mariosforsos

<p>If you're talking about the old 80-400 (I'm only saying this 'cause, according to rumours, a new one is coming out VERY shortly), then the 70-200 and TC-EIII 2x is the clear winner EVERY time, for all the reasons mentioned above. Hell, the combination proved better than a Sigma 120-400 OS I tested recently, producing sharper, better images all across the board.</p>

<p>If you're still selling it at 700USD (and it's in a good condition), I want it!!</p>

<p>But as far as using it with a full-frame camera is concerned, the vignette is there. It does go "relatively" away around f/5.6 and above (NOT at f/4), but it's still there. AND you have to remove it through software later which, if you're taking tons of images, can be a pain (as the amount varies depending on other shooting conditions and settings).</p>

<p>First of all, I'm surprised they would pour ANYTHING on the sensor or even that whatever liquid they embedded onto whatever cleaning pad they used was enough to "get under the low-pass filter". Furthermore, I was not aware that was a possibility... still, you live and learn...;-)</p>

<p>What the dealer is offering is perfectly fair. I recently (during a month-long trip, under harsh conditions, in Africa) scratched the low-pass filter on my D3s and had to send the whole camera (under warranty) for repair (since I'm an NPS member) to the authorised dealer. The sensor was replaced (unlike the D3 and the D3x, the low-pass filter on the D3s cannot be replaced on its own due to the sensor-cleaning mechanism embedded on the D3s), all the plastic grip material (which, FYI, are removed when the camera is opened) were replaced by new ones, the camera was reset and recalibrated using their specialist electronic equipment, it was cleaned and tested and was returned to me within 3 days. It did cost me around 1,500 euros but you literally cannot tell the camera was ever repaired! With the new grips, if anything, it looks newer than what I sent in...</p>

<p>PLUS, I got the old sensor as a souvenir to play around with...;-)))</p>

<p>Just make sure they do not try to charge you for anything...</p>

<p>I tried the Sigma 70-200 f/2.8 (the new, OS version) about 3 months ago as I was considering it for my girlfriend and I have this to say:</p>

<p>(a) it handles beautifully, it's very fast and very quiet.<br>

(b) the OS is a bit noisy (especially when all else around you is quiet)<br>

© the images are perfectly fine BUT, when you put an image taken with the Sigma right next to one taken with the new Nikkor (VR II) and enlarge them to 100% or even 200%, you WILL notice the difference.</p>

<p>For an enthousiast it's great. For the professional, it is a bit lacking, but not enough, in my view, to push a serious enthousiast into buying the Nikon one.</p>

<p>Skipping the FX/DX debate (after all, it's what suits you best and what you can afford, more than anything!), I would definitely agree that waiting for the D400 is your best option and, contrary to what you may think, I truly believe it WILL help you, professionally, as it will almost definitely have better low-light performance than the D90 (whose low-light performance is, at best, sketchy), faster frame rate, better interface, better ergonomics, more expandability, etc, etc.</p>

<p>I would however see if I could get a second-hand D300s which, at that time (when the D400 is announced) will drop in price significantly. That would allow you to upgrade your 18-200 which is, let us face it, a lens lacking in so many levels...</p>

<p>While there are elements of truth in what Robert said about the GF Lightsphere, it does have it's uses, especially for the amateur/starting photographer and especially for crowded events in dark(ish) places - it allows a very even spread of flash light which saves a lot of new photographers from literally blasting their subjects with tons of light and ending up with "wax-like" figures and completely dark backgrounds. In that, the GF lightsphere is pretty good.</p>

<p>But for professionals? You'd need something better. The problem with the D3100 and the SB700 is that your setup is becoming increasingly top-heavy and adding another item on top would mean your camera would weigh uncomfortably way too much at the top to be used properly. So, whatever you end up choosing, take that into account...</p>

<p>Personally, I favour the EZ softbox which mounts on top of the flash and, due to it's light weight, it does not make things too uncomfortable. Problem (for you) is that I say this coming from a D3/s and a set of f/2.8 lenses, so weight WOULD be better distributed anyway...</p>

<p>Search the archives and you will find, literally, dozens (if not more) discussions about LR, how better (or worse) people think it is compared to Bridge, what its strengths and weakenesses are.</p>

<p>Personally, I'd never choose Bridge over LR - LR is a much more complete, integrated and powerful system which, apart from 90% of my processing requirements, handles perfectly all my DAM requirements, backup, keywording and everything!</p>

<p>While I agree with the previous posters, I would point out that IF your name, however difficult, may sound like someone else's who's more likely to come higher up on a Google search, then you may have a problem. Plus, don't forget that - generally - a more complex-to-spell name might make spreading through word of mouth just that little bit more difficult.</p>

<p>However, you could see if you could also register a more easy-to-remember web address which may be a play with your name, initials or whatever...</p>

<p>There can only be ONE piece of good and useful advice here: talk to a lawyer. No advice you'll ever receive from photographers can replace that of a professional lawyer, however versed some of us may be in the legalese of the thing...:-( Also, be careful of what you post, as in these days of internet dominance, your name is fully searchable and may land you in hot water...</p>

<p>However, on the front of professional photography (and without being able to see any of the images she delivered):</p>

<p>1. Assuming you communicated with her via e-mails (and you've kept them), then you should be able to prove the entire timeline of events and thereby prove that you were not given the time to preview the images (if that indeed is the case). Should this come to court, you could always subpoena her website update information to show when she uploaded the images.</p>

<p>2. Similarly, with the equipment she used - the exif information from the photos will easily prove what equipment she used to take the images. (this to refute her claim that she only uses "professional equipment" - which however, in itself, means absolutely nothing if you do not know how to use it or use it sloppily) Also, any testament as to whether she used additional lighting (or any type of modifiers) should also be taken into account.</p>

<p>3. If the images she delivered were wildly different from the ones, for example, from her website, you could screenshot those and potentially use them as proof of difference between promise and delivery.</p>

<p>I'm sorry you had such a bad experience - however, I'm sorry to say, something like this is becoming increasingly the norm as more and more people, in an attempt to cost-cut (and I'm not saying that's what you did) are hiring photographers who, despite their claims, cannot shoot worth a damn and/or are truly unprofessional in every other sense of the word. This gives the whole profession a bad name and sours clients' from trusting truly gifted individuals...<br>

However, without knowing all the details, the language used or anything else regarding the case, I would say that her offer of a reshoot will have to count in her favour, regardless of the fact that I fully understand your unwillingness to trust her again. Ideally, during a reshoot, you could demand you see the images as they are created and thereby have greater control over the final outcome.</p>

<p>I wish you all the best in resolving this incident.</p>

<p>You can also - for future reference - change files' physical location directly from within LR - just go to the "Drive" tab, right underneath the "All Photographs" menu at the top left hand side and you'll have access to all the physical locations LR has stored images in. ANY manipulation you make there will automatically update LR and you won't have to deal with the ?? problem.</p>

<p>The only thing that will speed up PS is RAM. Not the graphics card, not the processor,not your monitor and not your hard drive. PS loads up as much of the image as it can on your RAM (and it takes space equal to = the image size * the colour space * 50%, so for a 500MB RGB image you'd be looking for 2,5GB approximately PLUS some space for layers, depending on what they are! - and that's the amount PS reserves BEFORE you apply any filters on the image or anything!), so if you have enough RAM for all the applications you intend on having open, then you should be okay.</p>

<p>MIND the following though: Windows (unless you're running the 64-bit version of EVERYTHING) does NOT free memory reserved by an application when that application quits, so sometimes even if you have enough RAM, you may not have enough - if you know what I mean.</p>

<p>Also, while SSD will resolve loading speeds for your OS and your applications, it's cost-prohibitive to go the SSD way when considering storage. However, do make sure you go for VERY FAST drives (min. 7200 rpm) and equally fast interfaces (USB 3.0 or FW800 or SATA II minimum) otherwise ALL your wonderful processing power will amount to nothing as the computer will simply sit idle while waiting for your 5400 drive through USB 2.0 to bring the data across...</p>

<p>Finally, since you're doing photography, make sure you leave some money behind for colour management and calibration hardware - you cannot live without this!</p>

<p>While charging by the hour may make sense for a lot of shoots, some types of shoots tend to be more standardised, and portraits tend to be one of them. However, most photogs will differentiate based on location (i.e. a fixed value for shoots within, say, 30miles, with additional charges coming online as the distance increases).</p>

<p>Additional services are usually quoted as whole different packages rather than as distinct add-ons (so you'll rarely find a separate rate for MUA for such shoots - you'll usually find a rate for a shoot excluding AND including MU) - most photographers who offer those services have special agreements (most, ongoing) with MUAs and can therefore offer "lower" prices than, say, a day-rate for a dedicated MUA.</p>

<p>And again, NO, photographer rates are, statistically and mostly, NOT all over the place. There is a certain reason and structure behind them, even if you do not know it.</p>

<p>You can always charge only for post processing (i.e. when asked to post process images taken by someone else). However, unless you have a massive studio with 4-5 people doing that job alone, there's no point in attempting to charge by the quarter hour or whatever. Undertaking a job would mean dedicating loads of time, so normally I charge by the hour and it ranges between $100 and $200, depending on what the customer needs.</p>

<p>Simply contrast, WB and colour adjustments would be charged lower than, say, skin smoothing, hair and makeup corrections and adjustments, spot removal and so on and so forth.</p>

<p>But generally, when I'm shooting, I ALWAYS incorporate those hours into my quoted fee and deliver one finished product. If I mess up during shooting, then it's my loss - the customer should never have to incur that anyway.</p>

<p>First of all, Ralph, you're completely wrong! The rates you mentioned are NOT all over the place - even when compared to the situation described by the OP (despite the fact that NONE of the instances you mentioned have ANYTHING to do with it). They are examples of different events, with different cost structures, different degrees of difficulty and so on and so forth. So please, next time, spend some time thinking a bit about your comments before passing judgement on a whole profession.</p>

<p>Charles' comments were right on point. Emily, you clearly have no idea how to handle this (business wise - even though, your comments make me wonder about the photography side as well...sorry...), so my first suggestion would be to pass. But since we're talking theory here, you should:<br>

- collect ALL your costs. That should include studio and equipment rental (if you own everything, you should count something towards depreciation and/or wear and tear), model fees, make-up and hair (both the cost of the professional as well as any other additional costs you might have to incur), insurance (unless you already have that, in which case you should simply account for part of it), general shoot expenses (food, cleaning afterwards, transportation, electicity, raw materials, etc, etc, etc) and of course taxes and your fees.<br>

- establish EXACTLY what the client wants. Does he need simple web shots? Does he need one or multiple poses? Does he need detailed shots? Should these be against a neutral background or can you be creative? What are his website colours and are you supposed to match/compliment them?<br>

- ensure you know how to handle colour reproduction! Remember, fashion means showing the right colour, so bear that in mind when shooting and post processing.<br>

- figure out who (if not you) will do the processing and ensure you know what types of fles you should deliver. If you are doing the post processing, check what deliverables the customer needs (high-res, low-res files, formats, colour spaces, etc)<br>

- calculate ALL the time it'll take you to shoot this, including presales, shooting, post, etc<br>

- ask the client exactly the questions Charles suggested you ask: will they use the images for the web only? If no, where else? For how long? What is the reach of the (if any) printed material? Is it only local? Nationwide? International? How long will the printed campaign last for? (this being fashion, your shots will most likely be removed from the site come next season's collection, but the print run can be an entirely different thing altogether). Web use for 1 month is NOT the same as a global print and web campaign for a year or ad infinitum! (That is why photographers charge anything between $200 and $50,000 for a single shoot, and NOT because they are "all over the place"...!)</p>

<p>Once you've figured ALL the above, convert them to a monetary value and present that to a customer.</p>

<p>May the f/stop be with you...</p>

<p>Since you're a beginner with this all travelling, I would be loath to advise you to take laptops and external drives with you. Also, I'm sorry to say that, while internet cafes in Asia ARE quite prevalent, the upload speeds are dismal at least (let alone the fact that those connections drop constantly - even if it's for a few seconds at a time, that's enough to disrupt the upload irrevocably), so that's out as an efficient and effective backup strategy.</p>

<p>Personally, given the VERY low cost of memory cards, I would buy a few CHEAP (I mean, from a reputable manufacturer, but not necessarily very fast in their read-write speeds) and put one of those onto a slot and have the camera write the same to both cards. When those are full, simply e-mail them to yourself (I would suggest you do that from a large, international hotel or a central post-office rather something small or a village post-box!) registered mail.</p>

<p>Alternatively, you could investigate those backup drives with built-in card readers which download images automatically (check out <a href="http://www.shutterbug.com/content/road-drive-i-said-backup-drive">http://www.shutterbug.com/content/road-drive-i-said-backup-drive</a>)</p>

<p>Have fun and shoot, shoot, shoot...</p>

<p>I have used a camera with over 150k actuations (and not a nicely treated one at that!) and it worked fine. It was already way above the maximum actuations quoted by the manufacturer, but no problem. Far as I know, the camera is still in operation and still keeps working...</p>

<p>And I've used a camera whose shutter died within half the time quoted. It is, as has been said, arbitrary, but normally I would expect it to be biased towards the top end rather than the middle or low. The more "professional grade" the camera is, the more sturdy I would expect the shutter mechanism to be - unfortunately, that also means the more expensive the repair would be in case of failure...</p>

<p>I agree that the photobook idea might be a bit too expensive compared with the - average - expected return (which is, usually, around 10% or even less if you have not targetted it properly)...even at $25-$30 a copy (even though I suspect it will be more), you'd be talking around $500-600 just to send out 20 of them... can you afford that? Easily?</p>

<p>Also, on the subject of captions: I too agree that captions might be a good idea, but they need to be PERFECT! I had a quick look at your captions on your site and, to be brutally honest, I'm not that impressed. Photos, in order to sell, must convey, first and foremost, emotion. That emotion must be reflected in the caption and that, my friend, is no easy task. It should come as no surprise that there are people who actually make a living from creating emotion-reflective captions for images. A simple descriptive title might not always be either suitable and can even be damaging.</p>

<p>Finally, if you're looking to write about travel, you also need to up your ante quite a bit. Travel writing is, despite initial appearances, very challenging as you need to balance personal feelings and useful (and above all, accurate) information. That was not clear from your blog (which I found a bit all over the place and lacking structure).</p>

<p>I hope this helps. Good luck with whatever you choose to do...</p>

<p>Wow..! Haven't seen such a post in what must be ice ages!</p>

<p>Well, you know what they say: when in Rome...</p>

<p>Ashley, as a business consultant (with more than 15 years experience) and a professional photographer, I could potentially help you with setting up this whole deal, but my rate as a business consultant used to be $750 a day (excl. taxes) and as a photographer, depanding on the project, from $750 to $1,700 per day. Do you think you could afford even a combination of the two, say $1,500 per day? For an estimated 15-20 full billable days (with a mandatory contractual margin of 20%)?</p>

<p>What I'm trying to say here is that what you're looking to embark upon requires TONS of forethought and planning and research and afterthought and then more planning and more research BEFORE you even put pen to paper and start scribbling your way towards a business plan. You would need to know your market INSIDE OUT and top to bottom. You would need a fully detailed analysis of ANY and ALL costs involved in RUNNING the business before you even stop by the window of a camera store for equipment.</p>

<p>We just opened a new studio (new company structure etc) and it took us literally 6-8 months of planning, research, legal, financial etc, etc (and, imagine, we already HAD most of the equipment and we have a VERY precise idea of what we may need now and in the immediate future) and it costs us literally thousands of euros in expenses and bulding works and planning.</p>

<p>My advice to you? Be a bit more serious about what you want to do and then you'll probably get more serious answers...</p>

<p>We charged a bunch! It was not a cheap event, but usually, such demands do not come from people who would fringe at spending an addition 500-1000 for such a feature.</p>

<p>As for the cable solution, true, a theoretical wifi would have been "better", but that would mean: (a) one more plug, power adapter, cables etc to set up, (b) wireless capability on the receiving laptop (which in our case was a bottom of the range, crappy machine, only used to display images on a projector) and © (which, with all the smartphones roaming around is becoming increasingly a problem) having to cut off all external communication to any form of hub to protect it from the literally dozens of people trying to connect to it from their iPhones or whatever.</p>

<p>Trust me, a good, old fashioned cable, ran wall to wall, was the best solution. Sometimes, going low-tech is more efficient (and cheap) than going high tech...</p>

<p>First and foremost, talk to a lawyer (in fact, that should really be all you should do IF you're serious about claiming some money back - otherwise, read on). See what they say. They will be able to examine your contract and tell you what you are entitled to or not. Nobody in this forum will be able to give you as good an advice as they will be.</p>

<p>However, it seems that if it was part of your contract, a simple request to take the images down should suffice. At least legally, you're on pretty safe ground there. Of course, then comes the issue of breach of contract on his behalf and any compensation you might be entitled as a result - again, your lawyer should be able to advise you accordingly.</p>

<p>Now, as to the quality of the images, that is a much more fluid and touchy subject. IN THEORY, you could possibly sue for breach of contract, but then the burden is more on you to prove the images did not meet the standard advertised and promoted by him and that, in effect, he misrepresented himself and his work, causing you distress. But that could be a complicated, prolonged and messy battle you're not sure you'll win...</p>

<p>So, to sum up: talk to a lawyer. It's your best bet...</p>

<p>The most important question is: why? What's the purpose? There might be solutions, but we can't know unless we know what they'll be used for.</p>

<p>At the risk of sounding a bit harsh, what you're saying is: "I just bought a refurbished/new Nissan Micra with alloy wheels. What do I need to race in WRC?" The answer has GOT to be more than "a flash" or "a fast mid-range zoom"...</p>

<p>You need another, better body (so this one can be a backup). You need, at least, two (2) fast zooms - a 17-55mm f/2.8 and a 70-200 f/2.8. You will need tons of fast memory cards. You will need a minimum of two (2) strobes (be they SB600 or SB900 - it doesn't matter) and the capability and knowledge to manage them off camera. You'll need light shaping tools for the strobes for when you mount them on camera. You will need...oh, need I go on?</p>

<p>But above all, you'll need to humble up and find a professional (or semi pro) who will be willing to let you tag along so you learn. And you'll need to do that again and again and again...until you build a portfolio capable of enticing someone to hire you... Only THEN you can think of undertaking one yourself and even THEN, I'd be sceptical.</p>

<p>Macro and landscapes are indeed easier...weddings? You're potentially messing with someone's precious moments...</p>

<p>Natural light (i.e. from a large window or from the sun) has the problem that it is not so easily contained within the eye so as to create the sharp catchlight you see in studio portraits. Natural light can light the eyes, but it does so more uniformly and with far less control.</p>

<p>Believe it or not, most photographers, when using natural light, will almost always add some sort of other light source (a softbox, a bare strobe, etc) just to ensure the sparkly catchlight is there...</p>

<p>I have the Rayflash adapter and, while it is great for the money, if you're planning to use it, for example, to shoot events, there are cases where you'll end up with red-eye. Also, while it does give out a nice, spread-out light with minimal shadows, that can work out against you if you're shooting more than 1-2 people - the light falloff is a bit of a pain.</p>

<p>For portraits, as a fill (in studio) is a superb adapter and works wonderfully.</p>

<p>The near perfect sharpness of the shadow (especially at the distance seen here) makes me think "post processing" - in other words, PS. Also, I cannot see how you'd be able to colour the shadow so completely uniformly (i.e. without the centre going darker and the edges lighter) using gels or whatever else.</p>

<p>Personally I think it's a great image (in terms of the lighting on the model) but the rest is 90% PS.</p>