zakslm

Cactus Flowers.

Rebel T7, EFS-55-250 ISII

In honor of National Puppy Day.  

Rebel T7, EF-S10-18mm @ 10mm

RebelT7, 50mm f1.8 STM

RebelT7, 50mm f1.8 STM

I purchased a used Canon EF-S 55-200M f-5.6 IS II lens from KEH that was described as UGLY. 

I had purchased used equipment from KEH years ago when I had an EOS film body.  The gear I purchased back then was graded anywhere from UGLY to EX+ and I had good experiences with KEH.  With the exception of a 540EZ flash that was graded UGLY an lived up to it (but worked perfectly), I found that their grading to be conservative and was very satisfied with the items I purchased. 

So, I saw the above mentioned ugly lens for a price that was a fraction of the cost of a new 55-200mm EF-S IS lens, and decided to go for it.

The lens arrived earlier today (together with the caps, UV filter and Canon hood I purchased) and I am pleased to say that KEH still appears to be very conservative in their grading.  Other than some external signs of use and wear the lens looks good.  I would grade the lens on first inspection as closer to a Good/Bargain grade. 

I cleaned the glass surfaces to remove some dust and residue from previous cleanings, turned on the AF and IS, put the lens on my camera and took a few shots.

I was not disappointed.  The lens worked perfectly and the images were crisp and clear.   I'm going to take more test shots this weekend, but for the time being, I'm satisfied with my purchase.  

Below is an image taken at 55mm, f/4 @ 1/100th sec, no flash.  

 

 

Still getting acquainted with the gear.  

Rebel T7, 50mm f1.8 STM lens at f2.0

Years ago, I sold my Canon EOS film body and lenses and until now, did most of my picture taking with an iPhone.  Someone showed me a picture of my dog that they took with an EOS digital camera and lens and it blew me away.   I became jealous, bought a camera and a couple of lenses and now I'm back!

Rebel T7, 18-55mm f/3.5-56-6 IS II @ 28mm f7.1.  Manipulated in camera to "grainy black and white".

Todd,

 

Set the 1n to M, set the shutter speed to whatever you'd like, set the aperture to whatever you'd like and as long as the 430EZ is in Auto Zoom and A-TTL or TTL, the picture will be exposed properly provided your subject is withing the range displayed on the 430EZ LCD.

 

So, if you set the shutter speed to 1/250th and aperture to f/8 and the distance to the subject under the active focus mark falls in the range (displayed as a horizontal bar graph on the bottom of the LCD) you will have a great shot.

I had an interesting problem weekend before last. The shoe part of

my Off Shoe Cord 2 was loose. The flash rocked back and forth in the

shoe, and somehow, it didn't make contact when the flash (540EZ) was

rocking back. A really tacky quick fix at the time was duck taping

the shoe of the flash in place on the off shoe cord and Stroboframe

bracket, but I thought that the cord was "toast" and I'd have to

replace it. I've had Cord for almost 5 years and used it extensively

in my wedding and event photography endeavors.

 

When I got home, I took apart the shoe part by removing the screws on

the bottom opening the shoe section with a jewelers philips head

screwdriver. What I found was a the contact plate of the shoe was

loose and the screws securing that piece came from the top of the

shoe. I put the bottom screws back in and then took a small bladed

jeweler's screwdriver and carefully pried up the metal plate or

template that had cut outs for the locking pin of the flash and the

middle contact and the 4 contacts covering the top of the off shoe -

"shoe". That revealed 4 more tiny philips screws that were loose

and I promptly tightened them.

 

I slid the piece of metal that I had pried up back into place and

solved the problem.

 

Hope this helps others that may have problems with their Off Shoe

Cord 2's.

You can and should shoot it at ISO 400 in natural light, with flash or mixed lighting conditions. The new NPH (so designated with "New" on the box in red) doesn't have to be downrated like the old NPH. You'll get nice result and still have lots of exposure lattitude. I've shot over 30 rolls of the new NPH at ISO 400 and acheived excellent results.

Put the camera in "M", set the camera to 1/15th of a second (to capture ambient light) and your lens to f5.6. The camera should switch itself into TTL and your exposure will be biased toward the active focus mark. This is called the AIM system. That is the best way to shoot in the conditions you've decribed.

I haven't used the 24mm f2.8 but the 28mm f2.8 is a nice lens. Well built, quick but noisy focus, sharp contrast and great color rendition. Good lens to use when shooting highly saturated slide films.

I use the 540EZ with the Stroboframe Camera flip where the camera pivots and the flash stays stationary (Off Shoe Cord 2 used as well). The setup works great. Never any problems unless I am very very close to the subject (less than 5 feet).

 

Don't know why it won't fire with the diffuser down. Sorry.

I owned one for 10 years and sold it when I went to EOS. The T-70 was the first Canon camera with an LCD. It will run forever on 2 AA batteries. It has a variety of program modes and manual as well. It is a rugged,sturdy and well made camera and I found it to be very reliable. You can use A series and T series flashes with the camera and of course, all FD lenses.

Sometimes I think that there are thousands of GA645's out there but

only 1 or 2 owners manuals. I too bought a slightly used Fuji GA645

and have been using it and loving it for about 9 months. I've read

in other threads that I can display the number of frames the shutter

has fired. How do you cause the LCD to display this? Any help would

be much appreciated.

I use the GA645 and it is surprisingly responsive and focuses quickly but rather loudly. The lens (60mm f4) is amazing. See the above tips on to solve the film slack issue. The viewfinder of the GA645 is much much brighter than the viewfinder on the 645Zi. The automatic paralax correction is great. The few times when I had slack issues, I never had a fogging problem, even with 220 film.

 

The drawbacks of the GA645 are only one focal length and the noisy focus.

 

The body is fairly light due to extensive use of polycarbonate. The camera is about 133% larger than a 35mm rangefinder but the ergonomics are fine.

 

Best of all, they seem to be cheap and plentiful on the used market.

Make sure the focusing screen is seated or installed properly. If it is, take the camera to service.

One of my favorite lenses is the 20-35USM. One of the faults of that lens is the distortion at the horizontal edges when zoomed out to 20mm. Perhaps someone could comment on the the edge distortion of the 20-35L?

The best choice is the 100-300 USM.

Run, don't walk away from the Sigma lenses. Get the Canon 28-105 3.5-4.5USM. Get it used and buy a Canon 50mm f1.8 MKII for less than you'd pay for the Sigma. You won't be sorry.

EF 85mm f1.8 USM

EF20-35 f3.5-4.5 USM. Great lens for the money. Fantastic for scenics.

I'll give it a go. With a 1v and 540EZ, you only have TTL, not A-TTL. That means in P, Tv and Av there is no pre-flash to estimate exposure settings. Everything is real-time TTL flash metering.

 

With the 550EX you'd have E-TTL flash metering and a host of other stuff.

Assuming TTL works the same on and EOS-3 as it does on a 10s, I use autofill quite a bit. I use in in AV, TV and M (where I meter manually) depending what I want to accomplish. There is an automatic flash reduction table somewhere out there that describes the amount of automatic flash compensation that Canon has programmed into their cameras. The brighter the EV, the the less flash (graduated in -1/3 stop increments) is pumped out in TTL.

 

For outdoor shots, I don't use a diffuser or bounce card. I shoot with the flash head straight on. About 80% of the time, I shoot in AV with the flash head pointed straight on and the results are fine. Generally speaking, I do not try to "outhink" the camera unless the readings I see in the viewfinder are way out of wack with what I would expect.