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toplitzin posted:You are not a Photographer hasn't updated in months. DJExile posted:this forum Unironically yes. Go get lost in the archives of the threads that heavily feature goons posting photos and other goons telling them how badly they suck. Street photos, Landscapes, Photo-A-Day, pick your poison and post post post.
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Sep 20, 2017 14:22
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| # ? May 20, 2024 02:42 |
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I Just Found the Best Photographer, or whatever it's called, is the best. Especially when it was all about leaving constructive criticism on other people's Flickr's.
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Sep 20, 2017 22:58
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Is there a general go-to budget option for a 50mm prime lens for somebody that's just starting out? I picked up a used Nikon D3300 with a kit lens for cheaper than I was originally planning, so I have a little money left and a "nifty fifty" seems to be the most recommended all-purpose lens. Someone recommended I look into the Canon EF 50mm f/1.8, and the price is definitely appealing, but is that a solid choice or would I be much better off if I spent a little more?
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Sep 25, 2017 23:42
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You'll want the Nikon version. I leave to the Nikon owners which available 50 is most appropriate. Expect to have the 35mm recommended, too.
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Sep 26, 2017 00:03
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Grizzled Patriarch posted:Is there a general go-to budget option for a 50mm prime lens for somebody that's just starting out? I picked up a used Nikon D3300 with a kit lens for cheaper than I was originally planning, so I have a little money left and a "nifty fifty" seems to be the most recommended all-purpose lens. The 50/1.8D is the best value and what I use. The 50/1.8G has better bokeh and better autofocus and is much more expensive. I'd get the 50/1.8D.
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Sep 26, 2017 02:44
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How much extra are we talking? If you want a general use fast prime the 35mm f/1.8 DX is good and runs about $150 used, the 50mm f/1.8 would be a good portrait lens (like VB said get the AFD or the AF version for max cheapness). If cost if no concern personally I'd be looking at the Tamron primes, they make a 35mm f/1.8 with image stabilization that runs about $600 but is nearly as good as the Sigma ART series lenses in sperg tests so it's an incredible value.
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Sep 26, 2017 03:55
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8th-snype posted:How much extra are we talking? If you want a general use fast prime the 35mm f/1.8 DX is good and runs about $150 used, the 50mm f/1.8 would be a good portrait lens (like VB said get the AFD or the AF version for max cheapness). If cost if no concern personally I'd be looking at the Tamron primes, they make a 35mm f/1.8 with image stabilization that runs about $600 but is nearly as good as the Sigma ART series lenses in sperg tests so it's an incredible value. $600 is a bit more than I want to spend now, just because I'm just starting out and that's like 3 times what I payed for the camera + kit lens. I know good lenses are the actual expensive part of the hobby, but I'd probably be more comfortable learning on a cheaper lens since with something that expensive I'd probably be way to afraid to take it anywhere interesting. Also the Nikon D3300 is a crop sensor body, so that means a 35mm lens would basically be like a 50mm lens on a full body camera, right? I'm a bit confused on how that works. I'll eventually have to buy both lenses anyway I think, I'm interested in everything from macro photography to portraits and landscapes.
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Sep 26, 2017 05:50
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On a crop body I would recommend a 35mm unless you really want to shoot portraits. 50mm on crop is a bit too long for an all-purpose lens. You could just set your kit lens for that focal length and don't change it for a couple of days and see what you like best.
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Sep 26, 2017 11:23
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torgeaux posted:You'll want the Nikon version. I leave to the Nikon owners which available 50 is most appropriate. Expect to have the 35mm recommended, too.
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Sep 26, 2017 11:27
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I had both the 35 and 50 lenses and I'm the black sheep as I always preferred the 50 (and then kept it when I bought lenses that covered both focal lengths, whereas I sold my 35). Starting with the 35 is probably the better choice though, I just found it less comfortable as a fixed length. The good thing is the kit lens that comes with the camera covers both a nice range and is surprisingly good, it's just limited by the slow, unfixed aperture. Take a ton of photos with it and look at which end you tend to use the most, then put your cash into a lens that matches your style. With regards to the '35 is like a 50 on full frame?' confusion, don't worry - everyone gets tripped up by this. It comes down to the following: * a 35mm lens is always a 35mm lens regardless of what camera you put it on. * however putting it on a crop (dx) body changes the field of view by a factor of 1.6. A 35mm lens will give you the same view on your camera as a 50mm would on a full frame. * in terms of focus distances, the aperture is also affected by this ratio. It does not change the amount of light that the lens can gather, however. This is mainly a thing when you want shallow depth of focus, an f/1.8 dx lens is closer to what you'd get on an f/2.8 full frame. This is why cellphone cameras with tiny sensors have 'f2' lenses but everything is in focus. * one common 'trip up' is people think a 35mm DX lens doesn't get affected by these rules, they do. It just means you can't mount those lenses on full frame without losing a ton of picture as the glass won't cover the sensor.
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Sep 26, 2017 14:20
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The whole 35mm -> 50mm FF thing only matters if you have a ton of experience with Full Frame, like from using a film SLR for years and years. If you're just getting into photography now, it's basically irrelevant unless you've got solid habits from the 1990's that are in hibernation. On a film SLR (using 35mm film - don't get confused by the same number popping up! The film is not the lens!), a 50mm lens provides a field of view (how big things appear, how far away things seem to be) pretty similar to what your eye sees with no camera in front of it. Because of the crop factor, a 50mm lens on an APS-C DSLR (such as your D3300) will have a field of view that looks somewhat "zoomed-in" compared to no camera, and a 35mm lens will provide that (approximate) field of view. As has been suggested, just set your zoom lens to a specific focal length (35mm or 50mm, use a bit of tape) and go for a walk. Shoot a bunch of pictures, and think about how it feels to shoot at that focal length. Go outside during the day, and use narrower apertures (f/8, f/11, f/16) to avoid getting tripped up by the wider apertures available on either prime lens. * Prime lenses cannot zoom, they have a fixed focal length. For example, 50mm. They almost always have a wider maximum aperture than a zoom lens that covers the same focal length. I have a 28mm f/2.8 for my Pentax (similar crop factor) and I love it for a walk-around prime. It's just a little wide, and it was cheap and widely available. Back in the film days, everybody mass-produced 28/2.8 lenses for every camera mount and they're super easy to find. Try your zoom set to 28mm during your walk, you might like it. Grizzled Patriarch posted:I'll eventually have to buy both lenses anyway I think, I'm interested in everything from macro photography to portraits and landscapes.
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Sep 26, 2017 16:49
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Nikon's 40mm micro (macro) is an amazing piece of glass if you want something different. It'll grab focus anywhere from ~6" away to infinity. It's great for waking around I feel. It ended up being my prime shooter for a month in Taiwan just because I could go from landscape to portrait to cool tiny flower without changing lenses.📇
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Sep 27, 2017 22:10
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Do we/did we ever have a drone photography thread? I just got one because I wasn't to get in on the fad and wow people with bad photos from the air.
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Sep 28, 2017 01:50
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Drone landscapes are showing up a lot more on photo subreddits, even in spots that are supposed to have drones completely banned. I can't decide if it's a fad because it's new or the photos are actually decent but goddamn do they catch the eye.
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Sep 28, 2017 03:14
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One of the news teams in my city has been heavily advertising recently that they have the area's first "newsdrone." This is it, this is the point drones go mainstream.
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Sep 28, 2017 05:22
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It's just a matter of time before some idiot ruins it for everyone and all drones get legislated as weapons or something so might as well use them while we can.
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Sep 28, 2017 05:23
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rio posted:Do we/did we ever have a drone photography thread? I just got one because I wasn't to get in on the fad and wow people with bad photos from the air. I bought a Mavic earlier this year and photography with that is amazingly fun. The photos give a completely different perspective than what you are used to and you need to think in 3 dimensions for composition as opposed to just 2 when you are holding a camera yourself (sorry for the cliché) There is also a lot of mundane everyday things that become interesting from above, such as trees and fields so doing this from the air opens a whole new world of stuff to take photos of. I am only talking about stills though, i don't give 2 shits about video. Drone videos are getting pretty stale as everyone is doing them. Drone photography is so fun i am considering buying one of those big drones that can carry a DSLR.
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Sep 28, 2017 07:56
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One reason I wanted the integrated camera was because although putting my x-t2 in the sky would be awesome, I had no idea how far of a reach I would be able to activate the shutter. How does that work with the drones that are meant to take an external camera? Does the camera somehow wirelessly connect to the drone and pressing a shutter for the drone will activate the camera, or are you stuck with keeping the drone fairly close by to activate the shutter?
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Sep 28, 2017 13:48
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I would assume they use a cable shutter release so your range is the same as your radio range to the drone.
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Sep 28, 2017 14:34
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rio posted:It's just a matter of time before some idiot ruins it for everyone and all drones get legislated as weapons or something so might as well
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Sep 28, 2017 14:43
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[quote="“xzzy”" post="“476848601”"] I would assume they use a cable shutter release so your range is the same as your radio range to the drone. [/quote] Oh cool. That would be amazing to get to a high altitude and do some long exposures at night with a real camera. I was really impressed by the stability of my drone and gimbal - 6 seconds and iso 400 was very sharp. Could have been better since I was shooting jpg on the first night since I hadn't figured out how to shoot raw yet but I would love to get my x-t2 up there for some nighttime aerials, particularly where there was no light pollution to get night landscapes. 
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Sep 28, 2017 14:45
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xzzy posted:even in spots that are supposed to have drones completely banned. Just stay out of DC airspace lol
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Sep 28, 2017 15:02
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The neat thing with drones is how easy they are to operate now. My friends have had a few that were a pain to operate. They recently got into real estate photo/video and picked up a mavic pro. Not only does it collapse for easy transport but it is super easy to operate. They handed me the control and I was able to fly it with no prior experience. It was even stable in wind which was something old drones really struggled with.
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Sep 28, 2017 16:28
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Don't you need a pilot's license to use them professionally, or is that just fixed-wing drones?
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Sep 28, 2017 17:44
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The regulations are in constant flux right now, everyone's trying to figure out what the gently caress to do about drones. For the time being the FAA requires you to register to fly a drone right now, but it doesn't matter much because even if you do fly a drone it's either been banned by the park you're visiting or your redneck neighbor is gonna shoot it down. Obviously that only applies to the US though. My employer has a large work site, and has a field open to model airplane flying. There's a sitewide ban on all drones though. 
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Sep 28, 2017 17:50
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[quote="“xzzy”" post="“476854212”"] The regulations are in constant flux right now, everyone’s trying to figure out what the gently caress to do about drones. For the time being the FAA requires you to register to fly a drone right now, but it doesn’t matter much because even if you do fly a drone it’s either been banned by the park you’re visiting or your redneck neighbor is gonna shoot it down. Obviously that only applies to the US though. My employer has a large work site, and has a field open to model airplane flying. There’s a sitewide ban on all drones though. [/quote] They stopped registrations for "fly for fun" people. If you use it professionally you do have to go through some poo poo and pay an amount that I don't know but have heard it is expensive. If you fly within 5 miles or an airport or helipad you are supposed to call them and tell them that you are flying your drone, the air tower controller or someone else. It is loving dumb because you are supposed to fly under 400 feet anyway and if you look a the FAA's map they have heliports all over the place (at least here in NJ) but most are not active or ever come near you. I, of course, call them all every time I fly....... but if you didn't they wouldn't know. There have only been a handful of fines and only a few have been for flying near an airport. I am 4.7 miles from a very small airport and never see planes near me and they are of course never flying below 400 feet anyway. The rules are dumb and they don't know what they are doing. I have read that the people who do call hospitals and airports have no idea why you are calling because they don't know the rules or who you need to talk to and are usually annoyed that you are taking up resources on things that will realistically not affect them at all unless you purposefully try to hit an aircraft (which would still be hard to do even if you wanted to Edit: I only got the drone two days ago but the times I have gone to the park people have been really cool. They are very interested and want to know all about it. I am not flying it near anyone so unless someone was just paranoid then no one would have a reason to feel uncomfortable. I have read about people literally flying it up to windows to spy on people though so there are, of course, idiots out there rio fucked around with this message at 18:07 on Sep 28, 2017 |
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Sep 28, 2017 18:05
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I got my drone to help take unique mountain shots and now they're banned in provincial and national parks in Canada so boo.
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Sep 28, 2017 18:56
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rio posted:Edit: I only got the drone two days ago but the times I have gone to the park people have been really cool. They are very interested and want to know all about it. I am not flying it near anyone so unless someone was just paranoid then no one would have a reason to feel uncomfortable. I have read about people literally flying it up to windows to spy on people though so there are, of course, idiots out there
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Sep 28, 2017 19:00
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rio posted:I have read about people literally flying it up to windows to spy on people though so there are, of course, idiots out there I'd love to play with my very own drone. I've used a colleague's a couple of times, he puts some really excellent photos into his scientific presentations - especially useful when the presentation is about the grid of berms they constructed as part of a wetland restoration project. The one he showed me 2 years ago, a DJI Phantom (whatever version was current in late 2015), cost about $2000 CAD including spare batteries and spare propellor blades, and a big black Pelican case to carry it around in. He crashed it in his garage after about a year, and promptly bought another one. Drones are also being used as scientific instruments, I've seen a few papers and talks in the past year-and-a-half about a technique called "Structure from Motion" (SfM). The basic idea (I don't really understand the underlying math) is the drone flies a pre-set course, usually a series of passes at a constant altitude over a roughly square area, and takes a picture straight downwards every pre-set distance (like 30cm, say). You feed the thousands of pictures into some software that surely uses similar algorithms as the panorama function on your phone, just much more sophisticated. You get a 3D digital elevation map (DEM) from the millions of paralax comparisons the software runs. I've seen presentations at conferences that claimed 3D resolutions of the measurements to be less than 1cm. The processed images allow you to identify some trees to species, if they have fairly distinctive features like shape and colour of their leaves. We (my lab group) wanted to do this as part of a little project in Quebec this August but the company that owns the site absolutely refused. We speculate they had done something the provincial regulator would be very curious about and didn't want to risk our photos showing their mistake I just want to take pictures of my field sites (literally fields) because a) I like the pictures other people have done and b) that kind of thing is gold for scientific talks and cover images for scientific journals. These are career-relevant things for me, but I haven't been able to convince a prof I work with to buy one for me, yet. I gotta push the career-development angle a bit harder, I think. It helps that the prices keep coming down, even as the regulations and restrictions start to pile up. A tenant in the building next door used to fly his drone in the space between and behind the buildings (i.e. the wide driveway and parking area). He'd do this at night, a couple of times I was woken up by the sound. My understanding of the regulations in Canada are that he was breaking several at the same time - at night, in a built-up area, and probably too close to an airport (there's an airport within 5 km of some ridiculously high percentage of Canadian residences). My feeling is the regulations are going to continue to change quickly, and that some current restrictions that seem onerous on paper are fairly easy to get past if you know what to do. Get a license (after an easy and probably worthwhile-anyway training course), phone the local helipad when you go to that field on the edge of town, etc. InternetJunky posted:I got my drone to help take unique mountain shots and now they're banned in provincial and national parks in Canada so boo. If you (anyone) has drone photos and feel like starting a thread I'd be looking at your pretty robo-photos.
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Sep 28, 2017 19:14
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If no one else does, I would be happy to start a thread after I learn a bit more about other models than the one I have. I like learning about technology and photography so I am doing the research for fun right now anyway. I don't know why in Canada but the national parks here in the US banned drones because of two incidents, at least what I have read. Someone crashed a drone into a lake and someone else crashed a drone into a geyser - it sunk down to the bottom of the geyser. I don't know how you can even do that if you aren't trying to. There were also speculations that, although there were no specific incidents, idiots were flying drones right up to herds of buffalo and causing stampedes and things like that.
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Sep 28, 2017 19:34
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I hadn't heard about that mapping technique- cool! My colleagues use laser scanning from drones, also spectral imaging, but I hadn't heard about the fine scale mapping like that. The field site photos you are describing aren't really primary data, so my guess is you could get pretty shots of your site without much hassle provided drone use in general wasn't a problem. You should expect to provide permit/license numbers if you are collecting data though. This wouldn't be as fun as having a drone to play with permanently, but I'm wondering if you could hire someone for a few hours to get the photos you want? I definitely agree with you that it would be perfect for conference/job talks. e: I'm actually OK with no drones in national parks. Maybe they can make some designated drone-ok areas, but until we know more about how they multiply human disturbance, I'm kind of glad they got ahead of this before people were having drone battles in yosemite valley or pestering raptor nests 85 times a day. BetterLekNextTime fucked around with this message at 19:48 on Sep 28, 2017 |
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Sep 28, 2017 19:39
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Is any of that software public domain? Because I made a go at stitching together aerial photography from the 30's and 40's last year and it was a painfully manual process. I basically ended up tidying the images in lightroom, merging in photoshop, then manually geotagging the massive raster it generated in qgis.
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Sep 28, 2017 19:45
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xzzy posted:Is any of that software public domain? Probably. Scientists are goddam stingy with the funds, we have to be because the hardware is so expensive (I routinely use instruments that cost upwards of $60K. The software that runs them or crunches the output is often free). Search for "Structure from Motion" and "Digital Elevation Map" and be prepared to pester some academic who wrote a hundred thousand lines of code in her spare time. Fake edit: I just googled "structure from motion software" and the second hit (the first is wikipedia) was this: http://ccwu.me/vsfm/ ChangChang Wu posted:* VisualSFM is free for personal, non-profit or academic use. See README for more details. That's a very typical academic-software license - as long as you're not using the program to make fat stacks of cash you're free to go hog wild (as long as you remember to credit where it's due). The downside is the documentation will be pretty meh, and you can forget about any kind of regular updates schedule. But creators of such programs are usually happy to answer emails that go beyond "please make work on my computer kthx" EDIT rather than doublepost BetterLekNextTime posted:You should expect to provide permit/license numbers if you are collecting data though. I wasn't there, but in the fall they tried again. If you're trying to get SfM of the ground in a forested bog, the plants present a bit of a problem. So she needed to wait until the leaves fell off of the deciduous species (can't do much about the black spruce, I guess, but the birch, aspen, and willow are pretty reliable self-defoliators). Fucknut is still the contractor, and for whatever reason he shows up in northern Alberta in October without proper warm clothing, causing delays that almost led to her missing out on more data because it started snowing on the day they did get out there. Snow also messes up measurements of ground surface elevation, but fortunately the early-season snowstorm melted after only a couple of days and she got lucky with some good conditions and fucknut not loving up quite so hard for a single 24 hour period. ExecuDork fucked around with this message at 03:50 on Sep 29, 2017 |
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Sep 29, 2017 03:32
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Well that's not the type of software I was after but it's cool enough that I think I need to find a use for it anyways.
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Sep 29, 2017 03:36
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Yeah you need a lic to fly a drone for commercial use. My buddies just got certified because the real estate gig. And you know someone is gonna call the cops if you are flying in a residential area.
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Sep 29, 2017 23:32
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Execudork- that situation sucks. I see why you're not eager to contract out.
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Sep 29, 2017 23:41
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Can someone please confirm that you should save your photos as TIFF files before then converting to JPEG? I read that it helps reduce banding in your photos. Tried it on a long nighttime exposure and sure enough they nearly vanished. Apparently I've been saving my photos incorrectly my entire life.
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Oct 2, 2017 07:10
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Drewski posted:Can someone please confirm that you should save your photos as TIFF files before then converting to JPEG? I read that it helps reduce banding in your photos. Tried it on a long nighttime exposure and sure enough they nearly vanished. Apparently I've been saving my photos incorrectly my entire life. AFAIK the data compression when you save to JPEG is no different when you export to a jpeg from LR than it is exporting to a tiff and then converting to a JPEG. Are you using LR?
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Oct 2, 2017 07:37
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I have never noticed banding in my photos from exporting to jpg that but I have also never converted to tiff just to then convert to jpg. Even if it isn't true, what could the reasoning be as to why that might be better than just exporting to jpg?
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Oct 2, 2017 08:03
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| # ? May 20, 2024 02:42 |
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rio posted:I have never noticed banding in my photos from exporting to jpg that but I have also never converted to tiff just to then convert to jpg. Even if it isn't true, what could the reasoning be as to why that might be better than just exporting to jpg? Probably that the poster had something in his export-to-jpeg settings that degraded the image quite a bit.
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Oct 2, 2017 11:21
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