The main reason for wanting to sync at a higher speed is when you are using fill-in flash when there is plenty of ambient light, which necessitates a highish shutter speed.

As Pentaxian says, in this case you need to reduce the ambient light, and light the picture with one or more flashguns. The effective shutter speed will then be the duration of the flash, not the actual shutter speed.

Turn the ISO down as low as it will go.

G

I don't think these were intended as works of art. Just a bit of fun. Furthermore, I prefer the expression on Sue's face in the second photo. She looks happy to me, not drunk.

I suspect that English isn't your first language, Gareth, (you don't seem to know what "blunt" means) so I hope you won't mind me pointing out that "would of" is not a tense. "Would have" is what you were after.

G

I am coming late to this, but it's worth remembering that John Riley learnt his trade with transparency film, which is totally unforgiving.

If you are able to expose every shot perfectly, then the main advantage of RAW (the ability to correct exposure errors) flies out of the window.

I use RAW because I am not quite so proficient.

G

If you are close up with a focal length of 135mm you will have a very tight portrait indeed. 1 metre is more than close enough for a 135mm lens.

I second the suggestion of the 75-150mm lens, which is lovely for portraits.

However, my definition of a portrait is a head and shoulders (or just head) shot of one person.

Some people like to include 20 people and the kitchen sink. If you are one of those, you would be better off looking at a much wider lens. Or standing outside the window.

G

For a zoom lens, the hood only works properly at the widest angle. At other focal lengths it is not as tight. I just use whatever hood I have to hand that doesn't cause vignetting on 70mm.

Super lens, BTW.

RobbieC,

Quite right. An image that has the same number of pixels as your screen, or fewer, does not need to be scaled in order to fit, and the difference, whilst small, is observable. Which is what you would expect, really.

Thanks, Wasleys. Quite right that he is hung up on early Mac displays.

And I have changed the pics to 72, but I just don't like being told nonsense. So I thought I would double-check.

The point is that you can change the PPI when printing anyway, and indeed have to if you are going to get the size you need.

Sorry, John, it's not that PPI.

But thank you for confirming my understanding.

Somebody has asked me to produce some work for him (for the web), and amongst other things has specified that each image should be given a PPI of 72. In vain I have tried to tell him that PPI has no effect on screen display, and is merely a way of specifying print size.

He believes that monitors display images at 72ppi, which is nonsense in itself, but he read it on the internet, so knows he is right.

Sadly, I have looked in vain for a simple, straightforward explanation on the internet, and every one I have seen is either wrong, confusing or massively over-complicated.

In a way, that proves that the whole thing can be ignored. When printing, it's just a matter of specifying the output size. There is no need to bring PPI into it.

Hello, all. Long time, no see.

I am having a debate with somebody about PPI. I maintain it has no relevance to anything, and can be completely ignored except for over-riding it (if necessary) when printing. In other words, you should decide how big the print should be, not the PPI parameter that happens to be attached to the image.

But of course, I might be missing something. Please shed some light on the issue for me.

G

Normally, a company runs out of cash, and the bank pulls the plug.

This almost happened to Jessops a year or two back, but the chaps in charge at the time talked the bank into buying most of the shares.

So this time, the bank was actually the biggest shareholder, and prior to the closure had been trying everything to make it work or to sell it.

As they had failed to do either, there was never any prospect that some of the stores might be saved.

Jessops used to be a decent company, but after the family sold out in 1996 it started to lose its way. Some years back it sacked most of the people who knew anything, and replaced them with smart-alecks who didn't know an F-stop from a Full-stop and were only there for the commission.

Then came the internet, camera-phones, and the recession. Amazingly, they kept opening stores when anybody with an ounce of sense would have consolidated into a small number of large, well-stocked places that people would be happy to travel to.

And so they are gone. Looking for a silver lining, it is possible to hope that this will give a shot in the arm to those specialist stores that still soldier on, like SRS and Park.

G