Tag: lens Posts

Last year I sold my Nikon DSLR and replaced it with an Olympus OM-D M5 micro four-thirds camera. While I’ve had a few of the micro four-thirds cameras, the Olympus OM-D camera was the first one where the image quality seemed on par with my DSLR, not just for outdoor photos with tons of light, but also for low-light photography as well. As a former wedding and concert photographer, it was a bit challenging to go from my Nikon and Canon gear (where most of my lenses were f/2.8 or faster) to my micro four-thirds lenses, where most zooms are f/3.5 or slower. The lack of a built-in flash on the OM-D complicates this further, since the camera doesn’t have the ability to increase the ambient light without purchasing a flash unit. For the most part I had been using my Panasonic Lumix 20mm f/1.7 lens on all my micro […]

In August I decided to finally upgrade my Olympus E-PL2 micro four thirds camera (henceforth referred to as u4/3). While that camera had served me well for a few years, there was still something that really bothered me about its performance, and that was how it handled low light. If you have no idea what a u4/3 camera is, then read on. Basically a few years ago some of the major camera manufacturers decided to come together and agree on a specification for a camera system that would have interchangeable lenses. Why this is important is that with the u4/3 system you can buy the camera body from one company and make use of a lens from another company. For anyone locked into a Nikon or a Canon system, this type of freedom will likely be a breath of fresh air. Another major benefit is that u4/3 cameras employ sensors […]

I originally wasn’t going to bring my SLR along at all on my trip, mainly because it would take up a pile of room. As the departure day loomed in front of me though, I just couldn’t bring myself to travel the world with only my point and shoot. As a compromise I decided to bring along the Canon EF 28mm f/1.8 lens, which I bought right before coming. On a 1.6x crop factor it acts more like a 44mm lens, which is close to a standard lens but slightly wider. I was hoping that would be a useful field of view for most situations. I find it a little long for walking around the city, but it’s decent enough for doing portraits (although I haven’t done any yet). I probably should have brought along a zoom, but I’ve made do with the prime so far. Anyways, here are a […]

Image from PBase.com That, my friends, is Canon’s biggest lens, the Canon EF 1200mm f/5.6L. For obvious reasons, they only make a handful of these every year. The cost? Approximately $10,000 $100,000 if I remember correctly.

Considering that my 70-200mm f/2.8L is completely hosed, and there’s absolutely nothing I can do with it, I figured I would just toss it on eBay and see if I could get like $50 from some guy that wanted to play with it or something. So, you can imagine my surprise when, after getting out of the hospital and checking my eBay page, I noticed that the sucker had sold for $260. I was completely clear in the description that the item doesn’t work, and that it would require major repair. But still, I’m completely astounded that someone would pay that much for what I perceive as basically a paper-weight. I’m gonna go around the house tomorrow and see what other broken things I can flog on eBay.

This will be a short entry, but I just wanted to say how great this place is. The people I’ve met have been super friendly, and the weather is pretty amazing. I took a pile of photos yesterday from around the pool. Unfortunately, upon waking up this morning, I’ve encountered some fairly serious camera problems. The first is that my DLSR body refuses to turn on now. It was working last night when I went to sleep, but now it just refuses to do anything. I suspect that due to the heat and humidity it’s being stubborn, but it’s not looking good right now. The other serious issue is that my 70-200mm f/2.8L is full of water vapour. I have no idea how that happened, since it was in my bag the entire day, and my bag wasn’t really near the pool. I was taking shots with the 17-40mm f/4L […]

About 18 months ago, I picked up the Canon EOS 20D to replace my dying Canon Powershot camera. Stepping up from a point and shoot to a digital SLR was a pretty big step for me at the time, since I had never even really used an SLR camera before. I made a rookie mistake when I got it, and instead of buying a nice lens to go onto it, I picked up a cheap Sigma zoom lens. I spent the first few weeks completely disappointed with my camera, thinking that my point and shoot pictures were nearly as good as the ones coming off my SLR. After reading the newsgroups, I basically figured out that I needed to ditch the cheap lens I got, and go with something a little nicer. Thankfully the store took the Sigma back, and I walked away with the Canon EOS 28-135mm IS lens. […]