A very quick selection of some of my favorites from yesterday, just after the 8-16mm arrived. First impressions - it's a really nice lens. I think I'm going to have fun with it.

Although it's not really relevant to the photos I've posted I have to comment on the build quality - I think it's just about the most solid lens I've ever handled. Built like a tank.

None of these shots have been cropped or corrected for distortion at all. I'm well aware of the unfortunate overexposed areas in the roundabout shot but I like the composition. A couple of other shots of the roundabout were exposed better but sadly I didn't quite nail the composition as well in those. Comments welcome!

Click on the pics for (slightly) larger versions.


1) City Chambers @ 8mm

[IMG]http://i1204.photobucket.com/albums/bb411/msitaylor/CityChambers.jpg[/IMG]



2) Edinburgh Castle @ 16mm

[IMG]http://i1204.photobucket.com/albums/bb411/msitaylor/EdinburghCastle.jpg[/IMG]



3) Fountain and Castle from Princes Street Gardens @ 11mm

[IMG]http://i1204.photobucket.com/albums/bb411/msitaylor/FountainandCastle.jpg[/IMG]



4) Roundabout in Princes Street Gardens @ 8mm

[IMG]http://i1204.photobucket.com/albums/bb411/msitaylor/Roundabout.jpg[/IMG]



5) Tree with old graffiti carved into the bark @ 8mm

[IMG]http://i1204.photobucket.com/albums/bb411/msitaylor/TreeGrafitti.jpg[/IMG]

Thanks for all the advice, it's given me a few things to think about. After all that I might have to put off the strobist gear for a while as I have the opportunity to get D FA 100mm F2.8 Macro WR for a nice price (assuming I can come up with the rest of the money by the end of next month, anyway) and I don't really want to pass it up and end up having to pay full price later! It's not a cheap lens, after all (well not to me, anyway).

The strobist gear will be next on my purchase list anyway, and it does bring up another question... Are the 'generic' type flashes mentioned above also useful for macro shots of live insects and such or is that going to really need a p-ttl capable unit like one of the Pentax or Metz flashes?

I don't know enough about flash yet to know if that's a sensible question but if taking macros of live subjects the opportunity to take test shots might be kinda limited, hence the reason I'm asking.

The DA 55-300 is a nice lens but can occasionally be quite slow to focus, especially if you are trying to hit moving targets at a distance... which is exactly what an airshow will involve. You might be better off manually focusing because it's likely that most of your targets will be close to the infinity focus position anyway so only very small adjustments would be necessary.

I'm thinking of spending some money on a starter strobist setup mostly for portraits both indoors and outdoors and the following is my basic shopping list, so far. It will be my intention to expand on it later on, of course.

1) 1 x Yongnuo YN-560 flash
2) 2 x Cactus v5 wireless transceivers
3) 1 x Battery charger and a few sets of Hybrio or Eneloop batteries
4) 1 x light stand, possibly this
5) 1 x Umbrella bracket for light stand
6) 1 x White shoot-through umbrella

Not sure what type/brand for the umbrella and bracket.

Being a complete novice at strobist photography It would be helpful to know if more experienced folks think the above is a sensible list and if there is anything I should really add to it, etc.

Also, with regards to the umbrella, how much does 'size matter' and what size would people recommend?

Finally, the only place I can find that sells the Cactus v5s is Gadget Infinity which ships from the US. Does anybody know of a UK source for these?

Thanks.

All of these projected advances will probably come to pass eventually, but there will always be somebody who needs even higher IQ for some specialised purpose. It will just be a smaller market - akin to medium format today.

I'm not sure the DOF control will be such a big issue. There is already software which makes a fair attempt at replicating the effects of a shallow DOF, and you can bet that given a few more years to develop it will get a lot better.

There may come a time when every image we take is sharp from foreground to background straight out of our (small sensor) cameras and then if we want a shallower depth of field we'll achieve it to perfection in PP with a couple of mouse clicks.

Kinda takes some of the challenge out of it, but then arguably every advancement in camera technology which makes things easier does that to some extent.

I enables the K-5 to transform into a 645D, but only when it's angry, a bit like the incredible hulk.

Unfortunately cheap commercial photo software doesn't come close to GIMP in terms of power. Unless you can afford some genuinely powerful commercial software - such as Adobe Lightroom - I'd recommend GIMP.

Rather than spending money on cheap software, I'd spend the money on a decent book to teach you how to use GIMP properly, such as this one.

It's a matter of being aware where you have saved your work, in this respect GIMP is no different from any other software. Always make sure you choose a sensible place to save rather than letting the application choose for you, regardless which application you're using. The only difference with GIMP is that the file requester - the interface you use to select where your files are saved - is a little different in appearance from standard Windows or Mac applications because it's derived from GTK which is really a Linux user interface. However, if you take a few minutes to familiarise yourself with it, it is no more difficult to use than the Windows or Mac standards. Like any decent modern file interface, it makes it fairly obvious how to find your way to any given folder in your file system.

If you have saved a file in a default location and want to find it, it's usually just a matter of going to save another file because the default location will not likely have changed. In the case of GIMP you can see clearly where it's saving as the directory path is illustrated as a series of 'bubbles' with the names of the directories in them near the top of the window. If you really can't figure it out from that, then save a file with a unique name which is unlikely to occur anywhere else such as "mysearchtest1234", and then use the operating system's file search facility to locate it. You should find any other files you saved from the same application in the same location.

Either way, you should find your saved files in a couple of minutes rather than hours.

If you don't know enough about file systems and directory structures to decide where a sensible place to save your files would be - learn. Find someone who can teach you. Seriously, it's absolutely vital for any level of computer use but the very most basic, and not knowing it will hold you back hugely if you want to do anything with a computer at all other than play games.

Well done, I think you did an admirable job especially considering it was (I assume) your first time doing a wedding!

It's not as bad as being a customer attendant. I won't highlight the letters in that one...