The Photography Thread

[Richard.John]

Today I had play on the EOS Digital Kiss X, AKA the 400D or XTi in Europe and the US.

It's a nice camera, very similar to the 350D, though it felt less cramped at least to me anyway. Canon are aiming for a 45% market share (Japan) with this baby, and they could well do do it.

[PeteJ]

Quite a few shots this morning, unfortunately I missed some quality chances due to me fumbling focus, but such is life. Also went to the beach to shoot some birds (the next photography subject at work is 'Birds'). Unfortunately I submitted my gull for the last one ('Movement') so they are going to get much the same again! I won with my gull last week though, which was ace.
Not so happy with this one, other than the fact its almost exactly the same without the funky crop.


Plus some macro shots:

[PeteJ]

I've booked a week off work (week after next) and have decided to take a trip to the local zoo - any tips on shooting through glass?

[MartyG]

Yeah - don't use a flash

( a polariser might help too )

I like that last pic Pete - I see you're struggling to get anything in the way of depth with these pics, do you think this is a limit of your technique or simply the tubes?

[PeteJ]

It's the tubes, I'm shooting at about f/9 or 10 but still have almost zero DoF. I could be doing something wrong though, obviously! I can put it up to 15 or whatever but the shot is then too dark, and I've already put exposure bias up a few notches. Really speaking I need the 160mm macro or 50mm 5:1 macro lens to do this sort of thing, but its fun trying

[Gareth C]

No respect...

[MartyG]

Found this interesting spider hiding under an old plastic bag in my garden that use to be full of stones. It's a type of sac spider, certain species of this type are rare and have only 5 known sites in Cambridgeshire - I don't think this is one of them, but it was strikingly coloured.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/martypg13/226200112/

Got a few pics of a centipeed this afternoon too - but I'd unknowingly knocked the camera mode to shutter priority and ended up with little dof at all, so they're not really useable :/

[mr ooops]

wow nice shoyts marty, what camera u using (threads to long to try and find out )
jason

[MartyG]

Thanks. All the properties are listed next to the photo on the right on that link - it's a Nikon D50 with a 105mm Sigma DX macro lens

[PeteJ]

A dragonfly! Finally



And this little fella. It's a well known fact that these things have slightly out of focus heads to avoid detection. The shot itself is focally spot-on.

[mr ooops]

slightly off topic, have a canon slr camera model eos1000f (see attached piccy) , comes with a 35-80mm lens, no dust on lens or damage etc, any idea what sort of price i could sell it for (if its worth selling that is) need to fund a new camera
regards
jason

[MartyG]

That's not what this thread is about - but I'd suggest ?30-50.

[mr ooops]

ah ok, sorry bout that, but thanks for answering anyway :

[Ginger Tosser]

I guess with your name mistakes are fairly common then

[briareos_kerensky]

almost zero DoF. I could be doing something wrong though, obviously!

Nope, not really. The closer you get to the subject, the shallower DOF will get. With a 1:1 magnification ratio at f16 you should have about a cm to work with.

Really speaking I need the 160mm macro or 50mm 5:1 macro lens to do this sort of thing, but its fun trying

With a 5:1 lens you have to get really close to the subject, and sometimes a 5x magnification is too much for whole insects. Also you'll need a good ring flash and a slider for your tripod: such lenses do not have autofocus, and manually focusing with a fully extended lens it's very difficult...the viewfinder gets incredibly dark and the flash's focusing light will be extremely useful, not to mention that you'll be able to keep low exposure times with a good DOF without any external shadow. Also it's basically impossible to hold camera, a fully extended macro lens and ring flash without any support, and it's very troublesome to move the whole camera/tripod thing to focus the subject.