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Thread: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

  1. #46
    Registered Member rickztahone's Avatar
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    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    Bear with me, this is going to be a lot of photos. All of the following are done without flash, which is to put in to practice everything we have been discussing in the past few pages.

    All of the following will first display the 3 main settings, aperture, shutter speed, iso speed.

    I will dive right in:

    f/4.5 1/25 iso640

    f/4.5 1/50 iso1600
    From these two photos you will notice that one is using a slower shutter speed. In order to keep the same exposure, I had to increase my ISO. The reason I chose these 2 photos is because, this shows that as you approach really slow shutter speeds, your photos are more difficult to get sharp, even if you have a steady hand, and in my case, even if you have in body image stabilization. It is difficult to see, but if you were to zoom in on both shots, on the eye, the one with 1/50 is actually sharper. Photobucket does a great job reducing the quality of your photos by the way. Hosting sites like Flickr retain higher quality. I would advise to use that type of hosting site. I only used photobucket here because I didn't want to use generic photos on my main Flickr gallery. But you get the point.


    f/4.5 1/50 iso800

    f/8 1/50 iso3200
    In these 2 examples, I took a different approach. I changed the aperture instead of the shutter speed. If you notice, the sponge filter in the background is blurrier in one of them, this would be the one with the wider aperture f/4.5 (rather than f/8). The ISO had to also increase in order to stop down and get a larger DOF.


    f/2.8 1/400 iso3200

    f/8 1/50 iso3200
    I will keep using the aperture setting moving back and forth examples until it makes perfect sense. You will notice that as you open the lens up (lower numbers), the DOF will get substantially smaller, which makes it really difficult to nail the focus, which you can see in the f/2.8 shot. Notice that opening up the lens allowed me to keep iso at 3200, but also, to increase my shutter speed, which in turn greatly increases your chances of getting a sharper photo.


    f/8 1/50 iso3200

    f/2.8 1/400 iso3200
    Last one, same thing, check the background fish in the shallow depth of field shots, much blurrier.

    Here are a few extra shots putting these settings in to place:

    f/2.8 1/400 iso 3200
    This is a very narrow depth of field at 2.8. Generally you never really want to shoot wide open in an aquarium setting, unless you are in a really dark environment. Even so, you can still get some nice shots wide open. However, if you have a faster lens, for example, I have Minolta 58 1.2, and if I tried to get something sharp with that lens in this setting, I would probably have to take 50 shots to get one keeper.


    f/4.5 1/50 iso800
    In this shot, I stopped down a little, and it helped to get the discus in to focus. However, the 1/50 shutter speed is right on the border of shaking to make stuff blurry. In retrospect, I should have increased my iso to 1600 and increased my shutter speed to 1/80 or so.

    I hope this makes sense. If there is something lost in translation, please let me know.
    Last edited by rickztahone; 05-16-2014 at 03:48 PM.

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  2. #47
    Registered Member rickztahone's Avatar
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    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    Found 2 Exif viewers links for those interested:
    Exify - simply hover your mouse over the image and basic EXIFs are shown in a translucent layer on top of the image.
    Exif Viewer - extracts and displays the EXIF and metadata after a right click on the image.

    Hope that helps.

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  3. #48

    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    Yo rick ....I have been taking so many pic' s with my HTC one phone camera and I want to know what do you think of them pics...check out my new AP's update pics on Kenny's forum that I just posted today ....let me know what you think of them pics and natural born photagraphy skills compare to yours.

    Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk

  4. #49
    Registered Member rickztahone's Avatar
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    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    Will do. Many times I am not able to see pics here at work because we block a lot of the hosting sites, but I will check it out when I get home.

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  5. #50

    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    Okay.

    Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk

  6. #51
    Registered Member rickztahone's Avatar
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    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    Quote Originally Posted by beastroy View Post
    Yo rick ....I have been taking so many pic' s with my HTC one phone camera and I want to know what do you think of them pics...check out my new AP's update pics on Kenny's forum that I just posted today ....let me know what you think of them pics and natural born photagraphy skills compare to yours.

    Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk
    Well, I saw the pics and I will say, those are some stunning discus you have there!

    First, you must know that you suffer from a condition called cell-phone-itis. This means, your cell phone can not take fully detailed pics like you would want. With the smaller sensor on cell phones, the resolution just isn't up to par with a dedicated camera.

    There is nothing wrong with cell phone photography, believe me, but you must know its limitations. One of the main limitations its inability to get good shots in darker settings which these shots seem to be. The noise (or grain) is too prominent. This of course isn't your fault. All cell phones have this main downfall. The larger you make these pics, the more noise and lack of detail you will show. They are meant to be viewed in a very small format.

    With all this being said and done I will say this, it is difficult to take a bad shot of such nice looking discus! Get a dedicated camera when you can, but until that point, keep on clicking :-)

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  7. #52

    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    Quote Originally Posted by rickztahone View Post
    Well, I saw the pics and I will say, those are some stunning discus you have there!

    First, you must know that you suffer from a condition called cell-phone-itis. This means, your cell phone can not take fully detailed pics like you would want. With the smaller sensor on cell phones, the resolution just isn't up to par with a dedicated camera.

    There is nothing wrong with cell phone photography, believe me, but you must know its limitations. One of the main limitations its inability to get good shots in darker settings which these shots seem to be. The noise (or grain) is too prominent. This of course isn't your fault. All cell phones have this main downfall. The larger you make these pics, the more noise and lack of detail you will show. They are meant to be viewed in a very small format.

    With all this being said and done I will say this, it is difficult to take a bad shot of such nice looking discus! Get a dedicated camera when you can, but until that point, keep on clicking :-)
    Very well said!

  8. #53
    Homesteader DiscusLoverJeff's Avatar
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    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    I was searching for a good tutorial on taking aquarium photos and ran across this video.



    It is not bad. It gives you some basic camera setting and angles.
    DiscusLoverJeff

    Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.
    Confucius

  9. #54

    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    I just came across this thread and just wanted to say thanks to all the contributors. It is highly informative and would serve well in a photography forum.

    I just want to add a point on camera selection and give a plug for buying used. There are so many ridiculous bargains out there for incredible cameras. When buying a camera, it helps to prioritize your needs as some cameras do certain things better than others. For example, if you shoot mainly well lit, slow moving scenes, pretty much any good camera will do. If you shoot sports or fast moving scenes, you need fast and accurate focusing and good higher ISO performance. If you shoot landscapes, particularly sunrise and sunset, you need a camera with high dynamic range but not necessarily fast focus. If you want to shoot night scenes or star photography, you need high ISO performance with low noise. If you want to make big prints you need more megapixels but dont be fooled by miniature cameras with giant megapixels such as cell phone cameras and other gimicky point and shoots boasting huge numbers. Most folks will never print larger than 11 by 14 and for that, any good 8 megapixel camera will do.

    I have several cameras that excel at different aspects. My 2009 vintage Nikon D3s is only 12 megapixels but has fast focus, fantastic low light high ISO performance, and very low noise as each pixel is quite large and gathers light well. It will not make wall size prints in fine detail as it is limited in megapixels. My more recent Nikon D800 has 36 megapixels which will make wall size prints in fine detail, has phenominal dynamic range, very good low light high ISO performance, but fairly slow focus. It is great for landscapes and moderate speed scenes but requires a good tripod to squeeze out the full resolution and excellent lenses are a must as the resolution of the sensor exceeds the resolving capability of most older lens. My sony NEX 7 has a 24 megapixel sensor with reasonably good low light, slow sometimes inaccurate focus, ability to print large but not wall size prints, but is very compact and travel friendly. Last but not least, my compact panasonic LX7 is a 10 megapixel gem with a wide 24mm 1.4. It is a great waist pouch camera that goes everywhere without cramping my style. It takes reasonably good photos that can be printed up to 11 by 14 and has very decent low light performance because of the fast 1.4 lens.

    My opinion is that no one camera excels at everything and one has to decide what is most important and shop accordingly. I will close by saying that there has never been a better time for photographers in terms of the amazing equipment available at crazy low used prices.
    Last edited by SteveCA; 03-02-2015 at 04:02 PM.

  10. #55
    Registered Member Ardan's Avatar
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    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    Ricardo and Matt,
    Very good and intriguing info! I am trying to gather in some of it! LOL
    I like those "off camera flash" pictures! WOW

    Ardan

  11. #56
    Registered Member rickztahone's Avatar
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    Default Re: Camera gear / tips and tricks / tutorials

    Quote Originally Posted by Ardan View Post
    Ricardo and Matt,
    Very good and intriguing info! I am trying to gather in some of it! LOL
    I like those "off camera flash" pictures! WOW

    Ardan
    I'm glad you are reading up Ardan . Let me know if you need help with anything or need questions answered my friend.

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