Photography for a beginner

[Ant]

Got the Canon EOS 1000d camera this morning and have been playing with it
Checked the shutter count and its only at 9445 so not a great deal of use over the last decade, both lenses are nice and clean, no dust of fungus or anything untoward even though it has been stored for a long time. Apparently it has been stored in the office in its bag, he'd put packets of silica gel in the bag with it which probably explains why its in such nice condition. Bit of slight wear to the grips if you go looking, but that's it.
Really nothing at all to moan at at all.

Took some shots with it to try and get my head around what the manual mode settings do when played with
These were simple and easy, wanted the shadows on the front of the parts as its backlit by the window so just turned the flash off

IMG_9440 by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

IMG_9441 by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

I quite liked the almost black and white quality because its all silver and black and chrome.

The fishtank was a harder target
Playing with iso and shutter speed to get the fish as the small wrasse flies about like a rocket. The tank is also lit with blue spectrum led lights so it looks abit wierd.
A fail, there were more deleted while dialling it in

IMG_9456 by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

Some more faffing and I got her

IMG_9457 by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

Not a very good picture, but that wasn't the point, it was actually catching her shooting around the tank and not blurred

And Clive the copperband butterfly fish

IMG_9459 by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

I'm enjoying playing with this

[pre65]

Got the Canon EOS 1000d camera this morning and have been playing with it

I'm enjoying playing with this

Nice one Ant, you are doing well.

[simon]

Digital photography is very forgiving as you can see the exposure instantly, no waiting for your photos to come back from the photolab to find you got it wrong:-).

You've probably worked it out but the trade off with higher ISO settings is more digital noise, it's kind of akin to analog film grain with higher film speeds.

Some cameras have a RAW setting - the photos are taken without any processing in the camera as I understand it, e.g. white light balance, and the the post-processing is done on a computer. I've never done this nor had the time and interest!

[pre65]

Some cameras have a RAW setting - the photos are taken without any processing in the camera as I understand it, e.g. white light balance, and the the post-processing is done on a computer. I've never done this nor had the time and interest!

I've never tried it either, for the very same reasons.

[Ant]

Yep its definitely more forgiving, it would have cost me 20 quid in film to faff in the same way with the eos1000fn or the eos50.

Ive told emma to use this one to get a feel before she starts properly with the film camera, although she knows more than i do and has done a load of research, there is no substitute for getting hands on something

[IslandPink]

Good work !
Film cameras are typically simpler to understand than digital, there are fewer options, though of course in the end both film and digital only have a limited number of variables. The main one that's extra with digital is that you can adjust the ISO on the fly depending on the subject.

I don't know off-hand what the 1000d has in terms of settings, but on the 5D Mk.2 you have colour temperature that you can adjust - this would help with the fishtank. Since it's bluer than normal light, you'd want to tell it the light is at 6000K or 7000K .

[Ant]

It doesnt have a specific colour temperature menu but it does have a load of presets, those pics were taken with it set to neutral which the manual recommends for if you prefer to play with the image in software on the computer.
I found that in the menus while faffing, i dont have the book manual with it but downloaded a pdf of it which i looked at after using it
Ill set that to standard for the next round of shots and take some comparative ones to see what the differences are.
There are a heck of a lot of settings to mess with, more than i expected there to be with it supposedly being a 'beginner' model.

I also found that it was set to the smallest file size to the arm pics are 2.5mp whereas the fish ones are set to 10mp. That was after more menu browsing

[IslandPink]

OK, well as always, the manual is good to check , although they are never much fun to read through from the start !

It's good that you did the shutter firings check, i was going to mention that. That number is very low. I don't know about yours, but the 5D shutters are reckoned to go well past 150,000. Mine only had 12000, which I was very pleased about.

For doing general processing, which would include tweaking the colour balance exactly as you want, then you should get your free download of Canon's DPP4 software ; you will just need the camera's serial number.
For this you will need to make sure the camera is recording the 'RAW' ( called .CR2 ) files when you take pics. These are the ones that can be edited to your heart's content in DPP4. Once you have that, I can dig out the list of lens codes for input ( although it might read it automatically ) because you can click a button in the DPP software and it will improve things like distortion and colour-fringing, based upon stored info for each lens.

[Ant]

Cool, thanks mark ill have a look into that
The laptop doesnt have an optical drive ( dont think i have anything with a drive now i think about it) but the unit did come with the original discs so ill have to borrow one so i can see if the discs will work with w11

Ill see about downloading their software, presumably its on the canon website?

[IslandPink]

Yes, just google DPP4 download and it should come up.

For transferring the files to a PC or laptop, Jack gave me good advice to get a card adaptor for a USB socket, that's very easy, you just take the flash or SD card out of the camera and plug it in this adaptor that in turn plugs into your computer.
Incidentally, double-check what storage card your camera has. The earlier Canon SLRs like mine use Compact Flash ( I think ? ) the newer ones, it's SD. Anyway, the adaptor should have eg. three sockets and handle all the options.

[Ant]

The eos 50e 35mm camera came yesterday, went to put some film in it and found that the shutter had black tarry stuff on the right hand side of the shutter.
Sticky shutter. Supposed to have been in full working order, firing it with the back open to watch it, its only opening intermittently and smearing the black tarry stuff when it does.

So thats going back for a refund
Shame

[IslandPink]

D'Oh !
Bad luck but there's plenty more out there.
Do you need an EOS ( ie. autofocus ) body , cos there are still good manual focus bodies and FD lenses out there ?

Edit : looks like somebody else had the same problem -
https://simonhawketts.co.uk/2016/10/07/ ... us-camera/

[Ant]

Its emma that wants the film camera, not specifically an eos, the 50 just popped up ar the right time, and the ability to interchange lenses between it and the 1000fn that daughter has was useful
Any recommendations for what to be looking would be appreciated

[Ant]

Been doing a bit of reading on the subject and came across the idea of playing with the way light interacts with subjects.
This morning it was bright and clear out so I went in the garden to have a play and try to get some interesting images

Made the sun the subject

IMG_9721 by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

Tried to get the light coming through the petals

IMG_9725 by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

And through the dead leaves

IMG_9718 by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

and making the background the focus

IMG_9713 by anthony cresswell, on Flickr

Both schoolboy level tricks, that's the level I'm at, but its pretty enjoyable to look for interesting images that are just right there in front of you
I'm also amazed that the dahlias are still out

[Mike H]