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Messing with Mother Nature
Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote:
Boater wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Boater wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Yesterday, my wife and I went to North Georgia to enjoy a quiet Thanksgiving Day in the mountains. We visited a beautiful waterfall, Minnehaha Falls, off of the beaten path. It was about a 5 miles drive on a one lane dirt/gravel road so it really was quiet and secluded, especially on Thanksgiving. Of course, I had to screw around with mother nature. Absolutely NONE of my photos come close to the way it looked in real life. This is the way it looks in real life: http://www.fs.fed.us/conf/ne-ga-wate...ha-falls.shtml This slide show shows how an amateur can screw up perfection: http://outdoors.webshots.com/slideshow/568959352vWicBu PS - If you move the mouse to the bottom of the screen an option bar will pop up so you can speed up the slide show so each photo is only up for 3 secs. No one really wants to look at them any longer than 3 seconds. You can also get entirely out of the slide show and look at the shots individually, and at a larger size. When you do that, though, they look fuzzy and out of focus, starting with photo #1. But I suspect that has more to do with sizing/resizing for the photo site than for the actual photos being out of focus. I liked #8322, because it gave me a sense of the scale of the falls. I think that was a photo of about 1/2 of the falls. When I tried to get all of the falls in the photo, i didn't like the way it looked. No detail, so I didn't even snap the photo. The photos were taken using a tripod, and using the timer with a 2 sec delay, so my hand was not on the camera when it was taken. So if they were fuzzy and out of focus it was the result of operator error. If that is the case, maybe you need a heavier tripod. What are you using? D-SLRs are kinda heavy, compared to film cameras, and require a chunkier tripod. But I wonder if "the problem" lies elsewhere, and not necessarily with the "operator." Using a tripod and self-timer should produce snappy results. I'm sure you can focus your camera properly. Tripod: 458B NEOTEC PRO PHOTO TRIPOD http://www.manfrotto.com/Jahia/site/...lsf=80&child=2 Head: 322RC2 HEAVY DUTY GRIP BALL HEAD http://www.manfrotto.com/Jahia/site/...lsf=80&child=2 The tripod is very heavy outdoor tripod, especially when used with a D200 and 18-200 VR lens. It actually rated for medium formated cameras with all but the monster telephoto lens. I still am not "sold' on the grip ball head. I think a conventional ball head would be easier to compose the photo and have the camera level. Interesting. BTW, you didn't offer up the correct URL for your tripod, but I am familiar with it, since a salesman tried to convince me it was the one I wanted. (you posted the manfrotto grip URL twice) I tried that same 322 a couple of times, and I think I agree that a conventional ball head would be mo' betta'. Maybe a Kirk: http://www.kirkphoto.com/ballheads.html |
Messing with Mother Nature
On Nov 28, 8:24*am, wrote:
On Nov 28, 8:24*am, Boater wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Yesterday, my wife and I went to North Georgia to enjoy a quiet Thanksgiving Day in the mountains. We visited a beautiful waterfall, Minnehaha Falls, off of the beaten path. *It was about a 5 miles drive on a one lane dirt/gravel road so it really was quiet and secluded, especially on Thanksgiving. Of course, I had to screw around with mother nature. *Absolutely NONE of my photos come close to the way it looked in real life. This is the way it looks in real life: http://www.fs.fed.us/conf/ne-ga-wate...ha-falls.shtml This slide show shows how an amateur can screw up perfection: http://outdoors.webshots.com/slideshow/568959352vWicBu PS - *If you move the mouse to the bottom of the screen an option bar will pop up so you can speed up the slide show so each photo is only up for 3 secs. *No one really wants to look at them any longer than 3 seconds. You can also get entirely out of the slide show and look at the shots individually, and at a larger size. When you do that, though, they look fuzzy and out of focus, starting with photo #1. But I suspect that has more to do with sizing/resizing for the photo site than for the actual photos being out of focus. I liked #8322, because it gave me a sense of the scale of the falls.- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - Teeheee!! Harry being judgemental of someone elses photos that are FAR superior to his!- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - I noticed that also. Maybe Harold should cross-post to alt.california, alt.rush-limbaugh, alt.impeach.bush, alt.politics.gw- bush, alt.politics.usa.republican, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.society.liberalism, alt.politics.republicans, alt.culture.alaska, to have his comrades add their gainful knowledge and carefully critique Mr. Smithers photo skills as well. |
Messing with Mother Nature
Boater wrote:
Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Boater wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Boater wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Yesterday, my wife and I went to North Georgia to enjoy a quiet Thanksgiving Day in the mountains. We visited a beautiful waterfall, Minnehaha Falls, off of the beaten path. It was about a 5 miles drive on a one lane dirt/gravel road so it really was quiet and secluded, especially on Thanksgiving. Of course, I had to screw around with mother nature. Absolutely NONE of my photos come close to the way it looked in real life. This is the way it looks in real life: http://www.fs.fed.us/conf/ne-ga-wate...ha-falls.shtml This slide show shows how an amateur can screw up perfection: http://outdoors.webshots.com/slideshow/568959352vWicBu PS - If you move the mouse to the bottom of the screen an option bar will pop up so you can speed up the slide show so each photo is only up for 3 secs. No one really wants to look at them any longer than 3 seconds. You can also get entirely out of the slide show and look at the shots individually, and at a larger size. When you do that, though, they look fuzzy and out of focus, starting with photo #1. But I suspect that has more to do with sizing/resizing for the photo site than for the actual photos being out of focus. I liked #8322, because it gave me a sense of the scale of the falls. I think that was a photo of about 1/2 of the falls. When I tried to get all of the falls in the photo, i didn't like the way it looked. No detail, so I didn't even snap the photo. The photos were taken using a tripod, and using the timer with a 2 sec delay, so my hand was not on the camera when it was taken. So if they were fuzzy and out of focus it was the result of operator error. If that is the case, maybe you need a heavier tripod. What are you using? D-SLRs are kinda heavy, compared to film cameras, and require a chunkier tripod. But I wonder if "the problem" lies elsewhere, and not necessarily with the "operator." Using a tripod and self-timer should produce snappy results. I'm sure you can focus your camera properly. Tripod: 458B NEOTEC PRO PHOTO TRIPOD http://www.manfrotto.com/Jahia/site/...lsf=80&child=2 Head: 322RC2 HEAVY DUTY GRIP BALL HEAD http://www.manfrotto.com/Jahia/site/...lsf=80&child=2 The tripod is very heavy outdoor tripod, especially when used with a D200 and 18-200 VR lens. It actually rated for medium formated cameras with all but the monster telephoto lens. I still am not "sold' on the grip ball head. I think a conventional ball head would be easier to compose the photo and have the camera level. Interesting. BTW, you didn't offer up the correct URL for your tripod, but I am familiar with it, since a salesman tried to convince me it was the one I wanted. This is the correct link http://www.manfrotto.com/Jahia/site/...fonce/pid/2280 (you posted the manfrotto grip URL twice) I tried that same 322 a couple of times, and I think I agree that a conventional ball head would be mo' betta'. Maybe a Kirk: http://www.kirkphoto.com/ballheads.html If I change ball heads Kirk with a L-Bracket will be on the short list. I have ordered a hot shoe ball level to see it if it makes it easier to level the ball grip. |
Messing with Mother Nature
On Fri, 28 Nov 2008 08:49:08 -0500, Boater wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Jim wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Yesterday, my wife and I went to North Georgia to enjoy a quiet Thanksgiving Day in the mountains. We visited a beautiful waterfall, Minnehaha Falls, off of the beaten path. It was about a 5 miles drive on a one lane dirt/gravel road so it really was quiet and secluded, especially on Thanksgiving. Of course, I had to screw around with mother nature. Absolutely NONE of my photos come close to the way it looked in real life. This is the way it looks in real life: http://www.fs.fed.us/conf/ne-ga-wate...ha-falls.shtml This slide show shows how an amateur can screw up perfection: http://outdoors.webshots.com/slideshow/568959352vWicBu I loved those pictures, particularly how you worked with the motion. These Qs will show what a dummy I am. How did you get the pics so sharp yet blur the motion just right in some shots and a little too much in others? Were you using a tripod? Is there a shutter speed that simulates how we see movement? I used a heavy tripod and focused on the rock or a patch of leaves, so that the non movement area was in focus. I had the camera set on manual. so I could adjust the aperture and shutter speed separately. I played with the shutter speed and it ranged from 1/15 of a sec, to probably 4 secs. By adjusting the aperture I could balance the exposure so I could get the detail on the rocks and leaves, without blowing out the water. I had the camera set up on Matrix Exposure, and found I would have to under expose the photo by 2 or 3 stops to compensate for the white water. If I used the exposure setting the camera told me was correct, it would completely blow out the water, so the water would just be white with no detail. So you are using a heavy tripod. As careful as you are, I wonder if your camera has a problem. Look at the photos you posted "full size" on that site. Something is happening there with focus. It could be a few things besides the focus. First, jpegs right out of a D200 are notoriously soft compared to other cameras. It's just the way it's set up by default. But they take sharpening very well. So after you resize (using sinc/lanczos as the resizing method and if your program doesn't do that, get one that does) apply some sharpening. If you shot raw, you also have to apply some sharpening as the last step. Second, if you resized or rotated (to fix a non-level image althought with a tripod there's no reason you should have to do that) with a program that doesn't use sinc/lanczos interpolator, that could be what you're seeing. Get one that does. I think Lightroom does, but I was reading online about some bugs in their implementation. I use XnView as the last step in my workflow to batch resize (using lanczos), sharpen (around 15 or so on the slider) and then save to final jpeg (jpeg options DCT method set to float, SubSampling set to 1x1, and the quality slider to whatever you want the final size to be. I use 85 for web shots.) Third, when you're doing long exposures in bright light, you have to stop down the lens so far that you're diffraction limited. Too small an aperture will soften the image. I didn't look at the exif data (is it available?) and different lenses show different effects, mostly because their sharpness where diffraction isn't a problem are different. But once you get down to f/11 or so, it can start showing up and soften your image. Some lenses that are super sharp will even show softening at f/8. Once you get down to f/16 and smaller, it can be a real problem with any lens. What you need to do is open the lens up to where it's sharpest (usually a stop or three smaller than it's max aperturn) and use a neutral density filter to reduce the light so you can take a longer exposure. If you want more depth of field, you can stop it down some. But once you get to f/12 and higher, you'll probably notice more softening due to diffraction than any better focus due to more depth of field. Steve |
Messing with Mother Nature
On Nov 28, 9:48*am, "Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq."
wrote: wrote: On Nov 28, 8:21 am, "Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq." wrote: wrote: On Nov 28, 8:10 am, "Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq." wrote: Yesterday, my wife and I went to North Georgia to enjoy a quiet Thanksgiving Day in the mountains. We visited a beautiful waterfall, Minnehaha Falls, off of the beaten path. *It was about a 5 miles drive on a one lane dirt/gravel road so it really was quiet and secluded, especially on Thanksgiving. Of course, I had to screw around with mother nature. *Absolutely NONE of my photos come close to the way it looked in real life. This is the way it looks in real life: http://www.fs.fed.us/conf/ne-ga-wate...ha-falls.shtml This slide show shows how an amateur can screw up perfection: http://outdoors.webshots.com/slideshow/568959352vWicBu I like Minnehaha. Have you ever been to Starr's Mill? I've got some decent 35mm shots from about ten years ago from there that turned out well. I had never heard of it, but are you talking about this place : http://www.pbase.com/kluken/starrs_mill-Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - Yep, that's the place. I took a picture from across the creek that turned out very nice. I'll have to scan it sometime. Or even better, go back and take some with your new camera.- Hide quoted text - - Show quoted text - Yes, I'd like to go back. I've heard that the state or county has taken it over, I hope they don't do something stupid! |
Messing with Mother Nature
Steve wrote:
On Fri, 28 Nov 2008 08:49:08 -0500, Boater wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Jim wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Yesterday, my wife and I went to North Georgia to enjoy a quiet Thanksgiving Day in the mountains. We visited a beautiful waterfall, Minnehaha Falls, off of the beaten path. It was about a 5 miles drive on a one lane dirt/gravel road so it really was quiet and secluded, especially on Thanksgiving. Of course, I had to screw around with mother nature. Absolutely NONE of my photos come close to the way it looked in real life. This is the way it looks in real life: http://www.fs.fed.us/conf/ne-ga-wate...ha-falls.shtml This slide show shows how an amateur can screw up perfection: http://outdoors.webshots.com/slideshow/568959352vWicBu I loved those pictures, particularly how you worked with the motion. These Qs will show what a dummy I am. How did you get the pics so sharp yet blur the motion just right in some shots and a little too much in others? Were you using a tripod? Is there a shutter speed that simulates how we see movement? I used a heavy tripod and focused on the rock or a patch of leaves, so that the non movement area was in focus. I had the camera set on manual. so I could adjust the aperture and shutter speed separately. I played with the shutter speed and it ranged from 1/15 of a sec, to probably 4 secs. By adjusting the aperture I could balance the exposure so I could get the detail on the rocks and leaves, without blowing out the water. I had the camera set up on Matrix Exposure, and found I would have to under expose the photo by 2 or 3 stops to compensate for the white water. If I used the exposure setting the camera told me was correct, it would completely blow out the water, so the water would just be white with no detail. So you are using a heavy tripod. As careful as you are, I wonder if your camera has a problem. Look at the photos you posted "full size" on that site. Something is happening there with focus. It could be a few things besides the focus. First, jpegs right out of a D200 are notoriously soft compared to other cameras. It's just the way it's set up by default. But they take sharpening very well. So after you resize (using sinc/lanczos as the resizing method and if your program doesn't do that, get one that does) apply some sharpening. If you shot raw, you also have to apply some sharpening as the last step. Second, if you resized or rotated (to fix a non-level image althought with a tripod there's no reason you should have to do that) with a program that doesn't use sinc/lanczos interpolator, that could be what you're seeing. Get one that does. I think Lightroom does, but I was reading online about some bugs in their implementation. I use XnView as the last step in my workflow to batch resize (using lanczos), sharpen (around 15 or so on the slider) and then save to final jpeg (jpeg options DCT method set to float, SubSampling set to 1x1, and the quality slider to whatever you want the final size to be. I use 85 for web shots.) Third, when you're doing long exposures in bright light, you have to stop down the lens so far that you're diffraction limited. Too small an aperture will soften the image. I didn't look at the exif data (is it available?) and different lenses show different effects, mostly because their sharpness where diffraction isn't a problem are different. But once you get down to f/11 or so, it can start showing up and soften your image. Some lenses that are super sharp will even show softening at f/8. Once you get down to f/16 and smaller, it can be a real problem with any lens. What you need to do is open the lens up to where it's sharpest (usually a stop or three smaller than it's max aperturn) and use a neutral density filter to reduce the light so you can take a longer exposure. If you want more depth of field, you can stop it down some. But once you get to f/12 and higher, you'll probably notice more softening due to diffraction than any better focus due to more depth of field. Steve My aperture was probably in the F11-F32 range, depending upon the shutter speed. Since F8 really is the sharpest for my lens, they would have been sharper if I had used a ND Filter, but really in RAW using Lightroom standard "Landscape Sharpening" they do look sharp. |
Messing with Mother Nature
On Fri, 28 Nov 2008 10:55:57 -0500, "Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq." wrote: Steve wrote: On Fri, 28 Nov 2008 08:49:08 -0500, Boater wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Jim wrote: Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq. wrote: Yesterday, my wife and I went to North Georgia to enjoy a quiet Thanksgiving Day in the mountains. We visited a beautiful waterfall, Minnehaha Falls, off of the beaten path. It was about a 5 miles drive on a one lane dirt/gravel road so it really was quiet and secluded, especially on Thanksgiving. Of course, I had to screw around with mother nature. Absolutely NONE of my photos come close to the way it looked in real life. This is the way it looks in real life: http://www.fs.fed.us/conf/ne-ga-wate...ha-falls.shtml This slide show shows how an amateur can screw up perfection: http://outdoors.webshots.com/slideshow/568959352vWicBu I loved those pictures, particularly how you worked with the motion. These Qs will show what a dummy I am. How did you get the pics so sharp yet blur the motion just right in some shots and a little too much in others? Were you using a tripod? Is there a shutter speed that simulates how we see movement? I used a heavy tripod and focused on the rock or a patch of leaves, so that the non movement area was in focus. I had the camera set on manual. so I could adjust the aperture and shutter speed separately. I played with the shutter speed and it ranged from 1/15 of a sec, to probably 4 secs. By adjusting the aperture I could balance the exposure so I could get the detail on the rocks and leaves, without blowing out the water. I had the camera set up on Matrix Exposure, and found I would have to under expose the photo by 2 or 3 stops to compensate for the white water. If I used the exposure setting the camera told me was correct, it would completely blow out the water, so the water would just be white with no detail. So you are using a heavy tripod. As careful as you are, I wonder if your camera has a problem. Look at the photos you posted "full size" on that site. Something is happening there with focus. It could be a few things besides the focus. First, jpegs right out of a D200 are notoriously soft compared to other cameras. It's just the way it's set up by default. But they take sharpening very well. So after you resize (using sinc/lanczos as the resizing method and if your program doesn't do that, get one that does) apply some sharpening. If you shot raw, you also have to apply some sharpening as the last step. Second, if you resized or rotated (to fix a non-level image althought with a tripod there's no reason you should have to do that) with a program that doesn't use sinc/lanczos interpolator, that could be what you're seeing. Get one that does. I think Lightroom does, but I was reading online about some bugs in their implementation. I use XnView as the last step in my workflow to batch resize (using lanczos), sharpen (around 15 or so on the slider) and then save to final jpeg (jpeg options DCT method set to float, SubSampling set to 1x1, and the quality slider to whatever you want the final size to be. I use 85 for web shots.) Third, when you're doing long exposures in bright light, you have to stop down the lens so far that you're diffraction limited. Too small an aperture will soften the image. I didn't look at the exif data (is it available?) and different lenses show different effects, mostly because their sharpness where diffraction isn't a problem are different. But once you get down to f/11 or so, it can start showing up and soften your image. Some lenses that are super sharp will even show softening at f/8. Once you get down to f/16 and smaller, it can be a real problem with any lens. What you need to do is open the lens up to where it's sharpest (usually a stop or three smaller than it's max aperturn) and use a neutral density filter to reduce the light so you can take a longer exposure. If you want more depth of field, you can stop it down some. But once you get to f/12 and higher, you'll probably notice more softening due to diffraction than any better focus due to more depth of field. Steve My aperture was probably in the F11-F32 range, depending upon the shutter speed. Since F8 really is the sharpest for my lens, they would have been sharper if I had used a ND Filter, but really in RAW using Lightroom standard "Landscape Sharpening" they do look sharp. There's a good interactive demo of what diffraction does at: http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tut...hotography.htm For camera type, pick a camera that has a similar pixel density to yours. The D200 is about halfway between the D2X and EOS20D/350D so you'll have to guestimate You'll see that at f/32, your 10MP D200 is only able to resolve the same detail as an around 2.5MP camera used at a non-diffraction limited aperture. Steve |
Messing with Mother Nature
On Nov 28, 8:10*am, "Reginald P. Smithers III, Esq."
wrote: Yesterday, my wife and I went to North Georgia to enjoy a quiet Thanksgiving Day in the mountains. We visited a beautiful waterfall, Minnehaha Falls, off of the beaten path. *It was about a 5 miles drive on a one lane dirt/gravel road so it really was quiet and secluded, especially on Thanksgiving. Of course, I had to screw around with mother nature. *Absolutely NONE of my photos come close to the way it looked in real life. This is the way it looks in real life: http://www.fs.fed.us/conf/ne-ga-wate...ha-falls.shtml This slide show shows how an amateur can screw up perfection: http://outdoors.webshots.com/slideshow/568959352vWicBu Lucky you didnt get shot by a fool mistaking you for a Turkey........ |
Messing with Mother Nature
Steve wrote:
There's a good interactive demo of what diffraction does at: http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tut...hotography.htm For camera type, pick a camera that has a similar pixel density to yours. The D200 is about halfway between the D2X and EOS20D/350D so you'll have to guestimate You'll see that at f/32, your 10MP D200 is only able to resolve the same detail as an around 2.5MP camera used at a non-diffraction limited aperture. Steve Very good interactive tool, and does highlight the benefit of using the NG filters. Thanks for the response. I also looked at the using the Lightroom preset landscape sharpening option after the batch convert, and it did improve the clarity and sharpness of the small jpg's. Feel free to critique and make any suggustions |
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