Sunday, cars and a kit lens

The so called “standard zoom” is the lens I used the least. Point of fact, I still have the original kit lens (Canon) even though, as every Internet-indoctrinated newbie photog can tell you, I’ve been thoroughly enlightened on its awfulness (we’re talking the 18-55 non-IS version here: the newer model is supposed to be better optically, aside from having image stabilization on its plus column. It doesn’t get the hate the old model does, anyway). I just don’t use it enough to make it a priority upgrade: even now, after a couple of years, a better standard zoom is probably 3 or four on my shopping list, far behind a ultra wide-angle and a couple of fast primes.

This strikes me as odd: this focal range is called “standard” for a reason, after all. And yet. Anyway, this preamble takes me to my Sunday activities, namely shooting a vintage cars showcase with my not-so-standard-for-my-habits zoom, equipped with a polarizer since it was outdoor, a very bright, very sunny outdoor. Polarizers are a wonderful thing as far as I am concerned, I use mine too much (skies too blue to be true? Yep, I’ve got plenty of those). Well, it was fun, though in retrospect I kick myself for shooting just the cars mostly. The people ogling them were interesting, too. Next year or next car show, I suppose.

This is my favorite shot of the day:

This one is a cheat: it’s twice a cheat, actually. It’s a cheat once because in the pre-processed photo the car was in focus and it’s a cheat twice because the fake bokeh effect (and the b&w with just one spot of color) were done using Picasa’s presets and not slaving hard (assuming it requires hard slaving, I didn’t try) in Photoshop or similar “serious” photo editing software. I think it looks nice, though:

This is, I think the word is curious, not the picture though, just the subject. All I have to say is, this old Jaguar came very well equipped. And I’d love to have such a cool tool box in my car (which is not a Jaguar, either old or new. Maybe that’s why it doesn’t have one):

I also shot cars in their entirety: but for some reason I always like the details better than the whole picture (pun mostly intended). Maybe that’s why the standard zoom doesn’t work as a standard for me.

Fun in the country

So I spent most of Easter day in the countryside, hunting for bugs and exploring the advantages of using a tripod. I think my favorite and I guess also the best result of the day was this butterfly, incidentally the first butterfly ever I've managed to shoot. This was handheld, with the 70-200 at 200mm, 1/1000 f5:

Then there was this tiny, tiny and frankly adorable snail, I’m guessing a very young one rather than a small kind. Not that it matters. I pp this a bit to bring out the greenness. Shot with the 60mm on the tripod, 1/25, f13:

By this point I was experiencing first hand some of the basics how-tos and books usually cover about macro photography. First of all: bugs are twitchy. They don’t especially like to have their picture taken. This is where a longer macro lens (or longer lens anyway) would be a better choice. But the only other (sort of) macro lens I own is my old Tamron 70-300 that can double as a 180-300 macro lens. It’s not really true macro and can’t compete in any way, shape or alternate reality with the sharpness and the optical quality of the Canon 60mm. So for the time being, I’ll settle to upset bugs and lose some pictures in the process. A longer macro lens to hunt insects is quite far down of my shopping list at the moment. Speaking of bugs, I have no idea what this one is, but it’s not of the twitchy variety and calmly sat on this daisy (if it’s a daisy, I’m not too clear on that), allowing me to try out different settings. First, a relative small aperture (f11 1/125):
Next, the same picture but wide open (f2.8 1/2000):

I’m not sure which one I like best. Maybe the third one I didn’t shoot, with an aperture in between these two (f5 maybe?).

Moving on: for the first time in a long time I missed the vari-angle lcd of my beloved Powershot S1. Live view surely would have helped while the cam was on the tripod but I really, really hope Canon (and the other makers too, but I shoot Canon, so that’s what I care more about) will add a vari-angle screen to its future DSLRs as well.

 

Among the reasons to use a tripod for this kind of photography that I’ve found spot-on: the ability to use the lowest ISO setting without worrying too much about blurred pictures due to slow shutter speed. Well, unless it’s really dark and/or really windy. Manual focus can really make a difference: too bad I suck at it. I blame the small viewfinder of the 350D. And my less than 20/20 eyesight. And my glasses. Plenty of scapegoats, I like it!

 

Other random observations: using a tripod can be really slow work, though it’s possible the 3way head isn’t the best for macros. The iPod Touch can be really useful to take notes. And something must really be seriously wrong with the environment because there were much fewer bugs around than I thought there would be. Maybe it’s still too early in the spring. Or maybe it’s because this time I went actively looking for them instead of trying to avoid and running from them.

What's in a tripod?

 

So today the courier came and went and left the newest addition to my gear: a Manfrotto tripod, specifically the 728b model. The model in question has just been discontinued by Manfrotto, who has launched a brand new line of lightweight, multipurpose tripods geared toward entry level dsrl users (people like me, in short).

 

Why didn't I get the newest model, then? Well, the 728b doesn't look noticeably different, same type of build, same material (aluminum), same unremovable head (it's a 3way head). It's slightly heavier (but the max load is exactly the same) but about 20 cm taller at its full height. I can comfortably place the camera to my eye-level without having to spread the tripod to its full height. Which I think should translate to better stability in those conditions.

 

Hopefully tonight the weather will be nice enough for me to start dabbling into shooting the night-sky. Rebuilding my homemade light-box for some indoor macro fun comes next.

Getting to know you...

It's now been a week since I've started using my brand new Canon 70-200 f4 (the non IS version). To be honest, I was expecting a smoother path: the first few days my keepers' rate had drastically fallen and I was beginning to fear there was actually something wrong with my copy. I'm still not convinced everything is fine, because it doesn't seem as sharp as I was expecting it to be but the last few days things have improve dramatically. As soon as I get home I plan to post a couple of test shots on PotN forum to inquire about the sharpness issue, but so far I'm tending very strongly toward user error to explain the bad results (what a surprise there, uh? ;) ).

If I should make a comparison with my old Tamron (a very unfair comparison: we're talking € 450 of price difference here) the first thing that jumps to my eyes, even in the bad pictures, is the absence of any noticeable chromatic aberration (for noticeable I mean something that's immediately evident, even when you look at the picture at 50 % of its actual resolution). The Tamron was really awful in this department and I'm very, very pleased that my days of correcting bluish edges are over. And then, there's the autofocus. Man, this thing is faaaaaaaaast. Look at the picture here: this was undoubtedly a lucky shot, but with the Tamron it would have been almost impossible to get, it would have never focused fast enough to catch it without serious blurring.

This guy in the pictures, btw, is Horacio Zeballos, a 22 year old Argentinean who's going to play the final here in Recanati at the Guzzini Challenger tomorrow afternoon. Horacio, who has gained his place in the Main Draw by winning his qualifying round, has become a bit of a fan favorite here and tomorrow he will play for the title against Slovenia's Grega Zemlja. The tournament this year had a less than stellar line-up, due to the unfortunate date that has placed it in the same week of Wimbledon's qualies. Hopefully next year, without the Olympics to wreck havoc in the ATP calendar, Recanati will be able to move to its old July date or at least away from a Grand Slam.

New gear, testing begins

Dear Blog, I finally cut out my indecision and pulled the trigger on a new acquisition for my gear. I'm now the proud owner of a brand new 70-200 f4 L. I debated long and hard whether to favor Sigma or Tamron f2.8 offerings for the same focal length and similar price.

Faster autofocus, QC, post sale assistance and, I have to be truthful, the allure of the 'L', all played their part in the final decision. Mostly autofocus and QC, since I bought it online and I didn't relish the possibility of having to send it back right away. That could still happen though, since I've barely had time to unpack it and snap a couple of shots just to see if it worked.

F2.8 would have been mighty nice, but this lens will be use 99 % of the time to shoot outdoor in bright light conditions. Hence, f4 will be enough (great to have constant aperture btw).

I'll be testing it intensely this coming week and I plan to have a blast with it. I'll still keep the Tamron (the new lens is intended as an upgrade for it) to use it whenever I want something light and cheap I don't worry about. But for the "important" stuff, like my tennis shooting obsession, the 70-200 is now my go-to-guy. I can't wait!

To buy or not to buy

Dear Blog, I'm in a bit of a quandary. Nothing remotely serious, mind you.

I was set to buy a UWA (that's ultra wide-angle for you) before the summer, eager to try out weird perspective shots and work on my landscape photography skills, which are sorely lacking. To this end I had decided to postpone the upgrade of my less-than-stellar Tamron 70-300, due also to severe indecision on what to upgrade to - I have at least 4 candidates, possibly 5. On the UWA front, things looked way easier: the Sigma 10-20 was clearly the winner in my mind: cheaper than Canon's 10-22, even cheaper considering it comes with a hood and the Canon does not, and not so distant in terms of IQ to justify the extra cash. The 12-24 from Tokina and Sigma I excluded from the start: I wanted to go wiiiiiiiiiide and those 2 mm count, especially since I'm not planning to go full-frame anytime soon. Finally, Tamron 11-18 didn't look so hot. Therefore, decision made. Right? Wrong!

While I was choosing the online retailer (I have a few favorites I always go back to, like most people I suspect), here goes Tamron announcing a 10-24 UWA that may or may not be on par or even better than the Sigma and may or may not cost less money. It's a mystery, because the lens isn't on sale yet, but it's not the good kind of mystery when you're about to fork out a nice amount of cash. It will be f3.5-f.4.5, and that is for sure better than what the wigma (its catchy nickname on english-speaking fora) has to offer.

To complicate matters even further, now Tokina is selling her new 11-16mm lens, which seems to be the new king of the hill in the UWA arena and offers a constant f2.8 aperture. Now, I may be a newbie photographer, but I can appreciate a large aperture as much as the next photography enthusiast. It's not such a big selling point if you're going to use your UWA for landscapes only, but really, if you could have it, wouldn't you want it?

So here I am, riddled with doubts once again. Although the real dilemma here is whether getting the Sigma and start having fun now or postpone my UWA purchase until the Tamron is out and there's some user feedback to go by. The Tokina appears to be a fantastic lens but 11-16 is such a small focal range that I'm afraid it will limit its use, at least for me. The 10-20 and, especially, the still up-in-the-air 10-24 from Tamron can function as walkaround lens: think a small medieval town (there's quite a few of those here in Europe, you know), with narrow streets and very little room to zoom with your feet. I don't think a 10-24 will ever leave my camera, in such a situation. I mean, on a crop-body that's the equivalent of 16-38. Plenty to work with.

I really want to see what Tamron will offer. Their 17-50 is considered one of the best lens in its focal range, the 28-70 is another very well-regarded lens of theirs and the new 70-200 f2.8 seems to be a cracker from the first reports.

So, I guess I'll be pondering this for a little while longer. In the meantime, I'll buy a real tripod. No doubts about that one, I did my research well and found a perfect solution for my needs. Amazing, uh?