earl

Tax write-off, indeed. Â Those pics are from the "engine tent" at a wrecking yard, and I was there mostly to grab some generic texture reference. Â These are just the few 'cool' photos I took. Later, I went to two other yards on the same road and they both denied me access, for different reasons. Â I'm sure it's because they think I'm undercover and looking for stolen cars. Â I was lucky they let me into the first one without too much trouble.

Nice photos guys, but the links are a bit tedious. Either that or MTV shortened my attention span. Guess what I bought? A threefiftydeeeeeeeeeeeee!

I think I've already collected all the old school that turns my crank (all studio recordings from the Doors and Led Zeppelin all the Pink Floyd that matters, Jethro Tull, the Band, CCR, Johnny Cash, Bob Dylan). 90's/seattle: -soundgarden -pearl jam -alice in chains -stone temple pilots Newer worthwhile stuff, most are below pop radio radar: -Modest Mouse -Broken Social Scene (got tickets for show in Ottawa) -Apostle of Hustle -Sigur Ros (saw 'em live in Brisbane) -Eggstone -Mike Doughty -Gomez

I was in your situation, having never left Canada except one short trip into the US. Since I started working for BIS I've had the chance to go to Australia twice and Czech Republic once. I've tried to make the most of those travels by visiting other places along the way. It's made me realize how easy it can be to travel if you have simple needs (and flexible work schedule). The tradeoff is living out of a backpack. When people ask me where I live, I never know how to answer. "I was in X, I'm staying with a friend in Y, and I'm on my way to Z". Some of my friends have bought houses for their families. I bought new socks. Any time I want to buy something new I have to think about what I will leave behind to make room in my backpack. Chile would be a great place to go. I'm considering Peru in January or February, and maybe in the summer a cross-Canada roadtrip with friends.

The first bunch of pics are taken on Kuata island, the last two are from Naviti. I would have preferred to stay on Kuata longer. Naviti is large but featureless, not nearly as interesting to explore. Kuata had lots of rock features and caves:

Ordered a Rebel XT and Sigma 18-200mm today, I'll have it next week. Â Meanwhile I had some prints done from a short stopover in Fiji. Â 35mm film is still such a great medium, when you now how to use it. Â Unfortunately I used an archaic manual SLR and underexposed almost everything, so the ones that could be saved are still a bit grainy and contrasty after adjusting levels. It also only had a 50mm prime lens, so too wide for wildlife and too narrow for landscapes. Can't wait for the new camera..

Here are some sites to look at before buying... General info: Â www.stevesforums.com www.dpreview.com Shops: Â http://www.bhphoto.com http://www.sigma4less.com The two shops are some of the highest recommended for reliability and low prices. Â I read some stuff on stevesforums.com about sketchy dealers through amazon.com so be wary. Â The 17-40mm is a strange choice when you already have the 18-55mm kit lens. Â It's definitely a much better lens, but why bother with the kit lens? Â It's also a bit slow, not ideal for low light. Tovarish - Nice photos, I'm moving to Ottawa in mid October.

Just from my recent experience using a 35mm SLR with a 50mm prime lens in many situations, the most common problem that came up was not having a wide enough FOV in tight spots or on big lookouts. I think 50mm is equivalent to just over 30mm lens on the 350D, so I don't think I'd be happy with just a 28-200mm lens like Canon offers, or having to swap often. I also tend to try minimizing the amount of stuff I need to carry or travel with, so battery grip is out and no extra 70-X00's lenses to carry around. The only canon lens I'm looking at now is the 17-85mm IS, but Sigma 18-200mm is still looking a lot better when comparing prices and telephoto range. I should get a chance to play around with both lenses on the weekend and get a better idea of what I want.

Hm, me too.  I hope it's not a problem. So I had a question for the Digital Rebel XT users (just Supah and Denoir?).  What lenses have you got and what do you think about them so far? I've heard people say skip the kit lens and just get an all-rounder zoom lens like the Sigma 18-200mm f3.5-f?  I've heard  other people say they wish they would have kept the kit lens for the minimal price difference.  After all, it's a faster lens and might be useful if you expect to shoot in low light situations. I started shopping and pricing so I'm terribly afraid that I might buy one soon.  After all, I can write it off as a business expense. And then I saw the Bigma... 50-500mm Â

A higher f-stop value (stopping down) is a smaller aperture diameter. Â I think you meant "fairly small aperture". You should try doing a super long exposure. I've seen some that are 20min exposures of a landscape after sunset, it looks really cool.

1. Nambucca Head 2. Byron Bay 3,4,5. Pacific Hwy scenic lookout directly before Byron Bay 6. Surfer's "Paradise". Emerald Beach, just north of Coffs Harbour was also really nice but I didn't get as many nice photos there. Â It would have been worth exploring more but i just arrived there before sunset. Emerald Beach:

Great photos Gagamel! Â I like Denoir's last seagull shot too, they seem to be a bit more majestic than usual, these 'rats of the sky'. I just returned from a 2000km roadtrip up Australia's south-east coast. Â It's a shame the days are so short, otherwise I would have had a lot more time to visit places. Â Once it gets dark there's nothing left to do but drive...

Went on a little walk today. Â I planned to hike down to the shoreline, but the slope down to the ocean was terrible, dense scrub and there were more houses around than I thought. Â Rural australians aren't too keen on trespassers, and besides I was standing near a pile of bones when I made my decision to turn around. Â I'm pretty sure they weren't human, but not 100% Â Here's a wider shot taken in automatic mode, to show just how crap my camera is when taking landscape/distance shots. Â Granted it was a brightly lit midday shot, so the burnout can be expected, but at 1/500th shutter speed, it shouldn't be this blurry. It's certainly starting to show its age. My camera sucks.com The manual controls are too tedious to use on the C-3000Z, and forget about the manual focus, it's impossible. Â Every photo session puts me one step closer to a new camera purchase. Anybody know what those plants are called with the huge stems? Â It's entirely strange, looks like an expensive garden plant, but size factor 10. Â I was standing in the middle of a thicket of these, thinking it would be about right to see some dinosaurs walk into the scene, when something nearby got spooked and went running away. Â I couldn't see what but it make a racket.

Thanks for that, some interesting stuff there. Yup that looks familiar. Â I spent two years working right near there, if you follow that link, then go north east from the ferry terminal by about 2km, you'll see the triangular shape of Boundary Bay airport. Â Directly north of that are some big rectangular buildings. Â Those are glass greenhouses. I worked in the northernmost one, which is 13 hectares (32 acres) of tomatoes. Â

Has anybody found any major US Navy ships? The only place I know to look is Norfolk, VA and I did manage to find this: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=....k&hl=en

I couldn't find the button to bomb a target? Is that only available in Google Plus?

Buh, it's contagious!! I want one. Is there not any kind of information displayed while you are taking the photo? I've never looked at one, for fear I might actually buy it, but I expected live histograms overlayed/projected into an optical viewfinder. I suppose professional simply don't need these things. I'm trying to talk myself into (and also out of) buying an Olympus C8080. But in the meantime I've been reunited with my old clunker SLR, the only thing mildy electronic about it is a light meter. I think I'll put that to work and re-learn the fundamentals. But now for some photos. Some friends came to visit the other day. Unfortunately, they couldn't stay long!

Some recent ones from NV & AZ Grand Canyon / West Rim panorama HIRES.

If you are hunting lightning at night it's useful if you can manually operate the shutter (i.e set it to infinity) a feature which should be found on your camera IIRC. Â You also "need" to be a good kilometer or two away from your'e intended target. A good tripod is also a neccesity, since mostly you'll get exposure times well over ten minutes. Just have some patience in the beginning to find the most active area. Good luck, mate! <!--emo& NSW, Australia, 2004. Â I used a lot of different settings and only a few turned out. Â Lots of noise in these, it's an old Olympus C-3000Z and I think it was 8 sec exposures w/ ISO 200. Â Some were corrected with PS filters. This bottom pictures shows how I was moving the camera all over (houselights) but when the lightning struck it exposed the scene in a fraction of a second so the horizon isn't too blurred. Â It was really dark out so there wasn't much light besides the lightning flashes.

I think you mean the photos from Poland. Wieliczka salt mines. There's all kinds of strange things inside, including a lot of religious carvings. There's even a number of chapels at different depths in the mine. Colossus, it's "Last of April" celebration. Really big weekend in Uppsala, with half a dozen different traditions all playing out at the same time, and lots of crazy students.

Vasa Museum, Stockholm, Sweden: http://www.baconbomb.com/photos/sweden/31.jpg Okanagan Valley, Canada [aka Home Sweet Home]:

Wieliczka, Poland: http://www.baconbomb.com/photos/wieliczka/04.jpg http://www.baconbomb.com/photos/wieliczka/08.jpg http://www.baconbomb.com/photos/wieliczka/16.jpg Uppsala, Sweden: http://www.baconbomb.com/photos/sweden/05.jpg http://www.baconbomb.com/photos/sweden/13.jpg http://www.baconbomb.com/photos/sweden/15.jpg

Here's a bunch of photos from recent travels. Cesky Krumlov, southern Bohemia:

I used a 4x5" Wacom Intuos for a few years and it was a little bit too small. Â It also seems that 9x12" would be a bit too large, but it depends what you want to do. Â I think some graphics people (like for realistic painting style) prefer a large surface to work on. Â For my work I am always using a keyboard as well and I think a 9x12" would take up too much room on the desk. Â I'm extremely happy with my Wacom Intuos2 6x8", and it matches the size of my laptop so it backs nicely into a laptop compartment in a backpack - which I have found quite handy in the last year or so I've had good luck and good prices from http://www.coolgraphicstuff.com in New York and I dealt with Anthony Coffee there. Â A WACOM rep sent me to him because he has cheaper prices than their online store, he also has first access to refurbished tablets which I haven't heard anything bad about. WACOM INTUOS 2: Tablet Dimensions: 13.5" x 10.2" x .6" Active Area: 6" x 8" Pressure Levels: 1024 Resolution: 2540 lpi Max. data rate: 200 pps Accuracy: +- .01" Tilt Range: 50ÅŸ-60ÅŸ USB connection http://www.wacom.com/_db/reseller/intuos2_bro.pdf

More photos from october in BC, originally in colour, but B&W seems to get more out of the landscapes.