This is the smallest and lightest real carabiner made. It is high quality and won't break. You might find it at outlets like REI, or here, from the source...

https://www.blackdiamondequipment.com/en_US/product/miniwire-carabiner/

These little bear cubs are playing in my backyard fountain. Each is about the size of a basketball, but they already have respectable claws. I figured mama was somewhere nearby, so this was from inside the house.

A guy here in LA advertised some Nikkor lenses on FB. Said he was switching his setup to Canon. One was the 50mm f1.8. I was interested in that lens, so I went to see the guy to look at it. He told me straight up that he was selling it cheap because it was never tack sharp. I stuck it on my D810 body and took some pictures of stuff like spoons lined up on the table (we met at a coffee shop, I'm paranoid). I could see that on my body it was back-focusing. I showed him what was happening, and he didn't care. He had no use for it. I gave him $65, took it home and tuned on the Focus Tune rig, and it's perfect. Spot on. Score.

My 28-70 f2.8 came in at different recommended setting at various focal lengths and fstops. If I were to adjust it for one, some of the others would be thrown off by more. I left it alone, and frankly it works well and is my go to lens most of the time.

hmm. trying to delete

The first is an F-16 testing a terrain avoidance system at The Needles, Giant Sequoia Nat. Monument, California (apparently it works).. The second two are an old RCAF T-6 parked at Santa Rosa Airport, CA.

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Desktop: Dell XPS / 32 gigs RAM / Intel i&-6700 CPU @ 3.4 GHz.
I have all f the applications and the OS on the SSD, all of the documents on the conventional drive. PS 2020 runs like a champ.

Laptop: don't recall all the specs but it's an HP Spectre. SSD only. It's a bit slower but not enough to bug me (I don't work that fast anyway.) :-)

"Sometimes these decisions end up not being technical at all. The Beta vs. VHS eventuality, which was truly a tragedy..."

My real career was as an audio engineer. I'm like one of those pilots whose career spanned from flying prop planes through f-4's. When I started everything was analog. Gradually digital got good enough to be viable. I ended my career working with high end digital systems. Much like with digital photography, it took took time for both the technology and people's tastes to catch up but they did.

Early on in digital recording SONY came up with a system they called F1. The analog to digital processor outputted the encoded digitized audio as bar code transitioning at the sampling rate of 44.1khz. This was recorded onto a VCR. BETAMAX, on a well maintained machine, was quite reliable. VHS was a problem, it couldn't resolve the signal at a sufficient resolution. But, due to the possibility that even the BETA machine would have uncorrectable errors I always ran an analog backup. Occasionally I could use a top end analog recorder (which blew the early digital away, but I did what I was being paid to do,) but on many occasions I ran my backup on VHS hi fi. The BETAMAX couldn't come close for audio quality.

I went through an ebook (Great Courses) by a Nat Geo photographer named Joel Sartore. He recommends leaving the WB set for daylight at all times. I've been doing this, and adjusting it in LR/PS when I need to. Good results. I don't know about other softwares.

That's pretty interesting about flourescent lights cycling on and off. I think I got bit by that once, now that I know what it is. Power lifting meet, pics were all over the place. Fortunately I don't shoot in that environment very often. My D-810 doesn't have that feature.

Well I guess this just about clears it up.

From the manual for the Nikkor 24-70 f2.8 ED VR:

"Normal and active VR can reduce the blur when the camera is mounted on a tripod. Off, however, may produce better results depending on the type of tripod and on shooting conditions."

Some camera's have an autofocus fine tune feature. There are various products/methods to use this feature. I use one which uses software to analyse the results. Basically you take a series of exposures at each adjustment point, turning the focus ring between each one so the autofocus has to re-acquire lock. The software graphs the results, showing which fine tune value is the most accurate for your camera/lens. The other thing the graph shows you is how much variation there is in the autofocus from shot to shot.

On a tripod shooting at 1/500 f2.8, my 24-70 f2.8 ED VR lens on a Nikon D-810 the variation between frames is larger with the VR on than off. The problem is that this information is hard to interpret since the graph does not give you the value of the points on the vertical axis. When I asked the maker, he simply said they are arbitrary.

My experience is that at slower shutter speeds the benefits of VR far exceed any inaccuracies of the AF system, but above 1/500th, or on a tripod, I turn it off because it makes me feel better.

A camera tech told me that the problem with VR on a tripod is that when it sees no motion it hunts around looking for it.

I haven't found a reliable answer as to whether my newer VR lenses turn off VR on a tripod, but I suspect, from my AF fine tune results that they do not.

Dead and alive. Bristlecone Pines can live for more than 4,000 years. This one is in the high desert in California's White Mountains.

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Here’s what’s going on. They are “aid climbing,” the standard technique for climbing a big wall (free climbing these walls is very rare.) So, they are working their way up using their gear to hang from and move up. It looks like the climber who led this pitch, in blue, has reached the end of the rope (60M) and is, or is getting, anchored. There will be two ropes going down from him/her, one for the second climber, the other for the haul bag (food, water, supplies.) The haul bag is white, directly under the lower climber. When the leader is anchored, he/she will set up a pulley system and pull up the bag (which could weigh as much as 80-100 pounds,) while the second climber will use “ascenders” to climb the rope itself. Once re-united the procedure is repeated. Most often the climbers will switch their roles as leader and second at the end of each pitch. It’s all very well organized, or at least it had better be. This sport – if indeed it’s a sport – can be done quite safely, or not. Almost assuredly these two are very well prepared and have practiced their craft thoroughly before heading up a wall like that.

Rather than being morons, climbers tend to be a pretty smart bunch. Otherwise there would be precious few left.

Great photograph, by the way. You ought to send a copy to Climbing Magazine, who knows? Another good mag is Rock and Ice, but last I heard if it’s been on the web they won’t use it.

St. Thomas Episcopal Church is right across the street. It's a beautiful stone Gothic style church. If you're at St. Pat's, check it out as well. One feature is a spectacular organ case set above the entrance facing down the nave, a very traditional setting. If you're lucky someone will be playing it while you are there.

Sorry for the double post. I don't see a delete function in the edit window...

St. Thomas Episcopal Church is right across the street. It's a beautiful stone Gothic style church. If you're at St. Pat's, check it out as well. One feature is a spectacular organ case set above the entrance facing down the nave, a very traditional setting. If you're lucky someone will be playing it while you are there.

The Lone Pine Peak image is sublime. I'm very familiar with the mountain having climbed both of the prominent ridges seen so clearly in your photo. Rarely have I seen a photograph where the lighting defines them so well, and in such soft lighting too. Thanks for the share.