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Forum: Photographic Technique
04-14-2024, 05:18 AM
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for the caverns: go wide, don't change lenses (very dusty), use exposure bracketing (some areas are very dark and others very bright). I was able to take lots of decent pictures during a regular tour.
for the bend: go at sunset and wait for a cloudy sky if possible
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Forum: Photographic Technique
04-13-2024, 08:21 PM
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We live here!
For the Canyon, definitely both wide angle and telephoto options. I am mostly happy with my 18-135 on APSC, but you might want something more telephoto for certain canyon features, or wildlife (deer and condors are possible) (and lots of chipmunks - DON'T feed them!).
As to Antelope Canyon - that's pretty much an assembly-line operation (we were there about 5 years ago - pre-pandemic, on a non "Photo" tour). Make a reservation. The guides want to take most of your pictures of you/your group and hustle you along. The light is generally not that bright. The best of all possible worlds would be to have TWO cameras - one to let the guide use (they actually are fairly "camera aware") as well as one for you. Crank up the ISO as high as you dare. Zoom range is good - again I had the 18-135.
Horseshoe Bend is another somewhat over-run operation these days. Pay to park, and join the hordes. Actually, once you get to the overlooks, things may not be too crowded. Be ready to walk for a mile or so (one way)(that winnows the crowds a bit). Again, as of five years ago. Coming back is uphill!
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Forum: Lens Clubs
04-14-2024, 06:40 AM
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Forum: Photographic Technique
04-14-2024, 12:04 AM
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If a photographic tour is an option at Antelope Canyon, do it! The experience in the canyon on the photographic tours if vastly different from the regular tours.
The slot canyons are very narrow, the best time of day to do a tour if you want to see the shaft of lights is in the middle of the day.
It's very dusty in the slot canyons because the guides are throwing sand in the air to show the shafts of light, don't even think about changing lens if you want your sensor to ever be clean again. Bring a blower or something to clean your lens while you are on the tour.
If you have more than one body go as wide as you can on one and short telephoto on the other. If you only had one body, I would go wide.
Bring a tripod, there's not much light and to get the classic trickling sand and shaft of lights shots a tripod is best. From memory, a tripod was required on the photo tour when I did it in 2016.
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
04-10-2024, 01:09 AM
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If I see a competition for "indoor photography" I'm gonna submit this. I was in my house when I took it.
 KP240750 by zkarj, on Flickr
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Forum: Lens Clubs
04-08-2024, 12:39 PM
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Bullet by xs4all
Carl Zeiss Distagon T* 2/28 ZK @ K-1 II
:cool:
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
04-03-2024, 02:08 AM
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I had started to assemble the 200mm dept. on the floor ( 40 something of them!) but then drifted off to playing with them instead checking out the capabilities of some that hadn't had much camera time with me.
They are like the 135mms in that they tend to render depressingly similar. And the really cheap few ones with just a doublet up front perform much the same.
And the bokeh wide open tends to be so smooth that individual character of the lenses is diminished.
Even the cat got bored!
I will get around to a roll call and a photo one day.
Then it is the 135s turn - a glance at the list and there seems to be over 70 of them!
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
03-17-2024, 11:43 PM
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Should have yelled out. I could have maybe put a face to a name. I was off on a wild kitten chase (with even less success than a wild goose chase - I've actually caught one of them once), with my daughter Sunday afternoon.
While the kitten we saw yesterday, as expected put in no show today, I did take the camera, and the dog got a good walk.
It's been extremely dry here, so I haven't seen much water about in a while, but I found somewhere new for dog and human walking I hadn't been to before that I thought was quite scenic. It did involve a wee bit of a drive, but it was so nice to hear running water again.
I took my Sigma 17-70 for an outing for the first time in ages. I'd acquired a Pentax DA 16-85WR that I thought would become my walk-around lens, but in spite of WR, quick-shift and a useful zoom range, it's the most disappointing lens I've ever bought. It's really soft at the edges unless stopped down to f/11. I haven't tried the DA18-135 which I thought had those sort of issues, but I thought the 16-85 was meant to be better, however my copy definitely isn't.
I was hoping for D-FA 28-105 type quality, as that's a great lens, just not really wide enough on APS-C, and I thought the 16-85 was the APS-C equivalent, as it's a fairly expensive lens, but my copy at least, is extremely disappointing.
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
03-16-2024, 03:43 AM
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Even more inexperienced in aerial photog than you Ross!!
The last one I went to was at Ohakea in the film days.
The neg is now colour shifted, fungused and scratched.
Weirdly it still has appeal!
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
03-10-2024, 01:45 AM
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It was nice to get out on Ruapehu again. It has been a very busy summer and with tricky knees trekking has been on the back burner. 3 -4 shot stitches on the K-1 with a 40mm pancake.
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
03-07-2024, 01:57 AM
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Yeah I know what you mean but I think he had two "fonts". One for precise mapping and one for communication.
Sounds weird but here is another example (needs editing).
His "subordinates" were bushmen. But there seemed to be some co-operation in the office. According to his diaries a lot of tracing was done. Enough so that it seemed to be the thing you did whenever there was spare time in the office. I think we underestimate how much copying was needed.
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Forum: Pentax DSLR Discussion
03-06-2024, 09:53 PM
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Some... not all, for sure, but some. If we buy their used gear (Pentax or any other brand), we're potentially enabling them to buy something new. What brand(s) they choose is up to them. Hopefully for Ricoh it'll be Pentax, but we can't be responsible for other folks' choices...
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Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
03-06-2024, 12:36 AM
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I wasn't interested in this project since I'm done with film. I'v been shooting digital only for about 20 years.
After the last announcement though I think I might be interested, depending on the final shape of the camera and the price, of course.
For me it looks so exotic, should be fun.
It's a way of supporting them as well. I'd like to see a new, fully fledged, film SLR.
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Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
03-06-2024, 12:42 AM
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My favourite cameras to shoot are recently ME-Super + K 50mm and *ist DS + M 28mm. Mostly in manual mode and f/5.6 .. f/8.0. So the joy of photography isn't related to latest sophisticated tech. This new camera could nicely fit in that concept. I can't wait to see official annoucement with availability and pricing!
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
03-06-2024, 12:22 AM
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DxO PureRAW 4 is out, introducing some key new features:
* You can now control the amount of noise reduction and sharpness.
* You can see the results immediately.
* DeepPRIME XD2 has arrived.
I have had some stunning results from XD2, even at the default settings.
DeepPRIME XD (DPXD) has been in PhotoLab for 2 releases now and it has its uses, but needs to be treated with care, as it can often introduce false textures, and not in a believable way. My default in PhotoLab is to use DeepPRIME (DP) unless a photo needs something more — typically when a heavy crop is made.
DeepPRIME XD2 (DPXD2) has, in my testing, yielded consistently fantastic results with the default settings. In the below comparison, DPXD (which has been replaced in PureRAW by DPXD2) has been left at default noise reduction, but needed the "noise model" slider pulled back significantly. That stopped unwanted textures in the OOF area, but also mushed the details somewhat.
This is a real pixel-peep on a very noisy image that, I think, I didn't quite nail focus on. You may judge whether DP was enough, particularly when downscaled for final output, or even just zoomed to a sensible viewing level, but this is a comparison to put the algorithms to the test. For shots that are heavily cropped it can be a real shot saver. My tests on night shots with ISO values in the 800-6400 range have been almost all utterly fantastic with DPXD2. Those that weren't, I think, were showing up the other flaws in the images.
The DP and DPXD2 examples are at default settings. The original is ISO 25600, f/8, 1/750 with the DA 55-300 PLM on KP.
And expect DPXD2 to probably come to PhotoLab 8 later this year. They tend not to add major new capabilities like this in interim releases. They have, however, just released PhotoLab 7.5 with an additional 1080 camera/lens combos.
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
03-05-2024, 11:24 PM
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and those who value scribble dot scribble and those who don't
life is not all about hoarding...sometimes one needs to repurpose, recycle, reuse...
(excepting, of course, 50mm lenses ? :lol: )
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Forum: Lens Clubs
03-03-2024, 07:09 AM
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
02-29-2024, 12:51 AM
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Here is that Rotokohu lake from the above maps taken about 20 years ago. A 5 or 6 shot stitch from a 4mp finepix. It has atrophied from the original - it was originally almost forest to forest when surveyed. In fact the entire flats in this image is lake floor except perhaps for the extreme back right. Such a beautiful area!
There is some disagreement whether it belongs to the farm on the right or the Rotokohu SR on the left. A quite extraordinary wetland badly modified by farming. And DoC their usual apathetic selves.
In Te papa there is 7 pio pio (native Thrush) specimens attributed to JR Annabell and according to his diary he shot 5 here and another 6 within a days walk. Such were the times!!
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Forum: Troubleshooting and Beginner Help
02-17-2024, 05:05 PM
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Do you have focus peaking on? From Pg. 64 in the manual:
While focus peaking is displayed, the histogram and highlight alert are not displayed.
So turn focus peaking off. Then go into the C4 menu, and go about halfway down to Monitor Display. In that submenu, go halfway down to the Live View sub-submenu, then into the Shooting Info Display
Set "current display pattern" to 1. Then go down to L1 customization, and turn on all the checkboxes.
Voila. You will have a level, and highlight blinkies, and a histogram and the grid guide if you want it.
You can set 3 different sets of Info Display in L1, L2 and L3. Access the different modes through the Info button repeatedly push the Info button to cycle through. One press brings up the Info menu, multiple presses are required to move through the L1, L2 and L3 displays.
I have focus peaking as one of the boxes in my Info menu so I can turn it on or off there. then press info button a few more times and it cycles through L1, L2 and L3 giving you whatever info you want in each.
The thing you set for Digital Preview is useless. It basically takes a picture and shows it to you. You can also just take a picture and just chimp the screen using the review button.
With all that said, the highlight and shadow recovery is very robust with this sensor. Just shoot at -1/3 EV, use Av, and fix it post. Manual mode is too slow for me.
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
02-13-2024, 04:57 PM
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Forum: Travel, Events, and Groups
02-04-2024, 01:56 AM
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Hot pants are more worthy of discussion!!
Aaaaahh those were the days.
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
01-30-2024, 11:20 PM
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I was lucky enough to do a bit of a road trip from Perth to South Australia with a side trip to Christmas Island and Cocos Islands. Lots of photos here are a few Bif. The last one is more Biffo than Bif.
Eastern great egret
Pied Oyster Catcher
Osprey
Red tailed tropic bird
Brown Booby
Osprey
Pacific Gull
Squabbling Pacific Gulls
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
01-27-2024, 03:21 PM
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I have to say I am very happy with the af-c on my K3iii. This photo with the flock passing between the sunflower stems would not have worked with any other camera I have owned.
 MHHH0131_DxO |
