Tag: 350D

The 1D Mark Huh?

Jason11 Comments

You knew it was gonna happen.  A new camera body has hit the market from Canon.  It was only a matter of  time.  The latest?  The Canon 1D Mark IV!  (That’s four in Roman numerals…)  What’s it got going for it?  Lots of features and functions.  Everything is being discussed ad infinitum from Megapixels to frame rates, to video, to shutter speeds to ISO’s, and everything in between.  In the end, I’ve come to one conclusion:  the camera market is always changing, always advancing, and new gear is coming out all the time – from all the vendors.  Want some proof?  The Canon line-up of Digital SLR’s in its entirety is little more than 2 years old – with the oldest being the 1D Mark III which was introduced in early 2007.  Take a look at the current active line-up of Canon DSLR’s and their dates of introduction (from Wikipedia):

  • EOS 1Ds mark III – Mid 2007
  • EOS 1D Mark IV – Two days ago
  • EOS 1D Mark III – Early 2007
  • EOS 5D Mark II – Mid 2008
  • EOS 7D – 2009
  • EOS 50D – Mid 2008
  • EOS Rebel T1i – 2009
  • EOS Rebel XSi – 2008
  • EOS Rebel XS – 2008

That’s a lot of cameras!  And that’s only their active lineup!  Others that have been “deprecated” (taken out of production) include the 40D, 30D, 20D, 10D, Rebel XT and probably more.  It’s funny actually that the two SLR’s I have owned are the XT and the 40D – neither of which is in production anymore.  And both of these cameras were absolute cutting edge on their release roughly 2 years ago and 5 years ago respectively.  The XT marked a new era of consumer grade SLR’s and the 40D marked a significant advancement to the 20D which was the most popular camera for serious enthusiast shooters for many years.  (Apparently, the 30D was only an incremental upgrade…)

A lot of people have been asking me:  “Are you going to upgrade?” What does the new MP count mean?  What about the video?  Do we need to be concerned about this?  Is it priced fairly?  What about this?  What about that?”  Lots of techno-babble is going around, and to be honest, I can’t keep up anymore.  For me it’s about one thing and one thing only:  Does it take good pictures?  In both the active and the deprecated line-up, the answer is a solid yes!

For what it’s worth, for me, I will continue to use my current camera until one of two things happens:

  1. It breaks
  2. My needs exceed its ability

Having said that, I am always interested in hearing what others think about the latest developments in the camera and photography industry.  It’s always fun to talk gear talk, and prognosticate, and “oooh” and “ahhh” over the latest gagedtry.  If I had a million bucks, then sure, I might look at all the stuff and buy every time a new one comes out, but until then…the above criteria fit the bill for me just fine.  What about everyone else though?  Does this make sense?  Am I being curmudgeonly?  Am I burying my head in the sand?  Is there something I am missing?  What are your thoughts on the “latest and greatest” in the camera world?  I’d love to hear, so sound off in the comments and via email – who knows, you may get your name featured on a podcast!  LOL

In the meantime, as always, Happy Shooting! 🙂  (We’ll see you back here on Friday with hopefully the latest podcast and some weekend nuggets (like a winner for the Flickr Monthly Giveaway!)

The Crop Factor…

Jason5 Comments

First off, my apologies for the absenteeism yesterday.  After a really fun photo shoot with some friends in downtown Denver (more on that next week), I got home super late (by working standards – my shift is 7-4 and I need to take a bus an hour to get there…so I leave at 6, which means I am up at 5!), and went almost straight to bed!  Hopefully the content today will make up for this, because it’s time to talk about (cue fanfare music)…the crop factor!

Now, before anyone gets all uppity because sensor crop factors have been discussed ad infinitum, just relax, because this isn’t about sensors (well, a little, but indirectly).  I am talking about cropping your pictures in camera.  We all do it, often to improve composition, or to focus in on one area of an image – but what about those undesired crops?  What am I talking about?  I am talking about images where it looks really great “in camera” but when you go to print it, the native aspect ratio won’t work for the size you want to print to.  See, most SLR cameras (non-full frame anyway) have roughly an aspect ratio of 2:3.  This means that you can print at this ratio without losing anything in your image.  But, if you want to print at a different aspect ratio, then something has to be cropped out.

So, what aspect ratio will work with the 2:3 proportions? Who all remembers their grade school math?  All you have to do is multiply each side of the ratio by the same number.  So, prints that work are …

  • 2×3″ prints (2:3 x 1:1 = 2×3)
  • 4×6″ prints (2:3 x 2:2 = 4:6)
  • 6×9″ prints (2:3 x 3:3 = 6:9)
  • 8×12″ prints (2:3 x 4:4 = 8:12)

You get the gist…but here’s the thing – the only “standard” print size that really fits our native camera aspect ratio is the 4×6″ print.  What if we want an 8×10″ print?  Well, cropping is required then.  This means losing some of your image.  So, this also means that you need to think about this during image composition in camera – if you like it – and want to print it – remember to frame things so that the crop won’t lose key elements of the picture.  Here’s a perfect example:

isla_original

I took the above shot on a trip down in Isla Mujeres.  I absolutely love this shot.  The problem is that my proportions are lost when I crop to print an 8×10.  Take a look at the 8×10 crop:

isla_crop

It still looks pretty good, and I love the colors still, but some of the impact has been lost by cropping out the frame on both the left and the right.  See how the brown “framing element” has been lost?  I could have cropped less on that side and more on the orange side (even though the orange side is still cropped to a degree), but hopefully you’ll see the difference easily enough because it’s really the orange, yellow and blue that I think are the fundamental colors that hold my eye for this shot.  Suffice to say, I still loved it enough to print and frame an 8×10…but that’s not the point here.

The point is to try and remember to frame your composition in camera with “the crop factor” in mind.   By taking these measures into consideration, you can really have many more printable memories.  So, when you go out shooting this weekend, keep the crop factor in mind.  Happy shooting, enjoy the weekend, and we’ll see you back here on Monday!

The 40D versus the XT

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40d versus XT

We are now in day 5 of the first ever photo contest from Canon Blogger, so keep thinking freedom as you point that lens – it could win you cold hard cash!  Check out the details from the post of July 3rd, here. In new news, I got a good long weekend with family to shoot with the 40D, and after some pretty extensive shooting (over 1500 shots in 48 hours), I’ve had a chance to get at least a good handle on the basics of the 40D.  Granted I do not have the minutia of it down pat like on the XT, but I suspect that will only come with more time behind the lens.

Anyway, I thought now might be as good a time as ever to give you the lowdown on my thoughts of the 40D as they compare to the XT.  It was definitely worth the upgrade!  I put together a short video showing a comparison of some of the benefits of the 40D over the XT, as well as one rather disappointing thing.  I should be back next week with a regular Photoshop tip – just the last few weeks have been rather crazy with prepping the house to be “show ready”.

Anyway, without further ado, here’s the 40D versus XT home video I recorded earlier today.  Enjoy and we’l see you tomorrow with the latest edition of “What’s This?”.  Happy shooting and watch those apertures!

Friday Feel-goods

Jason4 Comments

Canon 40D

Found a couple neat resources around the web over the last few days. But, I am not gonna share them today. That’s right, the old bait-and-switch! I say something then switch gears once you’re hooked and talk about something else entirely. But, rest assured weary reader, I am not selling anything…yet! Quite simply – I got my 40D!!! That’s right, pulled the trigger, but the bullet, took the plunge, and every other metaphor you can think of. So, now with not one but 2 SLR’s in hand, I feel a little better knowing I have a backup.

That means my trusty Canon XT is now a backup camera! The funniest thing about it is that when I got my XT about 3 years ago, I paid more for that than I just paid for the Canon 40D (body only)! Back in 2005, the XT was hot off the presses and I was chomping at the bit to get it. The market started with it around $1000, and when I found one at Beach Camera for $850, I thought – “This is a good deal!” So I took the plunge.

Fast forward to 2007, the Canon 40D debuts for $1140 retail for the body. Within a year, rebates start kicking in – the struggling economy starts impacting camera manufacturers, so the rebates are big. The Canon 40D now has a $200 rebate, and it’s not the mail in kind! That’s right, an instant in-store rebate knocks the 40D down to $940 bones. This is a pretty darn good deal considering where the 40D stands in the Canon lineup. (3rd in line as I see it: 1D Mark II, 5D, and then the 40D)

But wait, hold the phones, that deal gets sweeter! If you are a current XT, XTi, or XSi owner, an additional $50 mail in rebate is offered too. So, now after all rebates, you can get the pristine new 40D for under $900…a mere $890! What a steal! But, here’s the thing – that means the aftermarket is starting to feel a pinch. This means the 40D that many bought a mere 6 months ago for $1200 could concievably drop to half that in the aftermarket since the XS is coming out, and a likely successor to the 5D which will push it down further. No one wants to see their gear depreciate to the tune of 50% in a mere 12 months. Heck, the XT new was around $100, and it still can be found for $450-$500 after being in the market place for about 4 years! (Although I suspect not for much longer – it’s not even in the current lineup anymore…)

So, anyway, the aftermarket starts picking up. By keeping up with the market via 1001 Noisy Cameras I can see that Canon is taking the majority of the top ten deals for a good 3 months. Now, with the standard for after market stuff typically running around 10-15% less than retail, 40D owners start pushing their bodies for $900, then $875, and most recently I saw one for $850. Well, last week I posted in the Buy/Sell forums of one particular community that I wanted to buy (WTB) a 40D at the 10% off retail rate…after rebates! That meant $800. Within an hour I had a taker, so – for less than the price of my XT, I upgraded to the 40D a year after its release.

Ironic, because it was about a year after the XT was released that I got it for about just as the retail price dropped 10%. In the aftermath, I learned a valuable lesson about camera gear: bodies depreciate, lenses retain value. If you want to spend money wisely, don’t upgrade your body every year, upgrade your glass. Hopefully this upgrade will have been worthwhile – 3 years in the making, and for $100 less than my previous body – I think it was probably a good investment. The only reason I did it was because I really did feel as though I was starting to bump up against the limitations of the XT body. Frame rate was not where I wanted it, the image counter was becoming more of a hindrance as I take more, the images were harder to see, and it was just starting to show signs of wear and tear. A bit of the plastic casing had peeled off in my sweaty mitts. It was just time to upgrade. To the forum guy (you know who you are) that hooked me up…thanks so much!

In looking at the counter, it seems the actuations are even lower than I thought with the count in the 500’s! I simply just re-set it back to 0 and I am rockin’ and rollin’! So, in case you hadn’t guessed it – this is just a “Feel Good” post today – nothing insightful, informational, or even useful – just a gleeful post of what was formerly an adult and what is now a 5-year old kid at Christmas! Have fun all, go out and shoot some (I know I will be…)

Oh yeah, here’s your WTD for the week:

What the Duck - June 26th 2008

Monday Pictures and Puzzles

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Monday morning news. This past weekend I had a photo shoot I did for a co-worker and her kid (he apparently did not get very good school pictures this year). After about 20 minutes of shooting and putting him in various poses, I figured I had enough (about 50 shots) to get four poses for her to choose from. So, having done that, we sat back and sipped our morning coffee while the kids got ready to hit the beach. The older youngster was sitting around with us (older being relative – she was about 10-12). Playfully, without even looking, I fired a few snaps at her, letting the AF kick in. As luck would have it, this turned out to be one of the most phenomenal shots from the entire outing. So much so that I am going adding it to my portfolio. For those that read the blog though, here’s a sneak preview!

Portrait Close-up

Don’t forget, the TOP test has moved to it’s new location as a sub-folder of the Canon Blogger moniker. It can now be found at it’s new site: www.canonblogger.com/top so don’t forget to stop over there and take the second test (still a work in progress) measuring your advanced photography skills! Share results here in the comments or directly via email. I’d love to hear feedback on this too, as I move forward with more user-requested content.

My other Monday tidbit is a cool site I heard about (from my folks of all people to boot!) this last weekend: www.jigzone.com You upload your pictures and can turn them into flash-based jigsaw puzzles that you can share with your friends over your blog. Quite the time waster, but otherwise very fun and very cool! I uploaded a few images to test it out and since it seems cool enough, thought I’d share that with the blogosphere as other creative types might be interested in seeing it in action:

Well, that’s it for today. As we shutter-click our way through the week, enjoy it and remember to keep things in focus (happy shooting and watch those apertures!)

No blog Thursday – smelling the flowers (and shooting the moon!)

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Sorry all – after my Jalbum tutorial hit on Wednesday, I spent the better part of my afternoon and evening talking with some of their folks – and they want me to do a few more videos for them. I excitedly started talking logistics, and details before putting together a few short versions for use on the website. At 11:30, I realized – egad – I’ve not done my Thursday Thoughts yet!

So…rather than try to cobble something together at the last minute, I’ll make this a no blog Thursday, and suggest that if you are still up, go outside and look at that moon! Man it’s gorgeous!

moon.jpg

Photo Tuesday (to take your mind off taxes)

Jason4 Comments

Since I devoted Monday’s post to the Photography and Photoshop Blogroll report for Jason D. Moore, my other announcement got shifted back a day, so this week things will be a tad more compressed. I’ll try not to bore you with excessive links and heavy-handed material where you have to read a lot. That means – it’s Photo Tuesday! (The tutorial will be released Wednesday…since there’s no “Wednesday Web Gems” for the theme.) Besides, since it is a blog that I am pretty much writing single-handedly, I can change things up if I want, right? 🙂

So…for Photo Tuesday I thought I’d announce that I have a new gallery of photos put together on my dedicated photo site. The site portal is here: www.jasons-photography.com and the latest gallery addition is here. Please take a moment to stop over and then share your thoughts with me here (or via email) on the shots. Too many? Not enough? Layout? Treatment? Etc.? I’ve collected these images over the past 3-4 years and finally have enough (I think) for a dedicated gallery of wildlife. As a teaser, here’s a few thumbnails…all taken from my Canon XT and processed through Adobe Lightroom 2.0 (Beta)

_mg_1413.jpg

_mg_9028.jpg

_mg_9331.jpg

As a final reminder, it is tax day here in the U.S., so if you haven’t done your taxes yet, today’s your last chance to get them in legally.  If you’re a last minute kind of person, this is pretty much it!  Well, that’s it for Tuesday – happy shooting and watch those apertures! 😉

Monday Morning Meltdown

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As a part of our daily routine, my wife and I take our dog for a walk every day of the week. Usually we both go, but if I am busy, or she is, the other will take the dog out so she gets her daily exercise. (The vet told us the dog was a tad on the heavy side – we just think she’s curvy!) Well, due to the time change, the sun was just coming down to the golden hours, so I couldn’t help but grab the camera and take it along in case some chance opportunity came up to get some good pictures of the dog. She’s a good girl, but she’s become very much like my wife in that they both look away (or flip me a particular finger or paw)) when I point the lens at them. Continue reading “Monday Morning Meltdown” →

Canon in the News – XSi body to be released

Jason3 Comments

Well, since I am an admitted Canonite, and the blog name has Canon as part of the identity, I guess I should also chime in with a report on the announcement that Canon is adding a new body to it’s SLR lineup. The XSi was announced last Thursday by Canon, and this is apparently an incremental upgrade to the XTi that now serves as the baseline consumer grade SLR. Designed to compete with the Nikon D40, it offers a slightly larger pixel count, and makes the transition from CF cards to SD cards. I’m not sure if existing Canon shooters would be compelled to go out and purchase this, as I own the XT, and cannot see a need to own this. The camera instead seems as an attempt by Canon to recapture the lead market share for entry level SLR cameras from Nikon.

The reason I call this an incremental upgrade is because not much changes. The only things to change really are pixel count and screen size. I did a quick comparison chart of the bodies in the same range, so you can see where the “upgrades” are. Really, it seems more like they took this part of one body, that part of another body, and left other parts unchanged across the board (shutter speed, fps, ISO, etc…) Kind of a non-news item for me, but for those interested in entering the market, I can see where it’d be a decent option. Anyway, here’s my comparison chart to other Canon bodies:

canon-bodies1.JPG

For those interested in it’s specs, here’s a link to Canon’s official page for the new XSi.

Web gem for Wednesday – go buy some baggies!

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Starting the new year off with a bang, the Wall Street Journal reported this morning that the Transportation Safety Administration has implemented new policies regarding what battery types can be brought on airplanes. The new rule speaks to the Lithium batteries we’ve all come to know and love that charges everything from our cell phones to watches, cameras and laptops. That’s right, your Li-ion batteries are now a restricted item. What are the rules?

Well, it turns out you can have one in your device, so your camera, laptop, cell phone, and other such equipment is safe. You can also carry two spares, provided each is stored in its own sealed plastic bag or the original packaging. Loose batteries, whether in carry-on or checked baggage, are no longer permitted. Lithium content is also restricted now to less than 25 grams. For now, it’s safe to say that virtually all cell phone, laptop, camera, and watch batteries fall well under the limit, including standard AA and AAA batteries. Whether this is per battery or a total of all batteries is somewhat unclear, but from what I have been able to gather, the aggregate total is in reference to the total Lithium content per battery. This is not a definitive piece of information but is the best I can determine from the travel sites (referenced at the end of this post) and other resources.

For those that are curious, I have been able to determine that Lithium content is based on a factor of 0.3 per cell multiplied by the rated capacity in ampere hours. If you look at the back of your batteries, it will tell you certain key information that can be used to determine your total Lithium content. For example, on my Canon XT, the back panel shows that it has a rating of 7.4 volts, with 720 Milliamp Hours. It’s the mAh that we need to use for determining how much Lithium we have. So, if I take the rating of 720 mAh and convert that to regular Ampere Hours (remember your metric system?) I get a value of 0.72 (720/1000). Now, I would use that 0.72 and multiply it by 0.3 to get my total lithium content. So, the XT/XTi batteries have about 0.21 grams of Lithium. Here’s a chart of common Canon cameras, their battery models, and the total Lithium content:

Camera Model

 Battery Model mAh value Ah value Total Lithium content
Rebel XT (350d) NB-2LH 720 0.72 0.216 grams
Rebel XTi NB-2LH 720 0.72 0.216 grams
20D BP-511A 1390 1.39 0.417 grams
30D BP-511A 1390 1.39 0.417 grams
40D BP-511A 1390 1.39 0.417 grams
5D BP-511A 1390 1.39 0.417 grams
1D Mark II NP-E3 1650 1.65 0.495 grams
1D Mark III LP-E4 2300 2.3 0.69 grams
1Ds Mark III LP-E4 2300 2.3 0.69 grams

It should be noted here that the 1D Mark II series of the EOS family did not appear to be a Lithium battery, rather a Nicad battery, so it should be exempt from the new restriction. Regardless, at most, any EOS battery will yield considerably less than 1 gram, so with a total of 3 (one in the body and 2 spares), you are just a hair over 2 grams of Lithium (2.1 to be exact). When coupled with your laptop Lithium content, and cellular phone content, you should still be well within the parameters. As for other devices, I just checked my cell phone and laptop. The former (a Motorola v325i), and that has 880 mAh, so comes in at 0.264 grams ( 0.88×0.3). The laptop comes in a little closer as my Macbook Pro (15”) has an Li-ion battery that comes in at 60 Wh (no milliWatt hours here…), so the yield there is 18 grams of Lithium. I’d read elsewhere that the 17” MBP has a Wh capacity of 68 (or 20.4 grams of Lithium).

What it basically comes down to, is that you now must put your spare batteries in a plastic baggie, and can only tote those in your carry-on. (You cannot transport them in checked luggage.) Here’s my theoretical total Lithium content if I travelled with everything and the maximum number of spares:

Camera: 0.63 grams (0.21×3)

Cell phone: 0.78 grams (0.26×3)

Laptop: 54 grams (18×3)

For a grand total of 55.41

As a means of reference, here’s the links I visited in compiling this post:

Wall Street Journal Article

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119911051123859361.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Mac Owner’s Blog (for MBP 17” numbers):

http://stevenfettig.com/mythoughts/archives/000728.php

Safe Travel (note the <dot> GOV distinction)

http://safetravel.dot.gov/whats_new_batteries.html

Calculating Lithium Content

http://www.rosebatteries.com/pdfs/DOTshipping.pdf

 

 

When I get home this afternoon, I will set this up as a dedicated page so it won’t be archived and add it to the “blogroll” links on the side panel for easy reference. Happy Wednesday all, and go buy some baggies!

 

ETA: The dedicated page is now up and can be found here: Battery Lithium Content