gaule

<p>Whatever about the speckles on the right, the numerous dark spots that are visible on the left side have all the appearance of ordinary dust bunnies on the sensor, so a cleaning is proably in order. A blue sky at f/22 has a painful way of revealing every bit of dust.</p>

<p>Again, many thanks for the helpful replies. They have convinced me that it's best to send the camera in for repair. I didn't realise that the mechanics of the viewfinder shutter was so complex as to require a full-blown repair. It's only in recent months, as I developed an interest in HDR, that I began to see the need to avoid the possibility of stray light entering through the viewfinder when taking a series of bracketed shots with a cable release, so I'd better bite the bullet and get the thing fixed.</p>

<p>Thanks to all for the replies. Yes, the camera has an extended two-year warranty, so that is perhaps the way to go if a wiggling session produces no effect. At least the eyepiece shutter has chosen to get stuck while open and doesn't prevent normal shooting. Even when I have been using a remote release, I haven't noticed that stray light gets in and interferes with exposure, so the usefulness or necessity of that little curtain seems rather relative anyway.</p>

<p>When I got my D700 a year ago, I noticed the eyepiece shutter (that prevents the light from interfering with exposure when taking a photo with a remote control, for example) was a little stiff. It has since ceased completely to close. There is no movement whatsoever in the eyepiece shutter lever. It isn't a big deal. I can just as easily cover the viewfinder with a little black microfiber cloth I use for cleaning the lens, and it's hardly worthwhile sending in a camera for such a minor repair. Perhaps, however, some reader may have had a similar problem and could suggest a helpful D.I.Y. remedy. Thanks in advance for any advice.</p>

<p>I acquired one, too, in recent weeks, and, in recessionary times, it hurt, but the sharpness of the images has been a good medicine. I find the greatest difficulty when taking handheld shots with this lens is the sheer weight of it, combined with the awkwardness of the tripod collar, if not removed. It's a lot more natural to use a tripod or monopod and, in my own experience so far, this will invariably give better results, no matter what they say about the improved VR. Handheld, I try not to drop much below the reciprocal of the focal length, even if that means beefing up a bit the ISO.</p>

<p>To my eye, the scene has a very artificial look to it - especially the buildings. That, however, normally depends on the parameters one chooses when tone-mapping the image. What you give is perhaps just one of very many possibilities, between natural and artificial, so it's hard to judge the particular qualities or otherwise of the software you mention.</p>

<p>Thom Hogan's recently posted comments on "DxO Hysteria" give a bit of perspective to the very relative value of these ratings. In the end, the conclusion would seem to be that it is never the camera that makes the real difference, but the eye, the inspiration and the expertise of the one behind it</p>

<p>I, too, am contemplating the purchase of the VRII in the near future. I was put off at first by the scary stories that were circulating about the internal "peeling" and "silvery particles" quality issue. As far as I can see, however, these problems seem to have been explained and put to rest. Has anyone got some recent perspective on this question?</p>

<p>I see the forthcoming iteration of DxO Optics Pro (6.5) is said to offer "Single Shot HDR technology for optimized rendering of contrasted scenes". This seems distinct from the coming multi-shot HDR plug-in that they are also announcing for November. The single-shot technology is attributed, rather cryptically, to "enhanced automatic local exposure correction". We will have to wait and see what it brings.</p>

<p>I have used the older Sigma 50-150mm (Nikon mount) quite a bit, but it is a rather heavy lens and not particularly suited to handheld photography. It will always benefit greatly from the use of a tripod anyway. For that reason, OS seems to me to offer relatively little improvement at a stiff price.</p>

<p>I have used two Nikon-mount Sigmas for the last two years: the 10-20mm EX HSM and the 150-500mm DG OS HSM. The build quality of both leaves little to be desired and the image quality is quite acceptable. As an alternative to the Nikon lenses, I would have no hesitation in using them, even if I would give an edge to the better (and considerably more expensive) Nikon ones of a broadly comparable nature.</p>

<p>Have a read of Paul Johnson’s <em>Intellectuals: From Marx and Tolstoy to Sartre and Chomsky,</em> if you want to see how deeply the lives of many would-be mentors of humanity diverged from the philosophies they proposed. Nothing is easier than separating one’s intellectual life from the life one leads. Descartes was no different in this regard, if the biographical detail we have about his life is anything to go by. His relationship with his church, by the way, is pretty much summed up in his motto: <em>Larvatus prodeo</em>, “Masked, I advance”.</p>

<p >Fred, if you will allow me a follow-up comment on your last posting, I hope it won’t prove altogether unrelated to the present thread.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >I, too, think that Descartes was quite sincere in his philosophical intent, just as much as Kierkegaard was to be, but his philosophy is far more a matter of the mind than a matter of life. In fact, one can easily think of Descartes’ rationalism as an autonomous system, without reference to the philosopher’s life, whereas Kierkegaard’s thought is inextricably bound up with his individual, ‘existential’ experience. Descartes’ initial methodical doubt is an abstract construct of the mind. Kierkegaard’s self-doubt, expressed in terms of anguish, is tremendously personal and leads to a more deeply committed way of living life.</p>

<p > </p>

<p >When we approach our own pursuits – one of them being photography – in search of development, perhaps that difference in emphasis is a relevant one. There is a form of engagement that only touches the mind. And there is another form that grips our whole being and presses us to change, not just our perceptions, but even our way of life. </p>

<p ><br>

This difference in emphasis, I would add, is also visible in the different approach of Descartes and Kierkegaard to their separate religious backgrounds. In the opening pages of his <em>Discourse on Method</em>, Descartes, tongue-in-cheek, quickly excludes from scrutiny the ‘revealed truths’ proposed by theology. This leaves him free to attempt the construction of an implicitly all-embracing rational system of explanation. It is precisely this exclusively rational project that Pascal could not accept, because he is deeply convinced of the finite nature of human reasoning and of the human need for transcendence. There is, in fact, a strong parallelism between Pascal’s attitude and that of Kierkegaard, when the latter, a few centuries later, poured scorn on the pretence of Hegelian Idealism to construct a vast dialectic that would enfold everything in its self-explanatory rational arms. </p>

<p>In speaking of doubt, it’s natural to think of Descartes, as some contributors have done, but I find his ‘methodical doubt’, with its attendant fear that the reality of the world and of his own being may be a fiction, is one that, despite appearances, does not go very deep. For Descartes, the ‘methodical doubt’ is simply an intellectual stratagem (exacerbated by his theory of the <em>génie malin</em>) to help him to jump quickly to the solid ground of the <em>Cogito</em> and begin the recuperation of all he had chosen to doubt before. It’s an intellectual feint that had few if any consequences for his personal life as he lived it.<br>

<br />I am convinced that a thinker who has much more to offer when it comes to an analysis of doubt and fear and their necessary role in human development is Kierkegaard. Even the titles of some of his works are already pointers in that direction: “Fear and Trembling”, “The Concept of Anxiety” (sometimes translated, too, as ‘Anguish,’ or ‘Dread’). The phrases from Heidegger, quoted by Fred, take us back, in reality, to his 'existentialist' mentor, Kierkegaard. For the latter, our journey to true individuality and even self-transcendence always means grappling with a deep sense of anxiety or dread that is, in fact, much more than simple fear. Fear relates to something very distinct and definite, whereas the <em>Angst</em> he speaks of relates to the indefinite, the unknown. Ultimately, ‘anxiety is the possibility of freedom’. It is experienced as a menace to our present security, our complacency or self-sufficiency. It both attracts and repels, but if this ‘dread of possibility’ is not embraced, whatever the consequences, there is no true personal development. Without self-commitment to this uncertainty, without a leap into the unknown, we remain trapped in a world (and perhaps even a very comfortable one) of half-truths and inauthenticity. It’s true that, for Kierkegaard, this journey becomes a religious one in the end, but even for those who decline to follow him in that, there is much in his analysis – particularly in that of what he calls the ‘aesthetic’ stage in life – that is helpful in accepting to go beyond our present limits, whatever they may be, and enter a deeper phase of self-commitment. That holds good as much for the photographer as for anyone else.</p>

<p>The perfect bag has yet to be made. There is probably no cure for your addiction!</p>

<p>An Australian "heading out into the big wide world" is an Australian leaving a big chunk of the world behind him - a continent, in fact. Judging by the very striking photos that come from your homeland, I would have thought that any journey of adventure could well begin at home. Many of us dream of going there some day.</p>

<p>Luca, I think there's an obvious element of truth in what you say. We certainly tend to be self-centred in all our activities. That's part of human nature. At the same time, it's undeniable that we are capable of great generosity. I see these two aspects at play in the interaction that takes place on this website. Sometimes, indeed, it is self-interest that seems to prevail at the cost of genuine interest in others. But in many cases I sense, too, a real willingness to be of help to others and engage with them in their quest for photographic self-expression. One way or another, whether our own work receives attention or not (or the kind of attention we self-interestedly feel it deserves!), we benefit from the willingness of others to display their works in public. It enriches our own creativeness in many ways, and even the opinions of the self-opinionated can be very stimulating at times. Personally, I must admit I'm not only looking for enlightenment on the pages of PN, but also, now and then, for a bit of friendly encouragement. Or is that just another subtle form of self-interest?</p>

<p>Just another interesting thought from one of Galen Rowell's books, <em>Mountain Light</em>: "The reason the 35mm image doesn't look like a 4-by-4 image is more the result of method than of equipment ... When I come across a still landscape that moves me, I pretend my Nikon is a bigger camera, I heft it onto a tripod, fool with composition for long minutes, shoot at f/16 to maximize depth of field, and get a result that resembles in every respect what I would have gotten with a bigger camera, except the size of the grain in an enlargement" (p. 108)</p>

<p >Wouter, I feel that the ‘versus’<em> </em>in your question introduces an opposition where at most a distinction can be made. One can speak of tension, perhaps, but in the line of complementarity rather than in that of mutual exclusion. Take, for instance, the concept of artistic creation that developed during European Romanticism. Here, inspiration was often seen as an irrational flight of the human spirit, an uplifting of the human faculties onto a higher plane of sensibility (the German <em>Sturm und Drang</em> is a case in point), yet even then, paradoxically, the approach to artistic creation invariably showed itself to be disciplined, methodical and reasoned. In literature, painting, sculpture and music, the accepted and even conventional rules of composition were first adhered to and provided the foundation for whatever transmutation of them might take place in the white heat of inspiration. There was certainly an acute awareness that what creates the truly great work is an impulse of genius that appears to escape the constraints of strict reason. It might even seem akin to madness – more a creature of chaos than of cosmos. In practice, however, the resulting creation was, in each instance, by no means unrelated to reason. What that suggests is that the definition we often have of reason is too narrow. In our own case, it has been formed in the mould of modern empirical science but doesn’t encompass the full breadth of human experience, which continues to be rational even when it seems to lie beyond reason and refuse to accept its guidance. Is love sheer insanity, or is there not method in its madness? As Pascal nicely puts it: “Le coeur a des raisons que la raison ne connait pas”.</p>

<p > <br>

My own conviction is that, in photography as in other pursuits, we begin with rules that can be rationally codified. By adhering to them, we become technically and perhaps even aesthetically proficient, but we are still only providing a hearth for the spark that may one day ignite it all and give it a significance that is more than the sum of its parts. Where, then, does that spark come from? That is the mystery that makes Shapespeare a genius while another man remains a writer; it makes Ansel Adams a visionary while another remains a photographer peering through his viewfinder. I’m not sure there is any ready answer to that question.</p>

<p>From the contributions to the discussion, I think it’s fair to say that our individual understanding of the concept of ‘timelessness’, as a suggested constituent element in photography, isn’t altogether free of ambiguity. When I used it myself, it goes without saying that I wasn’t doing so in an absolute sense, making it the equivalent of the concept of ‘eternity’, conceived as the absence of time. That understanding of ‘timelessness’ can never be applied to any human activity, which is always characterised by succession – one thing after another – and never by the <em>simultaneous</em> possession of all that has been, is, and will be. When we come to any human activity, and hence to photography, our past is only present to us in the form of memory; our future is only present to us in the form of imagination; and our very present itself consists in ceasing to be in the very instant it comes into being. It’s the age-old conundrum that bewildered Augustine among others. In that sense, our photography is inescapably temporal and not eternal.</p>

<p>In speaking of the ‘timeless’ character that, I would contend, can be part of the process of photography, I wasn’t referring either to a limitless span of time extending indefinitely into the future: time unending. I would be naïve to think that any of our personal creations, whatever their possible artistic merit, will survive the inexorable erosion of time.<br>

<br />For me, ‘timelessness’, for want of a better word, is a way of expressing the <em>value</em> that our human intentionality projects onto what we do and onto the works we create. It can have an aesthetic character, an ethical or even religious one, or it can simply be the adding of some significance that I wish to embody enduringly in what I do. The common denominator lies in the transcending of the instant. That can be as true of photography, I think, as of any other human activity and helps to give it wings.</p>

<p>Fred, I take your point. Potentially, no doubt, there as many approaches to photography as there are photographers, and hence there can exist a multiplicity of photographic intentions, not all of them artistic. That does not mean, however, that the photographers who draw their inspiration from non-artistic motivations escape completely the need to add ‘something’ to their picture – some value that raises it above the time in which it was created. You use the example yourself of the person who wishes to share through a snapshot the pride of a meaningful moment in life. That pride is experienced in a moment, that is true, but its meaningfulness extends beyond that instant. It envelops the photo and makes it much more than the result of the instantaneous click of the shutter. If the photo is treasured and preserved afterwards, it is because its value content abides. It has acquired, in some sense, a ‘timeless’ quality. Unless we are talking about some spur-of-the-moment, impulsive and almost unconscious snap, there is always some degree of thought behind a photo and it is through that door that timelessness enters. It can, indeed, be anything from a vague inspiration or flash of insight to a fully elaborated intellectual visualization, but it will place the ensuing photo on a level that, I would argue, is beyond the mere freezing of a moment in time. I think an awareness of that complexity is helpful to photography. It contributes to making it more interesting, more human, less mechanical.</p>

<p>In speaking of somehow transcending time in the context of photography I was referring to the dimension of artistic creation rather than to the constituent elements in the realization of a photographic image, of which light, self-evidently, is the foremost. Photography, if truly human, is not a thoughtless activity; it implies at least a minimum of reflection. Nor is it a purely mechanical act; it implies at least a minimum of creative volition. Thought and volition, however, are capable of raising the photographic capture of an instant to a higher plane that has, I would contend, a potentially timeless quality. When we submit a photo for critique, for example, we are tacitly implying that it has a value that goes beyond the moment in which it was created. We are inclined to think that it embodies some degree of artistic value that is not exclusively personal but also universal, and not solely momentary but also enduring. We have the fond hope that others will recognize that, too. I don’t think this is a quest for personal immortality, although that ambition may also play a role in some lives. It is more an intuition about the intrinsic nature of the beauty – however defined – that we hope to have encapsulated: "A thing of beauty is a joy forever." The greater the success we have in infusing the work of a moment with this added value, the more ‘timeless’ it becomes. I think that’s an experience that opens interesting windows of reflection in life, too, if one cares to look through them and isn’t too taken up with the bare mechanics of photography!</p>

<p>I have only turned to photography, at least with slightly more serious intent, in recent years, but I have been intrigued to experience here, perhaps even more strongly than in other art forms, the curious contradiction that lies at the heart of them all. They begin by making use of time in one way or another, yet ultimately they all want to transcend it by becoming timeless. They are all seeking, as Nietzsche would put it, “tiefe, tiefe Ewigkeit”. Our photography always begins with the capture of a fleeting moment or a sequence of them, but the implicit desire behind the capture is to place what is captured above time, to confer on it a kind of eternity. That is notably true of photography when it is driven by artistic intent, but it is even true of the less ambitious “happy snapping” of tourists who are just trying to hold on to their precious vacation time lest it be swallowed up in oblivion. When I take a photograph, the measurement of time is very important to me, but it is only a means to an end. My mind is really set on transforming, like an alchemist of old, that base metal of time into the gold of an artistic expression that, so I dream, will have an a-temporal value. Through whatever beauty it may have, it will, I hope, endure. In the end, I find that the contradiction experienced in photography, far from provoking confusion or a sense of futility, is what energizes the entire process of creativity. By embracing it, it becomes a positive tension; by failing to respond to it, I am condemning myself to less meaningful transience, to the ephemeral. I’m not sure if this strikes a chord or not with others. It would be interesting to hear.</p>

<p>I'm a bit intrigued, Matthew, at the need you have to boost ISO sensitivity for landscape photography. For the last year I have been bringing a D700 with me on regular excursions into the mountains and don't often see the need to go above 200 or at the most 400. Leaving aside early dawn and dusk, by playing with aperture, there is usually sufficient light to get quite a good handheld shot following the usual rule of the reciprocal of the focal length as far as shutter speed is concerned. I would certainly agree with all who speak of the usefulness of a tripod, but it just isn't always practical to carry one on a strenuous alpine-style excursion. In my own experience, for quite acceptable shots, it isn't always necessary either. For me, a tripod is often synonomous with leisure, with having plenty of time to get everything right, and that may indeed be a requirement for hight quality artistry, but if your are walking, hiking, trekking, climbing, then compromises are called for.</p>

<p>Enrique, I tried to replicate your own experience using the same lens on a D300 in AF-C, and yes, I hear the same clicking sound. I notice, however, that when this happens the focus confirmation indicator in the viewfinder (the green dot) is blinking on and off. This would indicate that the lens is 'hunting' for focus. In fact, after a few seconds it usually locks on and the clicking ceases. Personally, I would worry no further about this clicking.</p>