Canon 7D, Canon, Canon 60D

The Secrets of Straight On Flash

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 30. January 2012 - 6:10

One of the most popular photography website is the http://www.strobist.blogspot.com/ from David Hobby. I'm not in the same league and I don't even pretend. But I use flashes regularly. I specialize in simple setups. The problem with most of the photos sites where they give you the lighting diagram, they tell you how they did it but not why they chose this or that solution.

Jasper is not a happy camper. Jasper clearly doesn't want to be here. If he could escape and go back home he would. Treats and weird/special noises didn't help to get his interest.

Jasper clearly doesn't want to be here. If he could escape to go back home he would. Treats and weird, special noises didn't help to get his interest.charlie-20120126-2457.jpg — ©2012 Syv Ritch -- foto-biz.com: http://www.foto-biz.com/usageterms

Jasper is not a happy camper   click on image for gallery

First look at eyes, no “evil” glowing eyes, good definition and not hard shadows. Here's the technical data:

Lens Acronyms

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 27. January 2012 - 6:21

I was talking to Marg who, proudly, showed me that she just discovered that her lens was also a macro. It's one of these, wide angle to extra tele, all in one lens (no name mentioned). The “macro” is not a macro mode, I would call it a close-up mode and that's not even that close. Then I looked at her lens… so many acronyms

Canon

Packing List

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 26. January 2012 - 6:15

Did you ever forgot to take… for a very important photo session or for a trip? I did, I realized that I forgot to take my flash cables (at the time, we only used cables, there were no Pocket Wizards) and forgot the extra batteries to make it worth.

That's why I created my photographic equipment list.

  1. All of my photo gear is in a chest
  2. All the boxes or unused equipment or monopods, tripods are in a separate closet
  3. Almost all of my “everyday” is already in the backpack

Do I use my list everyday? No, because many items are in small pouches.

Superwoman Photographer

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 18. January 2012 - 6:46

This woman photographer is amazing! She must be from the planet Krypton.

Amazing Woman PhotographerThis woman photographer is amazing! She must be from the planet Krypton. She's an older person and carries a 1DMk4 with a 500mm f/4. She makes her photos *HAND-HELD*. That's 17Lbs/8Kg at the end of the extended arm. That day, the light was not the greatest, low contrast and very cloudy. Either she's super-woman or she uses ISO 12800 or more. Just holding such a big and heavy rig at the end of the arm is hard enough for me. That's why I use a tripod or at least my monopod, usually set at 2½ feet tall. I wear a knee pad and I kneel down, like Tim Tebow but I was doing it long before he started to play football, so I'm closer to the ground.The way she holds the lens from the tripod collar, she can't even tuck her arm underneath.snowy-owls-20111231-0867.jpg — ©2011 Syv Ritch -- foto-biz.com: http://www.foto-biz.com/usageterms

This woman photographer is amazing! She must be from the planet Krypton   click on image for gallery

Canon 1Dx vs Nikon D4

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 8. January 2012 - 21:35

The mine's better than yours war has ready started. Nikon has finally announced their D4, almost 6 weeks after Canon announced their 1Dx.

  • It looks like Nikon will ship first. 1 point for Canon announcing first and 1 point for Nikon shipping first.
  • The prices are in the same range, the $6,000 range, 1 point Nikon and ¾ point for Canon because the announced price will be high end of the $6,000 range but I'm convinced that they will quickly match Nikon's.
  • Photo side: technically, if you read the specs, they are pretty much equivalent on the photo side. Canon is a little bit more here, Nikon is a little bit more there. In the real world, the major difference is clock-wise (Canon) vs counter clock-wise (Nikon). I defy you to identify a photo taken with the 1Dx or by the D4. They both have 60 years of experience and it shows. Nikon has closed the megapixels gaps by going to 16 megapixels. So 1 point for Canon and 1½ point for Nikon.

Canon: The Right Way of Metering

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 5. January 2012 - 6:15

Canon has 4+ metering modes:

  1. Evaluative Metering
  2. Partial Metering
  3. Spot Metering
  4. Center-weighted Average Metering

All new dSLRs have similar modes, they just call it differently

And then there's the manual mode. So what's the right way? That depends:

  • On the direction of the wind
  • The age of the captain
  • What about the exposing to the right?

Does this sound whimsical? Because exposure is whimsical. There's no right exposure. It just depends. The metering is only one step in the exposure.

Image Stabilization The Proper Way

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 20. December 2011 - 6:00

Canon calls it Image Stabilization, Nikon calls it Vibration Reduction, Sony calls it SteadyShot, Pentax calls it Sensor-shift Image Stabilization, Sigma call it Optical Stabilization and so on.

It's very much black magic. It's based on between two to as many as six tiny gyroscopes that track the pitch and the yaw to compensate for the movements of the photographer either on the CMOS/CCD sensor or around one of the optical element of the lens.

Canon 7D: My Basic Setups

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 19. December 2011 - 6:00

Recently, I was asked as to what was my everyday use setup for the Canon 7D. I have 5 stored settings. Yes, I know that there's only C1/C2/C3 but I can set the A mode and the M mode and the Canon 7D remember these settings.

I do mostly indoor landscapes and indoor & outdoor portraits, be it people or animals.

  1. I have removed the focus from the shutter. I always use the AF-ON back button or the focus will change every time that I press the shutter. See: Canon 7D and the AF-ON Button

Canon: Micro-Adjustements, How Often?

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 14. December 2011 - 6:00

Many people will micro-adjust their lenses as soon as they buy/receive their new lenses. But… How often should readjust the micro-adjustments?

Canon 7D Micro Adjust Screen

Canon 7D C.Fn III - 5: Micro Adjust Screen

Lately, I noticed that many of my photos were slightly out of focus. Either it's an operator problem, aka me, or the camera.

Canon: MicroAdjustment Not Working

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 5. December 2011 - 6:46

I received an email from Tatyana. Here's the key extract for her email.

I've tried to follow your instructions for the Micro-Adjustment. I can't get it to work, I still have some front-focusing…

BTW, I expected Tatyana to be either from Russia or Central Europe but she is from the Netherlands.

My instructions are at: C.Fn III -5 - AF Microadjustment. The Micro-Adjustment is controlled by the C.Fn III-5 - AF Microadjustment. After an exchange of a couple of emails, I found that instead of focusing and taking the photo through the viewfinder. She tried to make the procedure much faster by using the Live View.

Canon 7D: C.Fn III -5 - AF Microadjustment

Canon 7D: C.Fn III -5 - AF Microadjustment

Flash: The Dreaded Green Eyes

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 2. December 2011 - 6:25

For people, it's red and for almost all animals it's green. By now, the vast majority of the processing software can fix the red eyes with just a click of the mouse. But for cats, dogs and the other animals, they get the green eyes with the flash in their face. Most software cannot process it. Here's my way of almost removing the green eyes in Lightroom, but it's not perfect, Lightroom: How To Remove The Green Eyes in Animals

Buzz The Cat

If you look at the EXIF data from this photograph, you will see:

183 Megapixels Photo

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 1. December 2011 - 6:44

This is a humongous, ginormous, image: 183 megapixels. As you can see from the Lightroom screen capture, it is: 37,717 pixels wide by 5,110 pixels high, that's 192,733,870 pixels.

I did this image on a Canon 7D. It's a composite of 42 photos. It was part of a serie of photos that range from 35 megapixels to this one at 183 megapixels.

183 Megapixels photoThis is a humongous, ginormous, image: 183 megapixels. As you can see from the Lightroom screen capture, it is: 37,717 pixels wide by 5,110 pixels high, that's 192,733,870 pixels.I did this image on a Canon 7D. It's a composite of 42 photos. I'm not that interested in a Nikon D800, a D900, a D4, or a whatever the name will be and their rumored 36 megapixels sensor. Where are the lenses for such a sensor? At 18 megapixels per photo, it took me 2½ hours to compile the image on an iCore 7 8Gb RAM. I have so much detail that I can read the labels in the background.I can't put it on my website, I tried and it brought the web server to a crawl. I can't upload it to Smugmug. It's too big. Luckily this image is for printing. I haven't yet discussed it with the printer. I'll do that on Friday.I was able to import it in Lightroom but now Lightroom is extremely slow. The raw image is 1.6 gigabytes, that's a lot of disk IO for the preview. Looks like after the printing, I will have to delete the image from the catalog and recreate it as a JPEG with a 40% to 50% quality to make it manageable.

Canon: Pressing the Shutter and Evaluative Metering

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 29. November 2011 - 6:29

Everybody knows, by now, that there are two steps to the shutter button:

  1. Pressing the shutter half-way activates the auto-focus, if the focus is still associated to the shutter button, and sets the automatic exposure combination in Av, Tv, or P mode.
  2. Pressing completely the shutter takes the photo.

What most people do not realize is that when you are in Evaluative Metering and Single Shot AF mode, pressing the shutter half way locks the exposure for 4 seconds.

Digital Photography - A Basic Manual

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 28. November 2011 - 6:40

This is an interesting book from Henry Horenstein. It's unusual. It's a book about the basics, like f/stops… as a technical introduction to photography. It's not like the “… for dummies”. This reminds me of a text book, it's structured, just like a course. It's not just for dSLRs but most of the book also applies to point and shoot cameras.

I like the “plain” English. The photos are excellent and are appropriate to the topic that they illustrate.

Why Do They Do That?

Submitted by Syv Ritch on 17. November 2011 - 6:39

I've never understood why people carry a lens hood mounted on their lens reversed like this woman? What's the point? The lens hood does 2 things:1. The lens hood protects the lens for accidental touching and from many accidents.2. The lens hood job is to minimize flare by stopping the bright rays of light from entering the lens from the side. It was essential in the old days of the SLRs before they invented lens coatings. The lens hood was mostly used in teles. I use mine on everything, be it wide angle, normal lenses and teles. But it's mostly to protect the lens since I do not use filters.

Notice that her lens hood is reversed   click on image for gallery

I've never understood why people carry a lens hood mounted on their lens reversed like this woman. What's the point? The lens hood does 2 things:

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