Real Life Photography/Photo Editing II - NO IMAGES >100kb

[AimPoint 0]

Nice lens that 100mm raedor.

Random pic.

[HotShot 0]

Excellent colours Aimpoint.

2 randoms from a walk in the woods.

...

...

[Colossus 2]

While I was on vactation in München/Munich we drove around to Salzburg, Innsbruck, Dachau and Bregenz. A very beautiful region I must say. But since I only had my Nokia N75 with 2 megapixel with me, it wasn't very much to capture picture with. So one day we went to Innsbruck and I saw a Nikon D40 with two lense (AF-S DX Zoom-Nikkor 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G EDII and 55-200mm f/4-5.6G ED) for €499. I figured, why not? We hadn't bought a real camera since our old Olympus OM10 broke down. By then the vactation was at its end so I didn't really get to capture that many pictures, but I've selected two of my favorites.

Bregenz with the 55-200mm

KZ Dachau in the bunker where important prisoners were kept. Taken with the 18-55mm

I'll get there, just need some practice with the ISO, shutter time, focus, etc.  

[Daddl 10]

Nice pics everyone - a bit heavy on the planes (cool shots, tho).

To keep true to this tendency I've got something airborne, too: two pics I took in today - both shot with an EOS 450D, Canon EF 70-300 IS USM!

[raedor 8]

Ha, I like the second one.

I never owned a lens with IS, does it have any sense or use? I mean, does it really add something or is it just something to play?

[Daddl 10]

Well, yes, it does for three reasons:

1. It really helps stabilize the picture when using a long zoom length (like my EF 70-300 IS USM, which resembles a 112 - 480 zoom when considering the 450D's crop factor), or when working in bad light conditions. By rule of thumb you usually require a shutter time of about t = 1 / (2 * focal length) for a picture to be sharp without using a tripod - and the IS really helps to reduce that by 2-3 steps (i.e. 1/125 sec instead of 1/500 or 1/1000 at 480mm zoom).

2. In bad lighting conditions it also allows for longer shutter times, which is especially usefull if you don't have a good low light lense (f/1.4 or f/1.8). For example the new kit lense (18-55mm) now comes with an IS, which - considering it's cheap max apperture of f3.5 - really makes it a much more usefull lense, especially indoors when using a flash is not possible.

3. It allows you to play more with your aperture. Light conditions may force you to use a wide aperture, but you dislike the smaller focus depth. Now IS allows you to step up your aperture  2-3 steps (Canon claims up to 4 steps but that's a little too optimistic in my opinion), obtaining the effect you require.

Of course longer shutter times are of no use when trying to freeze moving objects. Although I have to say that modern IS lenses offer a second mode that at least helps with making panning movements more smooth (i.e. stabilizing only one axis, while you follow the moving object along the other).

The only disadvantages are the extra price tag and the fact that the IS consumes quite a bit of battery, reducing the number of shots you can take with one charge. If you have a fully loaded backup battery at hand (like I always do - when travelling sometimes even two or three) you shouldn't have any troubles, even when the next AC plug is a few days away. Also you can simply switch it off if energy consumption is of essence.

Regarding the extra cost this is not as big an issue as one would think (at least for non-L type lenses). The new kit zoom cost just 80 Euros (difference in price between a simple 450d body and the kit) and offers a much, much bettter optical performance than the old kit lense, at the same price and it now features an IS, too. The EF 70-300 USM IS is an excellent zoom lense with great optical performance - and still it only costs 500 Euros total.

I think in part this is because Canon nowadays faces competition from manufacturers like Pentax who have build-in optical stabilization in the camera body - allowing them for cheaper lense construction. So at least for consumer lenses Canon simply can't afford to make the IS too expensive.

So in general it's a usefull feature, especially in zoom lenses. I still prefer to use my beloved EF 50mm f/1.4 for low light conditions, even if it's fixed focal length makes it less flexible - sometimes a good aperture simply can't be beaten. Of course if that lense came with an IS... now that would be truly great!

[raedor 8]

Thanks for that posting...

[Jahve 0]

Sony A200 18-70mm

VIEW LARGE

[Hornet85 0]

Just played around abit

[Daddl 10]

Went to the races yesterday. Good weather, cold beer, beautifull horses:

My personal favourite:

A true winner!

[Daddl 10]

Some more shots:

[Daddl 10]

Some garden shots:

[HotShot 0]

Where did number 4 come Daddl?

I like the picture from KZ Dachau colossus, though I can't help but think some twisted girl is going to come running down the corridor shrieking.

[Daddl 10]

Number 4 (I assume you mean the donkey) was part of a fun race for kids - some donkeys and mules (the mules were quite fast - the donkeys simply didn't bother). He came in last...

Some more pics:

[Daddl 10]

By the way, I wrote a little command line tool for labeling, scaling and resizing image files. It can read various metadata tags and write them into the image, while scaling the image to a given pixel length and making sure the resulting file doesn't exceed a given filesize (like this forum's 100kb limit). Text gets automatically rotated to the long side of the image.

Makes it very easy to prepare images for posting to the forum: just export them from Lightroom (or whatever you use), give a max image size (I usually use 640pix for the long side) and a max file size (like 99kb), add a labeling expression and hit it. For examples just check my pictures above (the labeling expression used was "{Copyright} (f/{FNumber} {ExposureTime}s {FocalLength}mm)\n{CameraModel}, {Lens}").

More Examples: example 1, example 2, example 3, example 4

There's a shitload of parameters available (all optional apart from the labeling expression which can contain multiple lines of text). You can get it here (just 25 kb).

Microsoft .Net 3.5 required.

It's not perfect as it only works on whole folders right now, and also there's a problem when the text needs to be rotated and it's wider than the short side of the image. I might add a gui interface later, but that's a low priority for me as a command line tool is better for automation.

Edit: the tool got updated. You'll always get the latest version via the above link.

[the_shadow 0]

today o got me a new baby.. or actually, 2 babies...

one Nikon D300 and one Sigma 18-50 f2.8 EX HSM to go with the D300...

right now im charging the battery (the ones from the D50 dont work in the D300 but the D300´s work in the D50 go figure)

after this i´ll take a little walk and see if i can get something nice out of this baby without having figured out all the settings :P

so hopefully in the future i will post some more pics here then i have this far..

oh, and im currently saving for atleast 2 new lenses for it aswell

hmm... i guess i´ll be eating noodles the next 6 months aswell....

[sparks50 0]

Thought we needed some more colors in this section

Taken at a civilian broadcasting unit in western Norway, while hiking.

Bigger

[Jahve 0]

Maltese Sunset

View large

[raedor 8]

Thanks Daddl, maybe this little tool motivates me to post some more pics again.

[POPKA 0]

Aptly titled Douche

[Marcus-Ergalla 0]

[Daddl 10]

You're welcome raedor. I've updated it to allow people to set the desired output language (for date, time and numerical data), and added a few presets (the one called 'BIFORUM' results in images compatible with this forum's rules and with a label as below). I've uploaded the new version here (same link as in my first posting).

Anyways: here's some more photos. Lot's of butterflies!

Edit: added the link to the updated tool.

[Daddl 10]

Flower sharing:

Foursome:

[the_shadow 0]

are you using a macro lense for those butterfly shots?

btw...

a nice pic that unfortunatly is WAY over 100Kb (about 250 i think)

oh, and it´s cropped to about 25% of the original shot (some bastard stuck his head up just infront of me when i took the shot)

taken with the D300 on 6 images/second and a Sigma 70-300 f3.5-5.6 lense (lense to be replaced by a Sigma 70-200 f2.8)

still trying to learn all the cool things about the D300

[Daddl 10]

No, all pictures were taken using a normal Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 USM IS lens. I didn't include the lense specification in the image this time, but you can see the focal length used for the image next to the copyright note.

I don't find it too hard getting good macro shots with a normal zoom (before I bought the zoom I managed quite well with a 50mm fixed focus lense). I simply try to get as near as the minimum focus distance (~1.5m) allows me to, also cropping helps (though most are still at least 50% of the original size).