85 vs 28

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85mm, in 1.3 crop mode

On our recent trip to Washington DC, I took my new D7100 (of course) and two lenses: Nikon 85mm f/1.8 and Nikon 28mm f/1.8. I have enjoyed both lenses, and decided to carry these two rather than take the Tamron 18-270 that I took on our Europe trip in 2011. There are a couple of reasons I made that decision: the primes are much better optically than the super-zoom; and during a recent portrait session the Tamron decided to not focus at all (it sounded like a gear was slipping). I’ve played with the Tamron since, and it seems to be working, but I trust it less now. While I procrastinate on sending it in for warranty repair, the two primes got to travel.

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28mm, using fake miniature enhancement in camera

One thing I noticed during our trip is that I didn’t see any other DSLR camera-owner changing lenses. And DSLRs were thick among the tourists. It occurred to me why that is: changing lenses in the middle of a crowded museum is a pain in the butt. I know. Duh. So although I liked having the improved quality of the primes, I definitely felt the inconvenience of changing lenses. In fact, on day two of our trip, I decided to leave the 85mm in the hotel room so that I could travel light: camera and lens on a black-rapid strap. No camera bag. Nothing extra.

Panda in the distance, 85mm. Not cropped.

Panda in the distance, 85mm. Not cropped.

On day three, we went to the zoo, and I knew I’d want the extra reach of the 85mm to have any hope of getting a decent picture of an animal. On day four, I carried both lenses again, but used the 28mm almost exclusively.

Even the 28mm wasn't always wide enough.

Even the 28mm wasn’t always wide enough.

Out side of the zoo trip, where the longer reach was definitely needed, I found that I really liked the wider perspective of the 28mm. For the story of our trip, and the photos I wanted to capture, context was important. And the 85mm, although great for portraits and details, doesn’t do much for context.

2011 Indy Fall Dance

Initial impressions on the Nikon D7100

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DSC_0021Although I’ve been happy with the performance of my Nikon D5000, I definitely looked forward to the release of the D7100 for a couple of reasons: more mega-pixels (primarily so that I could crop more and still have usable images), better auto-focus, dual SD card slots, flash commander in the Nikon CLS system, and better battery grip integration. I’ve made use of all of these in the couple of weeks I’ve had the camera except for the battery grip. At $270, the Nikon is a bit expensive for my taste, so I’m waiting for third-party manufacturers to produce them.

As you might guess, I used the D7100 extensively on our recent trip to Washington DC. Here are the things I learned.

  • Spot metering has gotten more accurate, almost too accurate. With my D5000, I could put a focus point on someone’s face, and the spot metering would be perfect. With the D7100, it seems I have to be careful to put the focus point in just the right place on the persons face, otherwise it might pick up too much shadow, and over-expose to much of the scene (or the converse, pick up too much light, and under expose the scene).
  • Matrix metering has been greatly improved. There may be other ways to compensate, but when presented with spot metering challenges, I quickly changed to matrix metering, and I was almost never disappointed. The only time matrix metering didn’t give me the result I wanted was when I was trying to meter for the sky near the sun, forcing the rest of the image to go dark. That kind of shot really required (as expected) spot metering. Otherwise, matrix seemed to work really well in a wide variety of situations.
  • Battery life is great if image review is turned off. 4 day trip: 880 photos (very few with flash) and a couple of minutes of video, and I still have two ticks left on the battery meter. Everything I saw indicated that battery life would be adequate, but not amazing due to the sensor density.
  • The RAW files are immense, so for vacation photos, I just shot in JPEG normal, and the auto white balance was nearly always perfect. Impressively so.
  • I’ve got the JPG output set to “standard” in terms of post-processing (rather than vivid or monochrome), and it seems to output very realistic images. In lightroom, I’m almost always adding sharpness and saturation. I may add something like that as a default input in Lightroom on import.
  • Autofocus is very good. The only shots that I discarded due to focus problems were my own mistake, not the cameras.
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Playing with the “miniature” enhancement. This is straight out of camera.

Overall, the camera behaves just like I would expect–is very fast, and makes great images.

 

Thoughts and images from DC

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[Many of these thoughts and  images are cross-posted from Facebook.]

My family and I recently took a short trip to Washington, DC, and we had a great time. It all went well, except for my son’s mild cold, and my wife’s more serious cold at the end of the trip.

DC, Day 1

(full set of pics)

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While we were on the metro, this gentleman was preaching…. um, something. The words were English, but the syntax was…. different. I asked him if I could take his picture, and his response was “if it will help you.” The situation then changed dramatically when a second odd-ball got right up in this guys face, attempting to debate him. Again, words were English. Meaning was open to interpretation.
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Seems everyone has to do something with the monument. Emily poked fun at them all with her completely wrong pose.

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And speaking of a completely wrong pose.

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This meta is so complex, I’m not quite sure how to categorize it. He’s painting a replica. She’s taking a photo, thereby creating a replica. I’m shooting them all.

DC, Day 2

(full set of pics)

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I guess there’s a special place in my heart for street musicians. They’re out there doing what they love, adding a certain bit of artistry to the air, and hoping for a bit of appreciation. Anne and I chatted with this gentleman a bit about his soprano sax. As we walked away, he started playing the opening credits/theme song for Monsters Inc.
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At the new MLK memorial (which is gorgeous and amazing), getting fauxto bombed by a park ranger.
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We wandered just a little bit through DC’s Chinatown this evening. I’m pretty sure I could spend an entire day shooting in this neighborhood. I love this shot because the roast duck seems to be fighting back to the very end.

DC, Day 3 (at the National Zoo)

(full set of pics)

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Seeing in the dark. This wolf was darned near invisible to the naked eye, adjusted to the overcast day. A little bit of spot metering, and some fast glass brought him out of the darkness (for those who care: f/2.2, ISO 800, 1/200s)

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While we’ve been in DC, the opportunities for meta-photography have been, quite literally, at every turn. To the pundits who think stand-alone cameras are dying because of the camera phone, I say “Bah”. Of the six visible cameras in this shot, only one is a cell phone.

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Because of the constant presence of people taking pictures, I had to limit myself to truly interesting meta photos. Mostly, I was trying to find multiple-meta photos–where I could frame two or more people actively using cameras. This opportunity was just too cute to pass up, since this meercat seemed to be posing for the pic.DSC_1411
As I was talking about some of the photos of the day with my wife, I realized that several of my animal pictures have a distinctly portrait-like quality. For example, I took 24 frames of this golden-lion tamarin. The ONE I pick as the best is this one, where he seems to be addressing the camera directly. With a clean background. And decent light.

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Here’s another example of an animal portrait that I made today, but didn’t realize I was doing at the time. The orangutan was sitting only inches from my daughter, seeming to present her with regurgitated food while she ate cotton candy. It really was a cute interaction. I was feverishly attempting to capture the interaction, when he turned his head just a little bit, completely changing how the light struck his face. Snap. I knew I loved it the moment I pressed the shutter release.

DC, Day 4

(full set of pics)

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I spent 0 time seeking out multi-meta photos today. Really, I was a little tired of thinking of meta-photography. It has been everywhere. But when this school group walked into the library of congress and all of them (it seemed) lifted their arms up at once to take pictures, I just couldn’t resist.

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I really had no idea what I was getting into with the library of congress. I just thought it was a fancy library. Uh, no. Our tour guide mentioned the Paris Opera house’s influence several times, with strong details from Italian renaissance architecture. It was jaw-dropping gorgeous. At. Every. Turn. This photo captures some of the elements that were everywhere. And all the paintings and sculptures had significance.

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Up these stairs, you get to see the main reading room from a distance. It is gorgeous, but no photography was allowed. Want the ultimate book-nerd tour? Get a reader identification card from the building next door (from their description, it sounds like it takes just a few minutes) then you get access to go inside the main reading room. Then you can smile at all the tourists and school children as you breath air filtered by angel wings, sit on chairs covered in unicorn fur, and leaf through Guttenberg’s mistress’ private diary, learning how he got the idea to call it a “press”. That would be way better than doing meta-photography in the atrium.

No Photography Allowed. Not Suprised.

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We recently saw the Kodo Drummers–it was a Christmas gift for the family, so we splurged on great seats. It was a wonderful performance, though the segment where they wailed on the big drum went on just a bit too long. I’m sure my perspective on the duration is tainted by the fact that the drummers were wearing sumo-wrestler style attire–call it a thick g-string–and nothing else. For American sensibilities, it was just a bit too much man-ass. Yes, I get that it is a cultural experience and all, but still.

Anyway, the attire of the drummers really isn’t the subject of this post. The subject is the common prohibition of photography. I’ve ranted about the before, and I still think event promoters are incredibly short-sighted in declaring that photography is 100% verboten. Allow me to demonstrate just how different the world is right now from what it was just a few years ago. Perhaps you’ve seen this picture:

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This is a comparison between 2005 and 2013 papal introductions, and the difference is striking. Today, EVERYONE has a camera with them, all the time. And people LOVE to take pictures of the things that are important to them, and share those pictures with everyone they know.

Clearly, this kind of scene would be distracting at a performance like the Kodo Drummers. So I’m not arguing that people should be allowed to take pictures in any way they want. I’m suggesting that rather than having an announcement (and prominent signs) saying “Photography is not allowed” and “Cameras Prohibited” (which they didn’t attempt to enforce on cell phone holders), they should say something like “There will be an opportunity to take pictures at the end of the performance. As a courtesy to the performers and other audience members, please do not take pictures until that time.” Then, during the bows and the encore, let people take pictures, encourage it, and even suggest hash-tags. Then it won’t be a big deal what kind of camera someone uses, because EVERYONE will be taking pictures.

Yes, I broke all the rules by taking the picture that leads this post. But because I was doing it surreptitiously, with my phone, I got just one or two frames, and the result is pretty crappy. On the other hand, one of my coworkers, to whom I had attempted to describe the performance before we went, told me that he really appreciated this picture because it helped him understand what I was talking about.  Considering that the theater was only about 70% capacity, wouldn’t it be a good idea to have your audience do as much marketing as possible?

But, no. The prohibitions and policies are stuck in 2005 where “camera” was understood to be a stand-alone device, and few people carried one everywhere. Today is very different, and event promoters are foolish to ignore that difference.