Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

[ash]

http://www.creativelive.com/courses/zack-arias-again

This should be a good one!

[ash]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Really good workshop this, anyone watchin it?

[ash]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Excellent show, last episode is tomorow at 6pm!
Sometimes I get the impression of talkin to myself like when trying to communicate with my wife! Guys I really dont want any praise for telling you about it, its more that you seen it and thort it was good!

[Patrick]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Excellent show, last episode is tomorow at 6pm!
Sometimes I get the impression of talkin to myself like when trying to communicate with my wife! Guys I really dont want any praise for telling you about it, its more that you seen it and thort it was good!

It holiday time Ash people are out and about, forum activity is very much reduced as I see it.

Patrick

[ash]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Yeah I reckon so too, I just wanted to spread the word and hoped some people had watched it or watching it
How you finding the 7d Patrick, Ive been having problems with my d7000 and my d90, and even thinking of jumping ship to canon
Ash.

[Patrick]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Yeah I reckon so too, I just wanted to spread the word and hoped some people had watched it or watching it
How you finding the 7d Patrick, Ive been having problems with my d7000 and my d90, and even thinking of jumping ship to canon
Ash.

[Geoff]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

How you finding the 7d Patrick, Ive been having problems with my d7000 and my d90, and even thinking of jumping ship to canon
Ash.

I agree with Patrick, it is very rare that Nikon bodies give a problem so it seems odd that you are having problems with two at the same time. What exactly are the problems?

I thought that I was going to have a problem with my D700 because I dropped it when getting off a train in Norfolk last Thursday The lens hood smashed and the LCD screen protective cover smashed but there seems to be be nothing else wrong with the camera, it is still taking pictures with no apparent problems. The blood drained from my face as I watched it bounce along the floor

Geoff.

[Patrick]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

I agree with Patrick, it is very rare that Nikon bodies give a problem so it seems odd that you are having problems with two at the same time. What exactly are the problems?

I thought that I was going to have a problem with my D700 because I dropped it when getting off a train in Norfolk last Thursday The lens hood smashed and the LCD screen protective cover smashed but there seems to be be nothing else wrong with the camera, it is still taking pictures with no apparent problems. The blood drained from my face as I watched it bounce along the floor

Geoff.

On one of our club trips to Wales one of the members fell on some steps of a derelict building, and his Canon 5D bounced down about 6 of the steps.
He was lusting after a 5DII so hoped the camera was damaged beyond repair and the insurance would pay for a replacement.

He was disappointed, it was scratched and dented by the accident but worked perfectly.

Patrick

[yoshi]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Its only 18 months since its launch and now there is talk of the 8D.
Patrick

Well, I'm surprised to hear/read this. My 7d is about 8 to 9 months old or so but somehow I took much much less than 1000 shots since then. Either I'm getting a bit lazier photographically or perhaps I use compact cameras more often these days. Probably/hopefully the latter.
Of course, I do not mean that I always want a new one. It's not very important. Before 7d, I used a 20d.

Your 7d seems to be much happier than mine as yours have much nice image tests soon after the purchase. Mine is sleeping somewhere.
Nice shots by the way.

yoshi

[ash]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Hi guy's, its a focussing problem that I first started investigating after Ian commented on one of my shots I think with the sigma 18-50 2.8, now I no this particular lens is not super sharp wide open but it really was soft and the only lens ide had on my d7000 pretty much since purchase, at f4 it was sharp and under ideal studio conditions, this made me want to try the d7000 with a lens worthy of the quality and all those megapixels, so I aquired a nikon 17-55 2.8 which is arguably the best dx lens you can get for this focal length. Guess what same thing, tried on my d90 and was alot more sharper.

I did alot, I mean alot of testing with focal charts and diferent lenses I have and was confident there was a problem that could not be fixed with the in camera fine tuning of the focus, this only made it slightly better.

The other strange thing is that this problem seems to have got worse from when new, looking back through lr3 at all the pics taken with the d7000.
Now Im not a pixel peeper and these shots look ok viewing on the monitor, but when you are using a supposedly cutting edge focussing system d7000 body with top notch glass then you want the images to exel, which they were not.

If you google focussing problem d7000, it seems Im not alone, also i have read the review's that say no there is not a problem with the focussing and its people not using the camera properly, and I also aprecieate that a large number of those people reporting a problem don't no how to use or properly test a camera, so partly i agree with these reviews, but these reviews are not realising that there could be faulty camera's from a faulty batch.

I would expect that there are alot of people with a d7000 that do not no they have a problem because they only have a kit lens with a large depth of field, it will never show up.

As for my d90 thats alot more useable, when I get the 7000 back from repair thet will be going in aswell, also google focussing d90, unfortunately there is no fine adjustment on the d90 otherwise I would probably be able to correct that myself.

I will keep you posted what happens, fixation has had the 7000 for a week upto yet and not bothered to let me no whats going on, I will ring them tommorow.

So as you can see, having doubts in a brand often leads you to look at alternatives.
As a photographer my main priority is good quality focus sharp images from my equipment.

Ohh ive just thought of one of the tests, the live view uses a different focussing system to the viewfinder system but is alot slower, if you do have doubts, set tripod up get ya subject like a wine bottle or something about 10- 15 ft away and take a shot using both systems, this was what nailed it for me, the live view was alot sharper.

cheers
Ash.

[Patrick]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Hi guy's, its a focussing problem that I first started investigating after Ian commented on one of my shots I think with the sigma 18-50 2.8, now I no this particular lens is not super sharp wide open but it really was soft and the only lens ide had on my d7000 pretty much since purchase, at f4 it was sharp and under ideal studio conditions, this made me want to try the d7000 with a lens worthy of the quality and all those megapixels, so I aquired a nikon 17-55 2.8 which is arguably the best dx lens you can get for this focal length. Guess what same thing, tried on my d90 and was alot more sharper.

I did alot, I mean alot of testing with focal charts and diferent lenses I have and was confident there was a problem that could not be fixed with the in camera fine tuning of the focus, this only made it slightly better.

The other strange thing is that this problem seems to have got worse from when new, looking back through lr3 at all the pics taken with the d7000.
Now Im not a pixel peeper and these shots look ok viewing on the monitor, but when you are using a supposedly cutting edge focussing system d7000 body with top notch glass then you want the images to exel, which they were not.

If you google focussing problem d7000, it seems Im not alone, also i have read the review's that say no there is not a problem with the focussing and its people not using the camera properly, and I also aprecieate that a large number of those people reporting a problem don't no how to use or properly test a camera, so partly i agree with these reviews, but these reviews are not realising that there could be faulty camera's from a faulty batch.

I would expect that there are alot of people with a d7000 that do not no they have a problem because they only have a kit lens with a large depth of field, it will never show up.

As for my d90 thats alot more useable, when I get the 7000 back from repair thet will be going in aswell, also google focussing d90, unfortunately there is no fine adjustment on the d90 otherwise I would probably be able to correct that myself.

I will keep you posted what happens, fixation has had the 7000 for a week upto yet and not bothered to let me no whats going on, I will ring them tommorow.

So as you can see, having doubts in a brand often leads you to look at alternatives.
As a photographer my main priority is good quality focus sharp images from my equipment.

Ohh ive just thought of one of the tests, the live view uses a different focussing system to the viewfinder system but is alot slower, if you do have doubts, set tripod up get ya subject like a wine bottle or something about 10- 15 ft away and take a shot using both systems, this was what nailed it for me, the live view was alot sharper.

cheers
Ash.

Hi Ash

Does live view support AF on your camera if not and live view is sharper than regular AF then it says to me it could be a AF problem.

I have finished micro focus profiles for all my lenses on the 7D, two were all but spot on, three small adjustments made,counting my 70-200 f2.8 as two lenses as I did it with & without 1x4 adapter. The 150-500 proved the weakest in so much as up to 400mm it preformes very well and is very sharp, at 500 less so.

What lens chart did you use to micro focus profile your lenses, and what technique? I started with a home made device, you may have seen my post about it, but soon realised that just a target chart pined to the wall worked very well exposing -5 through to +5 making 11 test shots comparing and settling on the best. If further improvement looked possible -5 or +5 I would have made further shots starting at -5 or +5 whichever end. The 150-500 with it f5 through f6.2 proved the most difficult to judge along with the 10-20 f4 (very sharp anyway), The 150-500 was improved but still slightly soft at 500mm the rest of my lenses are f2.8, all as sharp as you could wish and all Sigma.

Was your method the same or similar to mine? Interested to know.
I trust when the camera is returned all is well.
A thought perhaps you are the victim of a poor example of a lens or camera or both.
Do you know another Nikon owner to run further test shots with your lenses, all avenues should be explored.

Patrick

[ash]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Hi Patrick the d7000 does af in live view but uses a contrast detection auto focus, this was absolutely tack sharp but is slow in operation.
Ive attached the chart I used.

Fingers crossed I should have the camera back tommorow, the important thing is that fixation has rung me this morning and confirmed there was a serious back focus problem which could not be corrected by the fine in camera af adjustment. Yipeee
And they said its been done under warrenty, yipeee again
If you remember I got the camera from camerabox, so really it should have gone back to them to sort out.
Ive also been talking direct to nikon about the problem and I told them it was at fixation for repair. They have obviously agreed the repair under warrenty with fixation.
Just show's dealing with the organ grinder is better than dealing with camerabox

[Patrick]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Hi Patrick the d7000 does af in live view but uses a contrast detection auto focus, this was absolutely tack sharp but is slow in operation.
Ive attached the chart I used.

Fingers crossed I should have the camera back tommorow, the important thing is that fixation has rung me this morning and confirmed there was a serious back focus problem which could not be corrected by the fine in camera af adjustment. Yipeee
And they said its been done under warrenty, yipeee again
If you remember I got the camera from camerabox, so really it should have gone back to them to sort out.
Ive also been talking direct to nikon about the problem and I told them it was at fixation for repair. They have obviously agreed the repair under warrenty with fixation.
Just show's dealing with the organ grinder is better than dealing with camerabox

[Ian]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Hi Patrick the d7000 does af in live view but uses a contrast detection auto focus, this was absolutely tack sharp but is slow in operation.
Ive attached the chart I used.

Fingers crossed I should have the camera back tommorow, the important thing is that fixation has rung me this morning and confirmed there was a serious back focus problem which could not be corrected by the fine in camera af adjustment. Yipeee
And they said its been done under warrenty, yipeee again
If you remember I got the camera from camerabox, so really it should have gone back to them to sort out.
Ive also been talking direct to nikon about the problem and I told them it was at fixation for repair. They have obviously agreed the repair under warrenty with fixation.
Just show's dealing with the organ grinder is better than dealing with camerabox

The D7000 has user-AF calibration, (sorry if already answered) - have you tried this?

Ian

[Patrick]

Re: Zack Arias Photographer Workshop - Free 6pm Tonight

Hi Ash

That looks a very much better chart than I used, where did it come from.

Patrick

Its OK Ash I have found it.

Patrick