Hello Bill, Coatachrome here.

Put that container back in the freezer and leave it there. It another 20 or 30 years your great grand kids will have a valuable piece of Americana History. Who knows, they may be able to sell it for a fortune on American Pickers.

Hello Dickerest, Coatachrome here.

Very nice set of photos, howerver, you are going to be receiving a visit from the ASPCA's Ornipholigical Model Release Division and they're going to poke a hole in your lens.

Hello Ugly Jake, Coatachrome here.

The absoulte best feature on any of the cameras I have purchased over the years is intrest free financing!!

Good Morning Elize,
Vandag is Sondag, April 7, is dit ongeveer 08:50 A.M.
Hoe is jy vandag?

I am sending you a private message with my personal e-mail address. Send a message back to me and let me know what version of windows you are working with.

Best,

Coatachrome

Hallo Elize, hoe is jy?, Coatachrome here.

I have two more resources for you to consider that may make your photography experience a little easier. These are two software programs that Nikon offers, free of charge. You can find them at the Nikon website, www.nikonusa.com.

When that page opens, at the top banner click on “Service & Support.”

Then, on the left side of the screen click on “Download Center.”

Scroll down the list and click on “Find the latest version of Nikon Software.”

The two programs are, “View NX2”, and “Nikon Transfer”

View NX2 is a program for viewing the images that you take, and it can be used to re-number those images as well.

Nikon Transfer is a program that will get the images from your camera and download them to a specific directory on your computer.

If you don’t already have this software I recommend that you download it and install it, both of these programs are free.

Once the software is on your computer I will help you to configure it the same way I teach my students to configure it on their computer.

Just let me know when you have the programs installed.

Best,

Coatachrome

Hello Elize, Coatachrome here.

You had asked me about settings on your D90 and I thought I would take a moment to share with you the routine I teach to my students. I use this routine when I take my D90 out to shoot. Setting up your camera is just a matter of personal choice. The D90 offers many different setting options to cover a wide range of shooting opportunities. No specific group of settings is right or wrong, some groups are better than others. The fact that there are so many only attests to the fact the people like choices.

This group of settings work for me in my shooting environment and I am sure others on this forum will have their sets and opinions as well. I have a checklist that I use to set up my cameras when I take them out.

On the top right side of your D90 you will see two buttons with green dots next to them. These two buttons, when pressed together, will restore most of your D90’s setting to the factory originals. I do this each time I take the camera out, and then I follow my checklist to achieve the set up that I want. Then after I have downloaded the photos I re-set the camera again, back to the factory default settings. This forces me to use my check list each time I take the camera out and insures that I will not have something set in a mode I don’t expect.

Holding the camera as if you were going to take a photo and starting on the left side of the camera, here is my routine.

With the camera off I check to make certain my lens is in the Auto Focus mode.
Next I check the Auto Focus Mode switch on the camera and make sure it is set to “AF.” On the top left I set the mode dial to “A” for aperture priority mode.
Next, I turn the camera on and press the “menu” button.
Use the multi-function switch navigate to “Shooting Menu.”
I will go down the list of settings that I use.

1. Set Picture Control – “SD standard”
2. Image Quality – “JPEG Fine”
3. Image Size – “Large”
4. White Balance – “Cloudy” (without the flash) or “Flash” if it is attached
5. ISO sensitivity settings – “200”
6. Active D-Lighting – “OFF”
7. Color Space – “Adobe”
(If your printer is not set up for the Adobe ColorSpace leave this setting at “sRGB”
8. Long exp. – “OFF”
9. High ISO NR – “OFF”
10. Active Folder – “NCD90”
11. Multiple Exposure – “OFF”
12. Movie Settings – Don’t bother with these until you are ready to shoot video

When you reach the “Movie Settings” press the left arrow of the “multi-selector” two times, then press the up arrow of the “multi-selector” five times to get to the “Custom Settings Menu.”

Press the right arrow of the “multi-selector” button to highlight “Autofocus” then press “OK.”

At menu “a1 AF-area mode” press the right arrow of the “multi-selector” button and choose “Single Point” then press the “OK” button. You will be taken back to the Autofocus menu. Press the down arrow of the “multi-selector” to go to the “a2 Center focus point” menu and choose “Normal zone” and press the “OK” button.

Now move to the top right of the camera.

To the left of the “On/Off” switch is the “metering button”, set it to Spot Metering.
Do this by holding the button down and rotating the “Main Command Dial” until the single dot appears in the “Control Panel.”

Next press the “exposure compensation” button and set it to show “0.0” in the “Control Panel” by rotating the “Main Command Dial.”

The button under the “exposure compensation” button is the “release mode” button.
Press it and rotate the “sub command dial” to select the “Single Frame” mode. (the “S” in the square)

The button under the “release mode” button is the “auto focus” button.
Press and hold it and rotate the “sub command dial” to select “AF-S”


Now press the “Info” button at the back bottom right of the camera.

In the LCD monitor you will see “AF-S” and a box to the left of that.
By pressing the arrow buttons of the “multi-selector” you will notice a little box within the larger box moving as you press the arrow buttons. This is your focus point selector, set it in the center of the larger box.

Use the “sub-command” dial at the top of the camera to select your initial f/stop, I recommend f/11.

Last, just above the “info” button is the “focus lock” switch. Point it at the white dot not at the “L.”

You camera is now set up in the aperture priority mode. That means you will select the f/stop and the camera will select the appropriate shutter speed to produce an acceptable photograph. In my opinion this is the best mode to begin to learn about photography.

If you go through this set up routine every time you take your camera out you will become familiar, very quickly, with all the settings. It is not important at first to understand why to use these settings but it is important to know where they are and how to access them.

I trust that this may help you.

Best,

Coatachrome

Hello Elize, Coatachrome here.

I would be honored to help you with your photography learning experience.

First, let me give you two valuable resources. These two books will do a lot for you if you are new to photography. The first book is specifically for your D90 camera. It is written by Simon Stafford and it is from a series of books called “Magic Lantern Guides.” If you do a “google” search for “Nikon Magic Lantern Guides” you should easily find it. It is much better than the manual that came with your camera and provides practical examples for using the various settings. It is not something that you want to read cover to cover, but rather keep handy as a resource when you have a particular question or you want to know more about how a particular function of your camera operates.

The second book is written by Bryan Peterson and is titled “Understand Exposure.” It is about 170 pages long and is an easy cover to cover read. If you are new to photography perhaps many of the terms and concepts you will find here on this forum may be new and hard to understand. This book will take you through all of it and has many practical and photographic examples

Now, about your question, “Could you help me with the settings for my camera and flash for when it's a cloudy day.”

I am guessing that by this question you are asking me about shooting in low light levels. If I am incorrect than you will need to be a bit more specific about the conditions and your expectations.

In my first post to you I discussed using your SB900 for fill flash to add light to areas of your photo that may become washed out by the bright sun.

Those setting would work just as well for adding light to a subject when there isn’t a lot of sunlight. In its basic mode, with your SB900 in the “On” position, attached to your camera, and your camera set to “Aperture Priority” mode, and the metering system set to “Matrix” the camera and flash will act together to achieve a good balance of fill flash light and ambient light.

I don’t know what type of lens you are using but if it is a zoom lens you should be able to see the effective range of the SB900 changing as you zoom in or out on a particular subject.

There are many other ways to compensate for low light levels, this one is the most basic for the equipment that you have.

Please let me know if this is the information you are looking for.

Best,

Coatachrome

Hello Elize, Coatachrome here.

You have two excellent pieces of equipment at your fingertips. I am not certain what kind of photography you are going to be doing but I can give you one specific example that may help you.

Your SB900 is an excellent light source as a primary and secondary light source, let me talk about the seconday light source first.

You can use your SB900 for flash fill photography of outdoor subjects on brightly lit days so that the detail in your main subject will not be washed out by the daylignt.

To do this it is best first to set your D90 in the center point focus mode. To do this access Custom Setting Menu, select Autofocus, then select Center focus point.

Next, set your ISO to 200.

Finally, using the button on top of your camera, to the left of your off/on switch, select Matrix Metering. You should be able to find information on the Metering Systems on page 87 of your manual.

In the Matrix Metering mode your SB900 will balance the ambient light with the flash/stobe power so that your primary subject will be well illuminated and your background will be bright as well.

Set your camera to the aperture priotiry mode, select an f-stop between f8 and f11, position yourself about 6 to 10 feet from some subject you want to photograph, put the sun on your back.

Take two shots, one with your SB900 off and one with your SB900 on and take a look at the differance between the two shots. This is using your SB900 as a flash fill for daylight photography.

I hope this will begin to help you in using your SB900 to its full capacity.

If you need more information just drop me a note.

Best,

Coatachrome.

This feature is standard in the new "Cardagria" version of most photo chips.

Hello Jimbo, Coatachrome here,

Since you are shooting with a Nikon, do not neglect Nikon's pre-setting for sports on your mode dial. When using this setting the camea does not need to aquire a focal point first, before the shutter can release. Expirement with it, you may find it a good solution for shooting fast moving sports events.

Hello Tommy, Coatachrome here.

A few more items to consider.

One item that may be of interest to you about your D90. Some poor focus problems can be caused because the optical low-pass filter (OPLF) can collect dust particles. Your D90 does have a self cleaning mode,

You can access it by from your set-up menu. Navigate to the “SET UP” menu. The 4th item on that menu should read, “Clean Image Sensor.” Select that function and you will see, “Clean Now.” Be sure your camera is on a solid surface in the standard shooting position, and press “OK.”

The sensor will be cleaned and you will return back to the “SET UP” menue.

The sensor cleaning can be set to work automatically to clean at start-up, shut down, or both, I leave it off and clean it each time before I use the camera. You can find information about the self cleaning function on page 244 of the D90 Manua.

Your note said you were a “beginner” in photography, here are some things that may help you. If you do an internet search for “Magic Lantern Guides” you will find a book written by Simon Stafford specifically for the D90. It is much better than the Nikon D90 manual because it was written by a photographer, not a marketing/engineering department.

One other great resource is a book titled, “Understanding Exposure” written by Bryan Peterson. This is a great resource for any type of photographer or photography.

I hope you find this bit of information usefull.

Best,

Coatachrome

Hello Tamurman, Coatachrome here.

If you are having focus problems with your D90, try this.

Switch your camear to the single focus point mode.

Use the command dial and select the Arperture priority mode and select either an f8 or f11 stop, let the camera decide what shutter speed to use.

If set your lens to 135mm and you are about 10 feet away from your subject a f-stop of f8 will give you a depth of field of about 10 to 12 feet. Everything in that range will be in focus. The smaller the f-stop the greater the depth of field will be.

Expierment with the arperture priority mode and see how the depth of field will be impacted by the various f-stop settings.

Good Afternoon Coop, Coatachrome here.

Long before Corel purchased the rights to Paint Shop it was the stand alone package offered in all windows software, made by Jasac. I have used it for many years. I stopped buying the progarm when Corel started making in bigger, more expensive and slower. I use Jasac last produced version, Paint Shop Pro Version 7.04 produced from 1999 until 2001. It is no longer on the market.

I have many other graphics programs, bigger, more expensive and slower that I have been asked to evaluate in pre-release formats. They are nice, but none of them have any more functionality than Paint Shop Pro 7.04. The only feature that my 7.04 version lacks is the ability to batch process files, and I have many other utility programs that can take care of that problem.

What I really like about the 7.04 version is the screen layout. I tested the Corel PaintShopPro version X3 some time ago and commented that the basic editing screen was so full of icons, tool bars and the like that there was very little room for the actual graphic to load and that most of the icons and toolbars represented reduntant functions. But when these toolbars and icons were switched off the basic editing screen did not get any larger.

I'm sure their new and improved version comes complete with a new and improved price tag and, like most, I'd wait until until the initial offering hoopala subsides and the price settles down to something reasonable.

But no matter what, I'm not givig up my orignal system, Jasac's Paint Shop Pro Version 7.04

Hello Norman, Coatachrome here,

Let me quote a piece from Simon Stafford's Magic Lantern Guide for the Nikon D90 that may help, he write, "It is easy to assume that using the lowest possible ISO setting would deliver the maximum potiential image quality; after all, this applies generally with film. However, digital sensors do not react to light in the same way as film. The standard base ISO sensitivity is where the sensor usually delivers optimal performance, which is ISO 200 in the case of the D90. At settings below this, the dynamic range of the camera is effectively reduced. Although low and midtone values are preserved, there is a tendency for highligh values to become overexposed more quickly. So, unless you really need to reduce the sensitivity, for example to use a wider aperture in brightness conditions, I recommend you shoot at ISO 200 to get the best out of your camera."

Hope this helps with your question.

Hello Buz, Coatachrome here.

I am not aquainted enough with that camera to offer you specific recommendations, but let me tell you a bit of what I know about DSLR cameras being used to shoot video. Generally this is not a good match. DSLR cameras are designed to shoot still subjects, not moving subjects. Although most of them do a good job at videos, providing the subjects are not in motion. Once the camrea is in the video mode everything is in the automatic mode and the photographer does not have any control to adjust for changing conditions.

I have done comparisons for some Nikon DSLR products that double as video cameras, and while the output was acceptable, I could acheive that same acceptable output with a $39.00 flip camera; and those Nikon cameras were a bit more that $39.00

My personal recommedation would be that if video is what you are after, than purchase a mid-line priced video camera rather that a mid-line DSLR.