One of my favourite photographers, Jamie McGuiness from Project Himalaya has a Canon 5D permanently attached to his hand.

How fast is the auto cleaning system of the Canon 1000D

Anyone check out the Olympus E-P1? I think it really shot itself to the top of the heap, although the lack of a built in optical view finder might be a bit painful in typical bright mountain conditions, even with the add on viewfinder it is probably easier to carry that most SLRs in the mountains.

Looks very interesting but expensive. I cant wait to see one in the flesh so to speak.

Wastral wrote:
[quote]Personally, I print VERY LARGE. Have Multiple 2x4 foot pictures or larger at home. All of them are stitched images. When stitching one can get away with "lower class gear." I find that most mountain pictures require the images to be stitched. I suppose if you took a Maimya P65 back producing 65Mpixel images, one would not have to do that. Sorry, I don't have $50,000 for a camera and a prime lense. Neither does anyone else judging by how many are selling...

Just came across your post. Could you elaborate on which stitching software & techniques you use ? I tried to read up on it, but this is a very confusing area. Thanks.

Diego Sahagún wrote:How fast is the auto cleaning system of the Canon 1000D

Well

I have been to the store and talked to the salesperson, and from what I have heard, auto-cleaning really isn't all that great, and not completely 100% effective. It certainly would not be a buying point for me, as I don't mind using a rocket blower maybe once every two weeks.

Just came across your post. Could you elaborate on which stitching software & techniques you use ? I tried to read up on it, but this is a very confusing area. Thanks.[/quote]

PtGui from ptgui.com

Why I like it. It allows one to put your own control points in it when using in the advanced mode. Thus, panoramas that have foreground which one took hand held have a chance of coming out. Autosticher cannot do this as far as I know. Someone will correct me on this I am sure.

Techniques:
Must have a manual camera. Turn Auto White balance OFF(AE LOCK button is turned on), TURN auto focus OFF. Many small cameras do not have the option of turning the auto focus off, so must be very patient and make sure it has locked focus. If you don't have this option, one cannot reliably get a panorama with foreground to come out properly.

When focusing with a camera that cannot have its auto focus turned off, one must choose 1 spot where you will point said camera at before every picture when wanting to take a panorama stitcher. This is done via the half press, wait till it focus's then move camera to the spot where you want said picture in the panorama. Next picture you point at your focus spot, half press till focus is locked and swing .... etc

Practice near home first with your camera. Many new pocket cameras come with a built in Panorama mode which uses AE Lock, and will show lines on the screen.

If using a tripod, the ultimate scenario, one must find the neutral point of the camera for all, or a few, focal lengths of the lense on your neutral positioning plate. It requires making a plate with different setting to adjust the camera to with regards to where the camera pivots on its axis in comparison to the tripod. Every camera/lense combo is different, thus you have to set it up yourself by using the convergence principle when pointing at a blank wall with a couple of lines on it. I personally don't do this, as I use hand held almost exclusively since mountain photography doesn't generally have foreground that close that needs to be pin tack sharp. I also generally don't do 360 degree spherical stitchers which for sure need this option.

I do not have the latest version of PtGui, but supposedly the latest version will do HDR automatically. Don't know exactly what alogorithim it uses for Tone mapping though. It has serveral tone mapping options I think. It does the HDR by using ones RAW files and pulls up to +2 -2 stops difference from the RAW images. It will also do it via Jpegs as I read it from their site.

Personally HDR in the mountains is what is needed due to super bright snow/sky and super dark rock. That is if you want detail in your image instead of a washout, or a dark blob. Got many of those pics already thank you very much!

Brian
PS look at panorama forums for tips etc on ptgui and ... there are a few other sites when you google it.

I recently purchased a Nikon dslr and am looking into software for processing RAW files and cataloging the raw and jpeg/tiff files generated. I plan to try out those that offer a demo option however as I am new to the field I'd like to get the opinions of those that have already tried out the major ones (Photoshop, Aperture, Lightroom, GIMP etc.).
I am familiar with basic photographic principles, am relatively tech savvy and am using a macbook (3 GB memory dedicated to Mac OS/1 GB to virtual PC). I've been using iPhoto for photos generated using my P&S and like the cataloging simplicity and integration with other Apple products. iPhoto recognizes the NEF files from my new dslr, allows basic editing (really slow) and saves edits as either jpegs (default) or tiffs (user selectable).
Beyond these fundamental abilities what do other softwares offer that you use on a regular basis. Do you use one program for edits and another for cataloging? Are other programs quicker or is that really a limitation of my computer? What attributes do you find most useful?
Thanx

A bit off topic, but I really like my Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX3. It's very light and does a good job on landscape pics. Also has video, which I will probably use more in the future. I also have a D200. I took that up Shasta, which was a bit of a pain. The LX3 fits in a pocket and takes nice pictures. The next camera I'm looking for is a full sized chip small camera. I don't think the DP1/DP2 (I think I have the models correct - not sure) are there yet...too slow.

Also, my LX3 has been to ~6000 meters.

All the (30 or so) pics I've put up on SP were shot with the LX3:

http://www.summitpost.org/object_list.p ... r_id=43931

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0807/08072 ... niclx3.asp

I think the only way I would bring a DLSR up a mountain again is if someone paid me.

ajdonner wrote:I recently purchased a Nikon dslr and am looking into software for processing RAW files and cataloging the raw and jpeg/tiff files generated. I plan to try out those that offer a demo option however as I am new to the field I'd like to get the opinions of those that have already tried out the major ones (Photoshop, Aperture, Lightroom, GIMP etc.).
I am familiar with basic photographic principles, am relatively tech savvy and am using a macbook (3 GB memory dedicated to Mac OS/1 GB to virtual PC). I've been using iPhoto for photos generated using my P&S and like the cataloging simplicity and integration with other Apple products. iPhoto recognizes the NEF files from my new dslr, allows basic editing (really slow) and saves edits as either jpegs (default) or tiffs (user selectable).
Beyond these fundamental abilities what do other softwares offer that you use on a regular basis. Do you use one program for edits and another for cataloging? Are other programs quicker or is that really a limitation of my computer? What attributes do you find most useful?
Thanx

Hi, I'm using Lightroom and I have Aperture as well. Aperture does not work with my LX3. I do like Lightroom though. It is straight forward and has some nice features. These programs will not do heavy editing though. I would like to have Photoshop but don't really need it at this point. My guess is that you will fall into the same category and could get by with Lightroom. If you try it, check out the videos of how to use it, they are pretty good.

Best,

AB

I have both Lightroom and Aperture and find both to be useful.

Ordering books through Aperture is awesome! I just put together a book from a South America trip and it turned out great. I also like Aperture's clone feature far better than Lightroom's. I have a few other small gripes about Lightroom, but it is $100 less than Aperture.

With either program Photoshop is still useful for some advanced techniques.

Franky wrote:Anyone check out the Olympus E-P1? I think it really shot itself to the top of the heap, although the lack of a built in optical view finder might be a bit painful in typical bright mountain conditions, even with the add on viewfinder it is probably easier to carry that most SLRs in the mountains.

I bought the EP1 for a trip up Mount Abbot this August and it's really an amazing little camera. I didn't have any issues with the LCD and brightness, I could generally see it just fine and since many times I'll do final composition (cropping) in PS, I was less concerned about getting it just right. It is a bit heavy for it's size. It's 335g, body only. But if you're someone who is used to bringing an SLR with you then it'll feel like a load has been lifted. I really like just leaving the 17mm lens on for most of my shots.
There's a great review of it here:
http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/EP1/EP1A.HTM

Overall I'm really happy with the images and it's performance - the jpegs it takes are some of the best I've seen. I've just started to use it's RAW settings but the problem I have is that Photoshop CS3 doesn't support .ORF files. I haven't found an update that will work and you have to get CS4. More of a problem I have with Adobe - but that's another story.

The Panasonic GF1 is out now and it's a bit lighter at 285g. Also well worth a look.

Is that 8Gb card compatible with Konika-Minolta Maxxum 5D

http://www.sandisk.com/about-sandisk/me ... flash-card

If SanDisk Ultra II CompactFlash 8GB is compatible with Konika-Minolta Maxxum (Dynax) 5D. Is SanDisk Ultra CompactFlash 8GB compatible with Konika-Minolta as well

We've already bought it and I'd like to know it before opening the case