[trammway]

Originally Posted by govigov

If you are solely looking for good out of focus areas, have a look at the canon 85mm F1.2 L II USM.

I have 85mm f/1.2 L II ism with me, I will have to dig deeper on Rokinon details I guess.

[nilanjanray]

Originally Posted by phamilyman

So I have a VERY stupid lazybones question.

I have finally gotten around to processing my Spain 2012 photos and I have realized (yet again!!) that i HATE pp, but that this damned 500D needs PP for the photos to look clean and punchy (or maybe i have bad shooting skills and higher standards).

Either ways, with a 400mm purchase looming, I'm thinking of getting myself a second body. Now I am even willing to wait a while (say an year) and just buy a good body - this can even mean a 7D successor or suchlike, but I basically dont mind the DSLR heft, I just want something that takes pretty damn neat (almost Nikon like) punchy images out of the box!

What canon body would that be?

Canon supposedly takes 'better/ more punchy' JPEGs straight out of the camera compared to Nikons. Nikon default settings result in flat images. But with all cameras you can tweak default settings to suit your taste. In Nikon there is something called Nikon Picture Control where you can tweak the settings. Why don't you play around with equivalent settings in Canon?

Newer bodies e.g. a 70D will have better high ISO capabilities and better AF. Default settings/ SOTC output might be similar especially in decent light.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by phamilyman

I have finally gotten around to processing my Spain 2012 photos and I have realized (yet again!!) that i HATE pp, but that this damned 500D needs PP for the photos to look clean and punchy (or maybe i have bad shooting skills and higher standards).

Do you export jpg out of the camera? If not, I would say shoot RAW and convert to jpg only through Canon's DPP software after PP in there. If you use Lightroom / Aperture, then convert RAW to TIFF via DPP and take that TIFF into LR/Aperture. I use 550D and am perfectly happy with the camera (Pretty close to 500D).

Instead of a second body I would say invest in some good L-Series glass. A 70-200 F4IS would be ideal. 500/550D in my opinion should be good enough. Its only beyond ISO 400 that they show issues. Else for outdoors I would say its perfect.

[Lalvaz]

Originally Posted by ampere

Do you export jpg out of the camera? If not, I would say shoot RAW and convert to jpg only through Canon's DPP software after PP in there. If you use Lightroom / Aperture, then convert RAW to TIFF via DPP and take that TIFF into LR/Aperture. I use 550D and am perfectly happy with the camera

I'm curious about this, what advantage would there be if one exports to Canon's DPP and then to LR/PS?

I usually shoot in jpeg directly and then directly export to LR. Ofcourse in a serious shoot, I use RAW, but again have never used DPP. Any major benefit in increasing the number of steps?

[ampere]

Originally Posted by Lalvaz

I'm curious about this, what advantage would there be if one exports to Canon's DPP and then to LR/PS?

I usually shoot in jpeg directly and then directly export to LR. Ofcourse in a serious shoot, I use RAW, but again have never used DPP. Any major benefit in increasing the number of steps?

If you shoot JPG, you are using Camera's capabilities for image conversion. You lose details and hence PP scope reduces. Thats given and we are all aware.

When you shoot RAW and take that RAW directly into LR, you are using LR's RAW interpretation capability. And thats the main aspect, which would set the colour render etc. And when it comes to RAW processing, its best to use Native S/W. Hence I suggested use of DPP. And on top if you use LR, convert RAW -> TIFF -> LR -> PP -> JPG gives you all the advantages.

I use Aperture. First I used to read RAW directly onto Aperture. Later I switched to the other mode and could immediately see the difference. In fact the colour rendering is so good, my PP steps came down drastically.

[Lalvaz]

Originally Posted by ampere

When you shoot RAW and take that RAW directly into LR, you are using LR's RAW interpretation capability. And thats the main aspect, which would set the colour render etc. And when it comes to RAW processing, its best to use Native S/W. Hence I suggested use of DPP. And on top if you use LR, convert RAW -> TIFF -> LR -> PP -> JPG gives you all the advantages.

I use Aperture. First I used to read RAW directly onto Aperture. Later I switched to the other mode and could immediately see the difference. In fact the colour rendering is so good, my PP steps came down drastically.

Interesting, I did not know this. Will try it out for sure, although its just so much easier to keep shooting in jpeg for normal sightseeing photography.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by Lalvaz

Interesting, I did not know this. Will try it out for sure, although its just so much easier to keep shooting in jpeg for normal sightseeing photography.

Thats very true. Also note, when you convert RAW to TIFF, file size bloats-up by 5X. A 20MB RAW file becomes 100MB TIFF!

So what I do is, parse all the snaps in DPP, see which is needed to be converted and convert them selectively through a batch process.

[nilanjanray]

Originally Posted by ampere

If you shoot JPG, you are using Camera's capabilities for image conversion. You lose details and hence PP scope reduces. Thats given and we are all aware.

When you shoot RAW and take that RAW directly into LR, you are using LR's RAW interpretation capability. And thats the main aspect, which would set the colour render etc. And when it comes to RAW processing, its best to use Native S/W. Hence I suggested use of DPP. And on top if you use LR, convert RAW -> TIFF -> LR -> PP -> JPG gives you all the advantages.

I use Aperture. First I used to read RAW directly onto Aperture. Later I switched to the other mode and could immediately see the difference. In fact the colour rendering is so good, my PP steps came down drastically.

LR5 is supposed to be pretty accurate for RAW conversion. Still, I prefer proprietary Nikon SW for NEF conversion to TIFF. Only times I shoot JPEG nowadays is when I need a big buffer. PP requires some (time, effort) investment in learning. I never believed in it before 2013 but it makes a big difference.

[tsk1979]

Originally Posted by trammway

I have 85mm f/1.2 L II ism with me, I will have to dig deeper on Rokinon details I guess.

Rokinon mostly runs rings around Canikon lenses. Takes a nap as it waits for them to catchup. And then again runs rings.
Seriously, I wonder what kind of magical forge they run to create such amazing lenses for this amazing price!

[ampere]

Originally Posted by nilanjanray

PP requires some (time, effort) investment in learning. I never believed in it before 2013 but it makes a big difference.

Only comment which I keep harping on, and which one extremely gifted snapper friend mentioned: With PP we cannot make a bad photo look good but surely a good photo can be made to look better!

Yes PP does make a lot of difference. The only point I would say is to keep a clean work flow and one which does not hinder with the back-up system.

Never tried LR. So no idea about it's RAW capabilities.

[sukiwa]

Originally Posted by ampere

Do you export jpg out of the camera? If not, I would say shoot RAW and convert to jpg only through Canon's DPP software after PP in there. If you use Lightroom / Aperture, then convert RAW to TIFF via DPP and take that TIFF into LR/Aperture.

Originally Posted by ampere

I use Aperture. First I used to read RAW directly onto Aperture. Later I switched to the other mode and could immediately see the difference. In fact the colour rendering is so good, my PP steps came down drastically.

This workflow makes sense as Aperture gets used. Do you retain/backup both RAW & TIFF OR discard one of those files?

Does Aperture have 'camera calibration' similar to LR - Develop module?

If one is looking to have exact colours similar to one seen on camera LCD backpanel, then camera calibration can be utilised in LR. By default, LR uses 'Adobe standard' for all images. This needs to be changed to specific camera profile (standard, portrait, landscape et al) in order to get matching colours with camera LCD panel. This need not be true colour though, monitor colour calibration has bigger role for true colour representation.

Originally Posted by nilanjanray

LR5 is supposed to be pretty accurate for RAW conversion.

Agree.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by sukiwa

This workflow makes sense as Aperture gets used. Do you retain/backup both RAW & TIFF OR discard one of those files?

Does Aperture have 'camera calibration' similar to LR - Develop module?

I use all correction in DPP and then move on to Aperture via TIFF.

I hold the TIFF for some time and then delete it. RAW is what I always store. TIFF is 5X the size of RAW. Does not make sense to store it.

[anujmishra]

Have any of you used LightZone open source PP software? What is your feedback on same?

I use this software to enhance my photos and it is available at http://lightzoneproject.org/

DpReview site highly recommends it. http://www.dpreview.com/articles/563...e-photo-editor

It could be nice alternative for Adobe LightRoom.

[nilanjanray]

Saw this interesting post from Thom Hogan. Nikon is gaining market share in the Japanese market. So Jedis are slowly defeating the Siths at least in the parent market.

Sony, Ricoh/Pentax have single digit market shares. One reason to stay away from then - ecosystem investment will always lag behind Canikon.

The Pentax K-3 has very nice specs though. If it had been a Nikon body (with similar AF performance), I would have traded in my D7100.

Mirrorless is still lagging bigtime behind DSLRs - have approximate 20% share of the interchangeable lens camera market. Lots of hype, not translating into marketshare. Performance not commensurate with (high) price. Size the only redeeming factor.

Detailed post here:
http://www.dslrbodies.com/newsviews/...se-market.html

P.S. Am now waiting for the D4S specs to be released, so that I can fantasize (and sigh).

[anujmishra]

Originally Posted by anujmishra

After much deliberation and researching over 2 months I am going to purchase Sigma 70 200 F2.8 EX DG Macro HSM II. ...

Plan was changed and instead of Sigma 70-200 F2.8 EX DG Macro HSM II lens, I bought OS version and more latest Sigma 70-200 F2.8 APO EX DG OS HSM. Yesterday, they delivered at home and took few testing shots at home only. It came out really good. Focus is really fast and in low light OS works excellently.
This lens packs lots of excitement and lots of experiments need to carry out. Looking forward for some free time to experiment with this lens.