hique

"Your other comments just further prove my point of how ignorant most folks are about the realities of hunting and trapping"

I am sorry, but I am also ignorant about those realities. What are the realities of hunting and trapping?

I understand that some hunters organizations care about the wildlife for a reason that is obvious and polemic, but I am really looking foward to understand those realities.

"as "sporting" to me as fishing with hand grenades"

Lol. Good comparison.

I think it's a good thing to invest in a Photoshop CS.

Thinking of expenses, you may consider that it may be cheaper than getting a traditional darkroom :)

Gimp's interface is terrible. Even terrible if you are already used to photoshop interface.

Good luck.

"Even better at 5.6 or 8, and started to really get soft quickly after that"

So you can conclude that it really depends on the lens. Not all lenses suffer the same way.

I always used a crappy zoom of mine at 28mm and f:22 with no softening compared to F:8, but I also used another lens that at 300mm was very ugly at F:16 already.

It depends, I guess. Someone correct me if I am wrong.

By the way, you are indeed correct Paul: One shouldn't take the job then try to think how to do it. Big mistake.

Anyway I am looking for help in the community.

Well Paul, my impression on Ellis post is that one shouldn't be considered a "hero" in a forum that pretends to allow people to interchange knowlegde if he is not ready to share it.

If someone is not interested in sharing/receiving information then there is no need for this person to be here.

I am interested in sharing and help in any way I can. I hope I can help you in the future.

The lasagne secrets are indeed the most valuable. Lol.

Thanks for the support so far. I'll surely post the results under the same topic.

By the way, thank you very much to the other two gentlemen who were king enough to help me with this situation.

I sincerely thank you both.

"How much are you willing to pay for a consulting fee? Yo uare doing a professional job and you want professional advice. That means my or someone else's time and experience is worth something."

Following your logic no question on photo.net would have answers. Is this a photo community or a place to hire consultants?

Very sad to see that attitude coming from a Photo.net "Hero".

I am being contracted to shoot some products for a catalog and it was

given me as a reference the Hermes products that I attached together

with this question.

I would like to analyze the lighting in this pictures and hope that

somebody could give me some directions on how to achieve this

lighting.

I would dare to say that all of this pictures were made with a big

haze light as a backlight and another haze light as a fill (or maybe

a big bouncer). Does this seem correct so far?

The pink towel picture have a warmer look. The light seems more

natural (natural light maybe?).

All of the pictures have a very soft look, someway softer than what

I'm used to see. What would be neeeded to achieve this look? I

understand that the shallow depth of field contributes to that. Maybe

a little overexposure?

Well, I hope that someone can help me 'dissect' this lighting

situation.

Cheers<div></div>

I don't think you should be worried. I have the ED version and it is not that good either. It's just Ok as you pointed.

I guess the ED should decrease the chromatic aberrations and increase contrast a little bit. But it won't be a big difference.

Good luck.

"...to a very silly question"

I don't think it is a silly question at all. It's funny but not silly.

Actually, the idea of setting the camera is terrific. I will do that myself. Will show you the results :) Cheers.

"Are you sure you're Brazilian? You seem neurotic enough to be a New Yorker"

Flávio is probably from São Paulo, our brazilian version to NY.

Just kidding. Lol.

The Ai-s 28mm has supreme sharpness, but only close-up. So I think all 28mm lenses from nikon should perform similar. Don't worry so much about it.

To answer my own question, I did an experiment in my work today.

I printed a 6x4cm print in the Frontier and then scanned with a Microtek 6800 flatbed (not the best scanner, just the one that was available).

The results show that there is no benefit from scanning the print. The transitions are indeed smoother as someone said, but that comes together with a huge loss of sharpness. Interpolation caused the picture to pixelate a little but provoked less loss of sharpness.

The friend of mine who defended the theory pointed in his defense that the scanner is not very good, but I hardly believe that it is the limitating factor (probably the print is. Maybe 40dpi as someone pointed).

He also said that the digital printing (Fuji Frontier) renders some artifacts, and that the original print should be better using an analog minilab or enlarger. I can even agree with him, but anyway the print would still hold little detail.

Thanks for all the responses.

Cheers.

"there will be noticeable- not bad, but noticeable- cropping during scanning (there is on Noritsu machines)."

Is this true?

At least Frontier Minilabs are able to scan the whole frame without cropping. Seems a big problem on Noritsu minilabs the lack of this control. It's hard to believe.

Hi there.

I would like to ask you about a question that is becoming a myth to

me.

It's the second time I hear about it from two different working

people of the graphic industry.

What they tell me is that if you want to make a big print it's better

to scan a smaller print with a good scanner than to interpolate the

file.

For instance, if you need to make a 20x30cm print at 300dpi, but you

only have a file with 10x15cm at 300dpi, you should print it with

10x15cm and then scan the print with a good flatbed scanner setting

the size you need to print (200% in this case, at 300dpi).

They suggest that this will create a file with better quality than

interpolating with photoshop.

Actually I don't think it's possible since we would only lose quality

when we are transfering the data from media to media. Another fact is

that it would be necessary to GAIN resolution in the scanning

process, what I believe, is impossible.

Did anyone ever heard about this theory. Is there any logic behind it?

Cheers.

How about starting like most people suggest: Getting a 50mm

A Nikkor 50mm 1.8 is cheap and has very good image quality. Actually I had a bad experience with one, but I know that the lens is supposed to be terrific.

"If your editing results in a sharper image, then the file size will increase"

Is this true? This doesn't make sense to me. JPEG should get bigger as long as the file has an increase in the number of different tones of the image.

Using unsharp mask would only increase edge contrast, so I believe it should even decrease the number of colors (by increasing contrast).

Can someone clarify this question?

Cheers

"another brand that carries a camera that would be equal or superior to the D2X Nikon"

Canon Does. But it isn't cheap. Do you have any SLR Lenses?

From my experience non-pro cameras can't do the AF-C very well. If you are not using Silent Wave lenses I believe the AF system will not be fast or precise enough to achieve the focus correctly.

I would trust the manual pre-focus technique.

Good luck.

I like the DG-2. I use it with a F-3 and a F-70.

I wish it had more magnification, but it is much better than trying to manual focus without it.