Well, in keeping with the spirit of this Thirty Days project, I made pictures yesterday. Out of keeping with the spirit of things, I didn’t get a chance to post them. C’est la vie.
Chris Dunn, Erin Schwartz, about four and a quarter million other photographers, and I descended upon the True/False film festival’s “March March” parade…which takes place in February. The parade itself was not terribly productive for me–I wasn’t prepared for it. But I loved this young woman, Ali Cooper, leaning against a traffic light, waiting for the parade to come to her. The only problem is that I’m not sure which image (and which crop) I prefer. They’re subtly different. I’m happy to hear your thoughts!
Ali Cooper watches as the True/False "March March" parade makes its way down Ninth Street on Friday, Feb. 26, 2010 in Columbia, Mo. The parade had taken Cooper by surprise: "I just came out of Lakota and didn't really know what was going on," she said. | Canon 7D and 200mm f/2.8L lens; exposed 1/800 sec. @ f/2.8, ISO 200.30 Days - Day 24 - Alternate
People with advance tickets for the True/False documentary film festival enter the box office to pick up their passes on Wednesday, 24 Feb. 2010 in Columbia, Mo. In all, 2,470 passes were reserved for pick-up. | Canon 7D and 24-70mm lens @ 50mm; exposed 1/8 sec. @ f/8, ISO 400.
Who Wears the Pants in this Relationship? | Canon 7D and 70-200mm f/2.8L IS lens @ 110mm; exposed 1/60 sec. @ f/2.8, ISO 2500.
Headed back to my car tonight, I noticed two vans pull up in front of a local restaurant, Forge and Vine, and a throng of young men and women began to line up in the 26° Fahrenheit (-3.3° Celcius) weather. But while the guys were wearing dress pants and sports shirts, the young women were wearing short dresses and heels. Why does trendiness/fashion take precedence over what is practical in the dead of winter?
Leopard-skin Pillbox Hat Tights | Canon 7D and 16-35mm f/2.8L II lens @ 25mm; exposed 1/6 sec. @ f/2.8, ISO 6400
Last night I found myself playing with zoom blurs at Jakob Berr’s 29th birthday at RagTag. While most people were wearing jeans, one woman was wearing leopard print tights. I was trying to make an image with her in focus, but I did not quite make the image I want. Maybe next time.
Winter Wipers, an homage to Calin Ilea | Canon 7D and 16-35mm f/2.8L II lens @ 25mm; exposed 1/50 sec. @ f/5.6, ISO 200.
Sometimes the images that we make are not altogether our own; truly, how often can we make something that we can claim is solely derived from our own inspiration and is not, in some respect, derivative of others’ work? Another photographer in my Picture Story class, my good friend Calin Ilea, made this image a few days ago of snow-covered car windshield wiper blades. It was beautiful for its simplicity, and I wished it was mine. This is my own interpretation of a similar scene a few days later.
American Robin, Peace Park, Columbia, Mo. | Canon 7D and 300mm f/4L lens; exposed 1/200 sec. @ f/4, ISO 1600
I have owned the Canon EOS 7D for a few months now; I purchased one in November 2009. One of the concerns I had with the 7D, at least initially, was that the files simply did not seem sharp “enough” at higher ISO’s because of the noise degrading the image quality. And I do believe that, in the case of basketball arenas and other dark situations where, frankly, “exposing to the right” to get a good histogram (and a good exposure) means cranking up the ISO to 4000, the quality certainly does go down. However, that’s true even of the oft-touted Nikon D3. And I don’t necessarily give the camera its fairest chance in those situations, because I prefer to use f/4 telephotos. Why? They’re smaller, they’re lighter, and they cost less. They cost less now, and they will cost me less in the future because I won’t need an artificial shoulder or knees like some of my colleagues when we all grow older.
This past Saturday, I found myself crawling around Peace Park with the 7D and the 300 in order to make this series of a Robin spitting out a berry. One of the things that pleased me greatly was that, as the light got dimmer and I resorted to higher ISO’s, the detail was held solidly from my ISO 1600 frames. How well? Below is a 100% crop of the head and bill detail:
100% Pixel Detail. No noise reduction or sharpening applied.
Note that this is before processing the image with any noise reduction plugins, such as Noiseware or Noise Ninja. Neither has this sample been sharpened! Not bad. Not bad at all…
For outdoors use, the 7D should prove to be a very capable camera indeed.
American Robin regurgitating a berry in Peace Park, Columbia, Mo. | Canon 7D and 300mm f/4L lens mounted on Walt Anderson panning ground pod; multiple exposures @ ISO 500.
I decided to take one more crack at coming up with an entertaining series on an American Robin. On Saturday afternoon I went over to Peace Park in Columbia and set up my 7D and 300mm on my panning ground pod from Walt Anderson, another native of Southeastern Wisconsin, and made some pictures in the fading late-afternoon light.
I do feel that it is more successful than my first attempt at a series on urban wildlife, although it probably still needs something “more.” At the very least, the visual impact is more dramatic, and the light is much improved!
Missouri women’s basketball forward Jessra Johnson, left, fails to prevent Oklahoma’s center, Abi Olajuwon, from making a two point shot on Wednesday, 20 Jan. 2010 at Mizzou Arena in Columbia, Mo. Olajuwon wears the same number as her father, Hakeem “The Dream” Olajuwon, from his college career. The Tigers lost 61-62 to the Sooners. | Canon 1D IIn and 50mm f/1.4 lens; exposed 1/1250 sec. @ f/1.4, ISO 800. | Color corrected with X-Rite Color-checker Passport.
The Set-up
Last Wednesday I found myself sitting on the court at Mizzou Arena in Columbia, Mo. with two different camera bodies and three different lenses. So, what’s the problem? The 7D and the 1D Mark IIn see colors differently. Add to the equation that the glass in a lens affects the color rendered in the final photograph. For newspaper photography, usually captured in JPEG instead of RAW, this is just something you would normally “live with.”
Maybe you’d just take two identical bodies and figure no one will notice the difference once its printed on Charmin, any ways. But online, the differences can be stark. Take, for instance, this Columbia Missourian slideshow where I was using my 7D and a 1D Mark III on loan from CPS, but my colleague Chris Dunn was using an older D2Xs body at the football game between MU and Kansas State. This is an extreme example, but it is amusing to watch Kansas State’s jerseys suddenly jump from purple to blue depending on which camera was used. Hint: Nikon didn’t figure out what purple “looked” like until the D3 and D300 came out.
Les Bourgeois Winery, Rocheport, Mo. Canon 7D and 16-35mm f/2.8 L II lens @ 16mm; exposed 1/500 sec. @ f/14, ISO 400
A belated Happy Thanksgiving to American readers of this blog. Here in Columbia, Mo., the weather has been ridiculously warm, with today reaching 71 degrees Fahrenheit. The past few days have been fairly relaxing–a welcome reprieve from the rest of the semester. I have mostly been using the 7D to continue my evaluation of the body.
Of particular interest to me was the usefulness of the new built-in wireless transmitter for the Canon speedlite system, shadow noise, and live-view functionality.
Fans wave glow sticks on the balcony of the Blue Note at the start of the Bassnectar concert, fashioned to be like a rave party, on Friday, Nov. 20, 2009 in Columbia, Mo. / Canon 7D and 24-70mm f/2.8 L lens @ 24mm; exposed 1/8 sec. @ f/2.8, ISO 4000.
Last Friday I was assigned by Vox Magazine to go to a pseudo rave at a Bassnectar concert held at the Blue Note, a theater-like venue here in Columbia, Mo. I decided to pack the 1D Mark III and the new 7D, leaving my 5D II on the shelf at home. While it is a great camera in low light, I was more interested to see how the other two would perform as they are both relative “unknowns” to me. Risky? Sure. But I figured it made sense to have one pro body with me, and my own 1D IIN is terrible in poor lighting conditions. The only rule imposed on me was “no flash.” This was going to be ISO 3200+ territory.
