bill_schmidt

<p>I took the one off of my D300 as soon as I opened the box; same as with the D70 it replaced. I covered the LCD with clear plastic self-adhesive film that they sell for PDAs and smart phones to give a bit of protection.</p>

"A Field Guide to the Insects of America North of Mexico" by Donald J. Borrer (!) and Richard E. Wright. Peterson Field Guides. Houghton Miflin, Boston. My copy 1s from 1979; first published in 1970.

Well, if the group is about 10 people and each is bracketing three shots (my metered exposures were in the range of about 30s) there wasn't a whole lot of time to do flash exposures as well! And, to be frank, few people anticipated using flash so didn't bring them.

 

Also, the shoot is very "linear": people start at one end, compose and shoot, and then move on. Not too much backtracking to re-shoot. But flash would make some shots easier, as long as the flash coverage was very wide.

I went to the Canyon before HDR was available so I just merged the images (mostly two) the old fashioned (!) way. Most came out quite well but I could have used a -2 or -3 on some.

Regarding flash - no one on the tour I was on, that's zero out of about 10 people, used flash. You surely will be smacked upside the head if you fire off a flash while someone next to you is in the middle of a 10s exposure! Most were contemplating merging two or more images to achieve a simulation (a la HDR) of a wider dynamic range. Personally, I shot 3 of each composition 0, +1 and -1 and some could have benefited from 5 exposures, each differing by a stop. Shot raw to boot and still could've used the five sometimes!

OK, here's one vote for going on a tour. I went with a company based in Page (nearest town). I booked a PHOTO tour, not the regular shorter tour for just sight-seers. All the participants were serious photographers, with tripods, who mostly knew what they were doing. The tour lasted two hours in Upper Antelope Canyon and, most importantly, the guide was very contentious about keeping other tourists, on other tours, out of our way. The non-photographers on the other tours had no idea what we strange people were doing, standing next to our tripods, staring off into space, but the guide did and he shepherded all of them away from our shots. No flashes going off in the middle of bracketed 30 second exposures.It worked great and was worth the little extra money it cost.

I have a Wacom tablet, an Intuit I believe. P/N on back surface is ET-0405A-U. Works great w/CS-2 and CS-3. Pressure function works fine, can switch between landscape and portrait modes to match your display, if the display can do that too. Wouldn't go back to just a mouse with Photoshop. No problem with the software on XP.

Regarding getting around. Old NYC question: "It's about ten blocks away - do you want to walk or do we have enough time to take a cab?!"

 

Especially true when going cross town (like from 3rd Ave and 50th ST to 9th Ave and 50th St) or anyplace downtown (below like 8th St) where the streets start going every which way, rather than on a grid. Also, don't forget Central Park gets in the way above 59th St to 110th St, 5th Ave to 8th Ave for busses and cabs. Also makes walking prettier but less direct.

Outside St Patrick's Cathedral (5th Ave and 50th St) after 10 AM on Easter Sunday is the "parade". More funny hats than you'll see in a lifetime!

I found it to be just the opposite. EVERYONE at the booths were friendly. I was especially interested in inkjet papers and most either gave me samples (to print on) on the spot or will send me them, when I requested them. I played with the latest P&S's from Canon (for my wife at Christmas), the M8 (one day to replace my sold-last-year M6) and the Nikon D200 to see if the finder was really better than my D70's (it is). Everyone was friendly and helpful.

Tread lightly - may be due to the PhotoPlus Expo (from which I just returned) special pricing which expires on Nov. 17. May be a real reduction OTOH. Check out before jumping in.

Go to "Program Files\Adobe\Photoshop CS\Plug-Ins\Adobe Photoshop Only\File Formats" and delete Nikon NEF Plugin.8bi. Everything will then go back to normal. Nikon View puts that plug-in in when it's loaded. Rude, isn't it?

Boy, if sombody had just stumbled upon this web site in the past couple of weeks they would have seen threads with about shooting pregnant sisters-in-law and a first gay wedding! What a hoot!

Oops - another one. Convert to Lab mode and delete the a and b channels.

Yes - Gradient Map. Very simple and often quite effective.

I just came back from Grand Teton and can confirm that there are flowers everywhere. The best I saw were on the trail to Granite Canyon and Marion (sp?) Lake, reached from the aerial tram at Teton Village. Many people remarked how nice they were at the end (top) of the tram but they were nothing compared with a walk about 1 mile further up the trail.

I have a morning free in Wichita this Wednesday, before an

appointment at Boeing. The only obvious place is the zoo. Anyone

have any other ideas? I'm open to anything - landscapes, city

stuff/street, intersting buildings (either going up, existing or

falling down(!)).

On the other hand, if you use the military definition of "right", the ocean will be on your right if you travel North on A1A...

Ditto, as of two weeks ago. Found just one patch of poppies - in full bloom but nothing extraordinary. Lots of Lupines, and others mentioned by the other posters. Nice walk, however, after a day of business at Beoing in Mesa, and the mountain was pretty illuminated by the setting sun at about 6:30. A bit different than the scenery here on Long Island.

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=32-105-221&depa=0

 

$155 if it's an upgrade.

I've got to respond to this seemingly automatic "...where crime is always a concern." type of comment. NYC is the safest large city in the US. Safer than Washington DC, Philly, Boston, LA, Detroit, Chicago, Miami, St Louis, San Diego, etc., etc., yet no one throws that comment into descriptions of THOSE cities.

 

Back to the subject - I cannot think of two places on Earth more dissimilar than B&H and Fiji!! Have fun!

OK, I know this is trivial but I want to discuss Winogrand's photos (live). Is his last name pronouced WINE-o-grand or WIN-o-grand?

Southwest flies only 737's. Big overhead bins. It's not a communter airline per se and dosen't fly commuter or regional planes. Only 737's.

From someone who travels a lot:

It depends on the airplane! Large airliners like 757, 737, 747, all the Airbus a/c have pretty good sized over-head bins and room under the seats for the "standard size" carry-ons. Regional jets or turo-props like from Embraer, Shorts, Bombardier, etc. have smaller over-head bins and less room under the seats. You'll be allowed to carry-on your legal-sized "carry-on" but you'll probably have to gate check it if the flight attendant or gate agent recommends it because in may not be safely stowed. This is a good deal - it gets put on top of (usually) the checked luggage, dosen't get "examined" (!) by baggage handelers or the security folks out of your sight and it arrives at the bottom of the stairs, just when you do, at your destination!

Are we saying it's good for pigment inks from an Epson 21/2200?