Your Cameras

u need a manicure, bro

i am simultaneously intrigued and insulted. could they be worked on as they are or would i need to grow them out?

ha don't be insulted I'm just fucking around. but since you ask yes they could be worked on as they are now.

is that a lot smaller than most medium format cameras?

TLRs are smaller than you'd expect (aside from the Mamiya Cs) - whether Rollei/Minolta Autocord or the various Chinese TLRs. About half the weight of any given medium format SLR, I'd say.

yeah, it's the same size as its rollei and yashica cousins. quite carry aroundable.

http://i937.photobucket.com/albums/ad215/jiaoqu/03790006.jpg
http://i937.photobucket.com/albums/ad215/jiaoqu/03790005.jpg

overexposed from the pearl river. i think portra 800.

how were those scanned? I'm sure you could get a lot more out of an exposed negative (are they from negatives?).

I mean "over-exposed negative"

epson v750? or v500. from negatives. you mean that i could get a better scan out of the negative?

http://i937.photobucket.com/albums/ad215/jiaoqu/comparison222.jpg

first, need to learn how to make proper exposures and focus this camera.

yeah, I'm sure you could. it looks like you're scanning the entire range of the *negative* (like white and black points determined by the unexposed sections, or pure black sections covered by the negative holder) but not the image itself.
it looks like you're scanning a lot of the "blank area" outside of the normal range of the histogram of a negative and are picking up a lot of gray as a result.

here's where I cut off the RGB channels when I scan fuji superia 400:
http://www.altairnouveau.com/various-curves.jpg

...which is already pretty low contrast, but your images look as if the highlights especially could be cut off a little closer

xpost

so your images look as if the lines on the right (determining where to cut off highlights) are much further to the right, which would create that gray tone. on my histogram you can see that there is *information* to the right to scan, but it's just the pure black of the negative holder. so if the scanner were to calibrate its white point based on the *purest white* it would come out somewhat gray since the purest white is much brighter than anything that actually appears in the image (since it's that negative holder shadow, essentially).

ah, alright. that explanation + diagram is excellent.

cool. I don't know the Epson scanning software or I'd be able to get more specific.
camera looks like it's making good pictures in any case!

disclaimer- i do not know much about photography, sorry for dumb questions.

i've got a superzoom p&s that allows for a fair degree of manual and programmed controls. it is often very sunny here. this is making dynamic range a bit of a problem when i shoot outdoors, i seem to get a lot of clipping. so, i tried to counter that by adjusting EV -1/3. this gave me a histogram shape without clipping, but i then have to go back in shop and adjust the curve both to the right and left. if i go full auto, i don't get as much clipping, but i can't force flash unless i'm in P or M.

is this a normal way to handle this problem? i mean, it seems to work, but i'm not very good at photoshop.

you're shooting digital? if so, that's kinda normal. you underexpose a bit to avoid clipping, and then later you go in and adjust levels or curves etc. to bring up the overall brightness.
it's one of the things I don't like about digital, since I can never seem to get the same sort of vibrance by bringing up an underexposed picture as I can by just exposing for a bight image at the outset. Recently I just decided to screw the highlights on a job I was doing in very mixed light, just to get the actual subjects right and it seemed to work pretty well.

an example:
http://www.altairnouveau.com/IMG_1781.jpg

not even worth worrying about the highlights here, imo
subjects are in deep shadow with backlighting. nobody really cares about lost detail in the trees, which are out of focus anyway.

looks good.

yeah, it's a canon sx40 i got pretty cheap, i wanted something that was versatile and easy to carry. at 35x i can take pics of my kids games and good video, and images are acceptable. i wanted a panasonic fz150 but i couldn't find one in time for a trip i was taking.

my pocket p&s is mostly ok, but really, for the kind of use i put it to, i might as well just use my iphone.

oh yeah the other thing is that it's hard to make *anything* look good in direct midday light.

yeah, i'm trying to learn the basics of like, just shooting good pictures using the basics. i need first to understand basic rules of lighting and composition. i want minimal fiddling around after the fact.

i am gonna descend on this thread like a plague of locusts next week. i need to start negative scanning, because i am shooting too much to afford to be able to process it all, & processing-only is feasibly cheap. i have some time off to play around with a negative scanner, but the seeming complexity of it scares me! it is amusing to me to hear hunter disclaiming a query w/"i don't know a lot about photography" & then going on to talk dynamic ranges, everything seems to get way complicated when you're into that side of things.

ha well i googled "highlight overexposure" or something and was thrown into forum hell, but it seemed like they kept talking about dynamic range and histograms.

THE ANSWER IS ... HDR

"okay so open up your negative scan, then choose 'edit', then select 'curves'"
"mm-hmm, done that, i'm looking at a straight diagonal line?"
"yeah you're going to want to make that into a right angle in the top right hand corner"

I can't really believe I was ever paying for developing + scanning before. there's no way I could afford that at the rate I shoot these days.
maybe when I've got a little time + energy, I'll outline how I scan, since I do a few things differently to get better results than the silverfast defaults would give. some stuff is going to be specific to the advanced version of silverfast 6 though. I shelled out for a used plustek w the advanced software and it's been worth it considering I would have otherwise spent over $5,000 developing and scanning the same quantity of film at a lab.

considering I would have otherwise spent over $5,000 developing and scanning the same quantity of film at a lab

i mean yeah this is a pretty compelling argument.
i would really be into reading about your process. it maybe just exists in my own head but i always think there's maybe a politics to analogue becoming digital, and being subject or not subject to whatever kind of techniques make this possible - all of my photo scanning is super quick & ready - ie untouched up, preserves selvages of photographs, &c - just because it has the vague integrity of 'i put an object in a scanner & this is it', without me necessarily having intervened in what the object was like, which i think kinda gets into some of the instagram-issues of 'what does it mean that i enhanced the colours'. (& i know that's pretty arbitrary!, & collapses when we consider the various interventions that have happened to a photograph before i scan it). but part of the slight nervousness i have re: negative scanning is having to accept a slightly more active role, which is just more stuff to think about. it's gonna happen, anyway, maybe starting next week. maybe i'll post some examples. i'm gonna be using a pretty basic setup, because i prefer scanning at the library to at home.

yeah there are so many technical decisions and changes made to an image at every stage from before pressing the shutter up to the final output (camera settings, developing settings, scan/print settings, color adjustments etc.) that I don't see how you could ID a point at which those adjustments are supposed to stop. I mean the real object is a negative with an orange cast, so there isn't going to be anything *but* massive adjustments from that point on. and the film itself might add a color cast, and the scan might add a slightly different color cast (it's not as precise as I'd like) and so finally I will once again change the color cast in post. I couldn't tell you whether each of those adjustments was a "correction" that got closer to what the colors were supposed to be, or just additional stages of my own transformation. none of those stages were the authentic, real deal object. because there *is* no authentic object. it's a photograph.
and man, if it were me, I'd suggest scanning at home because it can end up taking FOREVER and then you've got beer and music.
also I'd suggest getting archival sleeves that you can store in a binder, a sharpie, and a pair of scissors.

first graf of that super otm & worth remembering.

and man, if it were me, I'd suggest scanning at home because it can end up taking FOREVER and then you've got beer and music.

:/

see this is the thing that is bumming me out. my setup at the moment is an 11x17 only-slightly-scratched-up library scanner w/adobe elements* where i can do 36 photos in an hour. which is awesome. i am keeping a log & being able to process a couple of days shots in an hour is almost the maximum time i can afford it for it to be able to feasible. i'm not gonna ply you w/all my neg-scanning questions right now, but: this isn't realistic wrt scanning from negatives, right?

the sharpie/sleeve combo is one of the more appealing parts of this, the aesthetics of flagged up contact sheets are mega appealing to me.

http://www.npr.org/news/graphics/2009/feb/robertfrankatwork.jpg

*which is dope!, btw. just in case anyone does none of this & is looking for a solution to their problems, this is a kinda perfectly refined & light & straightforward image processing tool.

i am dreading some scanning i gotta do this week-- some local rag wants to run ten of my photos which is awesome but none of my drugstore scans are high enough res for print :(

http://www.mirrorlessrumors.com/the-biggest-camera-acution-ever-over-1000-cameras-in-one-single-auction/

this looks cool
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/wanderlust/travelwide-45-camera

I'm trying to remember the darkroom mechanics of loading a 4x5 film holder from my one photography class decades ago. I'm not so sure I'd like doing it in a changing bag every half-dozen exposures.

Real shame Fuji discontinued its FP100B45 film - I always loved the look of Polaroid B/W from 4x5s (IIRC Mapplethorpe used this for most of his B/W work).

Recent promotion + company bonus = maybe time to step up to full frame, but actually, when I do the sums, I can't afford it (also 6D isn't quite the do-everything camera it could've been, so I wavered over it for a long time). However, a certain UK chain is currently doing the Panasonic GF3 (which I've long fancied) plus 14-42 kit lens for £149 (about third the price it was launched at, two years ago). Now, the pancake primes (which are the reason to own this camera) are at least as much again (the 20/1.7 is still around £230, I think), but it is tempting. Obviously not superceding the 40D with this, but rather as a coat pocket/overnight bag kind of lightweight thing.

At least two or three micro 4/3rds users in here, right?

That's a good deal, so long as you're comfortable with the GF3's limitations. If you don't need a hotshoe and can deal with a practical ISO limit of 800, then go for it.

I noticed that Amazon US is running a promotion on the GX1 that would be much better, if it doesn't pose any shipping issues for you. Slightly less compact, but more modern innards and tactile controls.

http://www.amazon.com/Panasonic-DMC-GX1-Compact-System-Camera/dp/B00604YTFM/

Awesome deal on E-PM1, rough GF3 equivalent. You gain in-body IS and many people prefer its image output over Panasonic's. UK, too: http://www.amazon.co.uk/OlympusPen-E-PM1-Compact-System-Camera/dp/B0058GI8F0/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1369611256&sr=8-2&keywords=e-pm1

Sorry if I'm only confusing matters further!

Ah, the high ISO isn't so good on the GF3? That's an amazing deal on the GX1 - £131! I wouldn't fancy tripling the price with the power zoom kit, so it would force me to get one of the pancake primes.

Oh, I dunno. It really was just the appealing thought of going to Wells Street in the West End tomorrow and just picking up that camera, I hadn't done much research. (Meanwhile, I've spent more than the cost of any of these cameras on getting my 40D refurbed - still in the shop, waiting for the new shutter - so perhaps I'm just getting jitters from not being able to shoot at the moment).

Thanks for the tips!

The GF3's is essentially the same as the GF1's (which I had and loved), but colour noise starts creeping in even at ISO 800.

If you're really intrigued by the concept, wait for the inevitable price drops on any of the newer 16 MP bodies -- operation/AF speed and image quality in M43 land have advanced so much in the past year or so that they're much more pleasurable to use than the older stuff.

Just bought a Pany GX1 for $200 (these debuted at around $800 a couple years ago). It'll cost more to have the hot mirror replaced with a Wratten 89B, as this will be my dedicated IR camera.

BTW, as much as I love my EM-5, the Olympus m43 cameras with in body image stabilization are not a wise choice for IR conversions - the fixed sensors on the Pany bodies are much better (and a good deal cheaper) for this.

Saw a red GF1 in the window of a Brighton shop today for £169; they were doing a secondhand GX1 for £269. They also had a Bronica SQ-A + 80/2.8 for £500, which gave me the measure of their pricing (take eBay and double it). Wonderful little shop though.

Annoying n00b q:

A friend who's a photojourno came to visit recently and let me muck around with his camera for a couple of days, which really gave me the bug. So I'm thinking about taking the plunge and buying my first 'proper' camera. I have use of a Canon 550D (I think?) at work which i can take a passable shot with, but I don't think the kit lens is much cop (or maybe more likely I'm just shite). Either way I don't love using it. My mate's camera was a nikon, and I gather it's more personal preference than one being necessarily better/cheaper than the other(?), so I'm inclined to go with that (but a low end one, obv!)

I've been looking at the D3100 and D3200 - is there much to recommend the added expense of the latter? I don't see myself using it for video much (if at all) and I don't intend to print a lot (and when I do, it won't be poster sized). I've read that a D5100 might be worth going for instead if I can find it cheapish second hand?

I'm thinking about buying the body on its own and buying a thrifty fifty lens. I'm perfectly happy (happier) to go second hand - but are there any pitfalls I should look out for in doing so? Any recommendations for good uk-based (or london-based offline) places to go...? I'm guessing ebay and gumtree are probably not the smartest move given I don't know a lot about all this..

Thanks ilx!!

I shoot Nikon purely because I happened to find a D40x within my budget when I was looking to buy my first DSLR. I don't know much about the D3100/3200 other than that I assume they are the current equivalent of the D40x, which I really liked.

Given that those cameras are cropped sensor, you may actually want a 35mm lens rather than a 50mm to get the equivalent angle of view to a 50mm on full-frame/film. I have, and swore by, the 35mm 1.8 nikon lens, which is great apart from barrel distortion, but that can be fixed and is maybe more of an issue if you look for it. The basic 50mm is even better, great portrait lens on a cropped sensor, though may be manual focus only on the bodies you are looking at as I don't think they have built in focus motors.

I don't know what your budget is, but I've recently gone full frame so may be selling a D7000 body and the 35mm lens in the near future.

The D3200 has a lower readout noise sensor which according to DxOmark, is worth about 2 stops of dynamic range over the D3100. Pretty huge if you need to pull out shadow detail in processing.

In the U.S. there's not much difference in new price, B&H is selling the 3200 for $546 vs. the 3100 for $522 (each with the kit lens, after instant rebates), which would make it a no brainer. All of the camera companies are terrified by the current slump in sales, which means a lot of deals.

Cheers guys, dead helpful. Difference in sensor does make the 3200 more compelling for the small diff in cost - that's exactly what I was hoping to find out, as increased megapixels and 1080p video wouldn't have swayed me otherwise I don't think.

Also thanks for lens advice Michael - as I'm sure is dead clear, it's all v new to me so I didn't realise having a cropped sensor would have an impact on the view (though makes sense when you explain!) Given that I'm looking at just buying a body and a single prime to use as an all rounder to start, it sounds like the 35mm would suit me better.

(As amazing as that sounds, I think my limit is probably a fair old way off what you'd get for your D7000. The bulk of my budget is a £350 cash windfall I didn't expect to have, so if I go miles over that I might get myself in a bit of trouble!)

I found the D5100 for a fair bit cheaper second hand than I could get the 3200, so I've gone with that and bought a 35mm F1.8. The advice was much appreciated!

I've also found out that my old man bought an Olympus OM-2 for when I was born, so next time I'm up north I'm going to dig it out and see if it still works..

(ie if the horror of baby sktsh didn't crack the lens)

I also have an OM-2n, I like it but I'm starting to think it over-exposes a touch. Enjoy your new camera, will be expecting quite a few contributions to WDYLL2013.

Will do!

OMs and most camears from that era were designed to be used with 1.35V mercury batteries - nowadays you can only find 1.5V batteries, mostly, which work, but cause the meters to overexpose a tad. you can adjust the iso setting appropriately, or get the light meter set for 1.5V batteries by a tech xp

Great, thanks for that. Oddly i've never felt it was an issue, or at least noticable, with my OM-10.

yeah it shouldn't be *that* noticeable, maybe half a stop at most? could be you have a sticky shutter or your shutter speeds are off