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Archive through July 31, 2008

Reality TVClubHouse Discussions: General Discussions ARCHIVES: Jan ~ Apr 2009: All Things Technical: The Help Desk: Digital Camera/Photography Help (ARCHIVES): Archive through July 31, 2008 users admin

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Kookliebird
Member

08-04-2005

Monday, April 21, 2008 - 12:23 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Kookliebird a private message Print Post    
Serate - it sounds like a good deal to me as 'free is a very good price'. I came late to this discussion, but "with the FinePix S1000fd offering only the ability to boost sensitivity to (hopefully) gain a high enough shutter speed to prevent blur at the expense of image noise" means that you can change the ISO from 100 to whatever you need in order to take pictures in lower light. It would be the equivalent to buying 400 ISO film versus 100 or 200 ISO. As you go higher, the photos will become more grainy (noise in the digital world)

For example, you want to take a picture in a museum where flash photography is not allowed. You could shift your ISO on the digital camera to 400 or 800, which would allow 4 or 8 times more light into the photo than if your ISO was at 100. If the photo is blurry from being hand held, then you could continually move the ISO up and shoot the photo again at 1200.. 1600 to 3200. The trade off is the 'noise' which might render the photo less crisp than the visual.

A point of advice: Don't worry too much about absorbing all the information in the manual immediately. Just start shooting some photos around the house to see what you get. Then, I would start looking at the book so you understand what the possibilities are for improvement. But, please try to get a few shots in before you go too far. (Take a picture of those cookies you are baking! My first digital photo was of a Diet Pepsi can at my feet.) Otherwise, the manual may overwhelm you up front.

Serate
Member

08-21-2001

Friday, April 25, 2008 - 8:41 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Serate a private message Print Post    
OK so I'm ashamed to admit I didn't do much of anything with our new camera until today at Kansas Speedway. I did mess around with different settings - this camera is so dummy friendly that when you choose a setting it tells you on the LCD screen what it is for! Wasn't impressed with the pictures I took during the meet and greet with the Indy drivers after the ARCA race but the rest of the pictures turned out ok. All in all I'm pretty pleased with what I've taken so far. Hubby's plenty pleased with the zoom. Today was overcast, tomorrow is supposed to be bright and sunny.


These two are the same picture with the 2nd picture being zoomed all the way in.


Lucky shot? I thought this pic wasn't too bad considering the cars were going 160mph+ at the time I took it. #28 [the first car] was who I was cheering for as he is from Iowa too.

My brother is freaking because I'm not "utilizing the picture quality capabilities" of the camera. I have it set on the 2nd lowest setting, 2M. I can go op to 10M F or 10M D which are the settings he thinks I should use. It's just a NASCAR race.
Don't tell Watching I said that!!!!

Thanks again everybody for your input. I think I'm going to be happy with this camera and I KNOW I am happy with the price!

Serate
Member

08-21-2001

Friday, April 25, 2008 - 9:59 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Serate a private message Print Post    
OK so after playing around with the pictures I realized that my brother was *gasp* right - I have the quality set to low on the pictures. On my old camera 1M meant the pictures would be around 1,000kb in size. So I just assumed that on this camera 2M meant they would be around 2,000kb in size so the quality was better. I see they only are around 500 - 600kb so am assuming [when will I ever learn NOT to assume?] that the picture quality would be better if I turned it up like my brother said. SO I'll be playing around with that too. [AND reading the manual when I get back home!]

Eeyoreslament
Member

07-20-2003

Friday, April 25, 2008 - 11:24 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Eeyoreslament a private message Print Post    
Camera memory is relatively cheap these days, so most people will recommend that you turn your picture quality all the way up, to capture the MOST detail. The reason is that you can blow the pictures up a lot larger with more detail than less. This is illustrated when you try to blow the 1 megapixel picture up to an 8X10 and it comes out looking all "blocky". A 10 megapixel picture at 8X10 would be wayyyy less "blocky".

So, the reason that you would shoot at the best quality is because AFTER the pictures are taken, you can always shrink big/high quality pics and remove detail, but you can never blow up low quality pios because there is no detail to draw on.

Jimmer or Bob might me a better quthority on why your 2mp pics came out as smaller file sizes than the 1mp pics. However, I would think that with the technological advances they make, they probably store pics more efficiently nowadays. However, you can take two 2 megapixel pictures of different things, and both will come out different sizes. I think if you're taking a picture with a lot of detail and tons of colors, like a crowd of people, that would be a larger file size. whereas a picture of a brick wall, or a very plain landscape may be a smaller file size because there are fewer colors, and less details fo the camera to store.

Personally, I would recommend taking pics at the best possible setting, so you can always blow up and crop. For example, if that last picture was taken at 10 megapixels, you might actually be able to crop it and JUST have a picture of the two cars, and the picture could still be a decent size, with decent detail. Memory is cheap nowadays, and even a 1 or 2 gig card can hold hundreds of pictures. And if you're close to home, you'd be moving those pics over to your computer (and hopefully backing them up on CD/DVD too), allowing for your next photo event.

Jimmer
Moderator

08-30-2000

Saturday, April 26, 2008 - 8:35 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Jimmer a private message Print Post    
Yes. What Eeyore said.

Bob2112
Member

06-12-2002

Saturday, April 26, 2008 - 10:31 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Bob2112 a private message Print Post    
Ditto.

Eeyoreslament
Member

07-20-2003

Saturday, April 26, 2008 - 10:45 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Eeyoreslament a private message Print Post    
LOL thanks guys! hahaha

I'm off today to practice my sports photography at my bf's rugby playoff game. It's difficult though, because at the field they play on, the fans ALL stand on one side, and so it's hard to go up and down the sidelines to take pics. BUT, if you go on the other side, you are facing the sun, so the lighting is trickier, AND you have the busier backgrounds with all of the fans there. I've gotten some good shots of guys in scrums or something, only for there to be a smiling fan with a coffee perfectly aligned in the background to be distracting. I have a 70-300 lens, but obviously I'm not loaded, so it's not like a 1.8 or anything, so sometimes the fans can't be blurred out, depending on how far away the action is.

Mind you, I've learned from last week, so I'm going to be a bit more aware of those things, now that I've made those mistakes in the composition. It's hard with sports, because action is moving so fast, that you don't always have time to calculate the perfect composition, etc.

I'll share some later maybe....

Jimmer
Moderator

08-30-2000

Saturday, April 26, 2008 - 12:04 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Jimmer a private message Print Post    
Not to suggest too much PhotoShop trickery but you could always try a little gaussian blur with a mask to get rid of the distracting background details.

Eeyoreslament
Member

07-20-2003

Saturday, April 26, 2008 - 12:45 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Eeyoreslament a private message Print Post    
Yeah, I'm not too adept at PS, but I've downloaded a TON of the Lynda.com videos (during the week free trial you can get, and a Firefox media downloading add-on), and I INTEND to watch them, to teach myself PS, but I never really actually sit down and watch them! LOL I keep meaning to.....

I saw a cool link on a photo site I surf, that had a video for how to add DOF using PS and I thought it was very cool. There are some awesome tricks out there, for making pictures look good.

Personally, I'd rather USE photoshop if everything else in a photo is good, except a few little details. I feel there is more integrity in making a shot the best it could possibly be and sticking it on your wall, than having the shot be ALMOST perfect, but not letting yourself photoshop out of some sort of foolish pride or something.

I really would like to get into the Photoshop side of things, but I am really OCD about my files and learning a good workflow, etc. So I am always putting off starting. It's like having a ton of pics in a box, but never knowing where to start, to get them up on your wall finally. LOL

Julieboo
Member

02-05-2002

Saturday, April 26, 2008 - 1:38 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Julieboo a private message Print Post    
Eeyore, you make it sound like Photoshop is some easy magic trick. You have to be talented for sure to make photoshop that influential in a photo. Yeah, a simple glaussian blur is pretty easy, but sometimes just to make a simple fix requires a lot of talent...

Jimmer
Moderator

08-30-2000

Saturday, April 26, 2008 - 3:11 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Jimmer a private message Print Post    
I agree that it is obviously best to start with as good an image as you can get. That said, some photographers have the idea that any adjustments in PhotoShop after the fact is cheating in some way. IMO it is not cheating at all. It is simply a completion of the overall image as desired by the person creating it. Most if not all pro photographers photoshop the final product.

Eeyoreslament
Member

07-20-2003

Saturday, April 26, 2008 - 9:27 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Eeyoreslament a private message Print Post    
Yeah, I look at PS as just another step that technology has given us. Like in the old days when maybe we had filters added to the darkroom workflow, so you could come out with different levels of exposure on the papers, or whatever. It's just another advance in technology that lets pictures look better. People can say it's cheating, but then they should technically be stuck in the silver glass plates for their picture taking, or whatever they used at the turn of the century....

Holly
Member

06-19-2005

Sunday, May 04, 2008 - 10:09 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Holly a private message Print Post    
I'm trying to post a picture into my profile but it's too big. Can anyone help me resize it, please? I'm clueless about photo editing. Maybe I can email it to someone for resizing?

Jimmer
Moderator

08-30-2000

Sunday, May 04, 2008 - 10:13 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Jimmer a private message Print Post    
You can mail it to me if you like, Holly. Just check my profile for my email address.

Holly
Member

06-19-2005

Sunday, May 04, 2008 - 10:20 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Holly a private message Print Post    
Thanks so much, Jimmer. It's on the way! :-)

Holly
Member

06-19-2005

Sunday, May 04, 2008 - 11:10 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Holly a private message Print Post    
Thanks, Jimmer.

Serate
Member

08-21-2001

Monday, May 05, 2008 - 1:45 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Serate a private message Print Post    
Eeyore, Jimmer, Bob, THANKS SO MUCH. Sorry it took me so long to get back in here. Now I have to find my book - took it to Kansas - to see what the difference 10F and 10D are tho I guess the better quality of the pictures is the one that has the least amount of photos available.

I really like the camera. One think I didn't realize is that it takes decent video clips with sound. Small, but works in a pinch when Jack does something funny.

Thanks again for all the advice and info!

T

Eeyoreslament
Member

07-20-2003

Friday, May 09, 2008 - 11:49 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Eeyoreslament a private message Print Post    
Hey Canon owners....check this link out (maybe not for the technologically fearful):

Canon Hacker's Development Kit

Your point & shoot camera has been keeping things from you.

Has it mentioned, for example, that it has a motion sensor for photographing lightning, or that it can shoot in RAW format? We’ll bet it hasn’t even told you that it can shoot at speeds up to 1/25,000th of a second.

Well, if it happens to be a Canon, it can.

The Canon Hacker’s Development Kit (CHDK) is a free download that can expand your camera’s options like strapping a JATO rocket on a Chevy Impala.

CHDK’s been around for a while, but Lifehacker just wrote an article that makes it understandable for mere mortals. What is it? Why do you want it? How do you use it? It’s all there.

Open up communications with your camera. Let the healing begin.



Eeyoreslament
Member

07-20-2003

Wednesday, July 30, 2008 - 4:48 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Eeyoreslament a private message Print Post    
WOO HOOOOO!!!! I just got home from picking up a 50mm 1.8 lens (didn't bother with the 1.4, as it was double the price, and double the weight), and I start my Digital Intermediate Photo course today. Hopefully I can learn and practice a bit more than I did in the Beginner version at a different photo school.

PS - I found some cool looking flowers on the way to work the other day, so the next day, I took my camera to play with some macro shots. It was hard because it was windy, but I had a few bees join me for the photo shoot. Quite fun! I put them up on my Flickr account, if anyone feels like browsing. I don't post anything photoshopped, so I'm sure they could be much improved in post-processing.

Flower Photos

Kookliebird
Member

08-04-2005

Wednesday, July 30, 2008 - 5:42 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Kookliebird a private message Print Post    
I browsed and enjoyed the purple flowers ! Very nice !

Jimmer
Moderator

08-30-2000

Wednesday, July 30, 2008 - 7:24 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Jimmer a private message Print Post    
I enjoyed looking at the pictures. Macro photography is a whole new world. That should be a fun lens for you to use and optically it is one of the best and easiest lenses to build so they are usually awesome quality at a reasonable price.

Juju2bigdog
Member

10-27-2000

Wednesday, July 30, 2008 - 8:45 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Juju2bigdog a private message Print Post    
Nice. Don't know the flower, but those are honey bees.

Egbok
Member

07-13-2000

Wednesday, July 30, 2008 - 9:35 pm   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Egbok a private message Print Post    
Hey Eeyore, congrats on your new lens!! The flower & honey bee photos are nice. I look forward to seeing the pics you might be sharing in the future.

Eeyoreslament
Member

07-20-2003

Thursday, July 31, 2008 - 1:42 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Eeyoreslament a private message Print Post    
Hmmm....50mm seems a bit "close" still for some things. What millimeter-age would you say a regular P&S is set at about? How small a number? 20? 10?

Jimmer
Moderator

08-30-2000

Thursday, July 31, 2008 - 6:26 am   Edit Post Move Post Delete Post View Post Send Jimmer a private message Print Post    
Most of the P & S wide angle end of the zoom equates to about 30-35 mm on a full format SLR. But remember with your 50mm on your camera you have the multiplier effect so your 50mm seems like a 75mm which is a fairly long lens.

Not to confuse things but in reality most P & S lenses are 6mm but that is because the enormous multiplier effect of the small sensor requires an extremely wide angle lens. The 6mm acts like a 35mm on the P & S same as the 50mm acts like a 75mm on your camera.