DickArnold

I think it too early to look at drone safety as compared to other forms of aviation activity. Accident data will be difficult to collect for drones. Data is currently collected for ultralights, private aircraft, and commercial aircraft. I don't think there is a structure for reporting drone accidents currently so it is hard to determine their impact on society. The FAA has the responsibility for aviation safety. That means overseeing entire US aviation operation with the prime responsibility of safety followed by improving system efficiency. Their task with drones is to integrate drone operations into the system while protecting all aircraft already operating in the system, the public at large riding in airplanes and those living below aviation activities including drones. Hence the current rules about staying away from airports, staying below 400 or 200 feet, and staying away from airports. Similar rules have a applied for many years for model airplane flight. Note that model airplane operations have had very little safety impact upon the entire system. See and be seen is a rule that has applied in aviation since the Wright brothers. It is still vital in today's operations. It applies to drone operations by requirng operators to keep their drone in sight and away trom other aircraft. The only time see and be seen does not apply is when out of cockpit visibility is impeded in actual weather and/or flying above certain altitudes. It means that all pilots have to look out the window in visual conditions. Airlines today use collision warning systems to aid in spotting conflicting aircraft. The risk of mid-air collision is still present as evidenced by continuing mid-air collisions. This is the milieu that drones have entered recently by large numbers. The only thing the FAA regulates is safety in airborne operations and of the airworthiness of the drones themselves. Privacy issues are not in FAA jurisdiction. It is my opinion that drones do present some hazard but they actually fall more in the category of model airplanes as they should be operated away from most aviation activities. There is risk property damage and and midair collision particularly if they are operated out of defined parameters or if they are operated by uninformed, untrained or unskilled operators. That is why I believe the FAA has placed a 55 pound weight restriction on recreational and most current approved commercial operations. Drones are here to stay and they are being accommodated in the system. We need considerably more data and experience with drones to determine their actual impact upon the system. There have been a couple of incidents reported of drones operating within major airport boundaries without approval. Whether this was done in ignorance or deliberate there has to be vigorous enforcement and some required training on the rules.

I finally got to reading this entire thread because to subject interests me. I think Matt is very well versed on the subject and as an operator he will do the right thing. The rapid growth of drone use kind of took my former organization short. I have been reading up on FAAs efforts to license commercial operations. An altitude governor is a step in the right direction. The FAA is now granting waivers for commercial operations below 200 feet away from congested areas and airports but as I read not many of them have been issued. Much of my 41 year aviation career was spent in investigatiing aircraft accidents and working in accident prevention. Commercial photographers need the freedom to operate drones. If you look at other operations like ultralight aircraft you see that they do have significant freedom to operate even though there accident rate is higher than private aircraft. There will be drone accidents as commercial drone operators need the freedom to operate as do ultralights It is the job of the regulators to respect that freedom while trying to make the operation as safe as possible. You cannot regulate good sense. People will get hurt and die over time just as they do in ultralights and all other aircraft. The job is to integrate drones into the system with as much safety as possible with standards for flight, training and operator certification. Non-commercial use of drones is regulated as to areas and altitudes of operations but non-commercial operators are not required to be licensed. As I said it is upon us and we have to figure out how to live with it.

I am an 8000 hour airline transport pilot. I worked in an executive capacity at the FAA some years ago. I have not read all of this thread. Drones are here whether one likes them or not. They are being used in commerce without license because the FAA has not, I don't think at this time begun mass licensing for commercial use. There have been some close calls near airports between aircraft and drones. IMO there is no stopping the commercial use of these things. I was at a recent airshow.where the ones I looked at did not have much mass but the cameras they carry do have some mass and probably one of the them could shut down a jet engine. My hope is that the FAA licenses them in a sensible manner and operators form a user organization if they have not already done so to advise the FAA and participate the development of regulations. The horse is long out of the barn so shutting the barn door will not help.

You are absolutely right Mr. Arnold. I stand corrected. I still don't know what he meant. Have a nice day.

Marshall McLuhan used to say the "media is the message". I never did actually figure out what he meant. The media I have used, including crop, full frame, and medium format, all has been useful to me. I once was a professional and I think the difference in these three formata lay in very thin margins between them in actual practice. I think you all are arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. As Raylan Givens (my new serialized hero would say," it don't really amount to much in the long run what y'all use".

OMG. I would love a new 5Ds 50MP camera because I use a loupe and I love sharpness and I am a sharpness freak. I have never, ever needed that kind of sharpness in actual practice. I have been photographing seriously since 1997. Not so seriously for far longer. I have used medium format, full frame, 1.6 and 1.5 crop sensors for landscapes, weddings, news, sports, portraits, etc. I have a number 18x24s hanging in my house that were taken with Bronica, 645s, Sony, 35mm film, 6.3 crop, 12.8 crop, 18.0 crop and 20-22 Megapixel sensors. I defy you to look at those pictures and tell which is which. I showed a lot with 6.3MP sensor pictures and won a few awards. I have taken one or two decent pictures with my phone. Equipment is so good these days that I think this is hair splitting at the margins at its best. So if you are a sharpness freak like me or you are fascinated with bokeh, or make really big pictures, or if a big camera serves your ego, or have a real need or desire then by all means go for a full frame. All the rest is optional and becoming more so every year.

I have a 70-200 2.8L purchased in 1997. . No IS. Wasn't available then. I still shoot large swim meets in marginal sometimes yellow light with it indoors in venues like Harvard. . I have done weddings, newspaper sports, studio portraits, wildlife and some stage performances with it. It works fine. Canon built them solid in those days as this thing has been dropped on pool decks twice and once on a sidewalk at a wedding. I am clumsy sometimes. It still is very sharp as I have FoCal to check it. I would not trade it even for a new one with IS.

I am former FAA. FAA regulates drone flight. They are still in rule making from the last i heard. Before you do anything commercially call your local FAA flight Standards District office in Texas. They have approval requirements for commercial licensing. They have approved a few commercial operators last I knew. They also have up to date requirements for non-commercal use. There are more requirements than being in sight of the drone for both commercial and recreational use. Apparently if they have not already done so they are going to publish licensing procedures for commercial use. These licenses apparently will not have a practical test, only written on the rules. I am a long time pilot and it would ruin my day to eat one of those drones so their use while important to commerce drone use needs some supervision. However, the rest of the world is passing them by and there is probably some unapproved use presently. It is a conundrum.

I use a Canon 18-135 stm for walkaround. It is the kit lens for the 7d2 which I have. I have sharper lenses but this gives you a short tele and a moderate wide angle in one lens. It will make decent prints or show fine on a digital projecter. This turns out to be the most convenient for just plain tourist use. It runs around $500 US. You will miss a lot if you go with a longer lens.

Take the 100-400 as you will probably need every bit of it and wish for more. If you shoot propeller aircraft keep your shutter speed low like 1/200 and track the airplane otherwise you will stop the propellers which detracts from the picture. Try to get the sun at your back. Pick up formations from far out and track them into photo range. Go to my gallery here on PN as I have posted a number of airshow pictures. Just click on my name on this post and then click on pictures on the bio and then click on airshows. Good luck.

One of my best shots ever was taken literally over my shoulder down a mountain stream at f22(I never use this) and a 1/20th. It came out sharp and has great DOF. It is framed and hanging behind me. The light was great. I think the camera was on AV as I had not set the camera yet and was staggering over the rocks trying to get to a place where I could take "good" pictures. I shoot a lot of indoor swimming which is all ad hoc and a struggle with flaky WB and low light. When I did weddings I did the normal posed shots but my best shots were candid capturing the emotion of the moment. But I must confess, I have missed quite few good shots by not taking care to better think them through. I am a great lover of doing extemporaneous head shots capturing expressions and I have done a lot of them at weddings, working for a paper and at the meets I shoot.

I just loaded google photos into my android smart phone. I just went to my Google + account and Google Photos is in the plus photo file. Now I have to figure out what to do with it

Lex. Thank you. I am going to re-read your post a couple of times as it has a lot of good info. Thanks, Dick.

Lex. I am thoroughly confused and somewhat ignorant. I have Amazon Prime that I have not yet used for storage and I have been using Google + through Mosaic, which just got bought by on one and is now called photovia. Photovia automaically moves files to Google + if I wish and it is working. Those files, at least, have some organization on Google + but are by no means comprehensive. I have three hard drives with one at least I would like to store somewhere on line. A few years ago I lost about 200 valuable to me raw files with Carbonite and have not stored off line since as local Carbonite storage and on-line versions of them could not be recovered despite a months worth of trying, My files are bad enough without getting them further confused. So I have images on Google + and some images on Google Drive (how they got there, I don't know), and lots of them on hard drives which could fail any day and now there is Google Photos that I don't yet know how to access or how Photos works with plus and drive. Any suggestions or am I so hopeless disorganized that I am beyond help. .I would pay some for storage if I had to.

I buy lenses if they serve a useful purpose. I have thought about buying this new lens because it is so cheap but then I have carried an old 50 1.8 in my bag for over twenty years and hardly ever used it. I have a 40mm 2.8 already that I currently hardly ever use. So although it is a bargain for 1.8 should I buy another lens that I hardly ever use?. Then there is a little voice in my head that says, "what if you get in low light where you might really need it?". And then I think that I am doing a lot of acceptable work at high ISOs these days and don't use flash near as much any more. I don't use filters except on my 18-135 stm on which I had a front element inexpensively replaced by Canon because I scratched it. A lens hood costs about only four lattes or two movies plus a tip to the grocery bagger. Not too long ago I bought a 100-400 II. Now that really required some thought. I use it a lot and feel good about the purchase. My question is there room in my bag for the new 50mm so I can carry it around for years and not use it?

Yeah Lannie there was nothing like it elsewhere and I miss it. So thanks for letting me participate here. Your friend, Dick

Lannie. Why do you want to know? Do you think one of these would make a significant difference to a picture you would hang on the wall? Obviously you wouldn't buy the 7DII as according to DXO it is not in the same league as the others if you believe their system. I have a 7DII that I shoot major swim meets with. My keeper rate is significantly better with the 7DII than other Canons I have used previously. I can also use higher ISOs with the 7DII than my previous 7D. This allows me to use my new 100-400 II indoors in places like Harvard. I could not do that with the earlier 100-400. Other than that I have been shooting pictures with Canon and Bronica since 1988. I have done weddings, newspaper work, portraits, all sorts of high school sports and. PR. It did not make a hell of a lot of difference what camera I have used as I have gotten at least a professionally acceptable product with almost all cameras I have owned and used. I have a Canon SL1 and an EOS M that work just fine as long they are used within their limitations. I mostly use the 7DII with longer lenses and action. i use the SL1 with shorter lenses and when light is not critical as it is smaller, light and easy to carry. Do I think an EOS 5DR would make me a better photographer? No way. The thing that fails me the most is what goes on between my ears not my cameras.

I am 82 and I have all I need. I would find some starving kids and get them food and medication.

I am 82. I have had cataract surgery in both eyes. I have uncorrected far vision and clear far lenses my glasses. They work very well as well and are a distinct improvement in night vision. I can use the glasses or go without without. I prefer to use glasses while shooting so I can use the corrected close vision lens to see the lcd and dials. Cataract surgery is highly effective and is really quite simple and brief. My long lenses are their own corrective lenses. The surgery was like having the lights turned on.

The Digital Photography School has the most lucid description of ETTR that I have read. Beyond that I have no comment except that it is not very complex.

You are missing two stops of dynamic range and maybe a bit of resolution. I have shot two major swim meets with the 7DII. It has significantly increased my keepers with exceptional tracking and really improved focusing. I replaced my original 100-400L with the II version. I have been shooting winter surfing in NH with this combination with success as the new lens is a lot sharper at 400. I shot some of both swim meets at ISO 6400 with both the 70-200L and the new 100-400. I boosted the contrast and used LR noise reduction and the pictures printed up well at 8.5x11 including one surpsingly good shot of a start at ISO 12800. Everything constitutes a compromise and it is up to you where you want to make those compromises. Focusing and tracking are really important to me and if I don't overuse it ten frames a second make great start sequences.

Maria. I have a 7DII and a couple of big white lenses. These together are very heavy and large. I am going out today for Easter with a Canon SL1 and an 18-55 kit lens (a decent picture these days). I have a 55-250 and an EF-s 24 mm pancake.that makes a very small unit with the SL-1. It is about two thirds the size of my larger Canon. I had a Sony NEX 5N with an expensive EVF. It's a little smaller but I don't like Electronic View Finders. I have used the SL1 with all my canon lenses and it works fine. No adapter. It looks a little silly on the back of my 100- 400II. That little bag with the SL-1 and above lenses weighs about three and a half pounds. The camera and the pancake alone weigh somewhere over a pound. Incidentally I have an EOS M that has certain drawback like no viewfinder and somewhat slow shutter speed but damn it takes really good pictures compared to my former Sony. I use it when I want to go really light. It is a stretch to say it will fit in a pocket and that is a pun. I am not you and I don't know the right answer for you. This morning I read the Digital Photo Review site review on the brand new Sony A7II. The camera, although full frame has some significant drawbacks. I recommend you read it. I have seen the SL-1 or EOS 100 for 400 bucks with lens, I think. For me it was the least expensive route to have smaller gear. You could keep your D60.

Yes Arthur all that is true, exclusive of cancer treatments, AFib, pills, problems with progeny, name forgetting, stiff joints (and yes I still swim competitively), problems getting out of the pool while i can still get in OK, cataracts (had surgery which opened up a whole new world and preserved my drivers license), close relationships with my dermatologist, podiatrist (no one should be blessed with old feet that used to train for marathons), eye doctor, oncologist, dentist, losing high frequency hearing, and the worst New England Winter in decades, Being old has freed me up to admit all this because I don't care what anyone thinks about my image.. I still get around and swim five or six thousand meters a week and for my age my actual physical and aerobic condition is pretty damn good apart from the geriatric degradation of my swim times. My brain still works well most of the time punctuated by senior moments. My activities are mastered by my ever tolerant and understanding wife, my cats, my doctors whom I have learned to mind, I also mind my thirty year old female swim coach and my barber who cuts my hair the way she thinks it ought to be cut, I have a pretty good life and fortunately my swimming buddies, both male and female, don't take themselves very seriously so we laugh a lot between sets and in the respective locker rooms. So when my feet don't hurt and I am not going to the doctor life is good to me. I love to take pictures and even enjoy Lightroom although that may be a little sick.

I am 82. Yesterday I finished photographing a three day swim meet at Harvard. Today I posted the pictures after processing them. I used a new Canon 7D II and both a 70-200 2.8 and a new 100-400L II which is really good. As the meet has age groups I also swam seven events racing against other old men. There were 750 participants over the three days. My team took second place. I am considerably more relaxed as I have gotten older and much more accepting of what life hands me than when I was younger. Life is not all smooth as one ages. I certainly have nothing to prove anymore. Swimming has allowed me to associate with other swimmers of all ages. It keeps me young in my psyche. I don't much care how creative I was and have become. I do get very nice head shots of our swimmers and the 7DII really nails the action. I shoot barefoot from the pool deck. We are all very relaxed with each as I have been doing this with this group for quite awhile and we practice together. I did weddings earlier in life and that helps me be creative capturing spontaneous shots with these longer lenses. I really try to be tolerant of others so as to stay calm myself. I was very driven professionally and have striven to slow that drive. After swimming a thousand meters I have very little drive left. I am very grateful to still be able to do this in spite of the vicissitudes of old age. It is a day at a time. I really like some of the pictures I posted today. That is my creative satisfaction.

Well in this his main light is quite far back. Notice he has a background light. I have never had problems with shadows. I have used a larger and closer softbox but who am I to argue with Monte. I have software that will fix the eyes. Notice he used a reflector for fill. Also a nice background. What I learned from him is a little simpler but that's because he was far more advanced than I ever got.