There were a number of editors during WWII that felt the same way about 35mm. The problem with new technology is figuring out the proper use of it, given it's strengths and limitations. Nikon owned the 35mm battle for photo-journalism over the much larger competitors for the simple reason you could take the camera with you out of the way and grab meaningful shots that told the story, much more readily than a much larger Grayflex, or 8x10. It also didn't hurt that the photographer could easily stay out of the line of fire and still do their job. A few years back, I got the opportunity to talk to one or two folks that have seen the front line, and on that rare occasion, the Nikon took a bullet aimed in the general direction of the photographer. Some cameras had their lens shattered. Others took a huge dent or worse, but many times the body still functioned and pictures were still taken. NASA uses DSLR's and SLR's to record things such space launches, images from the ISS and the space shuttle when it was flying. I got to see several bodies that were strapped into the tower to record the lift off. They were burnt to a crisp, but people managed to put them back together again and used them over and over for the same thing. Try that with a plastic cell phone... :-)

In today's world, we get to play with cell phones. I find mine useful as a "cheap" polaroid to make "notes" of a place to come back later, check general lighting on a composition, or if that is all I have, then that is my camera of the moment. To me the limitations of the cell camera, make it "good enough" for social media, meals, and grab shots, lending it towards the journalism and memory end of the spectrum. For street photography it's a great tool as there are so many people wandering around with their phones out that many folks have trained themselves to ignore them. The convenience of the form factor, really does lend the camera on the phone to many uses that people find pleasing. The last couple of weddings I've attended as a guest, made me glad that I did not have to deal with the paparazzi swarming all over the event. Having said that, the opportunity was there for some enterprising person to collect many of those images as part of a memory book, or video that would have much more content than the single photographer covering the event with his camera. His gear was focused on getting those images that should adorn the wall for display, not candids for a walk down memory lane.

Thanks for the referral to monoprice.com. I will be using a USB cable 10-15 ft in length. I've figured out how to work the camera, with the laptop. My original mistake was to assume that HDMI was bi-directional. The intent was to use the laptop as live view. I already use a remote trigger for the camera, so I don't really need another one, but DigiCamControl does provide it, as well as other functions. I just need to bear that in mind during the process. For many years I've done most of my shooting manual and until now, is when I needed an assistant (digital or another person) to compose and execute some of the images I will be taking. The payoff from this is an upgrade to a D5/D500 to replace the venerable D300. Gotta pay for the toys. With any luck, the new body will last at least as long as the older one in service. I've found with the D300, it took almost 2 years and over 25,000 shots (experiments, practice) to find out what the sensor could really do. Sony did a good job.

Thanks to all who contributed to this thread.

Sorry to have to do this, but the D300 does indeed have an HDMI port on the body. Right next to the USB port that can be used for tethering as well.

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Folks,

I've got an i7 based laptop with a Nvidia 960 GPU in it, and plan to use the laptop for a live view monitor, as well as storage as part of the studio sessions.
I'm use my D300 as the work horse, and can not find any information on how long a HDMI cable I can use in order to place the live view away from the camera. I have the choice of a 12ft, 25ft, or 50ft cable, rated at 4K, 18Gb/sec, so it will handle far more than the body will deliver.

Anybody done tethering ?

Looking for suggestions...

Thanks in advance,

...Paul

My daughter lives in Lima Peru, and my wife and I have been planning a trip to see her for a week or so.
Doing research on going there and enjoying the experience, the vast majority of people kept suggesting
that in order to keep weight to a minimum and criminals looking elsewhere (when in the City) to avoid
taking my DSLR with gear, but instead take a pocketable (like a Lumix, Sony, or Canon) or just take my
smartphone if it has a good camera it.

I'm planning to upgrade to an S7 edge this week, and there seems to be quite a few external sets that can
working with Android phones as external clip on's.

Has anyone worked with this type of photo format ? If so, what has been your experience, and what can
I set my expectations accordingly ? Am I better getting a small camera to cover the trip? There are plans
to see the City, the markets, a number of local sites and trek up Machu Picchu.

Thanks in advance,

...Paul

Very pretty. Colors look spot on.

Very nice. Lighting is very well done.
Love the composition...

Hi Bill,

I took a minute to pull a copy of your flower to see the JPG info, and take a closer look at what you captured.

I'll ask the main question up front. Are you planning to use the same composition and distance from the subject ?

If so, IMO, using a longer lens is not going to help all that much, if not muddle things. You have a pretty good DoF that most likely is on the edge or has already wandered into the area of diffraction given the 105 and your sensor type.

If you want to reshoot the exact same thing the same way, I would suggest the following:

Plan A:

Placing a light source from the underside and to the right (image right) of the flower to highlight the underside of the flower. This should pop some of the color and more importantly take advantage of the diffuse nature of the petals on this subject.

Plan B:

If you want to tighten up any of the details on the edges and/or front to back ends of the subject, then I would calculate the optimal defraction aperture (it may be between F/8 or F/11) and calculate your DoF at that point and estimate the number of shots to take to cover the depth of infront of and to the back of the flower and then, once you take that series, stack the images to get the result.

As a side suggestion, you may want to consider isolating a portion of the flower that really appeals to you and meets the criteria of the Club Submission and have a go at that.

Hopefully this has been helpful.


...Paul

Hey Bill,

I like the comp for what you were shooting.
Since you asked, here are some things that can help with the image:

The background is great to start with - the closer to Black Matte, the better, but that type of background really begs for vibrant colors and a comp that pulls the eye into not only the subject, but the tiny details in that subject.

When you shoot with a macro lens (I use 55m/60mm and 105mm), depth of field becomes your enemy unless the intent is to isolate a specific portion of the subject.

I usually try to have a deep DoF. There are those times where I want to grab something of interest, like the pistal, or Stamen, and use the rest of the flower as the "background" to offset the image.



Here is a sample from some of the flowers I have shot in the studio.

Hope that helps...

...Paul

Daffodil from the yard.

The goose was rather grumpy as one of the mallards pilfered a big hunk of bread he was eyeballing...

Ducks can run rather fast, especially when being chased by a goose. :-)

SharpShooter has it right.

He did his due diligence before hand.

I spent an entire track season getting the right angles, distance, timing, camera settings and practice to get where I knew what spot to walk to and wait for the right moment to acquire the shot. If you spend time getting surprised by the action, you most likely will not get anything interesting except by chance. I also learned that I needed to pick the images I wanted to get before hand, as there will be those I will not be any where near to the action to capture. Rather than fight for a spot at the finish line to grab the winner, the more interesting shots are taken during the race.

The first weekend, where there was no snow, 50 degrees outside and the fowl were active in the pond, and happy to see people - especially with treats...

Took some time outside to enjoy part of the afternoon, and the birds.

Mallard Portrait


Ducks in formation


Those are my treats...

I agree with Richard. That and lots of practice.

I make the occasional visit to the drag strip.
Some cars cover the 1/4 mile in about 3 secs.
You can still capture the "victory" by hand - but it takes good anticipation. Some grab a video and play find the peanut with all the frames. I know some pros that will use expensive motion sensor rigs to trip the camera to grab the shot.

There is an old hot rodder's adage that fits your query:

Speed is a function of money. How fast do you want to go ?

You should enjoy it. You may find it's rather annealed to front of your camera after a while, as it's that useful. :-)
I found when I first bought mine, that I needed to spend a number of frames to get used to the personality of the lens before I used it in production. Quite a few of my lenses a internal focus and metal, so the getting use to the 18-200 took some practice.

Excellent lens. You will have to correct some barrel at the short end if you have vertical lines. The problem is minimal - typical of ultra-wide range. One minor issue - lens creep if you point it down and don't hold the barrel. That's the only issue I have had with it since I've owned one. I always have a rubber band or two with me to stop the lens from moving around. I take it with me when I need to travel one body+lens. Where you are going, it should handle almost everything. At that altitude, you may want to consider a strong UV filter, or correct it afterwards in PP.