The Big Brother of f1.2

Today I added another "red ring" to my lens collection, the renowned Canon EF 85mm f1.2L II. First impression was its weight, it is surprisingly heavy and chunky for a piece of short telephoto glass. Apart from the 50mm f1.2, it has the biggest aperture of all the lenses that are currently manufactured by Canon. The depth of field is razor thin at f1.2 and focusing obviously will be the biggest challenge of using this lens.

The biggest advantage of having such a huge aperture is it's ability to send everything not in focus into beautifully diffused blur or bokeh. Of course, big aperture also comes in extremely handy in low light conditions.

However, it's not all good news unfortunately. The biggest problem which I encountered so far with this monster is serious chromatic aberration when shooting wide open. The purple/pink fringing is particular noticeable on high contrast or shiny objects. It's kind of disappointing considering I almost have to literally sell one of my kidney to buy it! The second problem is of course slightly slower AF system comparing to my other Canon lenses. It also tends to hunt a bit more whenever there is a slight light falling directly onto the lens during focusing. ...and what's with that dodgy "electronic" manual focusing ring at the front of the lens?? BUT, I am willing to overlook all these shortcomings and thorough fall in love with this piece of glass as soon as I press the shutter button and watch the background disappears into beautiful BOKEH!

Oh...did I mention I love the BOKEH?

Right to Photograph

After lunch at Mal's house, we stayed and chatted for a good few hours about various topics from photography to environmental issues :) Apparently there was a protest in Sydney yesterday about the right for photographers. Details of the protest can be found here.

How ridiculous it would be if you are required to purchase a license/permit to photograph at any of the public location/building! I know these "restrictions" mainly apply to commercial photographers but how are they going to police it? How are they going to know if I am not a commercial photographer or does it mean if someone wants to buy a right to one of my photo, it would be illegal for me to sell my work because I am not commercially motivated?

Here is a quote from the article itself:

"The Sydney Harbour Foreshore Authority requires commercial photographers to pay a minimum $150 AUD ($141 Cdn) per session if more than 10 crew are involved. That's in addition to $65 an hour for a site co-ordinator, $65 an hour for security and an additional $65 an hour for cleaning. Each of those services must be paid a minimum four hours."

Seriously, if you were going to shoot a wedding at outside of the Opera House, do you need a site co-ordinator just in case you lost your mind or a security guard just in case if you were attacked by a mad dog. And, $65 an hour for cleaning? You cannot be serious!

Stop making photographers feel like criminals!!

FlexTT5 x2

I couldn't believe how fast this shipment actually arrived from Hong Kong, thumbs up to those guys at DigitalRev, they are indeed the best in the game!

At the moment, I can't really write anything about these PocketWizards because I haven't got a chance to try them out yet. But at first glance, these are indeed serious toys (tools) that are very well constructed. I can't wait to try them out soon!

Playing with lights

I am not really a big fan of flash photography, the reason I am saying that is probably because I totally suck at it, and I am. Last night I decided to get two of my flash guns and experimented on Jin in our lounge room. The first one was placed slightly to the right about a meter behind Jin and the second one was pointed towards a wall on her left. I quite like the results :) The three shots below were taken with 3 different flash ratios. I think I am starting to like it! Time to hunt for a bunch of PocketWizards lol!

Copyright of humans

Well, this is the second day of my do-nothing week, a break from my otherwise stress ridden, life-degrading and boring work life. Well, not exactly do-nothing as such, I did go out and do some grocery shopping, mowed the lawn and cleaned up my front garden this morning before the weather got too hot. Tomorrow unfortunately need to go back to work for a few hours in the afternoon but I am really looking forward to the dinner with a few friends coming over tomorrow night.

Now where were we....oh yes, for those of you who love taking photos of people in the street, or anywhere for that matter, have you ever wonder about your rights as a photographer? Have you ever wonder your action of taking photos of people (or buildings, statues or display of arts such as the sculpture by the sea) infringes any copyrights at all?

Well, I have been asked a few times because of my itchy trigger finger and I have also been told off a few times for doing just that. Well, I have done lots of reading this afternoon and I am glad to find out it is indeed perfectly legal to photograph anyone, with or without their consent (within certain limitations of course) in Australia, under the current Australian laws. Better reading here. However, in a few countries like France, publication of unauthorized photos (including on personal blogs/websites) is strictly prohibited although candid shots in public areas are not illegal.

Photography is not (yet) a crime!

Just for fun

While waiting for the sunset, I found the shooter in front of us rather....entertaining :)

Hartland Camera Repairs

I am a person that always expect things to turn out the worse way possible, you can call me pessimistic but I think it has its advantages. Well, if things do turn out the bad way, at least I am not surprised :) Our trip to Europe was fantastic in many ways, but we also had a few hiccups along the way. My beloved camera 50D was one of them! Well, simply it just decided to pack up on my first shot in London! What could be worse? I felt like loosing my eyes!

The good news is, I returned it to Hartland Camera Repairs in Northbridge as soon as we came back and it was sent over to NSW for a warranty repair. To my surprise, I received an SMS from the Hartland Camera Repairs in about a week saying that my 50D had been repaired and was ready to be collected! What really surprises me is, there was no charge for the service, not even the postage and handling, not a cent! Well, it did state on the Canon's warranty card that Canon Australia is not responsible for any associated cost of postage and handling.

Thank you Hartland Camera Repairs! By the way, they are Nikon authorised service agent too, so you know where you should go for your next camera service! Service with a smile!

Second "L" glass

I have most of my focal range covered now that I have got my long awaited general purpose lens, the Canon EF 24-70mm f2.8L. For a while, I was torn between the 24-70 and 24-105 but at the end, I decided to go for the slightly bigger brother. This lens has been around for for sometime now and is probably one of the most used general purpose "L" glass on the market despite weighing close to 1 kg. I have never tried the 24-105 before but from what I read online, these two are fairly similar, optically however, most people agree 24-70 has the edge and also not forgetting, it's a full-stop quicker. Going down from f4 to f2.8 means doubling the amount of light hitting camera sensor at any particular shutter speed. This coupled with high ISO could mean getting sharp images of moving objects, for example humans in low light, or blurred mess/ghosts unless that's your intention :) There is another difference between the 2 though, the 24-70 is unfortunately lack of image stabilizer (IS) but I guess if there is one, it will only land bigger blow to my hip pocket lol!

I did a rough test and the images shot are very good, sharpness and contrast are definitely better compare to those of EFS 17-85mm IS. However, it still doesn't beat my favourite prime, the mighty Canon 50mm f1.4 stopping down to f2.8!

If you need more info about this marvelous lens, click here!

An afternoon stroll in Freo

Love him or hate him

I've always been a great follower of Ken Rockwell's blog and a fan of his style of writing. Personally I don't know what sort of photographer he is or how good he is, but what I do love about him is his dry sense of humour. His collection of photos in his galleries are hardly inspirational to me but again, I hate to judge a book by its cover. He is just a regular guy who loves to write stuff about himself, his life and photographic equipments, just like most of us do on our blogs, except on a much, much, much and much bigger scale. Unfortunately, I do believe he has more haters around the world then people who like him.

Tonight I came across one of his page which was written a while back and I thought it was quite interesting. Check it out here - The Seven Levels of Photographers! While I don't agree with everything he said, but he did make a few valid points though.

"Bad rich amateurs think fuzzy B/W images of poor poeple are art" - Ken Rockwell :))

If you got more free time and would like to learn more about making great photos, here is another great page - How to Make Great Photographs. I have not undertaken any photography courses in the past and I am glad Ken is able to share his experience with us and help me to be a better photographer.

White Beauty

Got this from Harvey Norman last week, a vaio P series netbook (VGN P13GHW). It was their last display model and hence, we got a fairly good discount from them. It looks like a sport car on steroid, it is "beautiful"!

Yes...look without essence some might say, well, frankly I don't give a rat about what others said. The look alone is enough to justify the premium price although it has slower atom cpu, smaller hd and running on Vista, which slows it down further :)

Well, after all I am not intend to play game on it. The main reason I bought it is to travel with it so I can have occassional internet access and a place to save all my photos, and for that, this baby fits my criteria perfectly....and it can even fit into my pocket! All I need now is some spare batteries to go with it lol!

Update 26/7/9: This amazing netbook is great for watching movies/trailers in real HD on the go (720p/1080p) provided you use the correct software and codecs. For smooth HD playback, the best software to use is the Cyerlink PowerDVD 8 or Windows Media Classic HC (open source) with PowerDVD's playback filter. Playback using WMP is choppy and virtually unwatchable. I am also able to overclock this tiny Atom Z520 using setFSB from 1.33Ghz to 1.6Ghz without any problem, although I am struggling to find any real world improvement with it :)

Backfocus...a real pain!

Back focus is when the focus point or the focal plane is behind of the focus point where you originally intended. I first noticed this issue with the Canon EF 50mm f/1.4, especially with the aperture wide open. Although taking close-up shots, it is not much of a problem but as the distance between the subject and the camera increases, the back focus problem worsens. Mucking around with the autofocus/microadjustment setting of my camera improves the situation slightly but the problem is never fully resolved. Hence, AF with the 50mm is unfortunately a hit or miss affair most of the time. With the Canon EF 70-200mm, it consistantly front-focus for some reason, luckily by adjusting the autofocus/microadjustment setting to +5, it fixed the issue all together...or as far as I can see anyway.

These shots were taken on Sunday in Perth during a lazy afternoon stroll. Despite the unpredictable weather and sporadic downpour, there were still plenty of shoppers around for the end of yet another financial year sale.

Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM

As I mentioned in my previous post, I brought this lens to Lisa & Tim's wedding for a test drive. I was very worried because firstly, this is a new lens that I have no experience using it with and secondly, Lisa slammed the title of their wedding photographer on me!

Well, I shot roughly 80% of my photos on the day with this lens and the results were stunning to say the least. It is a fairly fast lens and coupled with 2nd generation image stabilizer from Canon, it has made indoor/available light photography a breeze and a joy to use. I manage to get decent images even at shutter speed of around 1/10th of a second at 200mm and that's amazing. It definitely blew the conventional shutter speed rule of 1/focal length to pieces! The zoom ring is easy to use and very well dampened. During zooming and focusing, the length of the lens does not change, in fact, nothing physically changes outside the lens and it is also impossible to get lens creep.

There is already so much great thing being said about this lens on the net, I don't think there is anything left for me to add. There are only 2 things left on my wish list, Canon 24-70mm f/2.8L (waiting for IS version) and Canon 5D MarkIII(?) :)

Meet my new family member :)

I remember when I first bought my first digital slr, the Canon 400D back in 2006, it came with a "twin lens" kit. They were the Canon EF 18-55mm f3.5-5.6 and 70-300mm f4-5.6 and I thought they were all I need :) Was I wrong, or may be I am just getting greedier, collecting lenses are just so addictive hehe!

Today I added the 7th member to my growing family of lenses, the Canon EF 70-200mm f2.8L IS. This is an important milestone for me because I have never own any L-lens before and that also means the most expensive investment thus far. I can't really write much about this lens at the moment because I haven't got chance to use it outside yet due to the appalling weather today. However, I am going take it alone for my first mission tomorrow, a wedding to photograph! I did take a few shots indoor at home and I must say, it's money well spent! AF is fast and virtually silent and boy, this baby is sharp even at f2.8. From the few sample shots I have taken, the AF was spot on!

I was tossing between the IS and the non-IS version but I think I have made the right decision to go with the IS despite being some $700 more. Why? My left hand was starting to shake after holding the lens up shooting for less than 10mins :) The lens itself weighs a hefty 1.57kg and although it doesn't sound like much, but try to hold it up to your head with the camera attached for a few minute and you will know what I mean. All I can say is, it is a serious piece of equipment and I truely love it!

At 10mm, things starting to look rather amazing!

Actually I was more interesting in getting the Canon 70-200mm f2.8 IS but Jin was trying to convince me into buying an ultra wide-angle lens first before our Europe trip this coming Spring. After reading what Ken Rockwell has said about the Sigma 10-20mm, I was a bit skeptical at first but after handling and trying on the lens at the Cameraland, I bought it without a second thought! It was indeed a very well-built lens with decent optic and quite a lot cheaper to my original choice, the Canon 10-22mm. What's more, the lens came with a free hood and a well-padded carrying bag for starter! The lens is fairly sharp at 10mm even wide open, CA is very minimal and barrel distortion is well controlled, something that I really hate at the widest end of my Canon 17-85mm. It uses standard 77mm filter.

As for the Canon 70-200mm f2.8 IS, well that will have to wait a little longer, may be just before we go to Europe (duty-free)...just may be... :)

Noisy or Shaky

Recently, I have been told that the iso I used for some of my shots were too high. Well, unless you are a brain surgoen or a guy who sleeps with tripod/monopod, camera shakes as a result of less than ideal shooting situation is always a big hurdle, even with IS/VR activated. Without any sort of image stabilization, I would always try to shoot at shutter speed of at least 1/60, preferably 1/100 or higher to double sure that my day would not be ruined by my shaky hands. I would trade a shaky shot for a noisy one any day and the world is never perfect anyway! But that is just my opinion :)





Lately I have worked a lot with the 50mm f/1.4 and what I have found is with the aperture wide open (1.4-1.8), images produced are very soft with a fair amount of bokeh chromatic abberation. Stopping down to f/2.8 or narrower produces much better results but increases the depth of field for portaiture work. Shooting landscape with the 50mm prime presents a bigger challenge as I found out during our trip to Sydney and Melbourne. During the whole trip, I sticked to my beloved 50mm prime while Jin has the zoom lens. Using f/13 and above produces softer images somehow when viewed at 100%. But of course, these situations vary with different lenses, some expensive zoom lens I believe are pretty sharp wide open but then I will have to save more money to find that out :P

A fun evening with a bunch of old friends

After gobbled up 6 pizzas from out favourite pizza heaven, Little Ceasars in Mundaring, we went for a quick photo session around South Perth. Unfortunately, the sun has set by the time we got there and the dwindling light did not help us at all. As a result of higher iso and the use of flash, the shots turned up very grainy and some, unnaturally exposed. Shooting portait is still very new for both me and Wayne, and a lot still need to be learnt. I guess I am probably better suited for flowers and insects photography lol!

Amazing pluggin for PS

I discovered a new pluggin for PS last night while surfing through one of my flickr buddy's photostream. It is capable of creating some amazing high quality artwork from a few clicks of your mouse. Check it out if you are interested!

A Gift...

A belated happy Valentine's day everyone! These three shots basically summarized what we did yesterday :) We spent most of our evening at the King's Park, the beautiful waso (West Australian Symphony Orchestra) concert as our background music, lots of food to feast on (ahem...KFC!) and a bottle of cool classic white to keep us going, what more could we ask for? hehe!

The weather wasn't the best though with sporadic spit and threatening cloud, but at the end it turned out to be a great night.

We decided to head down to South Perth on our way back just to remind ourselves how beautiful Perth really is!

(nb last shot - f/11, 15sec, 50mm, iso250, giant wooden pole as monopod :))

Australia Day

These shots were taken from an office building overlooking the Bell Tower and the "mini" ferris wheel (bottom left). Unfortunately, because the window is heavily tinted with some kind of reflective material, I just couldn't get sufficient exposure on most of my shots. To further complicate the matter, I have office background reflections on the window :(

Well...may be will have better luck next year!
(f/10;35mm)