Focussing manually has it's advantages. First, the number of potential lenses for your body sky-rockets. There are numerous old and new extraordinary good MANUAL FOCUS lenses available for the modern DSLR. Examples are lenses by Voigtlander, Carl Zeiss, and the old Nikon (Ai-S) lenses. The problem is that most of the modern cameras lack a decent (visual) indicator for when your object is in focus. My Nikon D300 has a small indicator (a dot) in the viewfinder which notifies you when you've got focus. But when you shoot with large apertures (e.g. f/2, f/1.8, f/1.4 or f/1.2) on MF lenses you have to keep track of your composition (through the viewfinder), and watch the 'in-focus' indicator. Something I find very hard to do. I allways seem to miss at least one of them. Missing composition is easy to fix in post-processing, but fixing focus can't be done.
Thankfully, there's a solution to this problem; Katz Eye Optics. These guys offer old-skool focusing screens for the modern digital SLR's. All you have to do is replace the focusing screen with theirs. You can do this yourself, or your camera brand service-center should be able to do it for you (at additional cost). I did it myself though, and ran into a problem (of course). But more on that later...
This Wednesday, Jamiroquai played @ the sold out Ahoy in Rotterdam (Netherlands). At first it was uncertain if he could perform, since they had to cancel their german performance due to Jay Kay's flu the evening before.
After being gone for at least a decade, Skunk Anansie is back with a new album. Last week thay gave a concert in the Heineken Music Hall in Amsterdam (NL), and it felt like old times.
It wasn't a concert where they played mainly new songs from their new album Wonderlustre. They mainly played those great old songs like Hedonisme, Brazen, Every Day Hurts (Twisted), and many many more.
Skunk Anansie @ HMHThis was also the first time I could use my new Nikon P7000 at a concert. Photo's were pretty much out of the question, since we were sitting all the way at the back. That's to far. Even for the 200mm at the long end on the Nikon. So I shot several videos.
PhotoLinkerI tend to geotag most of my photos. This way I have location information with the photo for future reference. It's also a neat feature that you might exploit when creating photo albums with e.g. iPhoto. The GPS coordinates in the images creates the option to create maps in iPhoto albums.
I use geotagging in two different ways. I use the jf Geocoding plugin in Lightroom and the PhotoLinker application. Both have their (dis)advantages. Something I won't go into in this post.
Nikon Coolpix P7000Some of the readers may know that I used the Panasonic Lumix LX3 as a backup/compact camera for the times a dSLR isn't welcome (or practical). One of the places where a dSLR isn't welcome is your average (pop)concert. The Lumix LX3 was (and still is) an excellent compact camera with astonishing low-light capabilities. The only problem I had with the camera was that the zoom function only went to 60mm (35mm equivalent), and 60mm is a bit short when you're not standing directly in front of the podium....
Last night we went to a concert/CD-release of the Belgium rockband Triggerfinger. This was also the first time I brought my new Nikon P7000. The following photos and video were shot with this new Nikon Coolpix Perfomance series compact camera.
The concert was great. Great enough to get their latest CD in the lobby. I hope we're gonna hear more of them.
Soligor Extension TubesSince I have no real specialty (yet) in the field of photography I do own a macro lens (a Sigma 105mm f/2.8 EX DG). Playing around in the macro field I find that the 1:1 representation of the subject isn't always what you want. Sometimes you need, or want more magnification. There are several ways of achieving a higher magnification ratio. One of them is using so-called extension tubes.
Taken with a Lensbaby Composer and a 36mm Extension Tube
ThinkTank Photo Retrospective 30 - BlackThe ThinkTank Retrospective camera bag series is different from the other regular ThinkTank (shoulder) bags. The normal ThinkTank bags are mainly professional looking. The Retrospective line is much more casual (not as casual as the Domke bags), and it doesn't yell 'THINKTANK'.
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