The Never Ending Photo Thread

[wooohooo]

Originally Posted by Regulator75

It's too hard to tell from such a small image and no EXIF data, though it looks blurry, dull and possibly taken with a cell phone?

Sadly no, I took it with my DSLR with a lens I got used. I'll try again tonight and see if I can get a tripod and get a better result. I used the 18-55mm lens with VR and autofocus on. I have a better lens I want to try too.

ISO 280
35mm
f/5.3
1/30 sec

That's the exif data right?

[SebC]

Originally Posted by wooohooo

Sadly no, I took it with my DSLR with a lens I got used. I'll try again tonight and see if I can get a tripod and get a better result. I used the 18-55mm lens with VR and autofocus on. I have a better lens I want to try too.

ISO 280
35mm
f/5.3
1/30 sec

That's the exif data right?

Yeah... Those settings look fine. Those settings are fine, although you should get better quality with f/8 and ISO 100 (Lo 1 on my Nikon and only works with ISO Auto off), though you might need a tripod under that amount of light. You can also try manual focusing - I find the best way is to stick it in live view and zoom in to the max on the viewerfinder. Honestly though it's hard to critique something that small, and I'm not even sure there's anything wrong with your photo. What did you use to resize it? Could just be that the resizing algorithm isn't very good.

[wooohooo]

Originally Posted by SebC

Yeah... Those settings look fine. Those settings are fine, although you should get better quality with f/8 and ISO 100 (Lo 1 on my Nikon and only works with ISO Auto off), though you might need a tripod under that amount of light. You can also try manual focusing - I find the best way is to stick it in live view and zoom in to the max on the viewerfinder. Honestly though it's hard to critique something that small, and I'm not even sure there's anything wrong with your photo. What did you use to resize it? Could just be that the resizing algorithm isn't very good.

Thanks, I'll try again tonight but I'm going to try a night shot. Would you suggest a longer shutter speed or a bigger aperture? I'm still not certain when you're supposed to want shutter speed or aperture. I just kind of know if you want the silky feel in waterfalls then a lower shutter speed is good, but with night lights or sunsets I'm not sure.

I used AutoStitch [http://cvlab.epfl.ch/~brown/autostitch/autostitch.html] - not sure why it came out so small, maybe I should try messing with the settings.

Thanks for the input I really appreciate it.

[Regulator75]

Originally Posted by wooohooo

Thanks, I'll try again tonight but I'm going to try a night shot. Would you suggest a longer shutter speed or a bigger aperture? I'm still not certain when you're supposed to want shutter speed or aperture. I just kind of know if you want the silky feel in waterfalls then a lower shutter speed is good, but with night lights or sunsets I'm not sure.

I used AutoStitch [http://cvlab.epfl.ch/~brown/autostitch/autostitch.html] - not sure why it came out so small, maybe I should try messing with the settings.

Thanks for the input I really appreciate it.

If you are taking night shots you'll need a tripod.
Keep your ISO low
Smaller aperture = darker scene
Larger aperture = brighter scene
Play with your exposure times and see what works best for you.
Practice, practice and more practice.

Read some forums online and understand what you want to capture.

If you are on flickr, there are literally thousands of groups and discussions to assist you with any questions.

Different examples below.

26 second exposure @ 11mm and f/6.3

Palliser South & Company by Witty nickname, on Flickr

4.5 second exposure @ 18mm and f/13

Twilight Skyline by Witty nickname, on Flickr

42 second exposure @ 50mm and f/25

East Bound 9th Avenue by Witty nickname, on Flickr

23 second exposure @ 11mm and f/10

Giants Admiring the Bow by Witty nickname, on Flickr

4.4 second exposure @ 32mm and f/14

The Blue Hour by Witty nickname, on Flickr

[wooohooo]

Those are really amazing pictures. I think I've gone through your whole album 3-4 times already.

I'm going to try to take some photos tonight and when I'm in mexico this week. Hope it goes well!

[Thor]

Yeah I need to get ready for Iceland, we go into perpetual darkness in mid winter, so I'll be doing a lot of night photography and hopefully if I'm sober enough new years fireworks which are amazing here.

[wooohooo]

I tried it again this afternoon and was playing around with light room and ended up with this.



I'm not sure why the image is still so small... but anyways

ISO 100, 50mm, f/8.0, 1/640sec



This is the original

It was pretty smokey today but it was the last day I had to retry it before I left to mexico. What settings should I change?

[Ramsayfarian]

Originally Posted by Titan

I much prefer the untouched one. WHen I saw my first reaction was "now that's a good picture"

Same here

[Ramsayfarian]

Originally Posted by Regulator75

If you are taking night shots you'll need a tripod.
Keep your ISO low
Smaller aperture = darker scene
Larger aperture = brighter scene
Play with your exposure times and see what works best for you.
Practice, practice and more practice.

Read some forums online and understand what you want to capture.

If you are on flickr, there are literally thousands of groups and discussions to assist you with any questions.

Different examples below.

Not bad shots for a Nikon.

[Ramsayfarian]

Originally Posted by wooohooo

I tried it again this afternoon and was playing around with light room and ended up with this.



I'm not sure why the image is still so small... but anyways

ISO 100, 50mm, f/8.0, 1/640sec



This is the original

It was pretty smokey today but it was the last day I had to retry it before I left to mexico. What settings should I change?

Hard to take a crisp skyline shot with this smoke. You made a valent attempt there on lightroom though.

The one thing I did notice is that your shot has a pretty noticeable lean to it. If you can't catch it in camera, Lightroom does have pretty good crop level tool which will straighten your photo out.

I'm fairly new to DSLR photgraphy as well, and I found Scott Kelby's first 2 books on Digital Photography a huge source of easy to understand information.

[wooohooo]

Regulator... I absolutely love this one of yours

http://www.flickr.com/photos/witty_n...n/photostream/

[wooohooo]

Here are the ones I took with the 35mm

Original - ISO 100, 35mm, f/8.0, 1/800 sec


My lightroom special


How do I make the bushes all nice a green? No matter what I did in light room I couldn't get it lit up

[SebC]

Originally Posted by wooohooo

My lightroom special


How do I make the bushes all nice a green? No matter what I did in light room I couldn't get it lit up

Eww... way too much vignetting (the dark corner) for my taste.

You can't create info that isn't there (well you can, but IMO it's not really photography). Black and white don't contain colour info. Clipping is where your image goes beyound the dark-to-light range of your exposure. Learn to check the histogram on your camera after you take a picture. If you clip shadows (i.e. hit the left side of the histogram), which may be the case here, then you lose colour info om the dark areas because black is black. Likewise if you clip highlights (i.e. hit the right side of the histrogram) then you'll lose colour info in the bright areas (often the sky). If you're clipping you can adjust your exposure using exposure compensation (+/-, + if your picture is too dark, - if your exposure is too bright).

Some days are have different light than others. If you don't have the light you want, you have to wait for the light to change (or change it yourself, but that's hard to do for skylines!)

[wooohooo]

I just find it almost impossible to see what the picture looks like on the LCD in sunlight. I don't really see what it looks like until I'm at home.

I'm going to have to re-read what you just wrote a few times it just pretty much flew over my head

EDIT: Okay I think I know what you mean by this histogram. I had no idea what that graph meant, and turns out I can actually move it around too... and voila... bushes are bright!



Thanks for telling me that, I kind of understand what this histogram means now!

[SebC]

Originally Posted by wooohooo

I just find it almost impossible to see what the picture looks like on the LCD in sunlight. I don't really see what it looks like until I'm at home.

Yeah, that's why the histogram on your camera is really the best way to check exposure out in the field. Obviously your shadows weren't clipped, which is why you were able to lighten them.

[Jayems]

Tom Cochrane rocks..... Balzac?

Some shots from tonight.

[SebC]

^ Nice shots Jayems!

Now a contribution from me:

[Cowperson]

A few images from the 103rd Annual Priddis & Millarville Fair yesterday, which was a great success. . . .

An elegant start to the day with this side-saddle riding lady . . . .




Led to this inelegent pie-eating contest . . . . blindfolded feeder, blindfolded eater and a coach telling them where to go.



. . . . . . ended badly for these two . . . .



Cowperson

[Kybosh]

Originally Posted by SebC

^ Nice shots Jayems!

Now a contribution from me:

That is awesome! How did you do that?

[SebC]

Originally Posted by Kybosh

That is awesome! How did you do that?

It's a technique called 'light painting'. A quick Google Image or Flickr search will turn up lots of good examples. You draw with a flashlight over a long exposure. This one is a three minute exposure, of which it took me about a minute to to draw the stickman. Camera is on a tripod, used my remote (best cheap accessory ever - I think the one I have is $17) to start and stop the exposure. ISO forced to 100, f/10 for aperture (full manual mode) in order to get the right exposure time. For the drawing I was actually sitting down, so I was able to use myself as a reference when moving the flashlight. You don't see me because my clothes were dark enough, I was moving a bit, and I was only in the picture for 1/3 of the exposure time.