Forgot Password
Pentax Camera Forums Home
 
Log in or register to remove ads.

Showing results 1 to 9 of 9 Search:
Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion 06-07-2015, 05:23 AM  
Retry a zoom lens?
Posted By normhead
Replies: 60
Views: 5,738
Well then thanks Nicholas, I think..... and I do love a good rant... but, in my experience a point is always better, illustrated with some images. Many of my posts are overkill... from my own perspective.... but once people start telling me I believe things I don't, I said things i didn't and start going to lengths to show everyone what I didn't say is wrong, I tend to try and put together something that will end their obvious confusion. Sometimes people get it the first time, sometimes I have to go on a bit. :D Sometimes I just give up. :D
Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion 06-05-2015, 02:48 PM  
Retry a zoom lens?
Posted By normhead
Replies: 60
Views: 5,738
I carry , on a regular basis the 21 ltd, the 40 XS, my Sigma 70 macro and my A-400. For zooms i carry the Sigma 8-16, the DA 18-135, and the DA* 60-250 or F 70-210. I'm not the zooms are perfect guy. I'm the guy that says there are a lot of times a zoom gets you a better image. And there are also a lot of times I get a prime out of the bag. You seem to be a bit confused in your last post. I'm the guy that says, you need to know how and when to use all the tools available and make the best use of all of them.

Now if you would like to extend the courtesy of allowing that I might know when to use a zoom and when to use a prime, that's cool. If you have some ridiculous "primes only" doctrine we are never going to see eye to eye. Just stop commenting on my posts. With that kind of attitude you'd have no hope of understanding what i'm saying.
Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion 06-05-2015, 11:37 AM  
Retry a zoom lens?
Posted By normhead
Replies: 60
Views: 5,738
NIcholas06, with all due respect... give it up. Find someone to tell how they should shoot, who actually might believe your nonsense. Every one of your "scenarios" involves exponential amounts of time and effort and a better result is not guaranteed. I decide how much I want the shot, I decide how much time and effort I want to put into it. Unless you're there, you have nothing to add about what I should do. I like the shot, I like having the shot, I got it on the spur of the moment and I'm happy with it. It represents the best shot I could have achieved with the amount of time I had to invest in it. If you can't see that, it really doesn't matter to me. I just wish you quit trying to sound like some kind of expert jumping in on other people's threads and spouting nonsense.

And to be honest with you... I've never seen one of your images, so I have no way of evaluating if there's piece of advice you might offer that would interest me. I tend to look at the people who's work makes me wonder what their work flow was. IF you haven't taken a few pictures I'm interested in, I don't know how to evaluate what you're saying. Until I see a few pictures, I don't know if you know anything... or you read a few books and you're spouting off. But you clearly don't understand the situation I'm in, in my workflow. Otherwise you wouldn't post such nonsense. I do know, that when you discuss my work, your points bear absolutely no relevance to the situations I shoot in. I can only assume it's the same when you critique other people's work.

A smart person knows what he knows well. and what he doesn't know at all, and only comments on what he knows. Smarten up dude.

The fact is, I liked that grouping of pine needles, in that sunset, with that horizon line and those colours. In all your chosen "You could have done this" scenarios, you never suggest how I could have incorporated the things I like into this shot, without a zoom lens. In fact in your given scenarios, there is no guarantee I could have produced an image I even liked. Even if I'd done exactly what you suggest. But I could have wasted the moment trying what you are suggesting and got nothing. A possibility you seem to be totally oblivious to.

Most of the time, you just take what you see the best you can and move on. It's not rocket science. I'm never going to sell that image, but i love having it in my slideshow of the trip. It ads something different.

http://s1132.photobucket.com/user/Norm_Head/slideshow/Canoe-trips/2014-Auges...ifer-Mike-Norm

Not everything has to be about creating the perfect picture. Sometimes you just want what you see in front of you, because it's special.
Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion 06-03-2015, 07:32 AM  
Retry a zoom lens?
Posted By normhead
Replies: 60
Views: 5,738
Add to that, that when we take our superzoom instead of our full kit.... we are often quite pleased with the results. Maybe if each image was taken with a top quality prime and compared we wouldn't be, but from where we stand right now, the benefits of having the best glass are ridiculously overrated. We've sold 3 copies for close to 1k of an image Tess took with a 10 MP camera printed to 30x20. Any image taken with a K-5 and our Sigma 18-250.. is way better technically, but, that doesn't affect how much people seem to enjoy the image. So if we can get great images with a 10 MP point and shoot, how does the argument that a Sigma 18-250 on a fantastic 16MP sensor, isn't going to be more than "good enough."

The simple truth is, we carry the best glass we can, but we don't fret if we end up carrying less than our best. The chances of not having our best making a difference is very small. Even printing to 30x20.

There is a certain amount of snobbery in these lens discussions.

I love my DA*60-250, but there have been many days I left in home in favour of the Sigma 18-250 or 18-135. And I can't remember even once thinking.. this picture would have been better using the DA*. Part of that is, if I think the DA* will make a difference I take it, and part is that, you can go through a whole 12 day trip without taking a single image where maximum resolution would make the image better. Most of the time, it's colour pattern, texture etc that make the pictures. Not infinitely fine detail.

Resolution is a long way down the list, of the things that make a picture a good picture. And too much resolution for the type of image taken is a real thing.
Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion 06-03-2015, 06:35 AM  
Retry a zoom lens?
Posted By normhead
Replies: 60
Views: 5,738
To be short... no, no, no, The shot is taken on a steep incline on the side of a lake. All you're saying here is I can waste precious time in a sunset where the light is different every 2 or three minutes, walking around with a prime trying to match what I could have done in a couple of seconds with a zoom. For what? You're not getting a better picture. Your comment is invalid because you haven't wrapped you head around the situation...

Just because the image is a simple image, doesn't mean it was easy to take.
Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion 06-02-2015, 06:30 PM  
Retry a zoom lens?
Posted By normhead
Replies: 60
Views: 5,738
.

Now we aren't talking about lenses. :D

Now were talking about a whole pile of non lens related issues. :D

My biggest problem getting good light is I can't get up in the morning. For a photographer, that takes way half your good light. :D

Don't be laughing... this is serious. :lol:
Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion 06-02-2015, 05:57 PM  
Retry a zoom lens?
Posted By normhead
Replies: 60
Views: 5,738
Because you can't move is the most likely scenario. You can zoom with your feet, until you can't.



Well then, what if you need 140 or 100? You need to spend more time getting to the gist of what's been said and not spend so much time trying to negate it. You end up missing the point altogether.



Actually, I'm rarely working on level ground, and I'm also shooting a particular background for either colour or detail. Moving means changing my camera angle. I didn't find the perfect angle and line up the background just to move and accept an inferior position. All you have to know here is that "zoom with your feet" is nonsense. It is not always possible, or even desirable. Another dictum is "if you don't like your pictures, get closer." You aren't getting closer if your zooming backwards with your feet to get what you want in the frame. The intellectual contortions you're going through to try and make "zoom with your feet" a reality , make no sense. Why are you doing this?

On a shot like this


I moved up and down the hill until I go the pine needles positioned where I wanted it against the horizon, then I zoomed until I got the framing I wanted, and I was working on tripod, so I could frame really tight, and not waste pixels cropping. Moving backwards or forward changed my vertical position, and therefore my lens angle with relation to the horizon. It's just true, "zooming with your feet" is one of those smug cliches that doesn't fit many real world situations.



For most images, I want the full 24 MP, that's why I bought a 24 MP camera, as I said before. For maximum picture quality you shoot 24 MP with a 24 MP camera, I'd avoid shooting for 90mm with a 100mm lens by backing up. That's just maximizing your resources. See, this is exactly what I don't get. Why would you claim you are shooting primes for better image quality, and then recommend shooting that prime without filling the frame? That makes no sense at all. I'm saying straight up, flat out, without a shadow of a doubt, I'll get a better image shooting with my 18-135 at 135mm, than you will shooting with a 100 mm lens and cropping, and probably with the 100mm lens backed out to however many feet it would take to frame the image the way I want it. I don't care how good your 100mm lens is. It's going to be true.
Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion 06-01-2015, 07:08 AM  
Retry a zoom lens?
Posted By normhead
Replies: 60
Views: 5,738
Where as in the sequence above, I would have had 3 or 4 lens changes within 2 minutes. When I get into light like I had on that morning, I just start shooting and try and engage with any possible image. Sometimes speed counts. If I was shooting with a prime, would I even know at this point what I missed? I suspect many prime shooters would have shot two or three of those images at the focal length they had on the camera. I took 8 images, one every 30 seconds on average, one every 20 seconds in the 25th minute. It's very rare I come on a scene that can effectively be shot at one focal length. Often I shoot, then move in, then another images then go long for the last one. I find the idea that there's only one true focal length to be shot from each standing position a bit limiting. But then I shoot largely in natural environments, which you would expect to be more random. I guess in urban environments distances are more restricted by standard street widths, house and car sizes, yard sizes etc.
Forum: Pentax SLR Lens Discussion 06-01-2015, 06:27 AM  
Retry a zoom lens?
Posted By normhead
Replies: 60
Views: 5,738
From my perspective , a guy without zooms has made a decision. "There are certain shots I'm not going to get, in order to maintain absolutely optimum image quality." You simply cannot carry enough zooms to adequately cover the range I get with my 8-16, 18-135 and 60-250.

SO here's what happens you need 120mm, but you only have 100mm and 200mm primes. So clearly you have to shoot with the 100mm lens and crop. My 60-250 is already equal to what you're going to get with the 100, but now you're cropping 20 %. SO in terms of resolution, you are getting 20% less lw/ph compared to my DA*60-250 image, yet, you are thinking that you're getting a better image because you are using a prime.

I would suggest, you only get a better image with a prime if the best framing happens to coincide with the primes field of view.

Look at the following sequence of images. They are taken within three minutes of each other at 4 different focal lengths at a time when the light was changing constantly. For this type of image, you can have a very short window during which the light is the best. The entire sequences is taken within 3 minutes. Short of having a "boy friday " to hand you different cameras with different focal length primes, I'm not sure how you even accomplish this with primes, and before zooms were good, that's what people did. There is one photo taken in the 22 minute, 2 each in the 23 and 24th and 3 in the 25th. Lens changes would both result in missed images and or lower IQ in most of the images. The images are also shot at 4 different focal lengths. That probably would have extended the time spent a this location and reduced the time I spent at other location nearby.

I hear the "primes thing over and over again... but personally, I just don't get it. There will be few images where a prime gets you a better image where a zoom would. There will be lot's of instances where you end up with no image at all because you had the wrong lens on the camera. And there will be lots of images where the zoom is just as good as the prime.

I always shoot zooms when timing is critical, and primes when i have time to lallygag around and fiddle about... but that is rare. I hate missing a great image, because I had the wrong focal length prime on my camera.

I work from the premise that, the first image I see is not always the best, the first focal length I choose is rarely the one that works out best, often I see an image within an image while taking a photo. I take the shot, and then , if I have time, I look at the focal length to see if one of the primes in my bag will cover it. If it's at 24 for the 18-135 or anywhere on the 60-250, I won't even bother. I've taken these lenses off the camera often enough to know, there are focal lengths where a prime isn't going to ad anything.



My experience would be, if you're shooting primes only, you are missing a lot of great opportunities. You can see there are 3 images in the sequence I looked at, thinking of printing them. How many would there be if I'd taken a couple minutes to change lenses? It's quite possible that the instant those images were taken would have been missed, because I was changing lenses. There is a reason why so many pros rely on zooms these days.

And to top it off, because, I was only 4 minutes at this location... I also got this, at a nearby location.



And this...


and... well,you get the point.
Search took 0.00 seconds | Showing results 1 to 9 of 9

 
Forum Jump


All times are GMT -7. The time now is 04:24 PM. | See also: NikonForums.com, CanonForums.com part of our network of photo forums!
  • Red (Default)
  • Green
  • Gray
  • Dark
  • Dark Yellow
  • Dark Blue
  • Old Red
  • Old Green
  • Old Gray
  • Dial-Up Style
Hello! It's great to see you back on the forum! Have you considered joining the community?
register
Creating a FREE ACCOUNT takes under a minute, removes ads, and lets you post! [Dismiss]
Top