The Official Head-Case Photography Thread.

[Knuckledragger]

I updated the firmware in the D200 (which was still running v1.01, from 2005).  It was a peculiar, but reasonably painless process.  So far my hit rate with it has been spectacularly bad (business as usual more or less.)  I'm going lug the D200, 300mm, and a [gosh darn] tripod down to the docks and photograph some of the famous sights around here.  I display classic Vineyarder behavior in seldom leaving my yard, never mind going to any of the famous and scenic places around here.  In my defense, there's summer people everywhere.

[Iron_Dreamer]

On 7/13/2024 at 12:20 PM, Knuckledragger said:

There's a guy on MV selling a bunch of DSLRs for quite cheap.  Most were of no interest to me (Canon Rebel T2i, Canon D40, Nikon D90, Nikon D3200) but he also had a 2005 vintage D200 paired with the 18-200mm VR (which is apparently a really good lens.)  My main interest is attaching my 300mm F/4 to it and using it as an effective 450mm. 

I had the 18-200 with my D200 for a while in the way back days. Loved the camera, that lens less so, it wasn't bad, but clearly wasn't that sharp off-center much above 50mm.  It was a heralded, sought-after lens in the time, but I found it pretty overrated optically. I think I ended up with a Tamron 17-50 2.8 that was more to my liking, as my main zoom until I moved to the D700 a couple of years later. That 300mm lens you got there, on the other hand, should be a great lens so long as you find use for it and can get things in focus.

[blessingx]

The Story Behind the Iconic Photograph of the Busboy Who Held a Dying Robert F. Kennedy in 1968 Assassination

https://www.vintag.es/2024/07/juan-romero-iconic-photo.html 

[Knuckledragger]

I still haven't done anything meaningful with the D200 and 300mm.  As I have said before, 300s are not casual lenses.  I did take a nice stroll with the 18-200mm a few evenings ago.  So far my experience has been the opposite of what I_D described.  I like the lens better at longer lengths than I do at the wide end.  Of course this is based on a sample size of "strolling down my street in the afternoon" so it's a meaningless assessment.  With that said, all of these were taken with the 18-200mm:

Two deer finding something good to eat in the field behind the home where my cousin (once removed) and her husband lived for decades.  200mm F/8, 1/100, ISO 250.

 

The back yard of the same property.  The current owners use the house for vacations in the summer, so no one actually "lives" there (this is Vineyard 101, I'm afraid.)  The flowers frame are hydrangeas, which are hugely popular round here.  The colors they display are soil dependent, so some people get blue and others might get pink or purple.   I like the gradual DoF the 18-200 provides here.  170mm, F/8, 1/90, ISO 200.

 

One of the many small trees on the farm across the street from me.  Bokeh is nothing interesting but again I like the DoF.  200mm, F/5.6 (which is to say, wide open), 1/125, ISO 200.

 

The famous Sweetened Water Farm horse barn.  There is an absolutely fugly McMansion behind it, and I had frame carefully to only get the barn in the shot.  I posted this to the private MV group saying as much an a whole bunch of people got very bent out of shape at me calling the house in question ugly.  70mm, F/14, 1/60, ISO 250.

 

Nothing says Edgartown like white picket fences.  70mm, F/7.1, 1/80, ISO 250.

 

A section of fence I've photographed a great many times.  40mm, F/9, 1/320, ISO 200.

 

The same view, more or less, some 20 years prior taken with a PowerShot S60.

 

I'll win no awards for the composition on this one, but the light is pretty.  50mm, F/6.3, 1/60, ISO 200. 

 

Looking out one end of my driveway.  This shot is fine, but it illustrates everything I don't like about wide angles on small sensors.   The exaggerated distances drive me nuts.  I think prevalence of cameraphones are most of my reason for this aversion. 

 

Slightly less fisheyed wide shot.  18mm, F/7.1, 1/200, ISO 200.  TBH I should have stopped down a couple more stops.  I still barely know how to wrangle the D200.

 

Gidget the kitty enjoying her new digs.  There's a long story here, but the short version is that the daughter of two friends of mine moved to MV full time and brought her two cats.  70mm, F/5.6, 1/640, ISO 400, meow.

 

[n_maher]

I had and almost exclusively shot with an 18-200 for years on my D7000.  I'm sure there's better glass, but for a lens that you almost never have to take off the body, I had few complaints.  I also understand why, from a professional or even semi-pro perspective, it was criticized.

[Knuckledragger]

I went on the 'Bay looking for a Nikon back cap and body cap.  The cheapest seller for genuine ones was in Japan.  (The Chinaman will sell you all sorts of knock-offs in a variety of colors, also Chinaman is not the preferred nomenclature Dude.)  For $2.12 with tax I got a body cap and lens cap shipped from Japan inside of 3 days.

Two boxes, with tons of air bags and bubble wrap.  The 5D IV/battery grip/85mm were not packed this well (and took longer to arrive from a US seller.)

To be fair, the 5D IV seller was a fuckin' idiot.

 

 

[blessingx]

Visited the Pacific Pinball Museum today. Here are a few shots of a Jerry Kelley and Christian Marche working machines exhibit with a M9M and LLL 1966. 
 

[mikeymad]

I like them better in B&W. And they seem way sexier than the pinball art I remember growing up..

 

[blessingx]

8 hours ago, mikeymad said:

… they seem way sexier than the pinball art I remember growing up..

What do you mean? 😉

 

Edited July 21 by blessingx

[blessingx]

Photographing the 2024 Republican National Convention

https://petapixel.com/2024/07/23/photographing-the-2024-republican-national-convention/ 

[swt61]

I would call it a waste of film. But I guess waste of pixels is more accurate. 

[jose]

We have been staying in the south of the island for almost two weeks.We need a few days away from home.

I took advantage of the opportunity to take some photos in very low light with the R6 MKII. I´m very surprised with the good result, the problem with this thing is that consumes batteries like hell.

 

 

 

 

[Knuckledragger]

It's Land Rover time here on MV again.  This year's location (which, ahem, was changed last minute) wasn't as nice as last year's.  Also the lighting conditions were fare worse.  With that said, I went around with my 5D IV and 17-40.  The combination of camera body and lens looks "official" so (most) people got out of my way.

 

 

I won't win any awards for framing with most of these.  As is invariably the case, what the camera doesn't show is the real story.  I was constantly dodging moving vehicles (both LRs and not) as well as ambling attendees.  Also as I mentioned, the sunlight was very harsh.  I'd have brought along my speedlite, but last time I tried to power it up, it refused.  The 580EX was $400 in 2006, I shudder to think was the replacement model costs these days.

Bonus doggo.  She didn't quite know what to make of all the commotion.

[n_maher]

Thanks for sharing the picks, Knucks.  Some day I'll own another Landy, my first vehicle was a '68 SER IIA.  I've lusted after another ever since, they're just wildly impractical and have gotten quite expensive.  Maybe I'll get one of my European colleagues to help me import a newer model one of these years.

[Knuckledragger]

Two bits of coda to the above.  As I have mentioned, most happenings on MV are arranged through Facebook.  There are 3 main FB groups.  One is invite-only and no politics allowed, another is "stuff or sale on MV."  The third allows politics and reads like the staging area for the next Jan 6.  In the for sale group, a fella listed his prized LR for sale:

That price is really not bad for what it is.  98K is barely broken in.  The problem is that it's a diesel and ...right hand drive.  I don't think my brain could adapt to that, especially around here.

After this weekend's Land Rover gathering, I posted a few dozen of the photos I took to the main MV FB group. Most people who responded were either there, wished they'd been able to get there or were surprised they missed it.  One guy reacted with a "barf" emoji and nothing else.  This is from his FB splash page:

Nice 'dozer you got there, bro. 

Spoiler

Yes, I am incredibly petty.  I ain't wrong though.

 

[n_maher]

Knucks, 

Agree on the RHD being an issue.  I've often contemplated settling and buying one configured that way since they tend to be priced significantly lower than LHD models. Then I remember the counsel that I got from a Rover guy some 30+ years ago, RHD isn't worth it, regardless of the price.  

[Knuckledragger]

I have a long post about wedding photography brewing, but that's going to take some time to assemble.  In the mean time enjoy this shitpost.

[jose]

Ale taking his first shots.

 

What do you think of the Canon EF 28-70mm F/2.8L USM? I have been offered one in good condition for €400 but I don't know if it is worth investing in such an old lens... although I have heard that it is of very good quality

[blessingx]

Cool new Halide app feature, ‘Anti-Intelligent’ processing, comes to iPhone named Process Zero. 

https://petapixel.com/2024/08/14/halides-anti-intelligent-update-makes-iphone-photos-truly-natural/

 

[dsavitsk]

3 hours ago, blessingx said:

Cool new Halide app feature, ‘Anti-Intelligent’ processing, comes to iPhone named Process Zero. 

https://petapixel.com/2024/08/14/halides-anti-intelligent-update-makes-iphone-photos-truly-natural/

 

I love that the new added feature is the removal of the old feature. At least it's open source ...

def IMG_PROC(self):
    pass

 

[jose]

I feel very comfortable using the 85mm f/1.4L but I must continue working and learning. 

The special nature reserve of the Dunas de Maspalomas is a beautiful place for holidays. 

 

 

 

 

[Knuckledragger]

Previously I mentioned wedding photography.  In general, I avoid weddings like the plague.  With that said, in the 00s I attended a few and dragged along my camera.  I always made it a point to be clear I was not "the" definitive article wedding photographer.  This meant I didn't have to capture anything I didn't want.  I've mentioned previously that 2009 was a roller coaster of a year.  I did a Part 1 Recap back in February and never did another installment.  That post stopped right as the year got interesting.  I might resume that thread at some point, but for today the topic is solely a wedding I attended in August that year.  Weirdly, I didn't make a post about it at the time in 2009.  That's odd as I was actively taking photos and posting them here regularly in that era.

Unfortunately, Flickr's embed codes and HC's forum software are not friends.  Much has changed about the Information Age in the last couple decades and it's largely been a turn for the worse (I'm looking at you, imgur.)  That means I have to dig out the image URL for every photo I want to post.  With that said, let's take a plunge into 15 years ago.

The wedding was held at the Hyatt Regency Boston Harbor, which sited on an absolutely gorgeous location.

 

This shot had some exposure issues.  I salvaged it by cheating like an MFer in Luminar 4.

 

The weather was about as good as anyone could hope.

 

I was always proud of this shot. Clever (if I do say so myself) use of fill flash.  The reality of the subjects in frame is of course more complex and, well, worse than the image.  The four men are all DJs.  The first died of an OD on his 44th birthday.  The second is a serial philanderer who failed to pay me for the last lighting gig I ever did.  The middle chap would later marry the woman beside him, but was a philanderer as well.  The guy on the far right has had some run-ins with the law, but is doing okay now as best I know.  Back stories aside, I love the arrangement of the people in the photo.

 

Careful observers will note that there are not photos of the wedding ceremony itself.  The couple hired a professional photographer and since he was there I made it a point to not be "that guy" just sat quietly during the exchange of vows.  The photographer's day job was being a paparazzo.  He had a Nikon D100, which was pretty long in the tooth even in 2009.  He'd outfitted it with a flash bracket that could rotate independently of the camera.  It was quite a compact rig and probably suited him well during his primary vocation.

The pro photographer seemed to know what he was doing, so I stayed out of his way and did what I always do.

 

This is a photo I didn't like at the time, but a decade and a half later I have a much different eye (and am much better at editing photos.)

 

The Hyatt has a permanent tent for outdoor functions.

 

The cake was pretty spectacular.

 

The couple (who are both drum n bass DJs) hired a techno DJ to play their wedding.  He did a stand up job of playing exactly the kind of music one expect to hear at a wedding.  I could spin (no pun intended) a good number of paragraphs about this DJ in particular, but I'll leave to this: he drove and 1986 Buick Riviera that had a CRT touchscreen and knew more about techno than anyone I ever met.  Everything else about his character is best left unsaid.

This is not terribly relevant, but it was only upon revisiting this photo set that I learned I had apparently lent out my spare DJ mixer for the proceedings.  I still have on the mainland, I think.

 

The first dance.  I've always liked this shot.

 

The groom dances with his mum.

 

The bride dancers with her uncle.  More on him in a bit.

 

At the time, the groom humorously called this one "second thoughts."  I took this shot and a number of the ones above with the manual focus Nikon 75-150mm F/3.5E push-pull zoom.  It spits CA if one is not careful, but has the best bokeh of any lens I've ever used.  Pretty sharp wide open as well.

 

The bride and her back tattoo.  The 75-150 really showing it stuff here, even if I flubbed the focus just a small amount.

 

Small footnote: The bride's uncle is gay.  This is her dancing with her uncle's husband.  Gay marriage has been legal in MA for 20 years.  Massholes stronk.

 

As I mentioned, the cake was something else.  I bounced my flash off the tent's ceiling.

 

Might as well drop the other shoe.  This is the only photo of the wedding ceremony.  I took it and it's not very good.  Two days after the wedding I got a strange email from the pro photographer (I gave him my business card.)  I had taken a couple photos with him and the groom and agreed to email them to him.  The relevant part of the email from him said:

Quote

I totally enjoyed shooting the shit with you and now I am in
desperate need of favor.  In fact the word "favor" doesn't do it justice.  I
had an issue with my first card of the day and do not have any shots of the
ceremony.  8 years shooting digital and this is the first time I ever had
this happen.  Is there any way in the world I can get all your shots from
the ceremony, no matter what they are?  I am so desperate because Josh is
one of my best friends and I would be so angry if I disappointed them.

I am not sure how many you took but I will do anything to get them. PLEASE
HELP.  I am sorry to ask so much but I am desperate.  Let me know if you can
help.  Needless to say I have not told the happy couple because I want them
to enjoy their honeymoon.  I certainly will let them know that you saved the
day.

Feeling bad for the dude, I sent him a link to the program FileJuicer.  I explained at length how it worked with corrupted memory cards and that it could salvage many of the images from it.  FJ was free to use, but cost $20 for all the features.  I told him that seemed like a small price to pay given the situation.  He wrote back clarifying that the "issue" was that he lost the first memory card and repeated (quite rudely, I might add) his demand for all photos I took of the ceremony.  Any sympathy I had for him evaporated at that moment.  In 2009, 2GB pro grade CF cards were less than $50.  The Nikon D100 is a 5 megapixel camera.  One 2GB CF card could easily hold 1200 shots.  If he was using such old cards that he needed to swap during the shoot (I strongly suspect he had 256MB cards he bought with the camera in 2002) then he's got no one to blame but himself.  Even in 2009, there were pro DSLR bodies that had dual memory card slots and could be configured to write to both simultaneously.  This practice was standard even back then for pros that could not afford to lose a shot.

I never replied to his second email.  I saw the couple a month after the wedding and had to act like I didn't know the photographer had lost all the photos of the wedding ceremony.  With all of that said, the sunset over Boston harbor is quite something:

17-40L.

 

Back to the 75-150 for a moment.

 

The Hyatt is a pretty cool looking building.  35mm F/2, wide open.

 

He has no idea what's in store for him.

 

The reception continued on for quite some time.  I couldn't stay for all of it because my ride out of Boston was leaving.

 

The 50mm F/1.4 misfocused a bit (as it is wont to due) but the groom's expression is priceless.

Why am I posting all these photos now?  Well, the 15th anniversary of the wedding just passed.  I don't do much on Faecesbook that I don't have to, but over the years I've periodically posted a few images from the wedding on the anniversary.  I hadn't done so in a few years so I decided to revisit the shots I took at the time.  As I've mentioned, I am much better at editing photos now than I was back then.  I spent a couple evenings reworking some of the old photos that I didn't like in 2009.  I selected one and posted it to FB, tagging the bride and the groom.  Before doing so, I FB stalked both of them a bit.  Both had profiles that said "Married to [the other one]" but not much else.  To their credit, neither are big users of social media. 

Half an hour after I posted the photo, I had a "message request" from the brides uncle.  I accepted it and he said "I'm guessing you're out of the loop.  You probably want to take that image down."  I asked for clarification and an hour later he said the couple separated.  Welp, as the kids say.  At least the photos are good.  Also think twice before you hire this guy for your event.

[Knuckledragger]

This guy shoots IR film with a Hasselblad.

 

 

[blessingx]

Saw another posted today you can use ChatGPT to write Fuji film recipes, Canon picture profiles, etc. poor examples below, but just tried. Anyway, worth experimenting to get unusual looks or possible better color match different models.   

 

Winter Night Recipe for Fujifilm X-Pro 2

• Film Simulation: Classic Chrome

• Dynamic Range: DR200

• Highlight Tone: -1

• Shadow Tone: +2

• Color: -2

• Sharpness: +1

• Noise Reduction: -4

• Grain Effect: Strong

• White Balance: 4500K, +2 Red, -5 Blue

• ISO: Auto (max 3200)

• Exposure Compensation: -1/3 to -1 (depending on the lighting)

 

Winter Night Picture Style for Canon 6D

- **Picture Style:** Neutral (as a base)

- **Sharpness:** 3

- **Contrast:** +1

- **Saturation:** -2

- **Color Tone:** -1 (this shifts colors towards cooler tones)

 **Custom White Balance:**

- **White Balance:** Set around 3200K-4000K (adjust based on your scene for cooler tones)

- **WB Shift/Bkt:** Move towards the blue and magenta (e.g., B1, M2) to create a cold, wintery feel.

[blessingx]

On 7/24/2024 at 8:33 AM, blessingx said:

Photographing the 2024 Republican National Convention

https://petapixel.com/2024/07/23/photographing-the-2024-republican-national-convention/ 

Here’s Steve Simon‘s take on the other side… 

https://petapixel.com/2024/08/26/photographing-the-2024-democratic-national-convention/