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Forum: Post Your Photos!
08-26-2012, 07:49 PM
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Thanks for pointing that out. I actually know very little about what I find around me, so wasn't really sure what it was. After a quick image search, I'm leaning toward it being a least skipper butterfly.
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Forum: Post Your Photos!
08-26-2012, 05:18 PM
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http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m7p5bsTw1y1ql4714o1_1280.jpg
I normally prefer my point and shoot for bugs since it delivers greater depth and I can physically get closer to subjects so there's less grass and what not in the way, but batteries were dieing. Turns out, kit lens is actually a surprisingly good lens.
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Forum: Photographic Technique
07-29-2012, 08:25 PM
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I stick everything in a pile and every few months, I go through and pick out the best ones. The rest get tossed away in the archives. There's seldom enough good ones to really justify organizing.
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Forum: Photographic Technique
05-26-2012, 10:31 AM
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My first experience with observing solar phenomenon was with cardboard that had a section cut out of it, roughly 20% of the area. It was far from centered. There were also three sheets of mylar on it and we were projecting onto an index card. It was my highschool chemistry teacher's setup. Cloud cover kept getting in the way and we gave up. It's been a long time since I dabbled in this sort of stuff, but you should be able to obstruct a considerable amount of the front element and centering isn't too important when it is close enough.
I haven't really put much thought into my own setup yet. For the time being, I'm personally leaning toward cake and online streaming. It's not on a good day for me.
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Forum: Troubleshooting and Beginner Help
04-27-2012, 04:14 AM
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I flipped through a lot of camera manuals before buying my camera. There's lots of interesting stuff in there. For instance, I never would have guessed that holding on to hot objects can lead to skin burns till Canon warned me about that. Nikon warns me not to use smoking electronics. I forget who warned me not to choke on my memory cards. The reactions you get when you point those out to people are worth the trouble of skimming it over at least once.
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Forum: General Talk
04-26-2012, 09:12 PM
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I don't know where you get the notion that Canada hates censorship. A couple years ago, there was a huge discussion over whether or not we'd allow anti gay speech or add it to the list of things deemed hate speech and illegal. Many american lobby groups decided that they had to cross the border to say their piece. Many were surprised that we weren't drafting a new law on hate speech just for homosexuals, but amending a existing one to include sexual orientation. Prior to that, whether or not we should allow the Westboro Baptist Church into the country was a bit of a discussion topic in the media.
There's also a number of groups that are regularly in the media for getting kicked off university campuses for various things. The genocide awareness project being a major notable one in various cities across Canada. Personally, I think they're doing a great disservice to their cause and free speech in general in this country. Being a jerk about spreading any message gets you viewed as any other annoyance, rather than someone who is struggling to get a message out.
Anyway, I question the assertion that Government deficits are private sector surpluses. As I recall, prior to the crisis that seems to drag on and on, the Canadian government was running surpluses and the private sector was doing quite well. Then surpluses in both died off in unison. The US data shows deficits leading up to, during and depending on whether or not you view the recession as over, after. Granted, there is a little blip of a surplus around the dotcom crash. Counting yours, this brings us to four data points. Not a very conclusive sample by any stretch of the imagination. Is there a correlation study you can link for review?
I think the more common view point in this country is that Canada having the lowest debt to GDP ratio in the G7 is the more significant contributer to economic recovery. Alas, I also lack an XY scatter plot of debt to GDP vs severity of recession of countries with their own currency. Anyone know where I can find one? It's probably harder to define than deficit and economic growth, or should I be hunting a debt and gdp graph?
It just wouldn't be right to ignore Cory Venable and Danielle Park's explanation of Canadian economic recovery Copper and Canadian Stock Market: Siamese Twins | Danielle Park | FINANCIAL SENSE The correlation is scary, and might warrant a discussion on causation as well as whether or not manipulating one necessarily impacts the other. Pushing the needle on your oil gauge won't fill your car's oil and I'll venture that crashing the Canadian economy won't make copper proportionally cheaper for the world. Going the other way, the feasibility of manipulating the copper price pretty much rules that out as a vehicle for economic improvement though.
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Forum: Troubleshooting and Beginner Help
03-17-2012, 07:51 AM
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I asked that question too and was told sensor. Now that I sit here looking at my shelf of lenses, I wonder why I've never simply measured to be sure.
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Forum: Pentax K-r
03-11-2012, 07:52 AM
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It's noisy, you can hear and feel the sensor shaking around. That was actually quite a let down for me. It feels like more of a marketing gimmick than a legitimate attempt to remove dust.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
03-03-2012, 11:46 PM
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I sleep with mine.
Well, actually most of it sits on the bookshelf at the foot of my bed. I use my bed to sort my bag though and things sometimes decide they don't want to wake up.
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
03-03-2012, 11:43 PM
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I mildly regret having passed on an similar A1200 deal, though there's nothing horridly wrong with my SD1000. Well, other than the lack of grip and the buttons being too small for use with gloves. Though I find I prefer to tuck it up my sleeve in the winter and I keep my hands warm putting them together and hiding them in my sleeves. Oh well, there's an A1300 with a viewfinder and a 16MP sensor and it goes 28-140 in 35mm eq field of view. Tells me that the budget p/s viewfinder isn't completely dead for another year or so.
I have another budget pocket cam, an Olympus FE-47 for $59. It has it's pros and cons, being 25% cheaper than an $80 camera is one. For now, I'm getting sick of this
100% crop
but on the other hand, it does wicked macros provided you can live with the way it processes details
and it has some rather bewildering instincts. I somehow got this without making any adjustments
I probably would have exposed similarly. It also has a weird part photo, part Monet aspect to it.
Part of me is tempted to try a GE A1255. Similar zoom range but has some motion panorama thing for when I want wider. Also, can be had for $40. Then again, another part of me says that I don't really need any more pocket cameras than I already have.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
02-27-2012, 09:11 PM
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Forum: Photographic Industry and Professionals
02-05-2012, 11:10 AM
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Question of the day, will you be ok with them cutting out the mirror if it saves money?
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Forum: Pentax DSLR Discussion
02-05-2012, 06:53 AM
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Interestingly, I haven't had anyone insult my choice of cameras yet. After getting a lomo La Sardina for Christmas, I wonder if that'll change.
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Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
02-04-2012, 07:05 PM
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Come now, it's not about carrying K-mount forward any more. It's going to be about carrying K mount backward. A backward protruding zoom lens would be a great counter move to the new compact zooms for the nikon one and micro 4/3. I picture something protruding maybe 3cm forward with a single big ring that becomes a focus ring when slid forward and a zoom ring when slid back. Maybe someone else can figure out the ergonomics of handling multiple rings in a small space.
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Forum: Photographic Industry and Professionals
02-03-2012, 05:20 AM
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I wouldn't be surprised if I'm a lone voice in this, but personally I think it would be super cool if K-02 is better than K-01 and subsequently K-03 better than K-02. Go through the numbers sequentially and everyone will know that 07 is better than 06 and 684 better than 683. Then again, we don't usually get multiple generations of cameras in stores, usually just the current one and whatever stock is left over. The value of that sort of simplicity might be lost. That's more or less all I can think of at the moment.
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
01-29-2012, 02:30 AM
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I'll be eagerly awaiting a more in depth review of it. Kodak scared me away years ago with excessive image noise. Tried everything I could think of with the lighting to give it optimal test conditions but it persisted even at low ISO. I'm hoping that they're more within the pack now.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
01-23-2012, 08:22 PM
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If you're going to check out lenses that aren't made by the big players, it's best to learn to recognize your lens mount. Request pictures if you're buying online. In person, you can obviously try them out. Just be sure examine any differences between the genuine pentax lens and the third party one closely. There's the story of the Ricoh pin and I think it's vivitar that has a well known scraping issue. I'm sure there's probably some lesser known issues with lesser known lenses.
Hmm, I think I may have one that isn't in the database. Haven't gone through and eliminated the possibility of a rebadge yet though.
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Forum: Troubleshooting and Beginner Help
01-15-2012, 11:31 AM
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Could be wrong, but I've messed with linear polarizers and point and shoots. It's a bit awkward without filter threads, but other than that, I haven't had problems. I can't come up with a good reason why hitting the live view won't solve focus and exposure problems.
As a curiosity question for those with more experience, is a polarizer really the best solution? This sounds a little like it could be a light diffuser problem.
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Forum: Post Your Photos!
01-14-2012, 11:00 AM
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Interesting how a dead spider develops cobwebs. I'm guessing that's a fungus breaking it down. If you notice I'm having dust issues in my pictures of a dusty spider.
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Forum: Pentax Camera and Field Accessories
01-11-2012, 10:21 PM
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Hmm... purchased would have be when I decided to have the grocery store print a grey card for me. I learnt a lot about exposure and white balance from those twenty cents. I still use it from time to time.
For things that I was given, I get promotional mouse pads every now and then, flip them upside down and one holds my camera and two lens macro arrangement. I don't have an adapter or heck don't even attempt to really hold things together beyond there being a lot of friction on the bottom of a mouse pad. Subject goes on the other one and they slide smoothly enough for fine positioning while keeping everything in place.
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Forum: Photographic Technique
01-10-2012, 09:47 PM
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Funny story, I saw a beat up looking k-mount lens at a pawn shop, a formula 5 70-200 f/4.5 push-pull internal zoom. Overall, it sucks as a lens, produces pretty hazy low contrast images and the aperture control is broken. It does have a redeeming quality though, it has a built in lens hood that's just large enough to snugly fit lenses with a 49mm filter thread like the old 28mm and 50mm primes that I have. Slapped a 2xtc on the back and the 28mm on the front and got some lovely macros. I just need to get around to cleaning my sensor. Man does that make the dust show.
Anyway, personal anecdotes aside, photographic equipment had no import duty in Canada. Sales taxes however may still apply. I should probably dig up the regulations again to refresh my memory.
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Forum: General Talk
01-09-2012, 06:46 PM
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Personally, I'm hoping these terms don't die out
1) dodge ball
2) tag
3) playground
Tell me I'm not the only one concerned about those.
oh and red rover... That could also result in injury and be declared too dangerous to play.
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Forum: Troubleshooting and Beginner Help
01-04-2012, 10:17 PM
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Funny, I walked into a shop a few years ago and asked about the largest print they'd be able to make for me from a 7MP source file. The guy pointed to a rather big one on the wall and told me that it came from a 6MP source file. It was a while ago so I could be wrong but I think he said that it was a 20x30. I must know more daring shops than most people.
My personal suggestion is to just make a couple of cheap 4x6s of different resolutions. Either crop down or reduce. Make sure you label them, I forgot to do that with mine. My personal cut off is about 100dpi, though I could probably use a finer scale.
Just to toss another possibility out there, one of my favorite all time pictures was an evening shot taken with a point and shoot in natural light. Noise is hideous and well, contrast is virtually non-existent. Made an absolutely lovely mosaic with it. If I could remember how to use the program, I could make absolutely massive.
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Forum: Photographic Technique
01-02-2012, 10:11 PM
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I want something that I can justify attempting a 2ft by 3ft print on. There's a few candidates so far but I often find reasons to reject them. Other than that, download pictures and clear memory cards more often.
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Forum: Pentax K-r
11-14-2011, 10:02 PM
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Some days I miss my old Sony DSC-S40. One button and it switches to spot meter and it's actually tight enough to get good pictures of the moon. That's another option if you're really determined to use some sort of automatic settings. The lighting environment isn't changing whereas spot metering will be kind of hit and miss, specially if you don't have full time exposure preview. I think enough has been said about using manual settings already.
Not enough has been said about clouds though. The moon illuminating the cloud cover can get very pretty if you have the right clouds.
I'm not sure what to do with this, other than maybe a bit of noise reduction.
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