks. I assume the Spiratone product is no better or worse than the Yashica product. On the sheet with my set the #1 lens focuses between 18 & 39 inches, #2 lens between 13 & 18 inches, and #3 between 8 &13 inches. It says if they are aligned correctly it will correct for parallax but recently I tried the # 3 and it was off. You can correct for this if you are using a tripod by lowering the camera by the distance between the taking and viewing lenses (measured center to center). The one shot I made does not look to bad. If they are cheap enough you may want to buy them just to experiment. Good luck.

 

Buck Cochran

Any hints on how to best use my Vivitar 283 as a fill flash with a

Yashicamat 124g. I want to shoot some outdoor family portraits

(mostly B&W)at the beach. Should I use the flash in automatic or

manual? What about aperture/shutter speed combinations on the

camera? It will be early evening/late afternoon lightning. Will the

flash give me the appropriate coverage if I mount it sideways on the

camera using the existing shoe? Should I consider one of the flash

bouncer or diffuser products? Thanks to all for any help.

I just shot my first two rolls of 120 TMAX 400 on a used Yashicamat

124G. I did the processing myself and noticed when I printed the

contact sheets that on both rolls there was a 1/4 inch lightened

strip along the edges. The image is not completely washed out but it

is noticeable.

 

I searched the database I saw this was a common problem with 220 film

or loading in direct light or not winding the roll tight enough. I

thought I protected it pretty well from direct light and the roll

appeared to be wound tightly when I removed it. I did not store it

in any special container but did put the rolls back into my bag

wrapped up in their original packing. I do have the manual for the

camera and believe I loaded and unloaded the film correctly. A few

questions from a beginner. Is this a classic light leak problem or

could something be going on with the camera itself? Thanks for the

help.

Jasper:

 

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Check out this site:

 

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http://soli.inav.net/~mkuhn/landlist/landhome.htm

 

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Lots of info on older models and film types. My father gave me a

model 800 a couple of weeks ago and I was wondering the same thing.

From what I've read on the site the answer is the film for the older

roll film cameras is no longer available. there is a link from the

site to hacker site that converts sx-70 film for use in these

cameras. have not read it or tried it though. Good luck.

I just bought a used GA 645 (60mm lens) to try out the world of

medium format and I've got a few basic questions about the camera:

 

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1. When I got home I saw the exposure counter feature and the camera

has 3000 shutter trips on it. Does this seem like high mileage for

these cameras? Camera is otherwise in excellent shape.

2. Can I use my old Vivitar 283 on this camera? I'm not sure what

the flash's coverage is and I'm concerned it won't cover the frame

vertically.

3. Can I use a standard collapsible hood on the camera without

interfering with the auto focus or metering?

 

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Thanks for the help.