ISO50

Remember its the guy behind the camera that takes the pictures, not the camera :)

Well for an entry level dSLR, I think the D80 beats Canon’s offerings hands down IMO (having owned both D80 and 400D). The saturation is a lot more natural, quality of build is better, it has a built in remote flash trigger, and uses a lamp for assissted focussing rather than firing the on-board flash like Canon’s entry level offerings.

The focussing problem you have is maybe due to the lens more than anything else – I just got my first prime lens (50mm 1.8) ad it’s quick as you like! Proper tasty bokeh too. Yum.

Still, I think all of those fatures would start to pale when you bring the 5D’s full frame sensor into the offering. And like Hampus says…

PS. Been enjoying your shots & the PP work on them. Have a go on Lightroom’s split-toning for mass cross-processed stylee.

Thanks for posting this :-D

I own a D80 as well. The AF does tend to be slow, but that depends heavily on the lens you’re using; my ($220) 50 f/1.4 focuses horribly in comparison to my (sadly $1,700) 17-35 f/2.8, owing to the use of an internal focusing mechanism in the latter. I think going for pro lenses is a far more compelling (and, unfortunately, money-sucking) option on Nikon since their lower-grade stuff isn’t really so hot.

What I find more frustrating, though, is the build quality… the D80 has been on the market longer than all of Nikon’s other in-production DSLRs, and it shows. Buttons and switches feel markedly less comfortable and natural than even the D40.

As for post-production, I use Lightroom exclusively at this point; Photoshop is an afterthought. I strongly second the other commenters that you check it out. I tend to step up the contrast and saturation a bit in most of my shots, and then increase the blacks and highlights to get the kind of tonality I want. Very similar to the p’shop color balance dialog, but seems to be more intelligently tuned to most situations I find myself in.

Sorry to hear about the troubles with the D80. I hate to mention it but today is PMA 08 and there’s very good chance that Nikon will be announcing a successor to the D80. Pentax announced their new bodies today and the specs on the K20D are very impressive. With my new set of unique-to-Pentax pancake lenses (not mine), it’s going to be a great year for street photography.

Agree w/ nickd: pick up Lightroom for 99% of your photo management. It has terrific cataloging and tagging features plus all the histogram and photo-editing controls you need. The one caveat is that it doesn’t do any local editing, ie. tweaking portions of an image. However, it hooks into Photoshop seamlessly so you can quickly move back and forth as needed.

I also recommend shooting in RAW. You get a lot of control over white balance which can be especially helpful for correcting odd lighting shots. Not sure about Nikon but with RAW on Pentax, you get extra dynamic range due to 12-bit RAW vs 8-bit JPEG. If you do heavy post-processing, that can be extremely helpful.

I started using Raw when I found out that those can be opened as ‘smart objects’ in PS.
I never thought about it too deep, but it gives me the feeling I have even more control.
That way I can always go back to the Raw file and tweek it.

A 1 GB card only costs you like 2 Scandinavian Hamburgers you know :-)
I always have a couple of them on me when I’m shooting.

Scott, it might be silly but I’m really looking out for your Dutch Cloud photo’s.
I’m a fan of skies and clouds, but a particular kind of cloud.
Next time you spend time in Holland, take the time and go to one of the islands and/or the province ‘Friesland’.
It’s flat, empty and basically a horizon and enormous clouds with, sometimes, a tree or a cow somewhere down the line.
Hard to describe (as it goes with images) but you might just have a more fun time there then in Amsterdam (which is kind of a tourist attraction)

I personally use a Canon EOS 350D with three lenses.

The camera it’s self isn’t that fantastic. Auto-focus is fine in the day but in low light is hopeless. The view finder compared to old film cameras is tiny and has no focusing tools. Hmmmm, it’s pretty noisy too. Also there is no control over the flash’s brightness so I try my hardest to avoid using it completely. I’ll go buy a wireless flash unit for it sometime.

Mostly I’m in love with my Sigma 10-20mm lens. It nearly cost as much as the camera it’s self but it’s absolutely amazing… I’ve found it immensely useful while skiing as the extreme wide angle helps me to get people in show while I’m skiing at high speeds backwards and not looking down the view finder. It’s also been fantastic indoors or in crampt spaces. It has some problems of course… It’s not so great when people are on the edge of the photo because they streeeetch and it’s so fat it blocks the flash a tiny bit. I also have a Canon 18-55mm that I want to replace. It’s the cheapest lens Canon makes and they bundled it with the camera. Finally, I have a compact 55-200mm Sigma telescopic lens that works pretty well.

I’ve noticed how much you use colour balance and that you favour greens and reds. I myself have to restrain myself from making images with too much cyan and blue on the shadows with orangey highlights hehe. I just tell people who try I shouldn’t post process where to stuff it. Especially when the dynamic range of dSLRs is SO poor.

It’s the difference between http://www.flickr.com/photos/jump_leads/2216987619/
and
http://www.cubeupload.com/files/15696evt196b.jpg

I tend to stick to using RAW now. Especially as I just picked up another 2GB sandisk ultra memory card for £12 ($24 or so). My 2GB sandisk extreme (useful for sequential shots) cost me something like £70 when i got it a couple years ago lol.

In my opinion… At low level, the Nikon cameras are better… Once you break over a certain cash level, the Canons seem to be superior. I’m also interested in the 5D.

Scott, thank you for posting this (especially while on the road) – very good insight into your creative process.

I’ll add my hat into the Lightroom ring. I rarely use photoshop now for color processing, only for clone/heal operations, and specific graphical elements. I shoot with a Canon 30D & 28-135mm lens, and again the posts above mention the advantages of RAW, I couldn’t agree more. With a larger capacity CF card, space is no concern, and creative process is endless. Too bad all the good stuff costs more, eh?

Thanks for sharing.
Peace.

Scott, thanks for posting this. Very generous of you to share with us all your tips and processes.

C

Like the Photos

I was thinking of the Canon 5D myself but after playing with the D40 and D80 they have a few benefits.

Good to know about PMA, I’ll keep an eye on that. As a longtime Nikon user it will be sad to swtich over to Canon just because of the 5D, hopefully Nikon will pull a prosumer SLR with a fullframe digital sensor & what ever magic tricks Canon included to get those amazing low light shots – out of the hat!

these are splendid!

I use both canon and nikon all the time, and it is true that Canons AF system is beyond better than what Nikon has to offer, especially in the lower end SLR’s. I’ve had my hopes up for a 5d replacement for a while, since I am really looking to go back to full frame on my digital setups. The Canon 40d takes some really amazing photographs though, the digic update to the image processing really makes that camera rock. I’d still prefer the full frame 5d just for being able to shoot truly wide without special setups, and hopefully the replacement will be what I’m truly looking for (weather sealed).

i’ve had the same experience with the d70, which is otherwise a great camera, but it kinda sucks when you’re at a party or walking down the street and you hold the shutter down only to have it do a little focus freakout dance and then not actually do anything or focus on the wall behind your friend’s head.

sadly, i’ve recounted this to other people only to have them tell me that i’m daft, but i think it’s a problem that only manifests itself if you are taking many impromptu or spontaneous shots.

also, love lightroom, but it seems to suffer like other programs when the catalog grows too big, but i guess that’s life for you. also, after using film cameras for long enough, nikon dslrs feel normal and canon dslrs feel strange… i know that’s not a really good description, but they just feel off…

Comparing a consumer grade nikon with a professional grade canon doesn’t really work as a thing. I take perfect photos with my Nikon D200, it’s even discontinued. Yet, somehow I still manage to take better photos than most people owning 5D’s…

Lenses and skill are what make a photo great not how much you push into buying a camera. Personally I’d rather stuff the same amount of money at Nikon for a better camera than I would to Canon (considering their products aren’t even better but still higher priced) and go for a low/mid level Pro camera from Nikon instead of a consumer one and save my money for something useful like good lenses instead of wasting it on a Canon. I hear people bitch a lot about consumer cameras, personally I wouldn’t own one if you paid me but you get what you pay for I suppose. Just my 2 cents. :)