peza
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Posts posted by peza
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<p>Those are quite different lenses from focal length POW and not quite interchangeable. 35mm is far more usable from my perspective, it's by a good margin better performer wide open, physically smaller and lighter and despite lack of USM, focusing accurately and consistently.<br>
I vote for EF 35/2.0</p>
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<p>Not that great around 24mm, pretty OK from 35mm onwards. IS too loud for video with built-in microphone in most environments.<br>
It saved me quite few swap for 70-200 or even carrying one compared to 24-70 as walk around lens. In long-end bokeh is pretty nice.<br>
Use it for a while, you can always sell later. Experience with it and getting your own opinion about it is worth the minor loss of value selling it used as opposed to new.</p>
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<p><a href="http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews/Canon-EF-28-300mm-f-3.5-5.6-L-IS-USM-Lens-Review.aspx">EF 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6 L IS USM</a> is doing very good.<br>
Why ?</p>
<ul>
<li>long zoom range</li>
<li>IS, with MODE1, MODE2</li>
</ul>
<p>Only push-pull zoom is a bit tough to work with.<br>
Another favourite is 15mm fisheye. Unique look good for walking and showing surrounding at the subject all at once.</p>
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It is decent performer. Better in the corners than 16-35/2.8L MK1, by large margin not as sharp in the center. Five star built quality, no problems with flare, as long as source is not too much to the edge of the frame.<div>
</div>
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<p>Would be nice to share with us your experience with setup you've taken after you are back from the trip. Good luck :)</p>
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<p>I'm 1-series user and 3'rd party chargers are unavailable AFAIK, so I took slightly different route than I will outline here.<br>
Your problem has two parts.</p>
<ul>
<li>charging device</li>
<li>solar panel</li>
</ul>
<p>Charging device is not big deal, this one looks fine: http://www.suntekstore.com/Home---Travel---Car-Charger-for-Canon-DV-Battery-BP-511-BP-511A-BP-512-BP-522-BP-535--US-Standard--.html<br>
Just one thing you should keep in mind - voltage of "12V" solar panel varies widely between 10-25+ Volts. Make sure, your charging device doesn't have "overvoltage" protection, which will render it unusable under good light with strong panel.<br>
As for solar panel - it is more difficult to get the right one. YOU have to answer question - how you will charge ? Stationary (lunch break) or on the go. For lunch break charging, you need panel with good output to charge fast even under overcast skies. For panels to be used "on the go", portability, possibility to mount it to backpack etc..<br>
Without going into in depth into battery charging theories, you better have something in range 10W+.<br /> Brunton Solaris 6, 12, 26 or Solar Gorilla fit the bill well. They are different animals - Solar Gorilla seems to be more sensitive under indirect sunlight (overcast, shadows under blue skies), Brunton packs more power/weight.</p>
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<p>see the attachment</p>
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<p>Sigma 12-24mm f/4.5-5.6 EX HSM DG is very good lens. Not as sharp as 16-36/2.8L in the centre, but better in the corners and with basically no distorsion. I was in the same situation, I went for it and I do not regret a slightest bit.<br>
It has very high quality build. Better than 16-35/2.8L (sad to say). Focusing is super smooth.</p>
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<p>Check/clean contact surface for the batteries on the battery lid. Inspect also state (corrosion/etc) of the contacts inside the battery compartment.</p>
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<p>The longer I have the EF 28/1.8, the less happy I'm with it. Worst prime in my bag. To make the answer short - most suitable for you in my opninion is EF 24-70/2.8L or EF 35/1.4L.<br>
What you can see here: <br>
fully corresponds with observations I've made on daily basis. </p>
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<p>Different lenses. Sigma dosn't have the funky look of fisheye - which is great for some purposes, but - optically it's very good. Extremely well controlled barrel distorsion, uniform sharpness (16-35L is better in the center). Very good resistance against flare when source in the frame. Stray light sources is a problem.</p>
<p>Built quality is - sorry to say (for Canon) - well ahead of Canon "L" series lenses. Silky smooth focus and zoom, it survived tip-over attached on 5D from ~120cm tripod on !concrete! with bent aluminium sun shade only. I have destroyed one 16-35 already and - it took not more than little bump to an edge by the lens when haging on my neck attached to the camera. The 16-35 lens mount is attached to the body of the lens by - plastic... Fragile one...</p><div>
</div> -
<p>accurate, consistent autofocus - please...</p>
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<div></div>
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<p>I bet you don't want to hear that, but - for shooting at 300m for 36" print you need 300mm prime to get what I would call satisfactory result.<br>
You will see difference between 300/2.8 and 300/4 at this print size. Let alone the zooms or zoom with TC.</p>
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<p>May I suggest you to undergo the same test I've done some years back with EOS 10D :<br>
http://www.photo.net/canon-eos-digital-camera-forum/00SoMN ?<br>
Instead of calendar you better use scene like here to rule out permanent front/back focus problem:<br>
http://www.komar.org/faq/camera/canon-back-focus-problems/</p>
<p>If the test will be fine - recomposing is the culprit, otherwise - you have front/back focus problem which is correctable or consistency problem, which - well - Canon might try to correct bringing system components to the factory specs.</p>
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<p>Focus and recompose is likely your problem. See below why:<br>
http://duncandavidson.com/2008/09/focus-and-recompose-exposed.html<br>
http://visual-vacations.com/Photography/focus-recompose_sucks.htm</p>
<p>Alternatively - use all the focus points of the camera and do not recompose. I got even better results on tight head shots manually focusing. Most suitable focus screen would be the EC-s.</p>
<p>Beside that, perform microadjustment for all your lenses <strong>at your typical</strong> shooting distance: http://stephenfrink.blogspot.com/2008/09/micro-adjustments-with-canon-mkiii.html</p>
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<p>Dear David,<br>
I have pointed out on several occasions, AF-accuracy of Canon bodies (well, I have just Canons) and it's consistency is something less than desired. On most of the occasion I got responses in style like "your camera has a problem", "your techinque has a problem", "what you want to prove here" and - myself, If I'm struggling with something, than for sure it's not technical part of the photography ;) My problem is, I'm not willing to accept something less than perfect.</p>
<p>If I make technically less than perfect shot, it can not be excused, because it is something one CAN learn. If my shot is not artistic and pleasing enough - this depends on taste to certain extent and - well, maybe I'm just not gifted enough. This can be excused.</p>
<p> Some cameras focus faster, some faster and more relible, some faster than others and less reliable. Beside that - some lenses focus more consistent than others. People "who know", already realized that and provide information on that subject. As example, some of best lens review can be found here: http://www.wlcastleman.com/equip/reviews/index.htm</p>
<p> In distant past, I was pleased with Tamron 200-400, despite, it had bad reviews. My standards have been lot lower these days, it was era of negatives, enlargements haven't been huge, but - much later I did scans which proved that point - it was fine lens, if shot in reasonable apertures. For example EF 600/4 is not THAT great at f/4. Close down by 1/3 of an f-stop and it gets whole a lot better. I saw confirmation of that on several websites. Every lens, even every sample of the lens has it's "personality" which one has to know to utilize it fully.</p>
<p> The point I want to make is - if AF is not >spot on<, a 20+MPX wunder camera effectively becomes 5PMX or much less effectively and lenses get bad reviews.. Focus plane is only ONE.<br>
Bottom line - thank you for your post and trying to open people's eyes and - good to hear you found the satisfaction with your equipment.</p>
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<p>If you want good backgrounds, source of light (flash) is to be positioned behind or well above your subjects pointing to the actual backgrounds.<br>
You will have following challanges:</p>
<ul>
<li>trigger the offcamera flash (outdoors/blocked line of sight renders IR triggered slave ineffective, the flash triggered often too) </li>
<li>have strong enough flash positioned far enough from the backgrounds not to create hotspots/uneven illumination, yet having enough power to illuminate it properly</li>
<li>keeping the slave flash off the frame</li>
<li>prevent triggering of the slave flash by other photographers/guests</li>
</ul>
<p>I would not go for anything less than "a flash" with pocket wizard. The "a flash" of my choice would be at least 600WS strobe with wide reflector on 3m stand, GN 40+ well positioned handheld flash migt to the trick it in most situations, but results will be by far not as good as with stationary strobe.<br>
I believe pocket wizard or simillar device is a must in your case.</p>
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<p>Shooting birds against lighter portion of the sky is good application for polarizer on long lens. You can make light looking a bit warmer or colder with subtle difference especially on surfaces which are facing either sun or blue sky or both.</p>
<p>It allows you to retain some extra detail in white feathers of birds too and make surrounding vegetation more "fresh". Loosing 1.5 f-stops is a negative you'd have to live with. Rest is up to you :) Depending on conditions, I'd not expect to use it more than 10% on average. I don't have it for 600/4 - just played a bit with 300/4 and 77mm screw-on.</p>
<p>Can be quite handy on insect reducing the surface reflection and allowing a bit more exposure/lowering contrast. (black shiny bug and 10am sun scenario). With magnification ration of ~12-10:1 (lazy to look at the specs), this will rarely be the case. On crop body with (lots of;) )extension tubes - it can be done though.</p>
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Just beware - excessive condensation repeated xyz times after you take the battery off a fridge can do a harm as well, nevertheless - I keep them in the fridge, not so humid and hot over here.</p>
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<p>you (might) have two-three, or even more problems<br /> <br /> 1, camera profile/style assigned to these pics in lightroom<br /> 2, LR itself is not very good for extreme tweaking of white balance (correction of huge shifts)<br /> 3, LR has nasty habit of cutting off shadows (shift shadow levels by 5 in Photoshop terms), instead of applying curve<br>
4, your pics might be very under-exposed. Show us the histogram and thumbnail of the preview generated by the camera and the same for what you get in LR<br>
<br /> Shift "blacks" slider to 0 or 1 and correct the look by curves. Canon DPP will likely give you superior result in this case, so will BreezeBrowser Pro.</p>
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<p>What about this one:<br>
black point shifted by 21<br>
Smart sharpen 5%, 5pixel<br>
Smart sharpen 105%, 0.6pixel</p>
<p>on pixel per pixel in 400% magnification 450D is much better. It's like with woman - some look good pretty from a distance, less so when you come closer ;)</p><div>
</div> -
<p><strong>Question is also - do I want an IS lens, or - am I able to consistently shoot 400/5.6 non IS lens.. </strong><strong>I will talk about things I know personally only. </strong></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>f/5.6 is slow for jungle most of the time</strong></li>
<li><strong>in Sanctuaries, 70-200/2.8 would be great, rare need for longer lens, cause Orang Utans are used to people and mostly friendly. Be prepared for 16-35 also (yes, that friendly)</strong></li>
<li><strong>shooting with 2x extender calls for stopping (at least) by 2 f-stops, not matter what lens you have for the optimal quality and yes, result can be pretty good. BTW - does your camera focus @f/8 ?</strong></li>
<li><strong>300/4L IS focus very close and doesn't suffer from CA even with (lot's of) extension tubes. It can double as good lens for closeups (big bugs, flowers etc.)</strong></li>
<li><strong>once you get in real wilderness, your best friend and enemy is 600/4 (you will sweat like hell climbing a hill with that baby in 95% humidity and 30 dg Celsius or thereabouts). There is never enough reach.</strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>You make your decision :) BTW - 400/4 DO IS is great lens too, if you can afford it. 300/2.8 can give you exceptional 300mm lens, good 420mm/4 and OK 600/5.6</strong></p>
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Apparently, the 35/1.4L is doing extremely well: <a href="http://www.nagelhome.com/phototest/35mm%20test.jpg">http://www.nagelhome.com/phototest/35mm%20test.jpg</a>
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