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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-25-2014, 08:21 PM
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Sometimes I just get images that just make me scratch my head... did the wind shake my tripod? Did I kick the tripod during a long exposure, just what the heck happened? Sometimes you can come up with a reason, sometimes it remains one of those mysteries of the universe.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-25-2014, 07:59 PM
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That's a terrible SIgma 8-16 image... is that the best you have?
It looks like motion blur on your sample. Check the images in the 8-16 thread. Either you just didn't get a good image, or your lens has an issue.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-22-2014, 05:58 PM
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I've been away on a trip, away from the internet... :D
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-22-2014, 08:54 AM
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That why I posted picture by famous artists who did shoot large format... just saying, many of the most famous were great at keeping their whole subject in focus. You constantly ignore the historical perspective, narrow DoF is an artistic conceit championed by a group of photographers led by Alfred Stieglitz. It was not at the time of it's invention nor has it ever been universally accepted. The ƒ64 group, which included Ansel Adams championed a completely different perspective. Not everyone is, or ever was in love with narrow DoF. Personally, myself and many others find the whole extreme narrow thing tedious and un-inventive. IN fact if you go into landscape and wildlife you'll barely ever see it used except out of necessity. I haven't shot large format since I left school. That doesn't mean I haven't forgotten the challenges.
SO all you've said here is you like shooting large format for narrow DoF. I liked shooting large format for tilt shift controls and intense image quality. I'm not seeing a problem with either of those approaches, unless one of us starts trying to say all large Format photographers prefer narrow DoF features of large format. Many of us did our best to overcome them and produce large completely in focus stunning photographs through the manipulation of the lens position and tilt, and the incredible detail of the Large format sensor size. My whole studio class was devoted to that. As I said, in many assignments ,if you didn't get your whole subject in focus, you failed. Picking part of the subject and just emphasizing that one part, any fool can do that.
Just putting out a different perspective to the endless barage of "I have to have an FF for narrow DoF" non-sense. The opposite view is, many really good photographers, would have considered it displayed a lack of skill. They would have failed my studio class.
Much of the narrow DoF stuff here is proposed as if it's universally accepted, and there are no other perspectives on the subject, and that's just wrong.
I'd be happier with a statement like, "you'll be happier with an FF if you are hoping to achieve narrow DoF, but that may not actually suit your style." And leave it up t the individual to decide if that's important to him. Saying I need an FF for narrow DoF, well first you have to establish that the person actually wants that. Not everyone does. Or not everyone would buy a camera just for that. You have lots of narrow DoF opportunities with your APS_c gear. You have to be a bit of a narrow DoF enthusiast to require equipment , just to achieve more narrow DoF than APS-c offers. Not that there's anything wrong with that if you are.
Now if you're a professional and you want a distinctive look to set you apart from the amateurs, that's a whole different argument, and definitely one that leans towards MF.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-05-2014, 03:22 PM
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I guess you didn't notice all my linked portraits are shot by artists who used large format, as in 8x10 film, calling 36x24 late format is a bit of a stretch... as I said, myself and many others prefer to use large format, and keep our subjects completely in focus... which if you've ever done large format studio work, you'll know is quite a bit more demanding than the narrow DoF thing. The current crop of folks who say "nice" when they get a narrow DoF 35x24 image, probably don't have a clue what large format is.
IN any case, I have no need to get into a full blown debate on different styles in portrait photography, except to point out, if you think you're getting narrow DoF in a 35x24 image, try 4x5 or 8x10 film. And a Wide DoF photograph taken on a large sensor camera is hardly cliche... people saying they take images like that on their iPhone. It would be nice to be polite, but that's just ignorant.
Take this with your iPhone...
If you've ever seen a print of the image, you'd know, it is not going to happen.
So no, not all large format portrait artists are in love with shallow DoF, in fact those acknowledged as the best usually aren't.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-05-2014, 06:54 AM
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Many good points you have there. A couple of responses
-That new Sigma 18-35 1.8 is the first to break that pattern.
-More expensive zooms tend to have better bokeh... comparable to that of primes...
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-05-2014, 05:41 AM
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Did you get that backwards... did you mean a zoom. A zoom gives you the opportunity to crop in loco and use the full resolution of your sensor. With a prime you're almost certain to be cropping in PP, unless everything is so static that you have time to move around.
As for shallow DoF in portraits, I don't even know if this has been said before, but, I really don't like it. I prefer using a backdrop to create subject isolation, and keeping the whole subject in sharp focus. To me it's more natural. IN the end, I like my able to wander where ever it wants in the photo and to be able to scan an image looking for detail where I choose. Having a photographer decide what is important and focus on that, that would be to me the sign of a control freak. I'll decide for myself what I want to look at. If I want to look at the guy's ear, and you're decided it's going to be out of focus...I don't want your picture....
Before anyone get's their knickers in a knot, I'm not saying everyone should think like me. All I'm saying is that narrow depth of field may get you clients, but it will also lose you clients. Shoot the way that makes you happy, but realize, there will be many who don't care for that style. I have books by Karsch and Avedon, I have no books by photographers who shoot consistently using narrow DoF for portraits, although I don't mind if one is thrown in every now and then.
Arni- taken by Richard Avedon...
One could argue that using effects like narrow DoF is technically lazy.... instead of achieving a subject that's in focus, one gives up and settles on selective parts in focus. After all my struggles in my studio class when I was given a specific subject and would fail if the whole subject wasn't in focus, and spending hours understanding control of DoF, I look at most of these images, and think, ,"the guy didn't have the skill to manage DoF." That's not always the case, there are also many images that are quite good, but it's like everything else. For every great narrow DoF image posted, there are 10 disasters.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-04-2014, 07:13 AM
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That for me is the issue. When I'm walking around with my 18-135, will I take the time to take my 18-135 off to put on another lens. If I have time, I will put on the 21 or 35... or 60-250, ...but much of the time, taking advantage of ephemeral light is more important than changing from zoom to prime.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-02-2014, 06:19 PM
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Next time I get a chance, I'll put together the same lenses , or maybe a few different ones... so we can do the bokeh test....unless of course someone else wants to give it a try.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-02-2014, 02:00 PM
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I doubt it would be much different.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-02-2014, 11:00 AM
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I only had a few shots taken with that lens, based on the number of shots I had to select from, it's done fantastic. Not only that, that image was taken at a spot I've been to over and over through the years with various lenses, and it' one of my favourite images ever taken there based on image quality. The one I do like better were based on better light.. not better lens performance.
That's why I said ""as a general rule, an image that looks better full size also looks better small". Maybe 90% of the time, 10% of the time, an image you think is a write off will look good reduced to 1080 if it has other things going for it.
Your welcome... the 21 is a gem for sure...
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-02-2014, 09:46 AM
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Ya, unless a 1080 web image is the most you ever do with your images, in which case you'd be silly to look at anything else. But from a professional viewpoint yes. But I will say as a general rule, an image that looks better full size also looks better small. As I said before, I see this as a fun way to kill a bit of time, not some kind of definitive commentary on these lenses. I would put something like this on a scale of 1-10 for usefulness on making a lens purchasing decision as maybe a 1. It might be better than something rated 0, but then, it might be more misleading than informative. The lenses are not used equally, so when I look through my library, sometimes I'm picking from thousands, sometimes I'm picking from less than a 100. I could probably write a page on why you shouldn't use this for anything more than a bit of fun. Hopefully most people will understand that, and I won't have to,
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-02-2014, 09:09 AM
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Well looks like everyone interested has posted, I'll look things over....
If anyone wants to check and see how they did.
Here's the list.
1.- 18-135
2. 21 ltd.
3 60-250
4 FA 50 1.8
5. DA 35 2.4
6, Tamron 17-50
7. DA 18-55
8 Tamron 90 Macro
So the correct answer is Zooms 1,3,6,7
Primes 2,4,5,8
The big winners at 75% accuracy are Dice, reeftool, rbefly, and arv.. after a very quick glance, if any one else did as well of better and i missed you feel free to chime in. It seem to be a pretty even distribution, without doing a statistical analysis I'd say that, shooting with different light, different PP with the size reduced to 1080 it's pretty hard to tell. I bet if I used images that include out of focus areas it would be no contest... next time I feel like wasting a few hours maybe, I'll cook that one up.
---------- Post added 05-02-14 at 12:25 PM ----------
After another quick glance , the one that tripped most everyone up was #3 the DA* 60-250 which was picked accurately by NZunicorn, so even if you didn't get as many as some, you got the one no one else did. Another fact to bolster the notion that the DA*60-250 is a "stack of primes" lens.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
05-01-2014, 07:19 AM
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I guided a photography trip last year where one of the clients took pictures in the same general area took them to with a D800, somewhere I have the link to his pictures, if I can find a couple of his pictures that are similar to some of mine... I'll give it a try.
Good to see so many good sports, you guys are true gamers.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
04-30-2014, 06:15 PM
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I agree to a point... where we have compared actual photos done of the same photo scene and same focal length, seconds apart, sometimes the results are still very close... but, also, at 3000x2000 pixels it's impossible to tell D800 image from a K-5 image... so taking images down to 1080 does put you at a disadvantage for sure. But I'm expecting anyone would be able to pick out the 18-55. I can, but that doesn't mean much, I know what to look for.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
04-30-2014, 10:30 AM
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Yes. DA 18-55...
---------- Post added 04-30-14 at 01:32 PM ----------
It's not scientific... the criteria was I tried to apply the most representative image I had for each lens in my estimation...without giving more than 5 minutes to selecting each image... so a fun challenge... not one to parade results all over the place and say "I told you so.: Something to keep you amused for a bit if you have the time. I know I have better images for every lens, but I didn't want to make it an all day chore... well except for maybe the 35 2.4, that one the 35 just doesn't get any better.
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Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion
04-30-2014, 09:40 AM
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I've pictures taken with 4 zooms and 4 primes... just wondering if anyone can tell which are which. I'd make it a contest and have prizes for the winner but you'll have to settle for bragging rights for the most accurate respondent.
Just for ease of compilation, if you could frame your answer
Zooms 1234
Primes 5678
Where the number is the number of the picture.... no need for commas they're all single digits.
#1
#2
#3
#4
#5
#6
#7
#8
The lenses involved are zooms DA 18-55. DA 18-135, DA* 60-250, Tamron 17-50
The primes are DA21 ltd. DA 35 2.4 FA 50 1.8 and Tarmon 90 2.8
If anyone wants to try and guess the exact lens used, go nuts....
If there is any interest I'll publish the picture with lens info in a few days.
Thanks for participating.
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