View On Monitors

Every modern photographer depends on their computer and its monitor(s) throughout the workflow, once the image is captured. Often, as much work is done here that affects the final output as in the camera.

My plain old, discount Samsung SyncMaster 203 is getting hard to start -- the bulb is taking longer and longer to warm up. But once it's going, it works great (like with most monitors, esp. LCD's, don't look for critical color and density adjustments until at least half an hour! after they start.)

So I looked into repairing it: replacing the bulb may be all it needs. This probably will require some surgery dealing with whatever I find inside: cutting out the old bulb, adapting the new one to fit, soldering in new connections, finding and matching specs on a new bulb, etc. I don't recommend trying to repair your own monitor because everyone has a different skill level and there are several levels of potential danger involved; it might be better to find a new monitor in most cases, or a repair shop.

Two bulb sources:
www.xoxide.com
http://www.lcdparts.net

It may be better to replace the current screen with a new one, so some basic understanding of the terms and technologies is a big help. This website, www.tftcentral.co.uk has lots of basic (and more advanced) info to guide the shopping process.

Effort Required for a Corporate Thrust

In the 45 days since I asked in the brand-new commercial Starbucks Coffee Company group on Flickr (on September 28) if Starbucks permits photos in their locations the company has been unable to articulate that they do or do not allow casual photographs to be made on their property and within their establishments.

It's more than a bit ironic, if not downright absurd, for them to attempt to establish a fan group of photographers on a photography forum website, such as Flickr, without a clearly stated and unequivocal policy that photography is permitted within their locations. There have been many reports that cameras, especially large ones, freak out the coffee makers, managers and sub-managers, and even the cleaning staff. There are many anecdotal reports of people being harrassed, yelled at, and demands such as that they leave and or delete their photos immediately appear to be commonplace. (You can be asked to leave the premises for whatever reason, but can not be forced to delete photos at any time by a shop owner or employee, meaningless threats notwithstanding.)

One of the most interesting aspects of this caffeine crazed situation is that many managers and employees have quoted 'Company Policy' while yelling and making demands of people with cameras that range from iPhones to Nikon D3 's. The 'Company Policy' seems to emanate from the 'Manager's Handbook' or guide to running the business, wherein the edict that photos shall not be made upon Starbuck's property is apparently engraved.

Last, the interesting thing about a policy of photo-permissibility entering the Starbucks culture is that, of course, all the normal rules would apply: you could not sell your photo for advertorial or other commercial use without explicit permission of the people in it, and for safety's sake, the explicit permission of the property and trademark holders whose image components appears prominently within said photos -- without fear of potential civil liability (actionability.) IOW, though Sbucks allows you to take personal photos onsite, you cannot run them as an ad for Gucci in Vogue without lots of paperwork (see your attorney,) which you will not likely get. Grow up, you know better by now. Starbucks need have no fear of you casual photogs, because you understand all this right? Right?

Juan Valdez is rolling over in his hacienda....

©2009 NewUncleMe@yahoo.com

Focusing a View Camera in Very Dark Conditions

There are a few things to help focus in extreme conditions. As always, start with the camera on neutral settings! (No tilt, no swing, rise/fall set to the same amount, all for front and back.)

One tip is to examine any highlight, point source, light, or a small detail (that even could be a dark spot): while focusing it on the GG, try to make it the smallest you can, then it's in focus.

For shots with as much as possible in focus, you have to try to do this for near and far objects, or use hyperfocal technique based on estimated distances and lens settings. If you intend to shift the plane of focus, you should understand the effect you intend to achieve and the limits, given your scene, before trying it in difficult conditions!

In dark conditions, close your eyes, or better yet, put a hat or dark cloth over your eyes for 2 to 3 minutes and just relax. Don't try to focus or use your eyes. They will do their best to adjust; then try focusing -- it should be a lot easier.

For framing -- you have to look at the scene and imagine (or use a cutout rectangle viewer) to see which details you want included in the frame borders. If you find it impossible to frame them accurately, then enlarge your frame (back up, switch to wider lens, etc.) and shoot outside the necessary inclusions and crop the frame later. Or don't crop, but sometimes it's necessary for the shot.

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Is the 14-24mm f/2.8 Nikkor a Good Lens for Rallies?

The 14-24/2.8 Nikkor is a really great lens, but its range is from wide to ultra-wide. The best use of this type lens, or any lens for action-shots, is to try to fill the frame with the subject and its immediate surroundings. To do this you must get very close with w.a. lenses! Usually photographers do this with longer lenses. If you think this way, then the 24-70/2.8 (an excellent lens) is good for middle distance, and the 70-200/2.8 (an excellent lens) is good for greater distance or to focus on details from the middle distance. A detail such as a face, head and shoulders shot, front wheels, etc.

What type of rally? You will typically get closer to the riders in a bicycle rally than you will to an auto or motorcycle rally!

The Mystery of Crop Size

The DX sensor chip that actually records the light coming through the lens in your camera has a smaller area than an FX (full-frame) chip. They use the FF chips in D3, D3x and D700 cameras.

Your lens projects a given-angle cone of light from its rear, depending on the focal length and subject and sensor distances from the optical center of the lens in its current state, the optical design and masking of the back of the lens. DX lenses like your 18-200mm lens, because of the last two factors, do not completely illuminate a full 24x36mm frame -- so they can be used on FF if they will mount (which they should if they are 'F' mount), but they may just light a circle in the center of the frame.

FX or film compatible lenses, OTOH, project a larger circle of good illumination that entirely covers the frame with an evenly lit and focused image (theoretically, if used properly). If you use a FF lens on a DX camera, the smaller sensor will only record a portion of the entire projected image, in the center of the circle. The lens does NOT change it's focal length -- everything about what it shows is the same no matter which camera it is used on: focal length, depth of field, quality and quantity of illumination, size of projected image, etc. (The DoF effectively changes based on the proximity and size of sensor elements, but that's another discussion.)

Crop factor is a relationship of a DX sensor to an FX sensor, for this discussion. If you have a crop factor of 1.5x to apply to your lens / camera system, then the image the sensor records is being compared to focal length required when used on a FF camera to produce the same image (or image magnification) at a given distance. To keep the subject the same percentage of the frame size on different sensors at the same distance from the subject, you would have to use a 1.5 time longer focal length on FX as on DX.

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My monitor is starting to fail. Shopping for an upgrade I ran across interesting (short) articles about improvements in color management in FireFox. It can respect ICC profiles in displayed pictures, and the articles describe this and tell how to turn it on:
-for tagged images (embedded ICC profile): 2;
- set it for all images and graphics to be color managed: 1;
- how to turn off color management: 0.

The code enhancements made the browser stop dragging when CM is turned on -- big speedup. I tried it before but turned it off. It's on by default in 3.5.

http://hacks.mozilla.org/2009/06/color-correction/
https://developer.mozilla.org/En/ICC_color_correction_in_Firefox

It's also possible to set a default color space by putting in the path to a profile directly:

C:\WINDOWS\system32\spool\drivers\color\AdobeRGB.icm

Very geeky, very cool. Important read if you edit images and graphics for the web.

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"I am thinking about getting some of my prints blown up on canvas and selling them: what do I do next?"

If you are thinking about selling your work, then you actually need a business plan that tries to answer some important questions -- and this goes beyond just "is this a good enough pic" and "how much to print it?" and "how much to sell it?".

You might do a little research into:
- Where and to whom will you sell?
- How much are people spending in that market segment?
- What kind of pictures are they buying?
- Does a segment exist for your work, style, and pricing level?

If you have to create a segment to sell your work:
- What kind of marketing are you going to have to do?
- How much will that cost?
- Regardless, how are you going to perform 'fulfillment'?
- Acceptance of payment (PayPal? Cash only? Credit cards?)
- Do you expect enough volume to have your own gallery?
- Are you going to seek space at someone else's gallery?
- Temporarily or permanently?
- Will you have enough volume of sales to profit by having a business license?
- Who are your competitors?
- What are their venues, markets, customers, styles, volumes, fulfillment methods,
supply chains, etc.?

If you look into it a bit, it's not such a simple question, largely because for many years there have been quite a few excellent photographers augmenting their incomes by selling beautiful photos all over the place, online, in galleries, through stores and agents, etc.

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What is Macro?

Macro usually is defined as 1:5 up to 5:1, or somewhere in that range. Subject size versus it's magnified size on film.

Some lenses can magnify the subject on the film up to life size. These are macro lenses. Macro lenses come in various focal lengths, such as 60mm, 100mm, 150mm, 200mm, etc. The longer the focal length the further the distance from subject at a given magnification. So a 200mm lens's front element is much further away from an angry red-ant hill than a 50mm lens when both would be magnifying the subjects at 1:1! This is called 'working distance'.

There are various ways to get that subject magnification without using a macro lens, such as mentioned above. Canon makes a screw on achromatic filter like lens (2 elements, 1 asymmetric, multicoated -- all good) called the 500D for use with longer lenses, not necessarily macro lenses. It allows you to get pretty good magnification based on lens focal length and the ability of your lens to focus at a given subject distance. On my 70-200mm Nikkor it does a great job, but that takes a 77mm filter and the 500D cost a bundle. I can use it on lenses with smaller filter sizes by using step down rings to adapt the filter size. Pure macro lenses and extension tubes do not put anything into the light path that's not part of the original lens, so they do not degrade it at all. Any other option does degrade it to some degree; the 500D has very little deleterious effect, but it is noticeable as a very slight softening.

These were both on a Nikon D200, I don't have and macro shots on film (from this century):



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What's Yours Is Mine, And It's For Sale!

If you look at a picture in your web browser, you have ALREADY DOWNLOADED IT. There is no implied intent for you to keep it, especially to reuse it for your own purpose, to sell it or otherwise distribute it.

A house's door left unlocked is no invitation to remove furniture, is it? Neither is listening to a song an invitation to make a copy and sell it, nor to provide copies from your copies (to lots of people on the internet.) If you copy it from the radio, or media you buy, or just d/l it from somewhere and don't spread it around, then you have got the right spirit.

It needs to be clear that just getting your hands on something does not give you any right to sell or distribute it: that's clearly 'conversion' (i.e. theft by conversion). It is pretty clear to most people that they can not go into a store and pick something up, and then claim it as their own without paying for it.

Intellectual property may be physically easier to acquire, but it's no less someone else's property. The internet has created a 'virtual nation' of deniers, who say, in effect, "It's just me, one person doing this thing, so it's not so bad." There are 10's even 100's of millions of those "just me's" around, so it is actually "so bad".

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I saw some discussion about trying to buy two lenses through a large and well known international vendor with a location in Glasgow. Unavailable are the new 50mm AF-S f1.4G, and the 105mm f2.8 AF-S VR. Both appear to be back-ordered for as many as 30 and 20 units, respectively.

While I can't answer that question directly, several things come to mind, especially related to the newish 50mm:

• typically there is a small supply when new lenses come out
  
  
• this drives up prices because of high demand
  
  
• production for new products of any kind typically 'ramps up' as more time and resources are devoted to meeting demand
  
  
• with the sagging world economy, it's hard to oversupply in advance of sales
  
  
• some vendors and some markets get priority based on size and past performance
  
  
• there can be 'unseen' factors slowing production: labor, materials, technology, finance, supply chain forward and back, etc.

Flickr is good for socializing and meeting people in places that are near and far (like APG or the London group), but the hosting options are so limited that trying to use a Flickr account commercially, even if it were permitted, is fruitless. Permissions aren't flexible on a per photo or set basis. You really can't organize except in the fashion already laid out -- and once you get a few thousand pix and a number of clients whom you want to see certain things only, it becomes so unwieldy it's about impossible. It would be easier to have a free account for each use, and just keep track of them.

But, lets say you want to put proofs online, and only wish to give complete access to the B&G, partial access to first family members, full access to reception images, and so on -- you can try to establish classes of users with friends / family / contacts levels, but how about more per-photo options? It's just useless for that purpose - on purpose. Flawed business model in that context. Not as flawed in other ways. I really think that when it comes to commercial use you're better off setting up a web site, maybe using a service, designer, or package if it's beyond your abilities. Photographers need to be generalists, with knowledge of a lot of things, but expertise centered on photography and the business they're in, rather than the specifics of each related business segment, such as web design and maintenance, processing and printing, etc.

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The Basics of Photography

Everyone who writes about photography typically loves to sing on about esoteric topics, and debate (ad nauseum) the merits of some esoteric bits of photo-trivia about which almost no one knows much or really cares. But comes a time when you answer the basic questions that everyone who picks up a camera wants to answer, especially those who stays with it for more than few moments. It's even more true with film photography. In that spirit I'll join that group and pass on some of my knowledge of a few of the very basics of photography to the next generation.

The first question I saw today about basics asked if the older Olympus lenses were any good:

Zuiko in general made a top quality lens. Some are better than others, while few of them are 'junk'. That 50/1.8 for instance is about as good as any other camera maker's 50/1.8: Nikon, Canon, Pentax, etc.

A very confused person said this:
"I don't think it really has any bearing on the subject, but I have neer seen anything I liked that came from a telefoto."

While there is nothing wrong with telephoto lenses in general, there are lots of problems with patently ludicrous generalizations.


Nomenclature is important, especially with technical terms, so that everyone is speaking a common language, and there can be effective communication:
Apature ==> Aperture. (Apature is the name of a brand of Cheap Chinese Crap)

More about aperture vs. shutter speed:
As you 'stop the lens down', you increase the aperture number and decrease the size of the light admitting hole in the lens. The shutter speed must be longer to give the equivalent exposure to the film / sensor. More occurs in the physical world during a longer period of time: moving things move further. This may cause some objects to be burred. Also, you may move the camera more, meaning that all that is depicted in the frame will have more blur.

You are balancing shutter speed and movement-blur against Depth of Focus (Field) and focal-blur, assuming equivalent exposures.

Equivalent exposures: F16 @ 1/125" is equiv. to F11 @ 1/250" is equiv. to F8 @ 1/500".

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A Great Rangefind for Travel and Hiking?

On a medium format photography board someone asked recently about a good choice for an M/F camera for long treks to use making primarily landscape images. I recently bought this very camera, a Mamiya 7ii, with this sort of light weight, high quality, M/F set of requirements in mind. The system has intrigued me recently because it's reputed to have one or more of the finest lenses in photography, producing some of the highest resolution images attainable, with vast sharpness, good contrast and color rendition, as well as potentially great bokeh.

Ok, doing landscapes you want quality, and flexibility isn't the same kind of issue you would have in a studio environment: macro, very large lens assortment, fast lenses, many accessories, etc. What you are looking for is top quality images, ease of handling, light weight, reasonable selection of lenses, and of course, portability.

I believe we have just defined the Mamiya 7 and 7II. Wide lenses range from 43mm, 50, 65 to 80mm. There are also a 150 and 210. Some of the lenses, the 50, 65 and 80 especially define world class. They include built-in shutters, typically 1-1/500", +B; synch at all speeds. It is a rangefinder. It is very easy to focus, even with wide lenses, even in very low light, even with wide lenses in low light. Most lenses except the 80mm have a matching, separate viewfinder for framing. The same rangefinder is used for focusing all six lenses, though. A typical kit includes a body (built in film handling which uses 120 or 220), and one or two lenses: 80+50? 43+65? 65+150?

The two main shortcomings of this system, aside from price are:

1) medium slow lenses optimized for quality images, not shallow depth of field or better low light performance
2) even the longer lenses are somewhat difficult to use close enough for tight portraits, which combined with the less than short DoF, does not make the system ideal for some portraiture styles.

I watched online ads for months, trying to find the camera and at least one lens for a reasonable (affordable) price. One day, a seller offered two, a 7 and a 7ii. The latter came with an 80mm / 4.0 lens (about a 39mm equivalent for 135), at a price I could relate to, and so I did. The camera arrived (UPS, ground), tossed into a large box with only a few 4x6 air bags to keep it company. It was not bound in bubble wrap, and had plenty of room to fly around in the box. Naturally, it had one of the corners knocked off (pic above). The damage actually looks worse than could have happened in transit, because this level of damage would require more damage to the box.... So the camera languishes at the recommended local repair shop. Seriously, it's been there almost two weeks, on a one week estimate, with claims of slow shipping of the bottom plate from Mamiya.
Aaaaaaagh.

Oh well: light, portable, sharp, etc.

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UPDATE: yay! Camera should be ready tomorrow, after calling the lab and passing on a little bit of low level angst and mildly angsty email to Mamiya USA about getting the part...well, it was cathartic, but not as much as finalizing the repairs and having this baby in my hands!