photography explored
RSS Feed
Get the most recent posts sent to you directly by subscribing to the RSS feeds!
Subscribe to the RSS! Subscribe via email

Archive for June, 2007

Jun 14 2007 Minimize the costs of a smash: a skylight or UV filter are an essential part of your lenses

Your lenses, through use, are constantly subjected to dust, scratches, humidity and so forth. Adding another layer of glass can protect your front element to a huge extent.

If you drop your lens, having a UV filter or skylight attached can mean the difference from spending another $15 on a new filter or anything from a couple hundred dollars to a couple thousand on a new lens. Is this enough to convince you?


If not I can give you my example. Some years ago, still with my film Pentax, I was just walking around the city as I sometimes like to do. My camera was hanging from my shoulder (something that I never did again) and, when climbing some stairs, to let someone pass, I stepped to the side. Result… camera hits rail, and all my blood evaporated at the sound of braking glass. I was too afraid to even look at my lens and seeing little pieces of glass on the floor didn’t help. But ok, damage had to be reviewed and I was already thinking about the price of a new lens. Fortunately the pieces of glass came from my skylight and the front element of the lens was not even slightly scratched. Having that skylight there probably saved me about $300. Even if the lens glass had not break for sure would have been scratched rendering it useless. Two lessons in it for me: carrying the camera hanging from the shoulder is dangerous and a skylight or other inexpensive glass means a huge level of protection.

Of course there are those who think that adding a $15 glass to the front of a $1000 lens can only mean a decrease in quality. My only answer is, a scratch or a broken lens definitely lowers the quality of any photo you try to make. If you are so concerned, just remove the filter before any important photo.

I have one UV filter for each lens I carry and they all live happily together.

And you? What lives at the front of your lenses?

comments (4)
-->
Jun 7 2007 Remus answers to “What photography is/means to you”

comments (5)
-->
Jun 6 2007 Upload your photos to Flickr with Adobe Lightroom

comments (7)
-->
Jun 4 2007 “In compact cameras, I think that the megapixel race is pretty much over”

Even C. Westfall, director of media for Canon’s camera marketing group had this to say about it: “In compact cameras, I think that the megapixel race is pretty much over, (…) Seven- and eight-megapixel cameras seem to be more than adequate. We can easily go up to a 13-by-19 print and see very, very clear detail.”

He was right on the printing part, but nothing else. Since the dawn of digital photography, the consumer has been given the idea that the megapixel numbers of a camera is it’s more important feature, the highest the better.

This trend slowed down when the 6-8 Megapixel limit was reached and camera manufacturers had to compete outside of Megapixel numbers and started actually investing more in other features to pack their cameras with, like battery life and bigger LCDs.

But now still, the magical number for the average consumer is still the MP. Would an upgrade from 300 to 350 shots per charge make you buy the new model? Probably not, but if the MP number goes up by 2 or 3…

So Mr. Westfall, the megapixel race is healthy and better than ever… You missed by a mile on that one. If not, let’s see just two small examples:

If this is not a race, then I have no idea what a race is.

What are your thoughts on it?
Are megapixels still the most important factor for a consumer when choosing a compact digital camera?
And in the future, will the megapixel race still go on?

comments (6)
-->
Jun 2 2007 Web Shutter: 02.06.2007

Add comment
-->