I was in Inverness for a day or two, got family up there, but back in Falkirk now. No snow here either !!! Taking my daughter and a few of her friends shopping in Edinburgh tomorrow, really looking forward to that, - NOT . There may be some snow on top of the Scott Monument, so better take the camera.

Daniel, I won't be in Inverness for a few weeks. I'm going to Orkney on the 19th Feb for a week, there's a camera shop, I think in Finstown? may have a quick look. Still fancy that 105 though
I am quite happy with most of my lens collection, but the 100mm Takumar M42 macro needs an update, and all the reviews of the 105 are in the 4-5 star bracket, one review I saw even said it was 'too' sharp ????

Forgot to mention, nice pics Daniel.
I'm still looking for that Sigma 105 you use with devastating effect.
Can't find a decent 2nd-hand version, so might try SRS for a NEW one. Chris is it, at SRS?

I'll give it a go, could one of you guys or gals send me a 'penny' ?

I'll re-phrase that, could you ALL send me a 'penny'


Happy to keep up the Scottish myths . . . . . . .

I agree with 'johnriley', you can get good results with the 18-55mm, and if I couldn't get sharp results in jpeg mode, the camera would be on ebay tomorrow.

You can get good landscapes with the 18-55m, the 16-45mm will get you a little bit wider, and you can go to extremes with the 10-17mm lens, where you have to lean forward to take a picture, or your feet will be in frame, you will also get the fish-eye distortion.

There is the 12-24mm wide angle lens, that is corrected for the distortion, and from what I hear from other users on this forum, it is a top-notch performer.


Re. the pictures, the top one is not balanced, it seems to have something missing from the top left hand corner and the horizon is sloping a bit, the second one is a little 'busy' and needs a person in a red jumper running through it. The 3rd and 4th pictures are a lot better, with the 4th one being the best. I think I would have exposed for the highlights, so that the trees were a bit more in silhouette and some of the detail in the houses could be lost.

Here is one I took in Shetland on Thursday, I exposed for the sky so that the detail of the house and land would be lost,




Well, you did ask for opinions, but as I am partial to Jack Daniels and like The Simpsons, my opinions may be distorted

Mr. Ist said, " Whats the best way to take a photo of flames that has impact? "

Get a Viking in the picture !




Sorry about that, just a wee joke.

I was lucky enough to be in Shetland this week for work and managed to take in the Up-Helly-Aa fire festival. I initially tried using the flash, with a slow shutter speed, hoping to freeze the 'vikings' and capture the flames of the torches, but I had problems because there was so much smoke about, that the flash was reflected off the smoke and made things look very murky. I ended up using a 50mm 1:1.4 lens, settting between f1.4- f2.8 @ ISO3200, with no flash. The resulting pictures are quite 'grainy' and exposed for the faces, so the flames are over exposed. I'll put a few more on my web page over the weekend and post a link when they are up.

This is a picture I took at last years Up-Helly-Aa festival, using flash to freeze the people, but with a slow shutter speed to get the flames from the torches. This seems to show the flames a bit better.



[/quote]

Aperture states support for the Pentax D, DL and DS, not the K series. Apple recommends a 'high-end' computer spec, loads of RAM and a decent graphics card for Aperture to run. But there is a 30 day free trial, so you can download it for a try-out.

Thanks for the comments.

I printed out a few copies for my sister and the "Grandparents', there seems to a bottle of 'medicinal' Highland Malt, heading my way

Took a few pictures of my sister's kids for her over Christmas, just got round to sorting them out.

Thought this one came out quite well, added a frame in Adobe Elements, what do you think ?

*istDS 1/60th @ f4.5 - 18-55mm kit lens, set at 40mm, AF500FTZ bounced off the wall behind and to the right.

Rain- sucks !!!
And Ft. William has one of the highest rainfalls in Britain, next time I venture there, I'll need web-feet !!!