Having the opportunity to work with a great photographer like Joe McNally taught me a valuable lesson about photography, why do I own so much useless crap? There are many things on my photography wish list that I hope to purchase this year. The Canon 5D MKII, with the 580EX II Speedlite and ST-E2 Transmitter Kit (cue the Homer “Mmmmmmm donuts” sound effect) for one. (more…)
Two days ago Canon announced the next revision of their popular Digital Rebel line, the ::amazon(“B001XURPQI”,”Canon EOS Digital Rebel T1i”)::, a.k.a. the Canon 500D. Briefly speaking, it offers 15 megapixels, 720i and 1080p video at 30 and 20 fps respectively, and pretty much all the other recent Canon body features (LiveView, dust reduction) as well. ISOs 100-3200 are offered by default, with expanded settings of H1 (about 6400) and H2 (about 12800) available if enabled, the sample images I’ve seen so far are quite impressive. It’s due to ship in May. Very impressive for the new “low end” of the Canon line, this leads me to talk about what I perceive as a narrowing of the DSLR market. (more…)
I recently was talking to an aspiring wedding photographer about gear. She has a ::amazon(“B0007QKMQY”, “Rebel XT”)::. I wrote her an email that outlined what gear I thought she should be looking to get. (more…)
In my last two articles, I talked about how to select tripod legs and a tripod head, with that gear assembled it’s time to get out into the field and learn how to use your new tripod to best advantage.
One of the primary reasons we use tripods is stability. It is simply impossible to hold a camera steady enough for a critically sharp image as shutter speeds get longer and longer, and longer shutter speeds are often an inevitable requirement of smaller apertures and wider depth-of-field. (more…)
Every now and then a device comes along that makes you think, how did I ever live without this? How many of us would ever think of venturing on a long drive without our cell phones? For me, that device is my Epson P-5000. Two years ago, while transferring photos from my card, to my G5, the computer decided to “burp”, okay not a burp, it was more like a projectile vomit!
This is the second of a two part article on selecting a tripod, and covers the selection of tripod heads and quick-release systems. The first part discusses tripod legsets and can be found here.
For most nature photography tasks, I’d recommend using a large, high-quality ballhead. The best of these feature a large ball, adjustable tension, and a can hold quite a bit of weight. The Kirk Enterprises KB-1, Arca-Swiss Z1, Markins M-20, and (if you can find it) the Burzynski Protec are all excellent choices for general-use tripods. (more…)
One of the most common questions I get from students who are just starting to get serious about their photography is “what sort of tripod should I buy?” This quickly breaks down into two questions, “which tripod legsets?” and “which tripod head?”. In this article, I’ll talk about how to select a good legset for your needs, in part two, I’ll cover tripod heads and quick-release systems. (more…)
So, my friend J.D. and I are up photographing along the South Fork of Bishop Creek in the Eastern Sierra. It’s autumn, there’s excellent color in the aspens in the valley, and we’ve scouted the area the previous day to estimate when last light will fall on the aspens. We arrive ten or fifteen minutes before, set up our tripods, find our compositions, and casually embrace the “If it looks good, shoot it….” rule, shooting as we chat and watch the shadow of the valley wall creep towards the edge of our compositions.
That last moment approaches, and just then…. (more…)