Topic: Bought a new Camera! :woohoo:

[MiniSimp]

Hey Mini, lets talk about filters.

What should I buy? Do I need to have all three, or more? Also, how much do they run $$ ?

First, a source http://www.bhphotovideo.com/ is where I buy 90% of my equipment.
Now for the interesting part; with digital cameras I have not found a need for filters, in fact it often makes the picture worse. Your camera will automatically adjust for high contrast situations, and you can manually adjust for florescent/incandescent lighting.

The only filter I use is Adobe Photoshop. It has every filter built in.

Example

[MiniSimp]

 

[BigMike [OP]]

You cheater



I picked up the package, now I am going to figure out a way to strap it to my backpack and ride (mountain bike) home and check it out!!

[MiniSimp]

You cheater

Honestly Mike, I love filters for film cameras, and hate them for digital cameras. I feel the cameras correct so much now, they are not needed, the camera is digital, why not filter digital.

[brainlessfool]

what size flim does it take?

[MiniSimp]

what size flim does it take?

SD

[brainlessfool]

SD

what's SD? I know 110, and 35mm. even used a polarod. never bought any SD flim.

[MiniSimp]

what's SD? I know 110, and 35mm. even used a polarod. never bought any SD flim.

It's digital Brainless!

[BigMike [OP]]

Man someone needs to get him a brain already!

[BigMike [OP]]

Hey guys............ THIS CAMERA ROCKS!!!!! I spent all last night playing around with it!

I read the entire manual, learned a bunch of stuff, and will be taking a TON of pictures in Las Vegas this weekend!

I have not gotten a chance to take any cool out door photos yet.

Here is a shot in macro mode in doors with no flash with the focal point located to the upper right at the screw driver, with the 58mm 0.5X wide angle lense on, but at only 1600x1200 and with medium compression/quality (max res is 2816x2112):
craftsman1600.jpg (533 KB)

The Video mode is sweet on the camera, and takes amazingly clear and beautiful videos, 640x480 @ 30 fps & stereo 44khz audio. It has a wind filter in case its windy, and also you can set the sound level for the two mics, zoom while recording, it adjusts the contrast on the fly (something my old camera did not do), and you can take snap shots while it's recording that are saved as pictures.

It must have 100 more options than my older camera, so it will take me some time to get use to it I LOVE IT! Awesome

I can even adjust how wide I want the focus area to be.

[MiniSimp]

Good job Mike!

Now try something...

Take the same photo with the F-Stop set around 4.0
Then take the same photo with the F-Stop set around 32.0
This is easiest done while in AV (Aperature Value) mode, you set the aperature and the camera automatically sets the speed.

With the F-Stop at 4.0 the background will be fuzzy (kinda like the picture you took)
With the F-Stop at 32.0 the background will be as much in focus as your subject.

Portraits are usually done with an F-Stop around 5 or 6 and a 50mm lens (AKA a portrait lens) at that focal length there is the least amount of distortion, and it does not take away the 3D look of the image (as it would with a 300mm focal length)

Also, you need to mess with the White Balance setting while indoors.
What I will usually do is take a plain white piece of paper, or sheet, and take a picture of it where I would have my subject (fill the whole screen with the paper), then in your camera set that image as the white balance. It automatically sets it and your colors will be perfect.

[BigMike [OP]]

Thanks for the tips. I will play with the F-stop for sure.

I just had the white balance on auto mode most of the time because we have both incandescent and fluorescent lighting in the house (in the above picture, the incandescent bulb was directly above the subject, while the fluorescent lighting was in the background in the kitchen).

I have not learned how to set the white balance, but I know it has that option. I will learn that soon!

[MiniSimp]

because we have both incandescent and fluorescent lighting in the house

That is the exact reason to set a manual white balance.

[MiniSimp]

 

[BigMike [OP]]

ahhh any one can do that

[MiniSimp]

ahhh any one can do that

Very good grasshopper, now read the chapter on white balance!

[brainlessfool]

That is the exact reason to set a manual white balance.

Ya know I don't know what ya's talking about.

Butt I'm tell Al Sharpten. 

[BigMike [OP]]

I just took my first real pictures with the camera. They can be seen here: http://board.marlincrawler.com/index.php?topic=31754.msg390452#msg390452

All of these pictures were taken with the WIDE ANGLE LENS ON.

One thing I noticed is that my old camera would usually have a bluish haze all over the picture making it fuzzy, and I always have to use the "Auto Levels" feature in Adobe, but with the new camera, the "Auto Level" feature makes NO noticeable difference. The contrast is much stronger and yet the bright areas are softer.

I am using the "P" mode (Program mode), which is what I always use for no good reason, so I never played with the F-stop or the aperture. I did set the focal point to the area of the bumper that I wanted focused on, and I was trying to get an out-of-focus appearance with the objects deeper in the image (backgrounded), which I think I got in a couple of the images, but it doesn't look good for this style of photography I believe.

Check out this picture, in its original form, which shows the focus on the bumper and blurry background objects. At the time I aspired to achieve this affect, but after looking at it on the computer screen, I believe it is a bad idea for this type of picture:
IMG_0097.JPG (0.98 MB, 2272x1704)

Mini, so you are saying that if I increase the F-stop (maximum on this camera is 8.0) then it will bring more of the picture into focus, correct?

[MiniSimp]

Mini, so you are saying that if I increase the F-stop (maximum on this camera is 8.0) then it will bring more of the picture into focus, correct?

That is correct. However, when you increase the F-Stop, the speed will have to be slower to compensate for lack of light let in by the smaller shutter. I won't shoot freehand with any speed slower than 60.

[BigMike [OP]]

As I was reading your reply, I was about to talk about hand-held vs. tripod, and then you stated your last sentence

When you say "slower than 60", are you referring to 1/10th of a second?

My camera can adjust its shutter speed between 1/3200th to 15 seconds with various incrementations in between.

The F can go from 8.0 down to 2.7.

[MiniSimp]

When you say "slower than 60", are you referring to 1/10th of a second? My camera can adjust its shutter speed between 1/3200th to 15 seconds with various incrementations in between.

Sorry Mike, I miss typed, it should be 1/60th of a second.
Yes, slower would be below 1/60 and into smaller fractions and whole numbers, faster would be above 1/60 up to your 1/3200th

The F can go from 8.0 down to 2.7.

Ok, so f8.0 will be most in focus, f2.7 will be subject only in focus.

[BigMike [OP]]

Thanks mang
Yesterday was my mothers BD so the family went out for dinner, and while taking pictures indoor in low lighting, it SUCKED. Everything was wwaaaaayy red. So without the manual, I began trying to self-learn how to set the manual white balance, which I thought I figured it out, but I still couldn't get a good picture.

On my camera, when I select the manual white balance, I can focus onto something and hit the Set button. The shutter will open and close and then the white balance is set, I think. So I tried setting it to my white dinner plate, but after I set it, everything would still be super super red. And when I then used the flash, everything turned our super super blue. It was pretty crazy!

So I brought the manual with me today, and when I get a break I might read up about white balance

[BigMike [OP]]

Ok, I read the manual and learned all there is to know about white balance In side of my office, our wall is painted with a very light olive green that has always turned out a bit on the blue side, but now with the white balance corrected by using a sheet of white paper, it is finally light green

So I just went out and took some more pictures of our new front bumper, with the wide angle lense on again, and man, they turned out UGLY!!

Look at this area from one of my pictures, it is so GRAINY!! This is cropped from the original image:



Here is how it was shot:
Resolution: 2272x1704 (2nd largest option)
Compression: Fine (out of Super Fine, Fine, Normal)
F-Stop: 8.0
Shutter Speed: 1/2000
White Balance: Custom taken to a white printer paper in direct sunlight
Location: Out side in direct sun light
Flash: No flash
Lense: Wide Angle lense, X0.5 w/Macro
Shooting in Macro mode: Yes
Zooming within Macro range: Yes
Picture appeared to be in focus on camera view finder: Yes


Ummmm... Ok, I just realized that the ISO was set to 80, would this cause a non-moving subject to become grainy?

Help this young grasshopper

[MiniSimp]

Ummmm... Ok, I just realized that the ISO was set to 80, would this cause a non-moving subject to become grainy?

Help this young grasshopper

Mike set your ISO to 200 and try again.
With ISO the lower the number the higher the quality, so I'm not sure where you are getting your grain from.
Set it to Superfine also.
Also make sure you are Optical zooming, not Digital zooming. Turn off your Digital Zoom if you can, never turn it on again. You get the same result from croping part of an image in photoeditor.

[BigMike [OP]]

Yes, I HATE digital zoom and feel it is a complete waste of time.

I will play with the ISO and try again. I also forgot to add that I am shooting in mode "M", fully Manual mode where I control the F-stop and shutter speed.

Another question: The wide angle lense will prevent the corners of the image from focusing, right?
Maybe this camera can't focus up close when using the wide angle?

I LOVE the wide angle lense. I feel like I never want to take another picture without using it, which sucks because it makes the camera so long that it won't fit in my pocket with it on

[BigMike [OP]]

AHHHH Dang, Mini, you are right and I was wrong, I WAS shooting in ISO800!!

Hang on a second...........

[MiniSimp]

Try your lowest ISO 50 or so.
Manual gets tricky, make sure your speed is high, then adjust your F-Stop to bring the balance back to center, if you can't then lower your speed until you can.

Keep a small F-Stop to focus the corners (F8.0 I think you said was your smallest?)

Try that same shot for me in AV mode and see what it does.

Optical zoom all the way in, then get as close to the object as you can and still have it able to focus.

[MiniSimp]

AHHHH Dang, Mini, you are right and I was wrong, I WAS shooting in ISO800!!

Hang on a second...........

Shoot in ISO 50

[BigMike [OP]]

H U G E  DIFFERENCE!!!!







As for the F-stop @ ISO80, I had to reduce the shutter speed to close out all the light, and camera automatically adjusted the F lower and lower to 3.2

WHAT A DIFFERENCE! Glad I learned this one such an unimportant picture! Imagine if I had taken a weekend of pics on a trip, only to come home and find them all grainy!

[BigMike [OP]]

Whoops, I mean to say that the shutter was 1/160 on the ISO80, NOT 1/1600, so I updated the picture.

ISO80 is as slow as I can go, and F 8.0 is the largest F "number" I can go.

Manual gets tricky, make sure your speed is high, then adjust your F-Stop to bring the balance back to center, if you can't then lower your speed until you can.

Ok, I am doing it the other way around. I am cranking the F-stop to 8.0 with a very slow shutter, and then I am speeding the shutter up until the histogram gets centered, then I shoot.

Keep a small F-Stop to focus the corners (F8.0 I think you said was your smallest?)

So a F-stop of say 20 is "smaller" than a F-stop of 3?

Optical zoom all the way in, then get as close to the object as you can and still have it able to focus.

WOAH! Really? I, for NO reason, have always thought to not rely on the multiplication of the lense and always try to take the picture zoomed out as far as possible, and then bring the camera physically as close to the object as possible while still being able to focus (this camera does has "Super" Macro which is pretty sweet). So you zoom around a lot then?

Try that same shot for me in AV mode and see what it does.

BRB