costas_h

<p>I've been given some photos recently (from a minilab), printed on paper with some texture I really liked, and I'm trying to find some similar inkjet compatible paper.<br /> <br /> I would describe it as semi gloss, with very little sheen, but the important feature is its texture; it's deep and symmetric and also very fine, "pitted" in a sense. It's the kind you can feel by scratching it with a fingernail, sort of like canvas but much finer. (It reads Endura on the back).<br /> <br /> Can anybody suggest a similar type of paper, but for inkjet? Or just which exact model of Endura that is?<br /> <br /> Here's a close-up photo of it so you can get an idea of what I'm talking about:<br /> <a href="http://tinypic.com?ref=ele2s6" target="_blank"><img src="http://i46.tinypic.com/ele2s6.jpg" alt="Image and video hosting by TinyPic" border="0" /></a></p>

If you don´t want Nikons you could also have a look at the Sigma 50-150mm f/2.8 or Tokina 50-135mm f/2.8 for

something in-between and go for a 12-24 or similar for the wide angle part.

I am running Windows Vista 64 and I used the Spyder 3 colorimeter for profiling the Syncmaster T240.

 

After the process finished the colors do look better and more accurate in Photoshop, Vista gallery and other color-

managed applications, but in explorer or IE browser they look too dark and also a little oversaturated.

Even images captured, edited and saved in sRGB show the same problem.

 

Is this normal, is anyone else experiencing the same problem with their monitors, or could it be caused by a bad

calibration?

Thanks for the correction Joseph, you are right. The Hoya +10 is not an achromat.

I´ve been using that filter for a while and never noticed.

Either way that is a very good filter for a 10 diopter power

There is no difference whether formatting with the camera hooked to the computer or from a card reader (supposing the camera is in the Mass Storage mode).

 

In Mac you can use the Disk Utility which can be found in /Applications/Utilities/ to format and check the card.

Those scenarios are mainly for exposure determination.

 

Don't expect to find exactly how Nikon or Canon or ... implement their versions of WB determination, these are

corporate secrets.

 

Here is a possible scenario: the camera checks, say, for light and dark areas. If a small area is much darker than

the rest of the frame then the odds are that you are shooting something backlit, perhaps a person. Now, if that area

resembles skin tones then the camera "concludes" that you are photographing a portrait of somebody and

compensates for the right exposure and WB.

 

Basically all of the information the 1,005-pixel RGB sensor (for the Nikons) carries (brightness, color etc) can be

compared to the in-camera database, which consists basically of thousands of professionally taken photos, and the

best match will probably be really close to the shooting situation.

 

That is just a guess, but I suppose first of all the camera breaks down the scene in bands or smaller areas, then

tries to determine the origin or direction of light (light-dark areas), then the light type (from the color of the source)

and then uses the rest info to compare to the photos in memory.

In that case you would be better off with a teleconverter (though you would have to manual focus and use a tripod of

course).

A teleconverter will not change the working distance but with a close up filter you will have to get even closer (a

teleconverter only reduces the apparent field of view).

Expect to get double the magnification of the 80-400mm (with a 2x converter) and the same working distance.

 

Just make sure the teleconverter you use can be used with the 80-400mm.

 

That said, supposing you use a 2x on 80-400, you get about 1: 2 reproduction ratio at 2.3m whereas you get 1:2

ratio on the 70-300 Sigma without filters at about 1m, so think if you really need that extra 1m of working distance,

while sacrificing autofocusing and steadiness.

Every camera has its own algorithms for calculating white balance, but in general there two basic ways:

 

1) The camera looks for the lighter parts of the images and assumes they are white so it can calculate the WB

setting that would make them white.

 

2) All pixel color values are averaged (think of it as mixing all colors of a painting) and that is assumed to be neutral

(grey).

 

Of course modern cameras also include databases of usual scenes so if the camera recognises the scene it can do

additional adjustments.

 

Anyway, Nikon cameras have one of the best auto WB systems and they are rarely fooled.

Check in case you had dialed any compensation for the WB that you forgot to change.

 

If you really need very accurate in-camera WB you should buy a grey card and use it before shooting (or just use a

white piece of paper).

 

 

Changing WB in post processing isn't that difficult, neither for RAW nor for jpeg, as most people think.

Photoshop can also open jpgs in Camera Raw and you can then change the JPEG's WB easily.

All you have to do is enable it in Preferences.

This doesn't sound like a card problem since you can retrieve the photos from a PC.

Those strange names could be something like temporary PC files, but I am not sure whether the camera uses temporary files on card.

 

You could also try controlling the camera through Nikon Camera Control and even let it fire lots of shots automatically and download them instantly to PC without a card inserted.

 

Your card can easily be checked from a card reader. Run Checkdisk from windows or try writing various things and the formating it a couple of times. If everything is OK there couldn't be a problem with your card.

 

If that thing happens again with the camera don't do anything and take it to the service center as is so they can see what happens...

The 80-400mm takes 77mm filters and Hoya makes a very good 77mm macro close up (+10).

Don't buy the normal close up set because they are not achromatic (they are made of only one lens element).

 

But you should not expect much of close up performance from a 80-400mm lens.

 

You could get much better results without much money.

For example you could buy a Sigma 70-300mm macro (58mm thread) and combine it with the excellent Nikon close up filters by adding a 58 to 62mm adapter.

That specific lens has by itself macro capabilities (1:2) so you should expect decent results.

 

But if you must use the 80-400 I believe the best choice are the Hoyas.

Take a look at Panasonic FX500. It has all manual settings, is very compact, image quality is very good and most importantly its lens goes down to wide 25mm equivalent.

Can D80 create Soft Focus Effect in-camera?

 

Anyway, if I were you I wouldn´t use soft filters at all and replicate the effect in PS.

There are several plugins to do this if you can´t do it manually, like Tiffen DFX(which is excellent) and Nik Color Efex.

 

With Tiffen DFX you can replicate almost all of their filters, so why limit your possibilities by using a specific filter?

 

If you really need a top quality soft filter you should go for a Zeiss softar if you can find one. It has to be the best filter

available and the way it diffuses the highlights is unique and rather difficult to replicate digitally.

I know some will consider this impractical but if you really have to shoot handheld at high ISOs you can try this. I did it a lot of time with the D70 and it actually works.

 

Set the camera in continuous shooting and take 3 or 4 shots at the lowest shutter speed possible for handhelding and try not to move as much as possible.

You can then stack them and align them in Photoshop and then average them and reduce noise significantly.

 

You can even underexpose the shots by say 1 stop and then digitally push them in RAW processing and since you will be averaging them noise will be reduced.

 

This should not be your first choice, nevertheless it can allow you to take some shots you wouldn`t be able to take otherwise.

 

Check this thread:

 

http://www.photo.net/nikon-camera-forum/00QQlP

I recently compared Nik Dfine 2, Capture NX, Noise Ninja and Neat Image.

 

From these the best two are Neat Image and Capture NX (Nik Dfine gives almost identical results to NX, but there is the added functionality of NX as an editor).

 

Especially when using the professionally made profiles, Neat Image gives by far the better reduction.

This is certainly a personal opinion, but they look shaprer and more details are retained, especially at high ISOs. There are also lots of options, you can even profile specific areas of the image and apply noise reduction there (though you will have to composite them in Photoshop later).

 

Maybe I try and add my samples later...

Try removing the battery for a couple of seconds (I had the same problem once and that fixed it)

 

But if you tried two different cards and nothing happened then there is probable a problem with your camera.

 

If possible try resetting the camera (press and hold the two green buttons if I am not mistaken).

 

If you still think this is a card problem try reading it from a pc and formatting it there.

 

You can also try connecting your camera to your PC through the mini USB interface and see if it can be recognized as a mass storage device or USB multimedia device.

Or if you have Nikon Camera Control Pro try controlling it from there.

I don´t know how it compares to D200 but compared to a D70 is about 3 stops slower (3 times more intense hot

mirror). You should expect about 5 sec at ISO 200 at daylight.

 

I suppose this is not an issue since you would be using a tripod eitherway.

 

There is an alternative method instead of filters and that is using exposed film in front of the lens.

Just from my experience, exposed film gives equally good results most of the times and it also has greater

transmission than a dedicated filter, though the cutoff is closer to the visible spectrum.

 

Check the samples here:

http://www.photo.net/nikon-camera-forum/00QiHZ

 

(Have in mind that the shots were consecutive taken with a D70 with custom WB presets for both methods and that

for the exposed film version the exposure time was about half the dedicated filter one).

I suppose the second one is sharper because of the higher cutoff of the filter (nearer visible spectrum).

Are those marks on the film negatives too or just on the printed photos?

 

It looks like something going wrong in the development process.

If there aren´t any marks on the film itself then there is something with the minilab printer.

 

Otherwise I suggest you try again with a test film shooting something whith even lighting.

There could be something wrong with the film rewinder in your camera (maybe a bracket is broken andthe film is scratched in every rotation).

 

Have a test roll of film, shoot multiple shots of a wall and have it developed asking the lab not to cut it. If the problem is in the camera those marks will come out with an ever increasing spacing between them (the film travels more distance while it gets rewinded and piled up).

The smooth bokeh you are referring to is only possible with a circular aperture diaphragm.

 

The bokeh created from any two lenses of the same focal length wide open (at their smallest f-number) should be

identical.

 

What you replicate in Photoshop (and I suppose you probably do it by Gaussian blurring of a selection) would look

the same with that from a lens wide open.

 

Close down any lens a stop or more and the diaphragm becomes a polygon (9 sides for 70-200 2,8) and the bokeh

becomes less smooth and even.

 

There is really no way of avoiding this and expect professional lenses of 9-rounded-bladed diaphragms to have very

similar bokeh at same f-numbers.

 

Now, comparing your 50 1,8 to your 70-200 2,8, the bokeh of the 70-200 shot at 2,8 would be smoother than the 50

shot at 2,8, becuase the 50mm has to be stopped down from its maximum aperture.

 

Now concerning the defocus control, that would be the ideal choice, because not only you can control the aperture

but also the spherical aberration. That is great for portraits since you can decide on how the background or

foreground gets blurred or just softer, plus the shallow depth of field the f/2 gives.

I tried the MF 80mm 2.8 on a full frame Kodak SLR/n with a Nikon MF to 35mm adapter a long time ago.

 

It surely wasn't as good as a dedicated 35mm prime.

Especially on that 14mp sensor you could clearly see that resolution -wise at least the lens was inferior to the

Nikon. It rendered a softer and less contrasty image.

Definitely the cheap 85mm 1.8 was much much better than the Medium Format one (plus the advantage of

autofocus).

 

But that outcome should be expected, since a MF lens is optimised for a larger image circle and therefore less

magnification.

Here is how a 20-28mm would look (photo is sample from sigma 20mm at their site).

 

If price is an issue I suggest going for a third party 17-35mm f/2.8-4 (Sigma and Tamron make two very good lenses at around $500). A zoom will give you much more freedom, especially at such wide focal length.

 

Considering the distance from the subject, with a 20mm you are able to roughly fill the frame with someone's face at about 15-20cm (just to take an idea). The important is that if you are working on say a landscape at f/14 you can acchieve depth of field starting from about 0.5 meter to infinity, thus a hyperfocal distance at about 1m and gain lots of depth.<div></div>

Sorry, here is the sample<div></div>

All lenses can do IR (the problem is UV which is inherently absorbed by normal glass).

 

Both Hoya and BW are very good but let me suggest something which gives equally good results.

Go buy some 4x5 or larger format print film (negative) and expose it to light and then have it developed.

You now have a piece of film that blocks nearly all visible and lets pass of the invisibles light.

(Remember that film is sensitive to only visible light and not to IR, so exposing it and then developing it

turns black, negative, where light hit it).

 

I have to say in some cases I achieved better results that way that with an expensive filter.

Check the samples below (first is with the BW filter, second with developed film).

Both are straight out of the camera.

 

Don't forget that if you are shooting portraits it would be difficult with a non modified camera due to the

long exposure required. You would be better off buying an old cheap camera and have the IR blocking

filter removed, or simulating infrared in PS (the Tiffen DFx plugin makes an excellent job by the way)

If you need the Best go for a Singh Ray. The quality is very high (and so is the price) but you get high definition glass

with the larger transmission factor (as far as I know) among all brands...

I still have the original D70 battery i bought several years ago. Recently I bought two off-brand Impact replacements

and both of them together give less shots per charge than the old Nikon...

Or you can have it removed in Capture NX automaticaly.

Take the dust sample shot and it should probably remove it as though it was dust. It's too thin to cause any notable

deterioration...