[Jean Poitiers]

Bonjour,

Just a suggestion, if you have not visited the KEH site (US), then give it a quick look. I was quite happy with my latest purchase there. I shop a lot of the UK camera sites (ffordes, charles eagles, etc.) since I live in France. Have also picked up some good used buys on a few select French camera sites, but one needs some command of the language here ... I really do not like e-bay type shopping because I have had a few unpleasant results on the French equivalents.

Bonne chance, J Frog

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Last edited by Jean Poitiers; 01-30-2012 at 03:27 PM.

[Khoff2]

Bonjour,

Just a suggestion, if you have not visited the KEH site (US), then give it a quick look. I was quite happy with my latest purchase there. I shop a lot of the UK camera sites (ffordes, charles eagles, etc.) since I live in France. Have also pick up some good used buys on a few select French camera sites, but one needs some command of the language here ... I really do not like e-bay type shopping because I have had a few unpleasant results on the French equivalents.

Bonne chance, J Frog

Thanks for the tip. Just went there and found a Pentax F 50mm 1.7. Seemed like a decent deal for $159. Has filter thread damage, but shouldn't need that indoors anyway.

[Jean Poitiers]

Thanks for the tip. Just went there and found a Pentax F 50mm 1.7. Seemed like a decent deal for $159. Has filter thread damage, but shouldn't need that indoors anyway.

Your welcome (de rien)

Forgot to add that I have started to get into old Tamron Adaptall-2 lenses ... there some bargains to be had here, too. Check out the "adaptall-2.org" site along with looking at the reviews of these lenses on this forum. Don't know if these will fit your needs, but there's some fun stuff here ... Salut, J

[Philoslothical]

You're getting lots of good advice on lenses, and acquiring them, so here's one other line of thinking to consider. Are you just using the denoising options native to Lightroom? I ask because there are much better choices available as PS/LR plugins. Both Topaz DeNoise and Nik Dfine give really good results. There are significant differences in the tools they provide, so it's worth researching both. Trial versions are available, definitely worth experimenting with.

[Khoff2]

You're getting lots of good advice on lenses, and acquiring them, so here's one other line of thinking to consider. Are you just using the denoising options native to Lightroom? I ask because there are much better choices available as PS/LR plugins. Both Topaz DeNoise and Nik Dfine give really good results. There are significant differences in the tools they provide, so it's worth researching both. Trial versions are available, definitely worth experimenting with.

Just this last weekend I began experimenting with various noise reduction software. I am a Mac user and have been using iPhoto, but am looking for something with better noise reduction and a little faster. So far, I have tried (trial) Photoshop Elements, LIghtroom 3, Neat Image, Noise Ninja (via Bibble 5), and a few others. The problem is that DeNoise and Dfine are plugins, and not a stand alone app. Not sure if any make a plugin for iPhoto. I know they do for Aperature, but that is not an option due to the huge memory usage and slowness of it (worse tha iPhoto). After trying the different apps this past weekend, I felt that Lightroom did a pretty good job - though I don't like the interface and am actively looking for other suggestions.
Thanks again.

[Parallax]

I have now lost 4 out of 4 bids on Ebay. What gives?

I would say the problem is that you aren't bidding high enough.






Sorry, couldn't resist. Welcome to the forum!

[Philoslothical]

The Nik and Topaz plugins work in Lightroom as well as Photoshop, but I have no idea if they're any good on a mac (seems whenever I see someone having trouble finding the right program, they're on a mac ). Lightroom is really a good application, but I haven't taken the time to really learn it. I'm using Adobe Camera Raw and an old version of Photoshop.

[Arn]

Welcome to PF. You've had lots of help, and I don't know about where you are, but a lot of stuff also comes up here on craigslist.

[Jean Poitiers]

... If you're not afraid to do a little Dremel cutting, you can easily mod Yashica C/Y and Olympus OM lenses to fit PK mount. Good Yashinon and Zuiko 50s are available, cheap. If you're not afraid of adapters, many great M42 Fifties can be found. The Yashinon DX 50/1.7; Meyer Oreston / Pentacon Electric 50/1.8; Super Takumar 55/1.8; Helios-44 58/2; many other good candidates labeled Ricoh, Mamiya, Petri, Porst, Vivitar. They ain't rare.

Other good fast focal lengths needn't be expensive either. I have cheap Vivitar 24/2 and 28/2 glass; and pretty inexpensive Nikkor 35/2 and 85/2 lenses that I easily modded for PK. ...

Bonjour,

OK ... I'm GO for dremel and Nikkor mods ... where can one find info ? Merci d'avance, J Frog

[ducdao]

Bonjour,

OK ... I'm GO for dremel and Nikkor mods ... where can one find info ? Merci d'avance, J Frog

Good luck in finding inexpensive Nikkor 35/2 and 85/2. I really don't think it is all possible at the moment and it only gets worse from here...

Do a search within PF and you should find plenty of threads addressing the matter

[Khoff2]

The sweet spot for almost all lenses on APS-C camras is around f/8. This assumes that you want edge-to-edge sharpness. We don't normally use fast lenses wide-open for such sharpness -- we want to grab images that are otherwise impossible. Most lenses sharpen-up considerable just 1 stop down, even less. An f/1.7 lens looks sharper than an f/1.4 because it IS sharper wide-open, with thicker DOF, but they'll probably be equivalent from f/2 onwards. Most f/1.4 lenses are very sharp, but only within a very thin DOF range. So the basic trick for action shooting is to use a fast-enough shutter, nail the focus, and fix everything else in PP. Noise can be fixed, contrast and saturation can be fixed, sharpness can be fixed -- motion blur can't.

So am I assumming that you mean to shoot manual with a fast shutter speed and disregard proper exposure to fix later?

[Parallax]

The sweet spot for almost all lenses on APS-C camras is around f/8. This assumes that you want edge-to-edge sharpness. We don't normally use fast lenses wide-open for such sharpness -- we want to grab images that are otherwise impossible. Most lenses sharpen-up considerable just 1 stop down, even less. An f/1.7 lens looks sharper than an f/1.4 because it IS sharper wide-open, with thicker DOF, but they'll probably be equivalent from f/2 onwards. Most f/1.4 lenses are very sharp, but only within a very thin DOF range.

So the basic trick for action shooting is to use a fast-enough shutter, nail the focus, and fix everything else in PP. Noise can be fixed, contrast and saturation can be fixed, sharpness can be fixed -- motion blur can't.

Have fun!

So am I assumming that you mean to shoot manual with a fast shutter speed and disregard proper exposure to fix later?

Where did he say anything about ignoring proper exposure?

[Khoff2]

Where did he say anything about ignoring proper exposure?

I guess I misunderstood " use a fast shutter, nail the focus, and fix everything else in photoshop".

[ripit]

I guess I misunderstood " use a fast shutter, nail the focus, and fix everything else in photoshop".

My guess is ignore exposure to a point. If you are shooting raw fixing exposure issues shouldn't be a problem as long as they are not too severe (I'm very new to dealing with raw and am still learning but even I managed to fix exposure).

Just a couple of thoughts. If you are shooting an indoor match, shouldn't lighting be reasonably constant? if you got an M lens for now (much cheaper), I would think you could set exposure (just takes the press of a button), then take a few sample shots, fine tune the exposure a bit, and shoot the rest of the night at those settings. Exposure should be close enough it can be easily fixed in post processing.

As far as ebay, one of the sharpest lenses I own out of maybe 60 lenses is a ricoh 50mm 2.0 that cost about 7$ shipped on ebay. You might not find such a deal on such short notice, but don't discount chinon, sears, ricoh and others, especially with 50mm primes. there are tons of them out there (M not A though) in the 1.7-2.0 range that can easily be had for under 25$ (possibly a lot under if you get lucky). RioRico could probably give you more recommendations as he has a billion primes while I only have a few (I favor zooms).

I would personally get an M 50mm 1.7-2.0 for now since you need it right away, bring the kit lens as a backup since you are used to it (maybe shoot with both), and have a little more patience getting further lenses (if you want bargains anyway). Most fast lenses tend to be expensive (new, used, old, recent or otherwise). I wanted a fast zoom and didn't feel like paying 100$ plus at the time. got a kalamar that was broken (only cheap one I know with any merit), got outbid on several trying to get another (not going to pay 50-80$ as its too close to what a much better one costs). 4 months later, I scored a camera with winder etc., the kalimar, and another lens for 28$. The other lens had fungus so 10$ refund, so 18$ for the kalimar in good condition. RioRico's strategy of bid often, bid low and expect to loose most works great.

[Khoff2]

Thanks for the reply. Although the M 50mm can be had for cheap, I am concerned about quick focusing since I'm trying to capture TaeKwonDO sparring (moving around a lot). I would like to be able to use the continous focus feature while burst shooting. I just picked up a F 50mm 1.7 for $159 (with chipped filter thread). Although, not what I consider cheap (most are going for $230), if it works well and fast, I'll be happy. Looking forward to trying it out.