Photography Thread

[Wingspan]

If your digital camera supports the RAW format, there is no reason to ever have your camera create a tif or a jpg file.

You can actually change the exposure on a lossless basis on the fly using the RAW format, it produces amazing results.

[Susquehanna Birder]

I was reading somewhere online that when you need different light levels, you can use Photoshop to pull two exposures together: take the foreground with a flash & short exposure, then get the background with a long exposure.  I'm too lazy for all that

I'd rather go through the effort of making the shot right than trying to cobble together a frankenphoto.

What is cool is that the new digital cameras have "auto exposure bracketing" where the camera will take 3 quick pictures at different exposures when you don't have time to set up the shot.  I've played with this, but I'm mostly obsessed with taking pictures indoors with no flash.  I love my 50mm f/1.4 lens but you have to stand in the next room to take a picture with it because the field of view is so small.  I picked up a 17-200mm f/2.8 wide angle but it is still too slow for where I end up taking pictures.  I guess I'll have to invest in a flash with a diffuser.

Same here. I'd like at least two, so that I can run the flashes from off-axis positions.

BTW, the lamp was taken with a 17-35/2.8 lens. It does pretty well, but I understand what you mean about it never being fast enough.

[Yeti]

Those are some awesome pics Sus.  These are in my neighborhood from the fall with my wifes digital.

[Susquehanna Birder]

Looks like a real garden spot! I especially like the canoe pic...

[phattymatty]

i'm pretty sure to call it a neighborhood means you have to have neighbors within 100 miles.

[Susquehanna Birder]

[Susquehanna Birder]

[Diomedes]

please tell me you drank some of that, not just made pictures

[mussa]

some atv riding pics

[Susquehanna Birder]

please tell me you drank some of that, not just made pictures

Absolutely. Brought 8 bottles of the Barbera home, and dusted 4 of them with friends last night at dinner.

[Diomedes]

some atv riding pics

no shtein.  lemme guess you're the genius with no helmet or goggles

[mussa]

no genius. im the one taking the photo

[Susquehanna Birder]

I was reading somewhere online that when you need different light levels, you can use Photoshop to pull two exposures together: take the foreground with a flash & short exposure, then get the background with a long exposure.  I'm too lazy for all that

Ah, now I understand what this is about. It's something called High Dynamic Range (HDR) images.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_dynamic_range_imaging

The resulting images look pretty cool. Despite my previous no-frankenphoto stance, I'm going to take a stab at experimenting with that.

Until then, this is my latest light experiment. I thought I'd posted it already, but I didn't see it here, so here it is:

[Cerevant]

Wow - nice depth of field.  Small aperture & long shutter time?

I got a new flash for Christmas - what a huge difference.  I was using the zesty on-camera flash or nothing, and that was frustrating the hell out of me.  I only have family photos right now, but I'll have to post some comparison shots.

[Susquehanna Birder]

Both. Maybe 2 minutes of exposure, while I walked around the car and fired a flash unit I was carrying.

I just got a Canon flash unit, and it does an excellent job. I'm going to maybe get a 3rd, and maybe a couple of umbrella setups, and try for some portraiture work.