Rick Helmke

<p>Use the fastest x-sync shutter speed your camera will allow and probably the lowest ISO you can. Add enough fill flash to match the background lighting. If it's a sunny afternoon around 4 pm with strong backlight at ISO 200 your shutter should be 1/200, f/16 or thereabouts. Set your flashes to output for the same f/stop you should be in good shape. If you have a flash meter this will be very easy. If not, put a few stand-ins on the platform ahead of time and shoot some tests and get it balanced. Do it ahead of time as the attention span of 50 kids of any kind is about 90 seconds. Your 580's may or may not put out enough power to keep the background from being blown out if using umbrellas so consider using a very light diffuser on direct flash instead. Especially with umbrellas keep them at the middle of each side, maybe four feet away from the camera. 50 kids should be easy enough either way. Good luck.</p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>I'm very happy with my Ft2, have always liked them and can reccomend it. For the money though and F2 is the best camera body ever made IMO. The F2A and later are Ai cameras so F2SB or earlier would fit your needs here.</p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>The 17-55 2.8 is superb and if you have the cash I'd get one. On the other hand I worked my Tamron 28-75 2.8 hard all weekend covering events on a DX body. It's been one of the best lenses I've owned in it's price range, under $400 I believe.</p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>I'd join one if I could find one locally just to swap ideas. And Michael, if you're in the neighborhood, come join ours. The R/C club that is...</p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>I'd join one if I could find one locally just to swap ideas. And Michael, if you're in the neighborhood, come join ours.</p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>A UV filter coated with hairspray is what I use. Takes a little experimenting to get the right amount, you may want to do 2 or 3 different ones for different situations.</p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>Beautiful family and beautiful work. I spent all day yesterday roaming the countryside with an F4s and an ancient FT2, a few manual focus lenses and some HP5. It was a lot of fun roaming through some old barns. I'll put a few up when I get them souped. <br /><br />Rick H.</p>

<p>I sized them all to 650 but some of them just refused to load. Oh well...</p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>I like the look of this lens very much, especially the wide open images. It's true, I do all kinds of things to get sharp lenses to soften up just like this but I've never gotten anything quite that nice. Wish I could find one of those, it would be a favorite portrait lens for me. And closed down it seems to sharpen up nicely. Nice find.<br /><br />Rick H.</p>

<p>Sorry folks, it won't take them. Moderater please delete the failed attempts to upload. I don't what's going on, will try again later. Sorry. <br /><br />Rick H.</p>

<p>Last try, again.</p>

<p>Grrr...</p>

<p>Plenty more...</p>

<p>Something isn't working properly, I'll give it one more go and may have to try back later.</p><div></div>

<p>And again...</p>

<p>Wine bottle and glasses.</p>

<p>Let's try that one again.</p><div></div>

<p>The Pebble Hill Hound...</p>

<p>Morning everyone,<br>

You may recall my post last week about the 85-250/4 Nikkor I bought recently from KEH and have affectionately nicknamed 'The Beast'. I finally got out and shot a little bit with it at an event Monday evening. These were done with my old D100 and not the even older F2AS shown in the photo. Wide open, the sharpness is not as good as I would like but it's okay. By the time I get to 5.6 and 8 I'm pleased with the results. Can't wait for an all day excuse to work it out and abuse my shoulder muscles. Pictures follow.<br>

<br />Rick H.</p><div></div>

<p>Ninety percent of my work is still getting done with MF lenses. I only actually own two AF's and that's about all I want. </p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>The red ring is actually an orange ring and is the weak close up filter I mentioned in the first post. It's stuck to the hood and until I can find a filter wrench I won't be able to use the hood. A quick trip to Cameragraphics should solve this problem. As for the F2, it's an F2AS, serial number dates it to '79. Came with the grip back that also stops the film from going back into the cassette. It's a fully optioned handful! Wish I could find an E screen for it though. It's a clean rig, got it at from C'graphics a few years ago for a song along with another black F2 with the DP-1 head and four MF primes for a total of about $400 I think. I've got newer more or less state of the art gear but find myself using film and these bodies unless I just am forced to shoot digital. On the other hand, I tested this lens last night on a bluegrass band. When my shoulder feels better, I'll post samples :-)</p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>I'll have it out tomorrow, will use it on the F2 and also on a D-something. I'll post photos shortly. </p>

<p>Rick H.</p>

<p>Afternoon all,<br>

The other day while perusing the KEH website I found, as the last one in the category, an 85-250/4 manual focus Nikkor lens. I'd used one of these some years ago to cover sports including football and the Master's water skiing events at Callaway Gardens. Unfortunately, the guy who owned it wanted it back. This is a monster of a lens, much bigger than any other lens in this range and bigger than anything even close that's made today. Anyway, there it was listed in BGN condition and for $115 I couldn't leave it there. A phone call and a day later I had it in hand. I was impressed that it came with original lens caps and shade and even an 82mm UV filter. I put it on the camera and was immediately distressed that it would not focus to infinity. Scratched my head alittle and realized that the UV filter was actually a factory-included very weak close-up focus filter. It allowed the lens to focus down to about 6 feet instead of the normal 13. Once that came off it focused perfectly. Then I noticed the aperture blades didn't work at all and I was REALLY dissapointed. Gotta love KEH though because they paid for shipping, repaired it under the 6-month warranty and paid for shipping back in less than 10 days total. Now it works great! A little background on this monster from the 1969 Nikon handbook, it has 15 elements in 8 groups. Its about 20 inches long and weighs a whopping 4.5 pounds. With the motor driven F2 in the photos it comes out to just over 9 pounds. An interesting feature is the tripod collar. It is actually two mounting holes, one on the bottom and one on the left side. It doesn't rotate, you have to take it off, rotate the whole thing and re-mount it. There is absolutely no plastic on this lens at all and based on the weight, not much aluminum either. I see no practical way to make it an AI lens so I'll have to stop down or use Sunny 16. It's about as old-school as an slr lens can be and I love it. Although it was sold as a BGN lens there is hardly a mark on it. It was either well taken care of or more likely not often used. I'll attach a few photos and with any luck, the computer gods will allow this old analog piece to come through.<br>

<br />Rick H.</p><div></div>

I'd stick with Alien Bees. You have experience with them, good quality, they work with any camera system. I use them for all kinds of things, studio or location, digi or film. A good product.

 

Rick H.

If you want a newspaper job, check journalismjobs.com and all the search engines, apply everywhere, have something good to show that covers events like spot news, sports, features. It's a tough market these days but keep at it and learn to live on a budget and to love odd and crappy hours. It's my favorite thing to do with a camera. No advice on being a war photographer. Nachtwey says he went to New York and got work almost immediately but that was the eighties or late seventies. I'm sure you can find a way in but's ugly, harsh, dangerous and smells horrible. Someone here will have better advice no doubt. Best of luck to you.

 

Rick H.