Cannon 50D for shooting windsurfing.

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Bluedog76

249 posts

Bluedog76

249 posts

19 Oct 2009 8:13pm

I've seen that a few people are interested in photography on these forums.

My wife has been getting right into photography over the last year and has come a fair way. I have found this to be a win-win situation as I get to go windsurfing while she takes photos and our little guy plays on the beach....plus I get to look at photos of myself windsurfing and find out all the things I am doing wrong.

Anyway, she got a cannon 50D camera with an L series lens (70-200mm I think) which has turned out to be really good. I can check my downhaul setting from 50m away and she has had about 8 photos in the Mackay paper over the last month, now she just has to start making some money from it to pay for it..........I just see a new board when I look at the camera/lens. Any tips would for money making would be much appreciated. Also for a shameless plug but also for people who want to see images from this camera have a look at www.rebeccasavill.com. Some windsurfing shots will be up soon.

Gestalt

QLD

14969 posts

Gestalt

QLD, 14969 posts

19 Oct 2009 10:21pm

that photo is all wrong. i don't want to sound like i know it all but you just shouldn't do it that way.

everyone knows that fanatic and north go together and JP and neil pryde work also.

there are some fantastic shots on her website. very nice stuff.

jeez i wish i had some l series lenses, you should definately get some more kit as a reward for your suuport.

Bluedog76

249 posts

Bluedog76

249 posts

19 Oct 2009 8:23pm

There is a 26cm JP freestyle fin in that fanatic as well (which I can read in most of the photos).........just to mix it up a bit more.

Need 4.7m weather to drop down to a north ice and look conected!

I think the photos are pretty good for someone self taught over a year (photos, processing and home printing). Any tips, critque of photos etc would be most useful.

aus301

QLD

2039 posts

aus301

QLD, 2039 posts

20 Oct 2009 12:02am

Pump the saturation.

Have a read of www.kenrockwell.com he has some great tips on settings to use to get great images straight from a canon with little need to spend hours post processing.

Gestalt

QLD

14969 posts

Gestalt

QLD, 14969 posts

20 Oct 2009 12:06am

it's very difficult to provide worthwhile feedback. the main problem is that everyones monitors are different.

if my monitor was caliberated i would be a little more confident to make comment. unfortunately i think my monitor is a little on the bright side. well when compared with my work monitor. so i can't really know whether the exposure is over or under (in my opinion) for the image.

to be constructive though one thing i have learnt from other people on this forum is try not to over process. for the image above, i think over sharpening has occurred.

what software is your wife using? is she shooting in raw or jpeg? maybe post a run down of the camera settings via exif info.

i've really tried to focus on what different settings achieve under different lighting conditions. people on this forum and at the local beach have also given me a huge step up. if you do a search on seabreeze there might be some nuggets in previous posts. more recently i've started shooting in full manual mode. have found although more difficult it's returning better results. have not tried full manual with windsurfing yet though.

to be honest, i find windsurfing photography challenging and enjoy it for that.

you have constantly changing lighting, a moving target, 20+ knots to brace against and knob head kiters getting their pupet strings in your frame all of the time.

Haircut

QLD

6491 posts

Haircut

QLD, 6491 posts

20 Oct 2009 1:31am

50d is a god awful camera for windsurfing

noice....looks like wello water

Haircut

QLD

6491 posts

Haircut

QLD, 6491 posts

20 Oct 2009 1:39am

i got a 50d too. not sure if you are aware of this, but if u shoot raw and at higher ISO's, use canon's DPP to convert the file to tiff 16bit before editing in your favourite image editing program and you'll get noticeably less noisy results. seems to be only a problem with the 50d as the raw converters like photoshop, lightroom etc don't support the conversion as well as DPP. Never had the same problem with 30d, 40d or 5d mk2

Gestalt

QLD

14969 posts

Gestalt

QLD, 14969 posts

20 Oct 2009 1:51am

i love my 40d

Haircut

QLD

6491 posts

Haircut

QLD, 6491 posts

20 Oct 2009 1:57am

heya Laurie - it's unfortunate seabreeze isn't a little more photo friendly - hint, hint

evlPanda

NSW

9207 posts

evlPanda

NSW, 9207 posts

20 Oct 2009 11:44am

aus301 said...

Pump the saturation.

Have a read of www.kenrockwell.com he has some great tips on settings to use to get great images straight from a canon with little need to spend hours post processing.

The more I read Ken the more I think he is actually bat**** insane.

Yeah, more saturation/colour depth. Is it perhaps from some too high ISO levels on some of the photos?

Inspiration: news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/8314105.stm

Gestalt

QLD

14969 posts

Gestalt

QLD, 14969 posts

20 Oct 2009 1:07pm

yeah, i'm wondering abut the rockwell stuff also.

evlPanda said...

aus301

QLD

2039 posts

aus301

QLD, 2039 posts

20 Oct 2009 2:19pm

I will agree that you have to take some of what he says with a grain of salt. I don't prescribe to all of it, but some of the gear setup advice he gives is great.

He is also against gear freaking on camera gear, which I like. A good photographer (which I will say I am not) will get great results from almost any DSLR on the market today.

whitecaps

VIC

313 posts

whitecaps

VIC, 313 posts

22 Oct 2009 11:32am

I have just purchased 50D and loving it although I have noticed with the L series 100-400 lens some vignetting.

Rebecca's other work is simply stunning and I suggest she can make money from other forms of photography and just enjoy the challenge of photographing windsurfers. I have been in business (windsurf & Kite) for 18months and the industry in Oz is too small to make a living out of, altough there are opportunities to make a buck here or there (most with local sailors wanting souvenier of epic session).

Agree with Aus301 it really isnt the camera that produces good photos it is how you use it, your composition and processing.

Here, here Gestalt - "to be honest, i find windsurfing photography challenging and enjoy it for that. you have constantly changing lighting, a moving target, 20+ knots to brace against and knob head kiters getting their pupet strings in your frame all of the time". We're just suckers for punishment. p.s. go you on manual mode!

Anyhoo Bluedog, Rebecca is free to contact me direct ([email protected]) for more discussion, happy to help :)

Jodi
www.whitecapsphotography.com

Bluedog76

249 posts

Bluedog76

249 posts

22 Oct 2009 7:21pm

Hi,

I'm Bluedog's wife Rebecca. He told me he posted some info about my photos here and told me to have a look. Thanks very much for all the feedback.

I am most interested in the artistic side of photography but I'm having a ball shooting various sporting events and I've found it's a fantastic way to learn. I have no plans to shoot windsurfing professionally - it's more a case of my husband wanting heaps of photos so he can look at himself all day. :D I agree with everyone who talked about the challenge involved though, it is so much fun.

Your comments so far have been spot on, especially about the ISO. I've been pushing it up to get faster shutter speeds and I guess I've found the limit now. Thanks Haircut for the DPP tip - noise reduction works much better than in Photoshop. Gestalt - I'm working through brightness and calibration issues too and I can't afford hardware yet. I recently halved my monitor brightness and it has really helped so far. I will also watch the sharpening - I find I'm reprocessing my best photos (from RAW) every few months as my skills improve and each time I'm using a lighter touch.

Thanks for your comments Jodi - I will definitely be in touch. Greg's been showing me your work for a while. :)

BTW The water actually was a murky kind of yellow and the sky was hazy - I haven't had a day on the water without those conditions since I bought my camera (same week as the dust storms). :(

And finally, my sincere apologies for any future photos of Bluedog that will undoubtedly appear on this forum.

Rebecca

Haircut

QLD

6491 posts

Haircut

QLD, 6491 posts

22 Oct 2009 10:50pm

u r welcome

it's not the noise reduction feature i was referring to, it was just that the dpp program does a much better job of the raw conversion, while the other apps produce clumps of noise. i don't know why it makes such a big difference for the 50d and not as significant for the other canon cams?

evlPanda

NSW

9207 posts

evlPanda

NSW, 9207 posts

23 Oct 2009 11:46am

Bluedog76 said...
Your comments so far have been spot on, especially about the ISO.

Has anyone noticed the new ISO wars (that replace the MegaPixel wars)? I'm reading this year's batch of dSLRs see in the dark better than us. There were some excellent examples of a movie made with one of the Canons, in the dark (almost). Been taken down now : (

www.gizmodo.com.au/2009/10/nikon-d3s-dslr-has-night-vision-with-102400-iso-yes-you-read-that-right/

PS - I'm still considering a Lomo.

Bluedog76

249 posts

Bluedog76

249 posts

23 Oct 2009 5:33pm

Thanks for all the responses and tips.

I think you are right Jodie, the windsurfing photos will be for fun....mainly mine I think.

There are a couple of opportunities in other sports, for example calenders for the local sailing club etc....Rebecca has just become the publicity officier for them and will hopefully pic up some good contacts in the Mackay region.

She has just started a masters in photography through the uni of Tasmania so it will be interesting to see what pictures come out over the next year. She is working an angle on tropical beaches, capturing what they look like the other 99% of the time outside of the picture perfect postcard in artistic sort of ways.......

Anyway, i am glad she apologised as I plan to put up more pictures in the future!!

whitecaps

VIC

313 posts

whitecaps

VIC, 313 posts

26 Oct 2009 11:06am

Hey Rebecca,

Have heard good money in sailing! Will be interested in how Masters go and will be keeping an eye on your website for more stunning images.

Re: ISO - oddly enough I have to pump it higher than I ever have before on the 50D. Hmmmm.

Gestalt

QLD

14969 posts

Gestalt

QLD, 14969 posts

26 Oct 2009 1:31pm

what iso are we talking here.

on the 40D i set it at iso 400 with polarizer and Aperture priority, gives me 800-1200 shutter.

without polarizer and i get 1200-2000 shutter.

evlPanda

NSW

9207 posts

evlPanda

NSW, 9207 posts

27 Oct 2009 5:44pm

Gestalt said...

yeah, i'm wondering abut the rockwell stuff also.

evlPanda said...

Case in point:
kenrockwell.com/nikon/13mm.htm

Haircut

QLD

6491 posts

Haircut

QLD, 6491 posts

28 Oct 2009 12:54am

seems 90% of worlds photographers think he's a total twat, but he has got some great looking photos

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