Tag: 40D

How do you like to sound?

Jason1 Comment

In preparation for the next podcast, due in no small part to a technical difficulty with Garage Band, I’ve set up a dedicated computer and recording space (call it my dedicated recording studio) and the audio quality is off the charts better than anything I’ve done before.  Ironically, the new topic for this weeks podcast is also about sound – the sound of shutters and how they can impact the feel of the camera, and how they can effect a moment is significant enough to warrant consideration.  Make sure you tune in for this one from the good folks over at Personal Life Media to get all the news, info, and latest from Learning Digital Photography!

Here’s the rest of the show notes:

Here’s the links from news items I talked about:

Listener Questions

  • How do you fix the Canon 99 Error?
  • What does the term “sync speed” mean?
  • What does kerning refer to in typography?

Listen in to the podcast over at Personal Life Media for the answers and full details on all the show segments.  In the meantime, what does your shutter sound like?   It doesn’t even have to be a Canon camera, listen to your camera whether it’s Canon Nikon, Olympus, Sony, Pentax, Panasonic, Leica, Hasselblad, etc! Find out why in the podcast up now over at Personal Life Media!  Thanks for stopping by the blog, and for all your kind words during the flu bug bout.  Enjoy the podcast, then go out and do y’all some shootin’!  See you back here tomorrow!

Go soak your gear!

Jason5 Comments

It pays to review your web traffic periodically because I just learned a way that your bathtub can be used for photography!  Not only is it a good place to mellow out after a stressful shoot, but it also makes a heckuva softbox!  I was on a forum that had referenced the blog and a guy had some product that he placed in his tub.  I thought it was an interesting idea, and decided to give it a try.  As it turns out, the tub is a great place to put your gear!  Granted, not to soak it (sorry, but I had to tease the title that way), but to act as a great background and softbox combined in one.

Here’s a few sample shots.  For all the tech-types, these are pretty much straight out of camera (or sooc) – all I did was adjust the WB for Flash and adjust the ACR sharpening from 25 to 75.  All are resized to 650px wide for the blog.  Here’s the setup:  I took the Canon kit lens (18-55) on my 40D, threw on the 550EX, and set everything to default values.  Shutter at standard sync speed of 250, aperture at f8 and ISO at 100.  I powered the 550EX at it’s standard setting, on camera (relax strobists – I can hear you shuddering from here),  and started firing a few shots.  I pointed the flash to camera right and got this:

ruler1

Yup, that’s a God-awful shot, with a nasty shadow.  Perhaps I could ditch the shadow.  Since we’re not exactly using conventional wisdom here, let’s try it with the flash pointed straight at the subject:

ruler2

Hey!  That’s actually not too bad.  It’s not that great, and still definitely a “Meh” kind of shot as it’s still got something of a shadow.  So, I spun the flash to fire above me and bounce off the ceiling:

ruler3

Voila!  You know what?  For being a spur of the moment thing, and without a lot of pre-planning or preparation, that’s not bad at all.  And, it was shot in a bathtub!  Anyone else out there have a bathtub?  Try some shots in it for different items.  I used a tape measure, but what about a pen, or a microphone, or a printer, or even a lens?  I bet you could get some pretty cool results with very little setup!  Anyone else have some odd or unusual ways to get clean backgrounds and even lighting on the cheap?  Feel free to share your thoughts, ideas, and feedback in the comments.  Feel free to link your own efforts there too!  Happy shooting all and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

Unintended Inspiration

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Today I thought I’d share a little “inspirational” series with the readership.  I had taken a break from reading blogs, magazines, news, twitter, forums, and all the other associated activities related to keeping current and learning about photography to actually put together to make some dinner.  Photography had exited my mind – I was taking a break, not even thinking about it.  So there I was, slicing and dicing, cutting celery, carrots, and onions for a spaghetti sauce, when BAM!  I saw some colors and shapes on the white cutting board and my knee jerk reaction was:  “Hey, that looks like one of those stock photos!  I wonder if I could make one like that!?”

Well, of course I had no equipment set up, no preparation, no lighting, no glycerine (it makes food shine), and had not given any thought to composition or anything like that.  But, having the 40D nearby, I figured what the heck, so began to document the process. First, I had the celery cut:

Celery

Then, I cut some carrots:

Celery and Carrots

Then, after some onions, it all went into a pot to brown in a butter sauce:

Veggies

After adding some ground pork and turkey, a little white wine and milk to steam down:

Steaming

Then once it had steamed down, the final stage, adding tomatoes:

Tomatos

The shots here are not all that great, but it does give a “back story” of sorts and helps to illustrate that sometimes you can find color and inspiration in the oddest of places – even if you’re not even looking for it.  So, if you ever find yourself stuck in a rut, trying to find some inspiration, sometimes it’s best to just stop trying so hard.  Forget about it and put your efforts into other things (like cooking).  Before you know it – you’l have new visions and challenges laid at your feet, waiting for your vision to bring it all together.  I’m sure others have experienced this too, so let’s hear it!  What other scenarios have produced unintended inspiration for you?  Feel free to share your stories, shots, and anecdotes in the comments!  Until tomorrow, Happy Shooting!

The Meat is in the Maintenance

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With another week come to a close, I got a late start in recording and putting together the podcast for today, so it’s going up a tad late.  However, as the old saying goes, good things come to those who wait.  This week, I look at some of the photo news, relevant to Canon users, photographers, and just some good old news tidbits.  In the “meat and potatoes”of the week, I look at what should be included in an extensive maintenance schedule for any photographer, including cleaning, software, firmware, batteries, data, backups – literally the whole schmear!  It’s quite the meaty helping on maintenance, so be sure to bookmark, download, listen, and whatever it is others do when enjoying podcasts as this is sure to be useful info for lots of people!

I also remind everyone of how you can win a Think Tank Photo Streetwalker!  This is a $150 value bag, and there are still a few opportunities left to participate in the random drawing.  Make sure you tune into the third segment to find out how (sorry, but only domestic US residents are eligible…) this can be yours for a simple song!  (Hint:  Make a post to the blog and you will probably be entered to win!)

Finally, I take a few listener questions from Josh and LaRae (thanks for the comments and email), as well as your weekly photo tip.  I made same changes to the recording process that I think have cleaned it up quite a bit, so I’d really like to hear some feedback on what people think of the difference in audio quality this go around!  Please don’t be shy, and make sure you let iTunes know they’ve dropped the feed!

Have a good weekend everyone.  Happy shootin, and we’ll see you back here Monday morning!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

What’s on YOUR tree?

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Since I missed out on recording a podcast this week, I was also slack in getting out and about to shoot a “What’s This?” type image.  The fact that Tracy wanted to get all the decorations up (I did too…actually it was probably more me than her) so we’d have some time to enjoy them also detracted from the photography mission for the week.  So, as I ditched the bad chili from yesterday, I pulled out the ole 40D and snapped off a few macro type shots from our work on the house.  Nothing that will make Better Homes and Gardens, but kinda neat anyway.  Here’s the best of that I got so far – will likely try more as we get closer and closer.  So, enjoy thiese two, but also please feel free to share your own as you ponder the question of “What’s on YOUR tree?“

Ornaments

Ornaments

Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again tomorrow!

Cactus Confusion

Jason5 Comments

Well, I finally got the Cactus gear that I ordered online at GadgetInfinity last week.  I had ordered their wireless trigger/receiver combo set and an extra receiver for the purpose of getting two lights to fire.  I excitedly opened all the packaging and unwrapped it all, then – stop, hold the phones, and check this out – I read the directions!

Yes, that’s right, an admitted geek read directions to make sure I utilize them right.  After reading about these kinds of things on David Hobby’s Strobist site and over on the Flickr Colorado Strobist site, I wanted to make sure I don’t accidentally fry either my precious 40D or the cheapo 550EX because of improper usage.

Well, after reading through the massive 1/4 page sheet of instructions, I was confused so I sorted back through the gear and here’s what I have:

Cactus Gear

Cactus Gear

Cactus Gear

So, I am not sure what the one cable is for on the right of the trigger (transmitter).  Is that supposed to plug into the transmitter, or the transceiver?  If you look at the back of the transceiver, there’s a funky little plug there that looks as if it is made to accept the one female end to that spare cable.  Meanwhile, the other end looks to be another RCA mini, and the side receptacle on the transmitter is built to take an RCA mini.  Not sure I understand why, as the trigger would normally be connected to the hot shoe of your flash.

Finally, it looks as though in order to get these triggers to work with a Canon 550EX, I would need an adaptor cable of sorts that would change an RCA mini to a female version of that three-prong set on the 550.  Any ideas from those out in the blogosphere?

Lest I forget you, dear readers, here’s a brief bout of humor courtesy of What the Duck:

HAPPY HALOWEEN EVERYONE!!!

Don’t get too hyped up on sugar – you’ll get camera shake!  Happy shooting all and we’ll see you back here on Monday!  Thanks in advance to anyone willing to help me sort out this wireless trigger confusion! 🙂

Camera Profiles

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So, today I had the day off work, and was catching up on a few things.  I read through most of my piled up photo magazines, caught up on some NAPP tutorials, and some overdue email replies to various asundry things.  One of the tutorials I watched was from Matt Kloskowski on installing camera profiles for ACR in both LR and CS3/CS4.  It’s pretty cool stuff.

Basically, Adobe has worked with various camera vendors to get the ACR to approximate the same colors that are shown in the vendor proprietary software (Digital Photo Professional for Canon and Capture NX for Nikon, and a whole host of others.)  Matt did a great job of showing how close it gets while even still in beta.  I was convinced enough to go ahead and download the plugin to use in CS3.  Fair warning though, you do need at least ACR version 4.5 or higher to use these profiles (I have 4.6 installed).  Since my bodies are Canon-specific my interface may look a little different, but thought I’d share the screenshot of what it looks like for me:

My thoughts are that the Camera Landscape beta is the closest to what DPP shows.  Since it’s all happening in camera raw, as Matt stated, it just gives you a better starting point with less editing to get to your final results.  I really can’t wait to see how this develops and moves out of beta.  Just hope that Adobe sees fit to release the final shipping version for CS3 owners as well as CS4.  What about others – has anyone else installed this?  How do your pictures look?  Are they close to your vendor software?  Feel free to jump in with the comments!

In other news for Friday, this is the last day to participate in the economy-photography poll from the sidebar.  You RSS readers – stop in and vote, we’re trying to break 30, and only have until midnight!  Other than that, it’s been a great day – I even got some cool shots of the dog after our walk with the sunlight glistening in her eyes.

I’ll leave with my favorite What the Duck of the Week.  Happy shooting and we’ll see you back here again on Monday – have a great weekend!

Thursday Thoughts v2.0

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As I jump back in the saddle of topical discussions, I am going to actually share an experience I had with the readership today.  You’ll notice the title of the post today includes a v2.0 – why is that?  Well, because there are many versions of many things out there, and as photographers one of the things that is easy to lose sight of is the versioning of our firmware.

See, cameras, like any other device in todays technologically advanced world, can have flaws that are discovered after it is released to the public.  Most of the time the bigger players like Canon and Nikon keep these to a minimum, but nevertheless, things can happen.  Here is what happened to me.

Thus far my lens collection has consisted of glass that does not have built in image stabilization(or Vibration Reduction if you are a Nikon shooter).  So, when I had a shoot for work this last Tuesday, I thought it might be a good idea to go rent some glass and give it a whirl – to see if I could benefit from it.  Well, the oddest thing happened…whenever I was using the IS lens, I would hear a funny sound in camera.  It’s very hard to describe, but when I swapped lenses out, I didn’t hear the sound anymore.  I stopped using the lens and did the rest of the evening with my kit 18-55 lens.  When I returned the lens to the rental store, the guy told me that there have been reported problems with my particular body (the 40D), and I should check my firmware.

Sure enough, the firmware was at 1.5 or something, and Canon’s website verified that a newer release had been issuedto correct this very problem.  So, I downloaded the firmware and will be updating that for a tutorial next week.  (Make sure you tune in for that, because it’s not like I’ll have a chance to practice for it, and if I mess up, that will make for a funny tutorial!)  The moral here though is that cameras need maintenance too.

As we think about our work flow, we make sure our software is up to date, our operatig system is patched and secured, and hotfixes or system updates are applied…after all, we’re talking about all our work captured and saved on those precious hard disks.

Since Adobe, Microsoft, Apple, and the rest all have ways to automate our updates, that side of things can become rather ubiquitous.  We’ve set things up, and we know it will update itself when it needs to, so we don’t even think about it anymore.  it falls off our radar.  Cameras though, do not have a way of “auto-updating”.  Thus, we can’t let things things fall off our radar.  Letting things slide like that will only result in what happened to me on Tuesday – equipment failure or problems due to lack of current firmware.

As sort of a PSA, I am including here indications of what the latest firmware is for all the EOS cameras that are active in Canon’s line.  Check your firmware in camera and if it matches, you’re good to go.  If not, follow the link to get the latest firmware direct from Canon.  Mac is listed first, Windows is listed second:

Canon 1Ds Mark III – at version 1.1.2, dated 4/30/08

Canon ID Mark III – at version 1.2.3, dated 4/30/08

Canon 5D – at version 1.1.1, dated 3/18/08

Canon 50D – brand new, no version updates available yet

Canon 40D – at version 1.0.8, dated 4/7/08

Canon 30D – at version 1.0.6, dated 3/18/08

Canon XSi – no firmware updates are available for the XSi – but software updates can be obtained too

Canon XTi – at version 1.1.1 dated 12/7/07

Canon XS – no updates are available for this camera on a current platform, but legacy WIn2K has some installers

Canon XT – at version 1.0.3, dated 12/1/07

So, there’s the complete list of all EOS cameras.  Hope you take a moment to check your firmware today.  Happy shooting and watch those apertures (and firmware).  We’ll see you back here tomorrow!

Some Friday Photos

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As promised earlier this week, I finally have some photos to share. In the middle of the drive across country from SC to CO, I stopped a few times and saw some possibilities for panorama shots. Keeping in mind a couple tips, I switched my camera from landscape mode to vertical (a.k.a. portrait) mode, and captured several scenes on my 40D. Here is the first installment of my attempts at panoramas:

So, you’ll notice that the color on these is a little off, and the exposure is a little dark. I realized that I would have issues though, if I tried to expose for such a wide scene and range of colors across the entire panorama, most especially when trying to use the Photomerge function of Photoshop. So I set my White Balance to cloudy, my exposure to one frame, and just snapped across the image.

Here’s where it gets fun…I am running CS2 on my Mac laptop which cannot read my 40D files. My CS3 was set up on my Windows desktop. The Dell only has a 2.3 Ghz Celeron processor with 1.5 GB of RAM (I never got around to adding that last 512 before the move…). Needless to say, without being set up right, I really couldn’t process 8 shots each at 10MP (that’s a grand total of 80 MP in the final pano)! Even now with the portable AC on the Dell, it was screaming along as I ran the Photomerge utility through Bridge. Once I got the photomerge done, I stamped the layers (CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+E) and converted to a smart object.

I then double-clicked the smart object to edit in it’s own window. This image file was now at 480 MB! Needless to say, I did some layer adjustments for exposure, and curves, then saved the file. I was now back in the full pano composite. I saved the full pano as a PSD file, then flattened before making some downsizing. For the curious, the full size pano is over 8000px on the long side. For the purposes of the web, I did have to downsize it a little. Clearly downsizing to allow the blog to show it would be out of the question, so here’s links to a large sized version (1600px long side), and a xl sized (3200px long side).

Large Pano

Extra-Large Pano

So, here’s the question: was it worth it? 🙂

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!