Any Photographers with DSLR's Around ?

[s/v Jedi]

I saw this today and captured it:



Amazing, isn't it? Also, Dutch friends left for a nice little cruise in their HR54:



ciao!
Nick.

[Zanshin]

I have a D7000 and am posting pictures daily on my blog pages (Trip Blogs). Prior to this trip I also got an Ikelite housing for the D7000 and am starting to learn the ins and outs of underwater photography; in fact I just came back from a dive and am copying pictures from the camera to the PC as I write this.

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by Zanshin

I have a D7000 and am posting pictures daily on my blog pages (Trip Blogs). Prior to this trip I also got an Ikelite housing for the D7000 and am starting to learn the ins and outs of underwater photography; in fact I just came back from a dive and am copying pictures from the camera to the PC as I write this.

Very nice

I'm too much of a coward and don't dare to take our Canons under water. I do have a cheap Canon Powershot with housing for that but that camera is beginning to annoy me... eying the G1-X now, for which a housing is coming also.

Please feel free to link some of your pics into this thread now and then

Here is a Passion flower, also captured this morning:


ciao!
Nick.

[Kai Nui]

Zabshin,
I highly recommend the Martin Edge book on underwater photography as a starting point. Watch you ports on the Ikelite. Aside from that, keep it well rinsed and it will last you.

[s/v Jedi]

Well, it looks like I'm confined to this thread as the mods keep whacking me in every other one; even in those where I didn't post for weeks or months

We're currently traveling through Panama and here's some sights that I captured:


And here is Vulcan Baru, the highest mountain in Panama at just under 22,000':


Both shots done with the EF 17-40mm f/4L USM on Canon 5D2

ciao!
Nick.

[s/v Jedi]

[downunder]

Well, it looks like I'm confined to this thread as the mods keep whacking me in every other one; even in those where I didn't post for weeks or months

Shame can't imagine why they would want to censor you.

cheers

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by downunder

Well, it looks like I'm confined to this thread as the mods keep whacking me in every other one; even in those where I didn't post for weeks or months

Shame can't imagine why they would want to censor you.

cheers

I'm out & about but no real serious subjects. It's not so much they want to censor me as that they can't handle all the complaints about me I may not debate anymore

ciao!
Nick.

[downunder]

Originally Posted by s/v Jedi

I'm out & about but no real serious subjects. It's not so much they want to censor me as that they can't handle all the complaints about me I may not debate anymore

ciao!
Nick.

I always enjoyed those debates and learnt much from both sides.
made for interesting threads as discussion developed. Often boring if everyone always agrees.

cheers

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by downunder

I always enjoyed those debates and learnt much from both sides.
made for interesting threads as discussion developed. Often boring if everyone always agrees.

cheers

Exactly. However, I suppose that participating in those, sometimes heated, debates requires a certain amount of brain cells to keep it non-violent and too many members take me disagreeing with them as a personal attack and report it. They also PM me hate messages etc. I got sick of that and the mods too I guess, so now it's only allowed to sprinkle love and flowers :S

cheers,
Nick.

[ReMetau]

Originally Posted by Zanshin

I have a D7000 and am posting pictures daily on my blog pages (Trip Blogs). Prior to this trip I also got an Ikelite housing for the D7000 and am starting to learn the ins and outs of underwater photography; in fact I just came back from a dive and am copying pictures from the camera to the PC as I write this.

Cool. How do you like it? We have a housing for our point-n-shoot, and we ruined one camera with it due to a bit of sand on the gasket. It would scare me to use my D7000 with it.

Here is a picture of our boat neighbor's car parked at the marina:

[deckofficer]

I know both my camera and my own skills are not anything near what has been shown here by Nick and company. But I am curious about zoom capabilities of all the high end cameras that the posters to this thread own. Mine is 12X optical with image stabilization and digital zoom I don't know, but it is crazy. I just shot this out my balcony overlooking the back yard and distant ridge line, maybe 1 mile distant. Hand held, this first one is normal focal length, note what appears to be a home on the ridge to the left of the tree on the left, near the top.


This is zoomed into that home, still hand held.


Can anyone share their zoom capabilities with those high end DSLR cameras?

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by deckofficer

Can anyone share their zoom capabilities with those high end DSLR cameras?

A term like 12x zoom doesn't really describe how much reach your camera has. It only describes the zoom-range of the lens. For example, if you have a 12-120mm lens, it is a 10x zoom... but 120mm isn't much reach at all.

High quality lenses are not "super zoom". The more zoom range, the more complicated the lens design and the less quality can be delivered. Instead, for high quality lenses, you have to switch to another lens.

But let's see, my standard lens is 24-105mm so just over 4x zoom. Another popular high quality lens is 70-200mm so less than 3x zoom. The best lenses are "prime" lenses which have no zoom at all, like my 100mm f/2.8L IS macro lens.

I just ordered a 8-15mm lens which is still a 2x zoom but ultra-wide fisheye.

So I guess you really mean how much reach one has to pull far away objects closer. To find how much reach a camera + lens combination has, you need to use a focal length number. These get multiplied by a factor determined by the camera sensor size, but most manufacturers tell you the 35mm equivalent directly to make this easier. For example, the Canon G1X is 15.1-60.4mm which is a 4x zoom. The big 1.5" sensor multiplies this to 35mm equivalent: 28–112mm. A smaller sensor would have multiplied it to much much more, so there you have it: a big sensor gives high quality but less reach for the same lens. If I would put that 15.1-60.4mm lens on my full frame 5D2 camera, it would just be 15.1-60.4mm because a full sensor gives 1x factor. On my 7D it would be 24-100mm equivalent because it has a 1.6x factor. On the G1X it is 28-112mm because it is 1.85x factor.

I see that Sony has superzoom's that have a 35mm equivalent focal length of 24-384mm which is 16x. At 12x I assume you have 24-288mm equivalent. My longest combination currently is 200 x 2 x 1.6 = 640mm. This means I can make that house more than twice as big as the Sony, but at the cost of a 6 lbs camera + lens + teleconverter combination of many thousands of dollars.

I am looking into buying a 70-300mm L-class lens from Canon which comes near what you can do at the high end, but at 70mm is still a telelens at it's widest setting. Also looking at the good old 100-400mm lens which is compatible with the 1.4x and 2x teleconverters I have.

Okay, here's my pic for today: it is a red-legged honeycreeper This is shot at a whopping 640mm focal length so Canon 7D body (1.6x factor) fitted with a Canon 2x Teleconverter (2x factor) to which is a 70-200mm lens fitted. This gives 200 * 2 * 1.6 = 640mm.


Nick.

[deckofficer]

That is red legs, cool. Blues pretty trippy too. Thanks for taking the time on the explanation, with what quality optics have to do, I wouldn't think zoom lenses could be as true as a single focal length. Next time you get the shot, could you take another at a standard focal length?

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by deckofficer

That is red legs, cool. Blues pretty trippy too. Thanks for taking the time on the explanation, with what quality optics have to do, I wouldn't think zoom lenses could be as true as a single focal length. Next time you get the shot, could you take another at a standard focal length?

That's the thing... no . "Standard" on a full frame camera is 50mm. On the 7D it is 31mm. The lens can only zoom out to 70 * 2 * 1.6 = 224mm. In order to make a second shot at standard length, I need to put on another lens... and we don't carry one. You can't see the bird with 50mm lens... we only discovered it because we saw it flying to the tree and found it using the camera viewfinder. I just ordered Nikon 8x42mm binoculars to help find the birds.

p.s.... what do you call "standard" length? The wide end of your zoom isn't standard length... it is a wide angle length. Standard is like you see it with your eyes for both field of view (angle) and size of target.

In terms of magnification: divide focal length by that standard 50mm. So, a 600mm lens (35mm equivalent) gives 12x magnification. You see a target 12 times as big as with bare eyes. Very different 12x as the zoom range on the Sony.

Now I get to post another picture Here's the moon at 320mm


ciao!
Nick.