soboyle www.oboylephoto.co

Re: in camera sharpening, it is recommended that you do your sharpening in photoshop using unsharp mask so in the future when you come back to your raw files for editing you will not be stuck with over sharpened files. Purchase a good photoshop book like "Real World Photoshop" to learn the tricks of post processing your files in photoshop.

The canon 50 1.8, a $69 lens is far sharper than the 17-40, at least the samples I have, if you want ultimate sharpness, then sticking to primes is going to be the way to go. I highly recommend the 50 1.8, best lens for the buck I have ever seen, chintzy, but great images. I currently have the 50 1.8 and the 50 2.5 macro and will be expanding my prime lens selection when funds become available.

I'll be making a 2 week trip to Hawaii in mid January, 11 nights on

Kauai, will be traveling with my wife and 2 year old daughter so

shooting time will be limited to short day hikes and from the car

shooting. Looking for suggestions on sites for shooting, esp spots

that are less known about and worth seeking out, we can do short

easy hikes with our daughter, my wife like to see and photograph

birds, and I will be focusing on landscape shooting as well. I know

of the major spots from the guide books and will be visiting many of

these, but any secret local spots would be great to know about. I

may get a chance to do some more aggresive hikes myself if I can

find a nice spot on a nearby beach for my wife and daughter, was

thinking of a short jaunt down the trail along the napali coast as I

heard that the views are good even a short way in.

I picked up an image tank last year, a 30 gig model G2. Since then it

has been a rocky road using the thing, sometimes it will power on

when in the field, sometimes not. The battery life is pathetic, I can

usually get 2-4 512 meg cards downloaded before the batteries are

drained. I'm planning a trip tomorrow and now I can't get the bloody

thing to even turn on when its unplugged from the wall. If I didn'

t spend $240 on it I would take a ball peen hammer to it right now.

Any similar experiences, or is mine just a lemon?

So we can expect fairly rough conditions on the north shore of Kauai during January then? We were seriously considering a stay in the Hanalei Bay area, but if it will be to rough for swimming and snorkeling then I think we will consider a stay along the south or east shore. Again, if anyone has first hand recommendations of places to stay on Kauai and Oahu send them along. Thanks for the tip on the Kauai sands hotel, it looks like it would work, looking for something a bit more local, small and low key, but will certainly consider this place as it is in our budget at under $100 per night.

Ted, We will probably split our time between Oahu and one other island, we are leaning toward Kauai, for our trip. Your photographs convinced me that Oahu has some very nice places to visit indeed, and is well worth part of our vacation to explore (albeit missing Waikiki completely). Since we will be visiting in mid january, will the seas be so rough that we will not be able to swim or snorkel on Oahu or Kauai? I know that time of year is when the big waves are coming in on the north shore of Oahu. Any suggestions for reasonable accomidations (under $100) on both Kauai and Oahu would be very helpful, trying to shop for a room over the internet is difficult, we prefer small places like cottages or B&B's that accept children.

JW

Thanks for your answer, can you make any specific recommendations for accomidations on Kauai, I'm leaning toward going there and need to find a place to stay that will not break the bank (under $100 per night if that is possible). Suggestion on which areas to stay in on Kauai would be helpful as well.

Cheers Shaun

I had a bunch of miles in my pocket, so I booked a flight for

myself, my wife and our 2 year old into Honolulu for 2 weeks in

January. So I need suggestions on where to go on Oahu, and what

other island we should check out if we can afford the hop flight.

This will have to be a low budget trip as far as hotels go, so any

suggestions on places that are good to stay, near beaches, and

reasonably priced would be welcome. Will be spending a fair amount

of time photographing, as well as short hikes within the range of a

backpack carried toddler. Emphasis of the trip will be on seeing the

natural splendors of Hawaii, mountains, rainforest, beaches and

volcanos. Kauai sounds really nice, as does Maui and the big island,

not sure which way to go.

I traveled all over asia, but that was about 10 years ago so I was shooting film then.

My one suggestion is to pick up a cheap 2nd hand canon film camera as backup in case your digital dies on you, or you find yourself without power/batteries etc. Traveling is pretty hard on gear, especially if you travel using local transport. Keep it as simple and light as possible, ie if your traveling with a backpack, make sure you wear it around town for a day before you go off to asia. That will motivate you to lighten your load considerably.

A nice walking tour is to check out the world trade center site, then walk across the pedestrian bridge into the world financial center buildings right on the hudson, the architecture is fairly spectacular, dont miss the atrium area where there are some architectural models of the proposed wtc rebuild there, then out the back doors onto the hudson river walkway and walk south past the yacht club berths all the way to battery park along the river, this is a great walk near sunset with the sun setting across the river behind the statue of liberty.

I like the 20D compaired to the 10D, small incremental improvements can mean getting or missing the shot, like the instant on vs. several seconds wait for the 10D, that is the biggest single improvement. I like the new 8 way controler on the back, makes picking a focus point very fast, essential when you are shooting moving subjects. Buffer doesnt mean anything to me because I find it very rare to need to turn my camera into a machine gun.

You may want a longer lens for shooting animals that you happen upon, I would tend to bring a 70-200 along, howler monkeys are pretty common to see, as are other animals and birds.

It can be very dim under the forest canopy, so you may want to have a tripod along for landscape shots.

I think my kit would be a 17-40 and 50 macro and a 70-200.

Thinking more about the trip, it probably makes more sense to fly into Juneau and use that as a base for making trips around the SE inside passage, rather than trying to do a round trip from Seattle or Prince Rupert. How difficult/expensive is a trip to Glacier Bay? I see there is a town near there, Gustavus, where one could base oneself for a few days, is that the best way to go about a visit to Glacier bay, or is it better to do a trip out of Juneau?

Thanks for the responses.

One other question, if you were to travel in the southeast off season, when would you go? Fall sounds like the wettest part of the year, so I guess spring, perhaps late may to early june would be a good time to come to miss the crowds but not be stuck in the ice?

Since we are traveling with a toddler, we will be seeking out cheap hotels and B&B's for accomidation at each port of call. If anyone has any specific recommendations for places to stay in Ketchikan, Wrangle, Sitka, Petersburg, Juneau, Hanes and Skagway please let me know. We want to keep spending to a minimun on hotels, but I realize that will be difficult in alaska. We want to experience an authentic alaska trip, if that makes sense and is still possible, not be stuck in a hord of tourists shuttling around to the same sites. We've done a lot of travel around the world, but this is a new experience traveling with a toddler in tow.

Tenting will be difficult with a baby, and in the rain just doesn't sounds at all appetizing. Hostels would work, but private rooms or cabins are the prefered way to go since babys make noise. I think renting a RV would be to much of scheduling hassle with the ferrys, so will not do that, but may rent a car in some of the ports of call to see the sights. Anyone have a ballpark figure on a daily expense of a trip like this? $200 per day cover it?

India is rich with photographic possibilities.

Varnassi is a spectacular place to spend some time along the Ganges river photographing the pilgrims who come there, hire one of the many row boats that are avaialable (they will find you).

Some photos from my travels in India here.

www.oboylephoto.com/india

I'm reading John Muir's book "Travels in Alaska" about his travels

to southeast Alaska in the late 1800's, and after reading his

ecstatic descriptions of the landscapes near Wrangle and along the

waterways north of there, I am considering altering plans I had for

a trip to mainland Alaska next year. Looking for feedback about

costs along this route, we would take the alaska marine highway

ferry's, and stay a couple days at each port along the way, finally

reaching Juneau, and then perhaps returning via a different ferry

route to Bellingham or prince rupert. Are the accomidations and food

costs along the inside passage as extortional as they are in

mainland alaska? Is it possible to get away from the crowds that are

certain to be teeming the ferry when one reaches a town along the

way (if you stay in town a day or 2)? Are the views along the way as

good as John says they are (even 125 years later). What is the best

time to make this trip, ie least amount of the plentiful rain? And

finally would you do this trip with a 2 1/2 year old?

I often mount the 1.8 on my 10D and only go out with that lens, that is how much I like it, it is an excellent lens and I use it all the time in low light and for nice shallow depth of field work. I've got some really nice photographs of my daughter with that lens. If the 1.4 is better, I would be tempted, but really, its all on paper, the 1.8 performs wonderfully. Built quality is another issue, the 1.8 is a cheapo lens, after shooting with Zeiss lenses all my life, these plastic canon lenses are painful to handle, but they perform just fine.

Anyone using the freely available Picasa photo organizer from Google?

Any good? Better/worse that adobe album?

RAW compatible?

Well, I figured I would risk the wrath to see if anyone knew if the mirror clearance was the same as the Digital rebel. To defend myself I will say my day job is as a mechanical designer where mods and reworks are a daily occurance, and I have many contacts at machine shops who could make short work of this change, IF it will fit the 10D afterwards. It would figure that Canon would come out with this lens shortly after I sold my Digital rebel to upgrade to the 10D. Now it looks like the best kit would be a 20D and a Rebel backup body.

Is there any reason the 10-22 EF-S lens announced recently will not

be adaptable to the 10D with a bit of hacking and filing like the 18-

55 EF-S lens was? The biggest potential problem will be the lens

hitting the mirror of the 10D, any indication if this will work?

<p>Bob </p>

<p>I've been considering the same thing, to try to make my images more available

to someone searching for a particular type of image or subject so I can capture

more sale. My ruins photographs are quite unique, but the sales potential is

very thin, so I need to let anyone who might be interested in what I have available

find the images as easily as possible. I considered the database driven site

as an option, but am coming to the same conclusion you have, it probably is

not worth the (huge) effort at this point in payoff of sales. There are some

off the shelf options, like Hindsight's Stockview and SearchLynx, but they are

still relatively expensive and require a huge effort to get set up with keywording,

not to mention the technical hurtles getting a online search engine working

smoothly. If anyone has ideas on how to make a html based site effectively searchable

with keywords I would be all ears. My webdesign skills are quite rudimentary.

My current website is set up by sites I visit, and the photographs are presented

in a storyline following a linear order, not the best way to present a stock

photo buyer with images for sale. One option might be to make a html page for

each photograph that I want to market, and include keywords on that page so

that a keyword search will uncover that photograph.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.oboylephoto.com/ruins">www.oboylephoto.com</a></p>

<p>  </p>

I had similar feelings about thumbnails when I started designing my site years ago, so I went with a linear layout so that the viewer would have to look at the images in the order that I layed them out in. Its not ideal, but it is the best solution I have come up with for a simple html designed website. Granted people have to put more time into viewing my site, but I think it is a richer experience and allows a photojournalistic approach to telling a story buy guiding the viewer through a series of images.

<a href="http://www.oboylephoto.com/ruins">www.oboylephoto.com</a>

Hi all

We made a trip to Florida last year, went to the Everglades, Key

west, Dry Tortugas and Ft Lauderdale area. We are thinking of a

return this year but want to miss the over developed areas around

the big citys like Miami and FT lauderdale. Are there any areas in

southern florida on the Gulf coast where we could string together a

10 day trip, visit the everglades again but not feel like we are

constantly driving past strip malls and paved over wetlands? The

drive from the Fort Lauderdale airport to the Keys is a depressing

drive, nothing but everglades be reclaimed for massive housing

developments and depressed strip malls and schlock development. Is

Sanibel island a good option? The dry tortugas visit was a highlight

of our trip last year and we would like to return there again to

camp for a couple nights.

I took a look at Hindsight's Stockview, it looks very comprehensive. Can anyone comment on how easy or difficult implementing this software is, and how user friendly working with the searchLynx is for allowing online catalogue searches?

It seems like a good solution, expensive, but compaired to building your own software...

Is anyone aware of any off the shelf solutions for building a

database driven website for searching, viewing and selling stock

photographs? My web design skills are limited to html based work, so

database driven sites are Greek to me, and I really don't have the

time to learn programming skills.

If no off the shelf solutions, then recommendations on possible

routes to take to get to the result of a searchable stock

collection, preferably with the possibility of making e-commerce

transactions and various licensing options available. Best current

database solutions?

Thanks all, I have been to P'town and Wellfleet wildlife sanctuary many times, both great spots, but I was hoping for some more local location less known about. Probably isn't such a thing since tourists (me included) run the place over and are hiding behind every tree in mid summer. Since we will be staying in the Chatham/Harwich area, any easy kayaking spots would be welcome, I have a ocean kayak, but will be paddling with less experienced people. Also, any failed industries on the cape? Since my photographic interests lie in the architectural ruins realm, any sites that fit that bill would be greatly welcomed.