The Photography Thread

[Herbalizer]

A couple of Photos from last Tuesday

[Magnakai]

Oh yeah, pictures.

All from SnowDay '09





I've been taking a lot (some really good ones IMO!) but not posting them at all. I need to share!

[demon9k]

....as it would allow the sky to be a similar darkness to the rest of the image.

Yeah I have seen thats a problem already, I'll take a look at your suggestion.

The last shot looks like it's focused on the tree branches. Since the rest of the landscape is very far away, it's going to get a bit blurry. If you close the aperture down, the depth of field increases, bringing more into focus. Do that, and with a longer exposure to compensate, you should be okay. Definitely a tripod shot tbh. I'd also focus close to infinity on the lens.

I'm going to head back to the same spot on Saturday or Sunday and try it again with your suggestions and see what I can come up with. I'd never even heard of "focus close to infinity" before so thats good to learn.

oh and I think your second shot there is great, love the trees.

Tbh this thread is just full of great photos, hope I can comment on more in the future.

[PeteJ]

Great load of photos being posted, always a pleasure to look through

As always I've been rubbish and hardly used my camera. Determined to get going again soon, hopefully this weekend. To help kickstart I've started to look through some old shots and I've uploaded two which took a bit of editing. Just firing up Photoshop is more than anything else I've done in months!

For some reaosn this one looked much better before it was uploaded to flickr. Not sure about it anyway. edit - replaced, bit better.

[winky]

I was mainly using the auto modes to start with but I used "TV" to allow me to use the setting on my camera which takes 3 snaps quickly at different exposures. Maybe I'm jumping in at the deep end? I can't help myself though, the more complex the better imo. Love figuring stuff out.

As for the filters I was thinking of a polarising filter. From what I've read/seen it looks like the sort of thing I want for landscape photography. Do you have any experience with them?

Cheers for the info! I've got loads of walks around Scotland planned over the next year, I hope to get a lot better at this.

To echo what dan said: set the camera in AV and and set a small apeture (ie f8 - f11). Then focus on something about a 3rd of the way into the image, ie for the first shot focus on the road. This is a reasonable attempt at achieving focus for the full scene. For a more technical discussion on focus for landscapes you should read up on hyperfocal distance.

Its not a bad idea to take several exposures this may help you understand the exposure. If I have time I always take multiple exposures for landscapes just to be sure I get the image I want.

If you are shooting from a tripod you want have to worry about shutter speed because you shouldnt have any problems with camera shake. For the 400D if you are not on the tripod your shutter speed should be 1 / 1.6x your focal length to prevent camera shake blur. Ie for a focal length of 50mm your shutter speed as a minimum should be 1/80s.

If you are new to photography the best thing is to get out there and keep shooting - this will help you master the technical side of photography aand you will develop the artisitc side.
I find landscape photography some of the hardest to do so you have certainly jumped in at the deep end

more snow:

[Garf]

Some lovely stuff in here again. All the snow shots are very impressive.

PeteJ - cracking shots. Love the beach reflection a lot. I assume the limo shot was a while back - not been that warm for months

[Garf]

A few from this morning..

[MonkeySteve]

Love that last shot Garf, great colours.

From the last week or so

[PeteJ]

Nice sunrise shots and loving that shot of the Bench, very nice indeed.

I'm having a problem with Flickr...I got a pic this morning of the sunrise and on my PC it is full of colour, on any other upload site it is full of colour, but on Flickr its like the saturation has been taken right out. Any ideas?

[winky]

colour profile? are you viewing it in IE?

[PeteJ]

Yeah, IE. Maybe if I shift the tone every so slightly it will behave...
heh, what do you know. It worked!


Hardly worth the wait mind

[funkydan]

Right chaps, bit of advice needed: can anyone recommend a decent, trustworthy online retailer? In a couple of weeks, I'm buying a Tamron 17-50mm f2.8 (Nikon fit) and am looking to spend about £270 (can't go much higher than that realistically, maybe £280). I don't want a grey import, and have not been impressed by any reviews I have read concerning these online retailers:

Camera Box
Warehouse Express
Simply Electronics

Can anyone recommend a reasonably priced site from which I can buy my lens, with free next day delivery by courier (also, it would be good if they would be able to deliver to my work address!)? Are UK Digital any good? Or a good shop based in the south east U.K.? I think I'm asking a lot to be honest but appreciate your help/advice, thanks.

Dan

[winky]

I dont think you will get it that cheap to be honest:

http://www.camerapricebuster.co.uk/prod250.html

I have only dealt with Jacobs from that list above and they were okay - not great but I had no problems with them, other than I head to phone them with one order to speed them up.

You dont want a grey, but if you reconsider I would recommend One Stop Digital (?260 delivered) but it will take a few days.
Once my order is shipped I usually phone fed ex and go pick it up but that suits me working near the fed ex depot.

[funkydan]

Thanks for wise words Winky. Having spoken to my boss, another keen photographer, he has told me that Warehouse Express are actually ok and he has bought many things from them including a very expensive camera and has always found them to be very good. So I am going to use them as they have it for £273.99 with free next day delivery. I'll phone them first just to check that it is actually in stock as apparently their online stock levels aren't always that accurate so I'll just check that they have it first before ordering online. YAY - can't wait, I can order it two weeks today and have it delivered on Friday 6th March if all goes to plan!

[charlesr]

Get em started early.