Any photographers in the house?

Used is tough, my only experiences have been eBay and craigslist, and fortunately for me they were pleasant experiences. I have bought refurb from BH and it was great as well, but not sure how it works out for you overseas.

I've bought from ebay before but understand your reluctance. Might be more hit and miss.

Are there any local photography clubs you could hit up? In my area that seems to be a good place option to find a recommendation or where to look if someone there doesn't have it themselves.

Craigslist is a good shout. I'll have a look for local clubs, though I might be hunting after something too specific to have much luck!

I've also responded to a post on DPreview's trading board (how antiquated are those?!), which just happens to be a UK-based poster, so that's a possibility.

Thanks guys. If I still can't find one, I might try and find an adapter and a standard SLR UWA.

B & H Photo have used items on their site. I'd trust them more than the Joe Blow selling their stuff online.
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/browse...

I finally got around to picking up Lightroom this weekend. I have a rough idea what a lot of the stuff does, but would really like to dig deeper. Are there any books, videos, or other websites that people have found to be particularly good? I don't mind paying for online "training" if necessary, but I'd prefer to go the library, youtube, or other free-tutorial sites if at all possible.

I have found http://www.slrlounge.com/ very helpful they have a bunch of videos on how to use Lightroom and are always adding more.

Hadn't used my ring flash in a while, kind of missed it.

IMAGE(https://sphotos.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/314772_361937067211196_1606983956_n.jpg)

Sheazy wrote:

I finally got around to picking up Lightroom this weekend. I have a rough idea what a lot of the stuff does, but would really like to dig deeper. Are there any books, videos, or other websites that people have found to be particularly good? I don't mind paying for online "training" if necessary, but I'd prefer to go the library, youtube, or other free-tutorial sites if at all possible.

From a book standpoint, you can't go wrong with anything by Scott Kelby. I have this one for Lightroom 3, and like it quite a lot. There seems to be a new version for Lightroom 4 which I imagine is just as good, but I can't speak to that one personally.

From a recent trip to Nantucket. Will likely be my entry in the island paper's photo contest this year.

IMAGE(http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8284/7527585246_fa97995f87_z.jpg) Madaket Sunrise by RichyRambo, on Flickr

Very nice RichyRambo.

I really like it so don't take the following as a criticism but I'm a little curious if you tried cropping out the road on the left (which I originally thought was a boat) just to see if it changes the balance of the image a little.

Thanks. I'll give it crop and see what it does.

Teneman wrote:

From a book standpoint, you can't go wrong with anything by Scott Kelby. I have this one for Lightroom 3, and like it quite a lot. There seems to be a new version for Lightroom 4 which I imagine is just as good, but I can't speak to that one personally.

+1

I too have Scott Kelby's Lightroom 3 book and have found it helpful too.

Awesome, thanks for the tips! I'll pick that one up and start reading.

I think I mentioned it earlier in the thread at some point but the Kelbytraining website has one day demo passes (a limited number each 24 hours) and they'll have some lightroom training classes there too if you want to try those out.

My wife's flight from Boston was delayed 3 hours last Friday, so I took the chance to head over to the observation deck at Raleigh-Durham airport and attempt to get some long exposures. This 10-second exposure of a takeoff turned out pretty cool:

IMAGE(http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8292/7630674434_0f7a383a02.jpg)
Liftoff by RangerRick, on Flickr

It's difficult to work on adjusting when it's 10:00 at night and they only have a plane taking off every half hour or so.

Neat Rick. Seeing that reminded me of a shot I'd seen somewhere before of SFO. I think it was this one: http://www.flickr.com/photos/exxonva...

Rahmen wrote:

Neat Rick. Seeing that reminded me of a shot I'd seen somewhere before of SFO. I think it was this one:
IMAGE(http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2534/3734764542_ec31df008c.jpg)
SFO crunch by exxonvaldez, on Flickr

Ooh, very cool. Yeah, they had a few more planes taking off than lil' ol' Raleigh.

Yeah, SFO is pretty damn busy. I used to spend a lot of time just browsing airliners.net looking at the photos over there. Lots of cool stuff.

Sigh -- browsing through this thread makes me want to break out the old point and shoot and try to get a handle on the thing again.

edosan wrote:

Sigh -- browsing through this thread makes me want to break out the old point and shoot and try to get a handle on the thing again.

Do eet!

Agreed. Do it.

Last summer I did a photo a day for 30 days and just getting in the daily habit did a lot for me. ... and then came winter and I've been a lot more sporadic.

With the recent drought in Ottawa my garden has been dying away.
This flower in our flowrbox somehow has left behind some color.

Taken with my phone though I'll break out my SLR and macro lens soon to shoot a few better ones.

IMAGE(https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-fwNXZUGu1cQ/UA80qFWh7uI/AAAAAAAAKLY/FEH0OBaCXt4/s708/photo.jpg)

Like it! Interesting to see a dead flower with so much color left in the petals.

Lovin the tungsten!
Great shots!

Not actual photography, but related - I recently started listening to On Taking Pictures, a new podcast hosted by Bill Wadman & Jeffrey Sadoris. The hosts are both professional photographers and there's a nice dynamic between the grumpy veteran (Bill) and the mild-mannered outsider (Jeffrey). It's only about 14 episodes old at this point, but the shows are a nice mix of geekery and photography.

groan wrote:

Lovin the tungsten!
Great shots!

Thanks

I particularly like the first one Slytin. Nice job!

avggeek - re the On Taking Pictures podcast. How much do they talk gear vs technique vs other stuff?

Those are interesting. What's your setup for doing those?

I'm using a IR filter that blocks almost all visible light with 30s-180s exposure times.
In some cases I'm using a custom white balance to get rid of all the red which is leaking through the filter.