ken_morano

<p>Interesting that you guys suggest a polarizer. Wouldn't you have a problem using a polarizer when shooting through stressed plexiglass? I would think you'd run the risk of getting that rainbow effect.</p>

<p>Lynn,<br />I have lost most of the dexterity in my left hand and had to give up manual focus film photography. Long story short - I now enjoy using my new D7100 since I can configure the buttons. Also you can set up the camera so that you don't have to hold a button (e.g. focus, exposure control) and turn the control wheels at the same time time.<br />Good Luck!</p>

<p>Oops, typo, meant to suggest turning off Intelligent Resolution.</p>

<p>I wanted the ability to shoot airshows with a lens capable of about 600mm. Any more would have been overkill. The lens specs of the FZ200 looked promising and, since I already thought highly of the IQ of my Panasonic LX5, I decided I would go with it.<br>

I have to say the FZ200 is a mixed bag for me. Using the Initlelligent Automatic mode tends to introduce odd sharpening and and compression artifacts - much more annoying than the LX5. I did, however, find that if I shot RAW with the FZ200, turned down the noise reduction and turned off the Intelligent zoom, the camera output was more predictable without the artifacts - even allowing me to crop.<br>

It took me awhile to figure out Silkypix to convert the RAW images but the batch capabilty makes it manageable.<br>

All in all a good shoice for me.</p>

<p>Well, after doing more investigation and testing I realized the following:<br>

- First, I was zooming into my scanned images to a ridiculous degree. The full size 35mm scanned images I’ve downloaded off the web are no better, pixel resolution wise, than mine. Resolution concerns solved.</p>

<p>- Second, I had been scanning with Unsharp Mask turned off since it introduces too much noise in the under exposed areas. I see now that if I give more attention to properly expose, scan to 48 bit TIFFs, and choose only a light application of USM, the textures of fabric and flower petals, for example, are brought out more. Softness issue resolved.</p>

<p>Resolved, of course, to my satisfaction...</p>

<p>Thank you all again for your suggestions. There is a professional store in my area that charges significantly more for their best negative scans. I'll try them out, though, so I can objectively measure the softness induced by my own scanner. </p>

<p>Thanks, everyone, for straightening out the "soft" issue.<br /> And sure, I know the the inherent limitation of using my flat bed scanner.<br /> Actually, however, the quality of the scans I get from my scanner are much better than the camera store scans!<br /> I do wonder why there is such a universal agreement that the Epson scanners are limited to an optical limitation of 2400 dpi. When I zoom in to compare scans at 2400 vs 4800 dpi I clearly see more detail at 4800. By detail, for example, I mean less stair-stepping along the hard edges. Crops from 4800 always look better than the same from 2400.</p>

<p>Interesting interpretation: Less contrast = soft appearance. I can understand that.</p>

<p>I was talking to my local camera store owner - expressing dissapointment that, hard as I try, I couldn't extract a satisfactory amount of fine detail out of my film scans. When I told him I was using Portra 160, he commented, "That's your problem! Portra is a "portrait" film designed to smooth out the image to be more pleasing." He told me Ektar 100 would give more detail.<br>

I bought a role of Ektar from him and will try it out (seeing is believing) but does he have a point about Porta being soft by design?<br>

My test parameters:<br>

Digital camera "control": Panasonic LX5 jpegs<br>

Film Camera: Contax RX with Zeiss 28-85 zoom on tripod<br>

Film:Portra 160<br>

Scanner: Epson 4490 @ 4800 dpi, TIFF output</p>

<p>Yefei,<br>

Yup, I did check out an AX at the same store about two years ago. I was impressed but chickened out and bought the RX that day...<br>

Gotta love those retro rotary switches and levers on both those bodies.</p>

<p>Alan, Fred,<br>

I was thinking of your comments when I checked out an N1.<br>

It would not have been a straight across trade. I was, however, thinking that the store would give me more credit if I was trading Contax for Contax (don't ask me why). As it turns out store credit is the same for any purchase new or used.</p>

<p>The N1 struck me as being more comfortable to hold than the RX/28-85mm combo. And, although I've read much criticism about the autofocus design, I found it worked okay - especially using spot focus. After looking at an F100, I saw of course there are more advanced SLRs out there but in the the end I decided if I was going to look for store credit, it would someday be towards a DSLR.</p>

<p>In the meanwhile I'm going to keep the RX and just slow down to enjoy it accepting that I'm going to miss a few shots due to focus-fumbling.</p>

<p>Thanks for walking me through this...</p>

<p>Thanks for the suggestion George. Actually weight is not a problem for me. My numb finger tips are the problem.<br>

For my digital needs I'm happy with my LX5.</p>

<p>For obvious reasons, I enjoy my RX with the 28-85 mm lens. Unfortunately, I'm struggling with a pinched nerve problem in my hand which is making it difficult to grasp the lens barrel to focus it - let alone feel for the aperture ring (keeping it in program mode helps with that).</p>

<p>Do you think I'd be nuts for trading it in (with all my lenses) for an N1 with a couple of N mount lenses?</p>

<p>Yeah, I know there are more sensible auto focus systems to choose. I just think i would enjoy the ergonomics of the N1 as long as the autofocus was somewhat reliable and the manual override was easy to jump to if the AF got confused.</p>

<p>Is anyone bothered by the fact that slow sync mode uses the double flash to reduce red eye?</p>

<p>Personally I'd rather they give me the option to control red eye apart from choosing slow sync.</p>

<p>fyi</p>

<p><a href="../digital-camera-forum/00XyAY?unified_p=1">http://www.photo.net/digital-camera-forum/00XyAY?unified_p=1</a></p>

<p>Thank you Andrew.</p>

<p>I tried it this time using the TLA360 in Auto (not TTL) mode and adjusted the F number value on the back of the flash head to equal what the LX5 was planning to shoot at and the results look pretty good!</p>

<p>Very cool guys, thanks.</p>

<p>I decided to use my TLA20 since it was mentioned on the web site - the TLA360 was not. It also made sense to use a simpler flash. The flash does fire but unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any automatic metering capability. The flash DOES have an effect but the exposure is unreliable.</p>

<p>I guess I’ll just use sunlight from the side and tone down the internal LX5 flash for fill.</p>

<p>Thanks again for your input!</p>

<p>Newbie here.... I want to connect my LX5 to my TLA 360 flash via a coil cord so I can aim the flash from the side.</p>

<p>Will I like blow up the camera (or even the flash)?</p>

<p>I read somewhere that given point A being the flash head, Point B being the subject's eye, and point C being the center of the lens, you should not let angle ABC go below 5 degrees.<br>

Someday I'll actually test that out!</p>

<p>http://www.nodalninja.com/products/ezlevelers.html</p>

<p>Ditto on Scott's advice, especially if you're doing 360 degree horizontal and 180 degree vertical panos.</p>

<p>Additionally, I purchased PTGUI Pro stitching software based on someone's review in this forum. I'm amazed how smart that software is. I could not do multi rows without it.</p>

<p>Also I use Panorama2Flash software to be able to view the 360 degree panos.</p>

<p>Thanks guys.</p>

<p>Personally, I never thought high FPS was a particularly important feature for me but FPS is mentioned sooo much in forums and reviews, I was beginning to wonder if there was more to it as a predictor of normal usage.</p>

<p>Let's say I'm comparing the specs on two DSLRs - one claiming 8fps and the other 4 fps. Would it be reasonable to conclude that the faster camera calculates and adjusts exposure and focus twice as fast as the slower even when just firing off a single shot?<br>

Or are fps claims only informative to those who wish to shop around for a camera that will shoot in continuous firing mode to capture some sports like event?</p>

<p>"Hand Candy" - good one Mr. Face!</p>

<p>A very informative article, thank you!</p>

<p>Peter, Thank you for sharing your approach. It did look promising but photostitch won't allow me to create a mov file if I've selected "Images Scanned In Sections" - bummer.</p>

<p>But you gave me an idea that did work. Using the crop tool in Corel PaintShop Photo Pro X3, I took my 8160 x 3060 jpeg and cropped and saved a left side (5000 x 3060) and cropped and saved a right side (5000 x 3060). That gave me two files with an 1840 pixel overlap. Photostitch was happy to merge them together and allow me to save the result as an mov file.</p>

<p>Thanks for helping me through this.</p>