General Music Chat

I bought a Nikon D5200 24 megapixel DSLR along with a Nikkor 1:2.8-5.6 18 - 140 telephoto lens and a 50mm 1:1.8 lens.

I took some pics going down the highway at 70mph and they were as sharp as the fall pics that I took when we got out of the car. This thing takes pictures so sharp that the subject looks like it was cut and pasted onto a backdrop. AMAZING. I took some pics of hummingbird moths that go from flower to flower so fast that you can hardly point the camera at them. The few times I hit the target, the moth was frozen in mid air looking as sharp as if I had taken a macro shot of it standing still.

The last previous camera I owned was a 35mm film Canon EOS Elan with a couple of expensive lenses. When I took 14 years of my best negatives to have them enlarged to 8 X 12's, they scratched every negative of my best shots. So badly that they were then unusable. I truly wanted to kill the careless incompetent bastard that did the enlarging. I was so angry that I put my camera away and did not take it out of the closet again until the other day, just to give it a glance. It still had a partially exposed roll of film in it.

Now that I am free again, from the incompetents that lurk within the photo shops I believe I can get back into photography again! Buffoon free photography! What a thrill.

I guess my guitar will have some competition now.

I just want a simple camera so I can do some photos without always having to borrow my wife's.

Good luck and enjoy !

Im looking to buy a new Camcorder. I have an old camcorder that uses 8MM tape. It still works but is getting gray hairs LOL. I've been looking at a SONY,not too expensive, cpl hundred dollars...

George,

I just want a simple camera so I can do some photos without always having to borrow my wife's.

My daughter bought a D3100 but she wanted a pocket camera to carry with her. After a lot of research she found an Olympus Stylus. (I think that is it.... I can't read her printing} it was about $199 on the internet. It takes great videos HD 1080p and from the reviews it takes great still pics. The specs are really good and so are the reviews from both reviewers and users.
I may even get one myself at that price.

Thanks . . . if I ever get to go back to work . . . I'll look into to it.

George

Here is the link it is the SZ 16

http://www.dpreview.com/news/2013/01/08 ... m-compacts

Impressive list of features for the price.

Thanks for the heads up !

Congrats on the new camera, hope you enjoy it.


I've been a huge Pentax fan for 30 years, their K1000 was my first 35mm, went through a KX, a ME or two, a couple of ME Supers and a A 3000, now using a 16 megapixel K30, great camera. I get plenty sharp pictures, just not that many that are really good ones. And plenty more out of focus, since I still use my old manual focus lenses from 35mm days. That's one of the nicest things about Pentax, they didn't change their bayonet mount when they went into digital like everyone else did, no adapters needed, plug and play...

I have a 7.2 megapixel Samsung that's done a great job for me over the past few years, for a compact, but their newer 12MP version I had for a while was not very good. I guess you have to watch what model you get...don't know much about any of the other compacts, but if I ever get the money for it, I'd like to get another decent compact.

I guess the main thing I like about digital is I can experiment. No more worrying about how much it will cost for developing...doesn't cost much to delete a bad picture...

I don't use zooms any more at all, I found primes, lenses that do only one focal length, almost always get better results.

I had a bad time with developing in Louisiana, the local Walgreens was the only place available for 30 miles, and their machine was leaving a white vertical stripe down the left side if every picture. Not in the negatives, so it was definitely the machine. 6 weeks after talking to the manager, who promised me it would be fixed...same thing...so now I have a dozen rolls taken with my Pentax ME and a Minolta SRT101 that are all unusable...I made them give me the last roll free, since the salesperson told me the machine was fixed...

Here's a decent sample of what the Pentax can do. And this is just decent, not one of the really good ones...



Maybe this is a little better...both with very old lenses.



You mentioned taking a shot out the window...my sister took this one of the Louisiana state Capitol building while going over the Mississippi River bridge at about 60. I set it to infinity focus, told her to just point and shoot...had to do some minor editing, it was tilted, and a very minor increase in contrast, that's all. Other than cropping it for what I wanted...



That was taken with the earlier K-x digital SLR. Taking good shots out the window can be done, but I usually advise against it...keep your eyes on the road and hand someone else the camera...yeah I've done it, and at night in town...just to get the moving lights effect, but I didn't have to look through the camera. (very bad idea) Just set it on the dash and click away...

Oh yeah I forgot...

George - What's this "if I ever get to go back to work" thing????

Paleopete,

Some of the best pics that I ever took was with a small 35mm Pentax with a fixed 50mm lens. When I bought my Canon Elan I sold it to a friend. She broke it in short order and then turned around and bought a foreign made version of the 1,000. I do not remember the model of the one that I sold to her, but after taking so very many rolls of film through the $$$$$$$ Elan, I wished I had never sold the Pentax. I believe it had three LEDs for for instrumentation and that was about it. Great cameras.

Even with a camera that has an IQ like Albert Einstein I can still manage to get an out of focus pic once in a while. But that is only because I am doing something with it that wasn't intended.

By the way, very nice pics that you posted.

Of course he could get some pictures of your willie - if he had a magnifying lens and he could talk you into letting go of it for 5 seconds. But that would just be child porn wouldn't it?

Get real Jimmy, he needs a microscope to see it..

He and his girlfriend the moth..next week it will be a fly. lol

Guys, guys...

Stop feeding the troll...

Slacker - Camera with 3 led's could be a couple of them, the only ones I'm really familiar with are the ME and ME super, which I think have more than 3, and the MV I think it was, pretty neat little camera. Interchangeable lens SLR but fully auto exposure. All you do is set the aperture you want and focus. Next best thing to an instamatic, if you don't know a lot about photography.

I manage to get out of focus shots all the time, but I use all manual focus. From what I've been reading though, auto focus does not have a great reputation either. The only one I've uised is the "kit" lens that came with my K-x and K30, not exactly a great lens, but does get some decent shots now and then. I normally use my trusty vintage manuals...

That K30 is a monster camera. You can take some great pictures with it. I'd like to own one. I also looked up the Nikon D600 the other day. The pro reviewer said it was one of the very best he had ever held in his hands. Not so good video, but it has a full frame 24 megapixel CCD. The diff in the 24 megapixel CCD that mine has and that one is that the pixels are spaced further apart allowing more detail. He said he could just spend hours blowing up the pics and looking at the definition in the pixels. He even said that it has an analog look to it like 35mm film. It is heavy and it is expensive, but it is a killer camera. Nice to dream about owning the mega dollar stuff, isn't it?

Oh yeah I forgot...

George - What's this "if I ever get to go back to work" thing????

I semi retired back in November last year to assist with family while the wife travels with her job.
Then my Mother fell and broke her leg, I was available to assist her and my Father. ( both in their 80's ) In the hospital and in the transition from the nursing home to home independent again.
Then my son dang near near blew his hand off. Spent weeks doing twice or more a day wound care on him.
Now, my wife and I have been given temporary custody of two of our grandchildren. As my wife travels working out of town, I cannot be obligated to a 12 hour shift and or also be out of town working as one of us must be available at all times. I have looked for some local employment, but most people are unwilling to hire an RN for a position as they know I could easily triple what they can offer in wages.
It's understandable, it cost money to hire and train people so retention is always a concern.

There are some blessings to being a "kept man" so it's not all bad.
Financial challenges exist, but I get to spend a lot of time in our studio.