This is a time for Manual. Set your camera in manual, then set your Aperture for the DoF you want, then set you shutter speed while pointing the camera slightly south of the sun (a spot meter here would be good). When the Sun hits the Horizon and begins to sink, point straight up and meter the azimuth. Set the shutter speed and re-point your camera. This shutter speed will be sufficient to carry your exposures until you are left with but a faint afterglow.

Photographically, the best pictures of a sunset occur from the time the lower edge of the sun hits the horizon until about half to three-quarter after the sun disappears below the horizon; it is called afterglow. I always chuckle at the sunsetters here on Lake Michigan that turn their back and leave when the sun drops below the horizon.

Because the picture was already in the JPEG format when he chose to level it. Any adjustment that moves or combines pixels in a JPEG will severely reduce resolution. If JPEG is your thing, then more of your photography must be done in front and behind the camera, while if you record the RAW image, you can adjust the image without reducing the resolution nearly as much and thus you can just record the incident light upon the sensor in your camera.

Scary how a young reporter can take a story from NASA about how we learned about space weather from our Nuclear Testing and turn it into a story about humans screwing up their environment. The knowledge we gained from these tests in the 50s and 60s moved space science at least as much as all space flights during the same period of time.

The Gizmoto story is a good example of how a reporter can take a random fact from nearly anywhere and base a story on that fact to promote her own worldview.

Perhaps a discussion of JPEG would cast some light into a dark corner. JPEG typically compresses at a 10:1 ratio. that is a minimum of 3.7 stops of information. A JPEG is fine if you take the camera output information and input it to a screen or a printer, however, if you crop that image, you may lose up to another 2-3 stops of information. Adjust exposure, highlights, lose more stops of information. Save that image recompress and lose another stop or two. Reopen and then do a save-as - more stops lost.

With a RAW image, you can push exposure, color, and highlights all over the place, crop, remove objects, etc and never lose a stop of information until you export the image to a JPEG (at which time you give away up to 3.7 stops).

Rent for a week, first a Canon and a 35mm or 50mm lens in your buying range, then a Nikon and the same focal length lens. Shoot no less than 500 frames with each camera. Then come back and tell us which camera you bought and why.

Uper or Troll?

Thanks for the advice....

https://faradayscienceshop.com/products/aperture-the-camera-coffee-mug?t=fb

I have never seen any difference between the Camera rendered JPGs and my Personally managed JPGs, and, yes, for most of my film work I allowed the Fuji machines to process and produce 4X6s w/o input from me; BUT...

Last week, I took my Canon lens off my camera and put a new Non-Canon lens on and the first thing I found was that the camera body no longer corrects for lens aberrations, because, to the people at Canon, only canon lenses exist. There is not even the ability to enter a correcting curve manually in the camera. I can go into PSP X9 and correct each image for distortion and for Chromatic Aberration, or I can process the photos in batch through Aftershot pro and correct for these lens errors. At the same time, I can set up Aftershot to match my selected film type (vericolor, ektachrome, gold, etc) and every shot I run in that batch will show as if done in that film. Now, in PSP, all I need to do is adjust selected individual shots for special effects desired. Aftershot will also add a watermark to my photos as I convert them. In all of this, RAW will also SAVE File space because the photos will only exist on disk as RAW with a db of corrections rather than saving a Raw and a Jpg of each photo.

I don't do RAW because of elitism, I do it because I have ALWAYS been functionally lazy - I will always find the easy way to do a job, and currently, I find RAW Processing to be the easiest method - FOR ME.

Before you buy from Cosco (I am a member there) Check prices! Cosco can be slow to meet market prices so B&H ($596) and even best buy ($599) may be better.

One other thought - check with your local camera store. the worse price they could have is $599 (Nikon's price) and they may actually have a good used D5500 from someone that just upgraded to the newest and bestest.

Sitting as you sit to process photos on the monitor, have someone hold an X-rite chart next to the monitor. If the colors on the chart match (exactly) the colors on the photo you shot of the X-rite that is displayed on the monitor, then you are where you need to be. Now if the printed copy of the chart (Camera --> monitor --> printer)is indistinguishable from the original, you are really calibrated.

Think about what the word professional means and who we normally think of as "professional". The Airline pilot that verbalizes every action he takes so his co-pilot knows exactly where in the the procedure the pilot is; the reactor operator that uses a two person rule to check his every move; The racecar driver who has a team of people watching his gages and his performance so as to correct his performance during the race; The Physician who is absolutely sure he knows what is wrong with you and then orders lab tests to prove his diagnoses.

You are right in your premise that the difference between a professional and an amature is checking, but your directions are reversed. A professional always - ALWAYS - checks his work - over and over and over!

Professional Photographers of yesteryear had chimping techniques and used them when the shot was critical. It was the reason why Dr. Land developed polaroid film - most 4X5 and 8X10 cameras in the late 40s into the 60s had a polaroid back to snap in place to check lighting and exposure on critical shots. Sometimes the photographer would allow his able assistant with 20-25 years under his belt to actually take the polaroid - under the watchful eye of the photographer. Once the polaroid proved the setup was correct, then a sheet of the real film (Tech Pan or Pan-X) would be loaded and the single exposure of the day would be taken.

Today - someone buys a 0.6sensor camera and a zoom lens and next day wants to hang his shingle as a wedding photographer

Of the two, I like the B&W better, but did you try the carmel horse on a B&W background?

Your system calibration should entail calibration of the color input of the camera system to the color output of your finished media system.. It is your Camera input to your Printer or photofinisher for hardcopy output, and camera to display monitor for electronically viewed images. It is convenient but not critical that your laptop duplicate your finished product only that it performs its function well enough to get your image to the finished product.