Are you getting motion blur? What settings and focal length are you shooting at?

You always want ISO as low as possible. The higher the ISO, the more likely you are to get noise in your images.

You need to learn the exposure triangle . There is an abundance of information out there are the subject in books, on websites, and YouTube.

You might have issues with which auto-focus setting you are using. Have you tried back-button focusing ?

Have you previously used aperture priority or shutter priority ? Those shooting modes paired with understanding exposure compensation will be much faster than manual shooting.

Kinda sorta. F-stops are a ratio of focal length to the size of the aperture opening. The higher the f-stop, the lower the number. The lower the f-stop the higher the number.

The lower the f-stop (a higher number) the larger the depth of field will be. A larger depth of field mean more things will be in focus.

Get some books. YouTube videos tend to omit important underlying concepts. "Michael Freeman's Photo School Fundamentals" will cover what you want to know and more, but the book is rather dense. I haven't read any other books that cover what you want to know. Hopefully others will give you some book suggestions.

I'll explain my thought process when I'm shooting with it and hopefully that helps you.

ISO — I want to keep it as low as I can get away with however sensors do such a great job with noise these days especially when there's adequate light that I'd rather err on the side of using a faster shutter speed to ensure a sharper image than sailing too close to the wind at low ISO and seeing blur from subject movement or camera shake.

When shooting landscapes with a night sky I'll often crank the ISO so I can keep the exposure <20 seconds to avoid star trails. Ditto when I need more depth of field at say f/5.6 or f/8. More on this in a moment.

When shooting with flash indoors or around sunrise/sunset, I'll use ISO to balance flash with the ******t to produce a more natural looking, evenly illuminated image. If ISO is too low at say 1/50 you might get a subject that is nicely exposed but areas of the frame not illuminated by flash will be too dark so you see strong fall off, kind of like shining a light on someone in a dimly lit room. This is just something you'll have to experiment with. You dial in an exposure that might be a stop below where you want the subject exposed. Pop a nicely diffused or bounced flash on the subject and it's perfect. Happy to go into more detail on this.

Aperture/f-stop — This is primarily a decision made for depth of field and isolating a subject from a distracting background but it can also be at the ends of the spectrum for exposure, e.g. too much light or not enough.

If I'm shooting a landscape where I want everything in focus front to back then I'll stop down until it's all in focus. I only stop down as far as I need to. If it's all in focus at f/5.6 then that's as far as I go. No point unnecessarily introducing diffraction.

If I'm shooting in full sunlight outdoors without an ND filter (like sunglasses for the lens) then I'll stop down for a proper exposure. f/2.8 at 1/4000 or 1/8000 will probably be overexposed. Conversely if I'm shooting in low light without a tripod then I'll open up as wide as I can.

If I want to isolate the subject and make a distracting background disappear, I'll shoot as wide as the lens will allow. Just my 2 cents but this effect is often abused to the point where every shot has little context because the photographer wants to show off how fast the lens is and the extra FOV a larger sensor provides since it's an effect that can't be duplicated with a slower lens and smaller sensor. You see a lot of images where it's overdone. What they often fail to realize is you can often isolate a subject in a more interesting way with light than just throwing out the background.

Shutter speed — This decision is made to minimize subject movement or camera shake, working within the constraints of maximum sync speed with flash e.g. 1/250, or for a specific creative effect like shooting waterfalls, fireworks, waves, cloud movement, etc., or panning with sport/action photography.

Just my 2 cents but I'd start with Aperture Priority mode first and then make the jump to full manual. Taking advantage of Auto ISO where it's implemented properly can also make life easier. When you're interacting with a subject, trying to think several steps ahead, and remain aware of everything going on around you, you don't need to over-complicate things trying to juggle too many exposure controls because you might end up missing the shot or screwing up a lot of exposures.

No they're not. But for 9/10 they're not nearly as expensive either. The difference between Sony and the Big 2. The pro is that your camera doesn't go obsolete after just a year.

where do you brahs usually sell your old gear? CL? Ebay?

The Fuji GFX has 14 stops of dynamic range. High ISO performance is something that has greatly improved over the past 5 years.

The sync speed isn't an issue because there are third party manufactures pumping out wireless TTL & HSS enabled speedlights and strobes.

For $600-$700 you're looking at either a D7100 or D7200.

I sell my stuff on eBay or Amazon. I'm a professional seller so I am aware of all the risks and pitfalls. Selling on eBay is going to be easier than Craigslist, but the PayPal + eBay fees are going to be around 15% of the sale price. For cheap stuff, I'd rather not deal with the people on Craigslist.

For more expensive gear, the savings on fees can be worth it. In addition to that, you don't have to worry about returns, shipping damage, or a PayPal dispute. People have up to 60 days to dispute a transaction with PayPal. It'd suck if someone dropped a camera or lens and then decided to try to return it. I mean you can scroll up and see all the melted gear due to the eclipse. Though, I think the risk is low. Cell phones are a category that constantly produces problems.

Check to see how much you'll pay in fees: http://finalfeecalc.com/

POTN

If you want quick $$$ you can trade your gear into B&H too

Thanks brahs will look into it, have a Sony a6300 set up, a Canon m3 setup and a Canon 15mm Fisheye 2.8 set up I need to sell.

New portrait


Tiffany by Gary Hebding Jr. , on Flickr

I love how she's the only thing in focus in the photo. Well done.

so I've been on the fence about trying film again, and I pulled the trigger on a canon canonet 28 and fuk this thing takes some fantastic photos, I've always had huge admiration of film shots and when I saw how well this thing takes pics… boy I thought it was a digital shot for a second lol

ty!

What's everyone's thoughts on ND filters for landscapes? Circles vs squares? Ones designed for long exposures?

As with everything there are pros and cons.

Key advantages of the screw-in ND is they're compact and robust, especially the more expensive filters with a brass ring, and cheaper since you don't need a filter holder and adapter ring. The main disadvantage is without a step up ring they won't fit your lenses with smaller filter thread diameters.

Another PITA in my experience is having to unscrew it to focus, calculate exposure, etc. It's a lot easier to unclip a filter holder then clip it back on, especially in the cold.

I use the Lee filter system but I'm not going to pretend it's perfect. I've got a modified version with a couple of thumbscrews to take square 4mm glass filters which are a lot less likely to break however the main reason was for a long time Lee only offered 3 and 10 stop filters and I wanted a 6 stop. They now have one.

Downsides: it all takes up a lot more space in your bag especially if you carry them in a proper filter case. 2mm glass filters are super fragile. Leave one in your pocket when squatting down and there's a good chance the next thing you hear is the sound of glass cracking. Another disadvantage is no lens hood. With the 10 stop "Big Stopper" you need to make sure no light gets in between the filter and the holder.

Cliffs: I'm a fan of both but I like the flexibility of a holder for also using graduated NDs. I actually use a really thin screw-in B+W polarizer and then screw the adapter ring onto that. That way I can conveniently use a polarizer, ND, and graduated ND all at the same time.

https://imgur.com/gallery/F544x Enjoi

Some new stuff from over the weekend


Ferrari F12 TDF by Gary Hebding Jr. , on Flickr


Ferrari Enzo by Gary Hebding Jr. , on Flickr


LaFerrari by Gary Hebding Jr. , on Flickr

Awesome photos. Lighting setup? Do you ever do any rig shots?

Thanks! These are all in slightly harsh natural light, I cloned out the reflections and played around with the red channel in PS to bring out some detail.

I played around with a rig once, felt like it was too much work for the end result when you can get pretty similar results using a chase car or panning.

Just got the lumix G7. I also got the stunning digital photography course and Light room from tony Northrup. Lets go Champ

Haven't posted in forever, holy hell. I'll have some new stuff here soon hopefully. Been so busy with the architectural stuff I basically shoot every day before/after my FT job.

Also ordering a RRS 24L tripod this week. Ohyeah.

I like RRS but given you're doing a lot of architectural work why not get the tallest CF tripod you can afford?

For that money hands down it's the Gitzo GT3543XLS, no contest. Comes in a few bucks cheaper despite being a class above (series 3 vs. 2). RRS maxes out at a manlet sized 5'5" with no center column while the Gitzo goes to 6'6". I've got an older model and I'd be more upset if someone stole my Gitzo than one of my cameras.

Wow I thought for sure you used strobes. Great PS work. Probably tedious as hell though.

Convenience vs flexibility. But why limited to landscapes?

Thanks brah.

Well landscapes/nature stuff because that's what I intended to use them for. For video I would use screw in filters. If I wanted to overpower the sun, I'd use HSS. Maybe I'm overlooking something?

picked up another film camera the canon ae-1 and I love it so far no doubt been looking into developing my own shots at home, not too hard or expensive. hoping I can pull it off with the chemicals and such

Pretty intense sunset yesterday


Chicago sunset by Gary Hebding Jr. , on Flickr

Looks like DXO can't fap any harder for the D850. Maximum level reached.

Hey y’all, I’m in a photo contest to win a bunch of stuff from a Ferrari dealer. I’d really appreciate it if you could throw me a like here:

https://instagram.com/p/BaExsZcj129/

Will rep anyone who does!

Liked and commented. Your photo actually is the best, too.

Ty!

New blog post up:

https://www.garyhebdingjr.com/blog/2...delegance-2017

Gary, ever tried light painting?

I could see you incorporating it into your style.



Finished result at 2:30