bob_bill

Dog, no just one cloud backup. The CC version isn't large enough for my images and wonder if I can turn it off and how. Not sure what you mean about is it is Scott and he does not understanding color management. I use a color checker passport when appropriate, not sure if I have seen it used in his classes. In the case of nuclear devastation, I don't think we would be around to worry about our photos.

You can always go from color to b&w, not the other way. I also like the control I have from color in post. I head straight to nik silver efex. If you don't have it, you should, it's been free for a few years.

Roseate Spoonbill

The class is truly inspirational. It isn't the typical gear and how to light class. It is a window into the creative process and then capture rather than mechanics. To the gear heads, she may be a disappointment as she is a minimalist and tends to work on location where she stays with the direction of light and gives it a bit of help. With lenses, she says use only one and master it.

Gary, exactly. The old joke is the proper viewing distance is 1 to 2 times the diagonal of the image... unless you are a photographer, then it is the length of your nose.

Gary, I shoot a 400 mm 2.8 weighing in at 10 lbs on a heavy tripod and wimberly gimbal head. That is one beast of a kit. After that, the 70 - 200 2.8 feels like a toy. I have posted elsewhere, I picked up a d500 while shooting a FF d700 for 8 years. Interesting new usage of my lenses. The 85 1.4 now functions at close to an equivalent of my 135 2.0 and I have become enamoured with the look of images shot with the 135 2.0 taken at 200 mm distances. In studio I shoot off a rolling camera stand so it double as storage if shooting hand held or for tack sharp images if shot on the stand. But I have posted this before on the 135, to get adequate dof for both eyes on a head shot, I need at least 3.2 and my version of that lens is razor sharp there and the ca is once click controllable in light room. At f/4 it is wonderful and I have a margin of error and I just match it with the bokeh ring for gorgeous bokeh. Like one of the posters, with the FX body, I carry that instead of the 70-200 beast.

LR CC classic. I will try that alan. As for storing on the cloud, I attended Scott Kelby's filming of his class on managing photos in lightroom. He calls it SLIM I believe. He recommended keeping all photos on an external HD and backing up to a second that is stored off site. I do that. But at that class a year ago, I scoffed at his strong recommendation to have a third backup on the cloud in case of some disaster. Then Hurricane Irma came along with hurricane force winds and potential flooding and I saw the wisdom of his recommendation as I carried the main external HD to the shelter.

How can I stop the constant warning that CC storage is full. New to LR after resisting for 10 years. What is CC storage, is it done automatically and can I set it up to only save selected images. How do I empty it? Thanks

One of the most valuable tools for a novice photographer is free and only takes a piece of cardboard and a knife to make. It is called a "viewing card." Cut a rectangular opening in the cardboard with a 2x3 ratio matching that of your 35 mm frame. A 2 inch by 3 inch opening is easy to use but a 24mm x 36mm has the advantage of telling you the lens mm by measuring the distance the card is from your eye. To use it, move it further away to zoom or closer for wider angle. It gets your itchy trigger finger off the shutter release and forces you to look around, in and out for images. There is a great b & w seascape photographer in Pt Reyes National Seashore that makes a point of going out with one for a month every year. Ernst Haas used to have his students in Yosemite do a drill involving standing in one place and finding 10 images. Try it. Use it for a week and see if it doesn't improve you vision. Also, a great tool was the fact in large format cameras, the image on the ground glass was upside down. That helped force the photographer do something important, disassociate what the objects are and see them as shapes forms and their relationship and position in the frame. Try that with the viewing card and when critiquing your shots. Last thing, before you click the shutter, do a counter clockwise "border patrol." Make a sweep around the edges for clutter or distracting or bright objects that could pull the viewers eye to the edge and out of the image. And of course, simplify, simplify simplify within the frame. Caution on wide angle lenses, they include lots of things to place properly, a narrower angle of view of a telephoto helps remove clutter.

S curve. My buddy, Walter the wood stork in the pond behind my home. We have a deal, I will occasionally feed him and he agrees not to deliver any babies here.

Here is the moon in the full 35 mm frame. As Joe calculated, about 10-11 mm of 24 mm tall frame. Thanks.

Sally, thanks. I wanted to emphasize the shape of the bill and b&w and silhouette seemed to emphasize the graphic nature of the bill. I have plenty of color photos. She stayed in the tree for 4 hours. 400 photos worth, sorting was a pain. The effect was one of those things that just happened to occur while trying things. Was shooting this series with silhouette in mind and moved the camera to get more rim light around the body and head to keep the bill the sharpest area in the photo to drive the eye there along with the leading lines and uncluttered frame surrounding it. The rim light on the head and shoulder gave depth to an otherwise flat silhouette by revealing the head is in front of the limb, ie overlap perspective. That really got more pronounced when it went more "woodblock."

Roseate spoonbill silhouette with a woodblock effect.

I just had a problem with the rear feeder not loading the paper. You often hear comments about printers clogging if not being used and the 3880 being an exception. Not turned on for a year and a half, did 3 test runs and each time the nozzle check improved til it produced a perfect nozzle test. Epson was patient with me and worked logically through the problem and it cured when I cleaned the rear slot then blew it out with a bulb for lens cleaning rather than compressed air. The recommended using a cleaning sheet to keep things clean.

Thanks everyone. Just finished editing a project and will post an example of the size of the moon soon. It is about 10-11 mm tall in the 24 mm tall frame. Joe, I admire your math. I ended up shooting 150 feet from my subject with the 1020 mm. A far cry from my usual portrait distance of about 10 feet. My light triggers performed flawlessly at that distance. Jeff, I will have to check the instructions for the Sun Survey or app as I couldn't get the moon path. I just need it to show where it will rise because I need to set my lights up, dial them in and start shooting as it comes up. Taking the easier route, composite.

Sally, you had me going to my 3 bodies, d200, 700 came with a detachable plastic cover over the lcd. d500 did not. I am usually breaking glass at the other end of the camera and have one of my broken clear filters on my desk as we speak. A prior time the impact locked the filter on the lens and I took it into : Cam-Tek and he not only removed the jammed filter but had some of the rubber exterior parts that had melted off that nikon wouldn't sell. You might give him a call if it is a last resort. Kinda long distance, but, to save a camera, if Nikon won't fix it, it might be worth it. His address and phone is 1435 W Busch Blvd, Tampa, FL · (813) 961-8874

Zelph, with 1000 mm, 10 mm on a 24 mm vertical will be perfect. Thanks.

Joe, I am a photographer, not a math guy so I really appreciate your calculations. Last night I had a huge moon at the distance I was standing from the location so hopefully can capture it. My triggers say good to 400 feet. It being later means no light from the sun, if any, so I will probably be closing down quite a bit, but then, I want a large dof to get both subject and moon in focus so closing down shouldn't be a problem and I have plenty powerful studio strobes. I haven't shot the moon in a couple of years but will check my metadata for those settings as a starting point. Thanks everyone.

Thanks Jeff. I figured out how to get moon rise on my sun surveyor but need to figure out how to find the path as it rises. I am in Clearwater FL. Yes, I use the 400 on a crop taking it to 600 mm effective and still 2.8. Using the 1.7 tc takes it to 1020 mm but cuts my speed to f/4.8, no problem as my lights will take care of the subject and I want plenty of dof and I can use the shutter speed to control sky/ moon tone. Will the 2.4 degrees be a portion of the angle of view of the lens degrees. I am guessing 1000 mm has less than a 3 degree angle of view.

Although the shot I will be taking will involve a portrait, I expect the landscape folks are experts on this question. I will be shooting a lit subject standing on a hill top and the rising moon behind her. I want to make the moon as large as possible, larger than my subject if possible. I believe there is an illusion that makes the moon look bigger when it is close to the horizon and that is perfect for the shot. Anyone have any thought on how well a 600 or 1000 mm equivalent lens will make the moon? I expect I want to use a 1.7 teleconverter on the 400 mm lens on a nikon crop camera to get the maximum possible distance from my subject. My light triggers should work up to 300 feet. I am guessing the further I am from my subject, the larger the moon will appear and using as long a glass as possible would help. I can control my strobe power from camera to dial it in for the first shot then adjust in the changing light. Will initially do a silhouette or 2 then turn on the lights. The sun will be setting behind me as the moon rises. Tonight the moon was about in the perfect position at 6 to 6:30 pm. Any thought if it will rise earlier or later tomorrow night. I don't think my sun seeker program gives that info. Any suggestions are appreciated.

Allen, do you realize that the qualities of natural light can be reproduced with strobes. Creative live did an experiment with Sue Bryce, window light photographer and Felix Kunze, strobe user. Sue shot her favorite window lighting set ups and Kunze used strobes to emulate her shots. They were indistinguishable. I can produce an identical shot using the window next to where this shot was taken. Same exposure, same direction, same highlights, same ratio, same shadow edge transition and even same white balance. Might even be able to control the background shade, but not nearly as precisely as with strobe, by opening, closing, or blocking a window behind subject. However, that natural light makes huge changes as the sun moves and totally disappears once it sets. An important advantage for a professional is being able to produce a particular light at any time, day or night. Clients can't always be shot at a particular time and that limits the amount of shooting time. The shot above is simply a test shot for a camera trigger. but I don't know what you mean by natural feel, coldness and falseness of flash. And no depth??? If you expect principles to reveal depth used in your outside photo with multiple subjects like subject overlap, decreasing size, one point perspective to be done with a head shot, that is just not possible. But the highlight and shadow reveal shape form and depth, the sharp mask of face and out of focus back of head and shooting vest, the kicker showing separation from a background all provide depth. How is flash false? I can blow out using the sun. Looks like the highlight on the woman in front is blown out or nearly so without flash. So all art must be natural? Tell that to the impressionists, surrealists painters. I'm sure the Realist school would agree though, Your comment is exactly the kind of adverse opinion about the use of artificial lighting I was referring to, almost always from those not schooled in it's use and often not understanding light. We see the same from those who don't use photoshop/lightroom. Recentiy I had someone claiming to know about photoshop that it makes images look fake. I love Stieglitz because he fought to get photography recognized as an art form, more than a mechanical aping of nature.

Gerry, you are absolutely right, this shot was taken using a piece of foam core for a reflector camera right reducing the contrast ratio, evidenced by the catch light. Main was a 5' octa with an egg crate camera L a couple of feet away that I didn't bother to clean up in the catch light as it was just a test of a wireless camera trigger. It definitely takes 10 years off but is helped by a just high enough camera position that eliminates a view of any double chin aided by a shadow placed there with main position. Getting the flash off the subject/camera axis creates shadows that reveal form, in no way flat, and here, shooting from the shadow side also takes off weight as the viewer's mind erases the side of the face in shadow. If the flash was on camera axis, the side of the face would be illuminated and and make it look wider. As for warmth, a bit of sepia added. When using flash I like the analogy of a circle drawn on a sheet of paper. It is flat, but if you take the side of the pencil and shade the circle, it becomes a ball, three dimensional. Flash on camera axis is that circle, the off camera shadows, the pencil shading. We paint with our lights. In addition to camera height creating a more flattering image, shooting with 200 mm at 11 feet really compressed the nose. The distance was not a problem communicating with the subject. It was like he could read my mind. Using on camera flash can produce similar results, just adjust bounce angle and produce a larger lit spot on the wall, ie a larger source and keep the subject close to the wall. Adjusting flash head angle and height can produce a similar rembrandt lighting pattern, an upside down triangle under the shadow side eye yet light in that eye or loop before the nose shadow reaches the cheek shadow. Also, on the planet where I live there are 5 suns and here one acts as a kicker/hair light from camera l rear. In the profile shot, 2 kickers, one from each side/rear might appear to be a bit hot, but rules are meant to be broken if they serve the purpose of the shot. This is an homage to one of my favorite photographers, Karsh and favorite authors, Hemingway to the Karsh shot that hangs over Hem's mantle in Key West. In it he had his trademark fisherman's knit sweater and a white beard. I have emulated the white beard with light. Light can also have meaning in itself in a shot. Like Alton Brown says about deep frying, frying isn't bad, bad frying is bad, flash isn't bad, bad flash is bad. Unfortunately flash seems to get the same bad rap as frying.

Consider shooting from the hall outside the room doorway, it can give an extra few feet. You can put a speed light on a stand and trigger either with a radio trigger or in that close quarters, even use a cable. It is more important to know the principle and then apply it than be given a formula that may not work in your location. If you want softer light, ie, slower shadow to diffused transition, you need a bigger source. When you bounce off a wall, the area lit is the size of the source. If your flash allows, set it for wide angle and get it a good distance from your wall bounce area. That takes care of soft/hard light. Another problem you may be having bouncing off the ceiling is that the light is coming from to high above the subject resulting in racoon eyes in shadow. Also, if you are pretty tall and then have the flash sticking straight up, you are creating a pretty small area of illumination on the ceiling that may only be a foot or two away , and could cause hard edged shadows. If you were shooting the dental staff, were you shooting in each of their rooms? Often those have no windows but those that do could have some great light quality and as mentioned above, a reflector fill may be all that is needed. The fun of location work is it forces you to "improvise, adapt, overcome" as Clint said in Heart Break Ridge. That addresses diffusion, direction and intensity/contrast has to be addressed by you as well. Finally color may be altered if you are bouncing off a non white wall. Put a gray card in each scene's first shot to make color correction in post a snap. Try thinking in terms of of the qualities of light and solve the problem based on them, direction, diffusion(soft/hard edged shadows), intensity/contrast ratio, and color.

Joseph, I have been using the Lexar XQD card for a couple of months in a d500 and it has been flawless. I have the vertical grip and use a second standard battery there. Andrew, I'm with you on that and it will probably be timed to a price drop.

Rick, I'm with you on the 180 for the RB, but for 35mm I reach for the 135 2.0 dc. They produce the look I like most, hence are my favorites.