Need Opinion - DPChallenge Forums

02/27/2006 12:43:33 PM · #1

I have finally been able to convince some people to fund me to start my online busines.

Camera i have picked is Olympus sp-350 another one i am looking at is olympus SP-500

I am more keen on 350 because it has a hot shoe. I can attach my studio strobes. I plan to get a wein safe sync.

350 is costing 236$ plus say 50 dollars for that sync.

Plus a memory card.

Sp500 cost like 261 $ doesnt have hot shoe but has in built support for Studio Strobes( read it at dpreview).

I have used a40in past and have managed very good result from it and i think both camera will be decent enough.( i am not asking too much performance)

I am just bit scared as to why these camera are so cheap.
Also will my plan to attach wein safe sync on hot shoe and than attach my Studio strobes will actually work .

My studio Strobes are simple and are not TTL or stuff.

What do i mean by simple strobes, well simply that they just fire when attached , there is no change in power as result exposure reading etc.There is one switch behind that changes power of strobes into half.

All i want my sp-350 to simply fire my strobes and i will use wein safe sync so that my strobe wont fry my camera ( as a precaution).

Please wish me luck so that i can start my work ASAP

Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR II

02/27/2006 09:42:33 PM · #2

anyone

IndigoButterfly

Nikon D7100

02/27/2006 09:49:02 PM · #3

Don't know enough to give advice, but... Good luck!!!
:)

SamDoe1

Canon EOS-350D Rebel XT

Tamron SP AF 28-75mm f/2.8 XR Di for Canon

02/27/2006 09:52:14 PM · #4

I have no idea, but here's a bump for good luck.

Sony 16-50mm f/3.5-5.6 E-mount

02/27/2006 09:59:48 PM · #5

Thanks for Bumping my thread, it is really appreciated

jmsetzler

Sony Alpha a6000

02/27/2006 10:16:46 PM · #6

I read your post and couldn't figure out what sort of 'opinion' you were looking for. It sounds like you have done what you set out to do...

Tamron SP AF 28-75mm f/2.8 XR Di for Canon

02/27/2006 11:03:27 PM · #7

I just looked at another camera Kodak Z7590 and that too is in my budget.

Opinion i need is which is better, ( i feel i am not able to put things to right perspective i.e on paper all of the are winners specially Sp-350 but i feel i am overlooking something).

I am not crazy about Pixels much.I print 8x10 occasionally and even with a40 i have got results so sp-350 being 8 pixel is no big issue for me

Opinion i need is that three different camera , almost same price range but are really very different.

I am just not very sure

With sp-350 i get RAW ,8 mega pixel as compared to Kodak's 10x zoom.

Which do you think is more realiable. I know with kodak i can plug in my strobes without safe sync as it can handle triggering voltage upto 500v

Message edited by author 2006-02-27 23:04:33.

SamDoe1

Canon EOS-350D Rebel XT

02/27/2006 11:23:42 PM · #8

My parents have the Z7590 and it's a pretty decent camera. It has some great results, but no IS on that 10x zoom makes it harder to get good stuff without good light. Manual controls are pretty straight forward and there is even a command dial to help change settings. I don't have any experience with the Olympus so I can't offer anything there. I think Kodak is coming out with a replacement for the Z7590 so you might want to look into that too.

Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM

02/28/2006 01:08:40 AM · #9

Thanks

eschelar

Canon EOS-7D

02/28/2006 10:02:03 AM · #10

If you are setting up a business, you would be much better off dealing with some form of digital SLR.

Your lighting can be really instrumental in putting great images together, but it will be up to you to learn how to use them.

I really have no idea what kind of business you are setting up, but I'm going to guess that you will be dealing with portraits.

You will do much better picking up a cheap body camera and an older Manual focus prime lens than you will with any Point and Shoot.

This will probably mean an extra 300-400 dollars.

The good news is that you can get by with a very humble DSLR as you won't be dealing with much change in your setup.

I really don't know how advanced a photographer you are and I'm not that amazing, but I can give you a few suggestions. I'm going to assume you know how to handle a camera pretty well because you take some pretty decent pics and hey, you are looking at doing this for business.

#1 Camera. I would look at a used 300D or Pentax body. Possibly an older Olympus Evolt. The Canon's advantage is large numbers of 2nd hand lenses. The Pentax's advantage is that while there are less numbers of 2nd hand lenses, you should be able to find one that is excellent optically but not too expensive. The original purchase price was low too. The same goes for the Olympus Evolt. They had really good prices to begin with. They are a bit of a niche market for various reasons that aren't important here.

You should be able to find a body for 400 dollars US if you look hard. I can't promise anything because I have absolutely no idea how 2nd hand markets are in India.

#2 Lens. I would just try to find a decent prime lens. You could talk to store owners and check out some of the older Manual focus lenses and see if someone is interested in offloading something with good optics for cheap.

#3 Lighting and studio setup. Well this is where it comes together. Even if the above equipment choices are not possible, you still will probably be able to make some really nice results happen if you have a good handle on your lighting. I can't help you with the equipment side of this as it's outside of my experience, but this is going to be critical because as you said, you only appear to have two settings for your strobes.

This means that you are going to have to do a lot of trial and error to get your studio set up so you know what is going on.

I would recommend getting a few different colors of electrical tape and getting one of your more patient friends to sit in your photographic area. You will also need a measuring tape. A lot of guys use a set peice of string to measure distance from camera to subject when taking portraits in studio, but you will need a measuring tape to get to that point.

I would use tape to mark out a tested "acceptable" area for your subject (and once you get things stable, try taking test shots with your model in different parts of the area to simulate different poses and multiple subjects).

I would then set a basic spot for your primary shooting area.

Mark on the floor the locations of your tripod feet and the feet of the chair for your subject. From here, you can then set up a peice of string which you can tape to your tripod for precise measurements. This is really going to be more helpful in the long run if you actually do use a manual focus prime lens, but it will also help you to make more predictable measurements for your strobes as well. The string should be in a place that will not move on your tripod and is usually measured to the bridge of the nose.

I strongly recommend this for your setup process and I think it might be helpful as well for when you actually get your business moving. It will reduce guesswork and allow you to work more accurately and quickly.

Possible problems you may encounter involve using a P&S camera which loses it's zoom and focus settings when you turn it off. This means that you will need to muck about with your camera to get things set up. Blah. I hate that.

Once you do get your tripod and subject set up, the next thing you need to do is figure out how to control your lighting. I'm assuming that you will already have the equipment for triggering the flash units. The next thing you need to do is find places to put them.

With your subject in place and the strobes set to a setting, take some test shots, first with one, then with the other, then with both. Take measurements from the subject to the light to help you judge changes that take place.

Once you have something you like, choose a color (say, red) and mark the locations of the strobe stand feet. If you want to be fancy, you can also mark the center of the light stand and a line to subject center so you can have greater control over moving the strobe away but keeping the same orientation to the subject. This can be your basic setup.

You can then start experimenting with moving one light on one side to create shadows for dramatic effect and depth.

With strobes with limited ability to adjust output, your first method of changing light level should not be the switch on the back, but simply moving the stand around. Be careful.

Once you have an idea how to set up your stands, you can then move into filtering the light.

You can look into picking up diffusers and possibly gel-packs.

For this, I would advise checking out a lighting store and seeing what they have. You might be able to get plastic sheets like they use for fluorescent lighting in some stores that will do a nice job for very cheap. You could then stick a couple of metal clips on your light stands for versatility. Further, you could also get sheets of plastic film to act as gel-packs to warm up the light as desired.

That's about all I can give you for now. I hope at least some of it comes in handy for ya!

photogrl

02/28/2006 10:07:44 AM · #11

im wih eschelar a digital slr is much better.
what type of online business?
ebay is a good way to find cameras too.
good luck

Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM

02/28/2006 11:37:52 AM · #12

Thanks eschelar for indepth tips.

My online business is not related with Portrait instead my online business is selling Indian Handicrafts , Garments and Jewellery on ebay, and may be on my own site.

I cannot afford a DSLR,I have two great strobes. I am very comfortable with lighting and i have done earlier.
I just a need a camera that allows me to fire my strobes using a PC or Hot Shoe.

Camera i have mentioned fall in my budget.

eschelar

Canon EOS-7D

03/01/2006 12:12:12 AM · #13

That information puts things in a totally different perspective.

If it's just for ebay, you should be fine with that setup. Another camera to look at might be the upcoming [url=Kodak V570]//www.dpreview.com/news/0601/06010201kodakv570.asp[/url]. I can't say for sure, but I would guess that it will have a larger sensor than a big zoom cam and the 23mm prime lens will probably give you some image quality that is far beyond that which can be achieved with a big zoom P&S cam.

A big Zoom P&S cam is really nice for portraits because it can actually achieve some shallower DOF. This is rare on P&S cameras due to the exceptionally small sensors (FOV crop is 6x on my cam). They usually have 1/2.5" sized sensors.

One would hope that the above mentioned Kodak cam will come with at least as large as a 1/1.8" sensor which is ever so slightly larger.

It is also 5MP, which means the individual photo sites will likely be quite a bit larger than a 6mp big zoom.

This could be important to you because product photography often uses deeper DOF to get the whole thing in focus. This is the opposite of portrait photography. Oftentimes, this also means using narrower apertures, especially for close-up work. Big Zoom cameras can't keep up here because they begin to noticeable lose fine detail at around f/5.6 (mine does and it's 5mp with a 1/2.5") due to diffraction limitation effects.

As you are selling handicrafts, I would guess that fine detail would be pretty close to paramount in your photographic decisions.

Either way, I'd recommend against a big zoom P&S for your purposes.

As far as controlling the strobes, I believe you can also pick up a device that has what is called a slave flash receiver.

If you set just about any camera to manual mode, you will usually also set your flash to manual flash mode, you will get rid of the multiple evaluation micro-bursts and you will be able to fire strobes via the on board flash. Fill flash mode can sometimes also work here too depending on the camera.

This is the method I use for my Canon S2. I have a recently released Tumax external flash that has 5 settings for flash response. It has it's own slave receiver built in, so I can trigger it with the basic camera flash. It itself also fires a single burst, so if I had strobes in the room with slave flash hotshoe receivers, I could trigger them all with my on camera or offcamera flash.

If you are confused by my wording here (I'm not always as clear about things as I think I am), please feel free to PM me.

I'm not an expert, but I do what I can.

I can't give you a lead on those devices, you will have to look around, but I've seen Slave Flash Hotshoe mounts for anywhere from 20 dollars to 35 dollars US. They do tend to be somewhat rare though. I found none in Taipei, but found a handful of them in TaiZhong in a really neat store with tons of extra goodies. I don't go there very often, but next time I'm around there, I'll try to take some pictures.

Nikon AF-S DX Zoom-Nikkor 18-70mm f/3.5-4.5G IF-ED

03/01/2006 06:10:08 AM · #14

Thanks for the details. I want camera that has either PC socket or hot shoe for attaching strobes. In past i have fired my camera with camera flash and was not happy with whole setup( when shooting reflective surface for close up.)

I am thinking of either getting an IR trigger or say weins safe sync hote shoe.

Both are very expensive almost 60$.

Saw some other options at ebay but companies were totally not popular.

woohoopepper

Nikon D70

03/01/2006 06:59:52 AM · #15

Hi ... I have an Olympus at work, an older one, but I've never really liked using it. I have had three Kodak's, which I absolutely loved - the photo quality, the color, the option for b/w, and the 10x zoom. I wanted to advance to the DSLR world, so I have now had a Nikon for about a year. But, when friends and coworkers ask my opinion of what to buy within a budget, I still always recommend Kodak. My Kodak 6490 worked wonderfully with my strobes (two units with bounce umbrellas, full and 1/3 power).

eschelar

Canon EOS-7D

Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM

03/01/2006 09:14:20 AM · #16

Hey Woohookeeper. I can't imagine that there would be a use for the specific function of a 10x zoom type camera for General's purposes, but I wonder if you could mention how you connected got your 6490 to work with your strobes?

Regarding flash/thyristor based slave flash units, you need to get one that is capapble of dealing with more than one TTL type. The Tumax that I have is capapble of dealing with two different flash modes on my Canon S2, but cannot work properly with the 300D's flash modes. I didn't have much time to really work on making it work though. Maybe 5 minutes. I would imagine that if I did have 15-20 minutes, I could get something working. I didn't have a chance to find a way to set the flash to manual.

Most slave flash units work fine if you can check in the manual how to disable TTL flash prefires.

If the camera can't do it, it's a bit of a pain.

I'm not sure how well IR flashes work. I would imagine they would work fine if they are within the IR beam area. Like anything else, IR is highly subject to object interference. Of course, so are direct flash slaves. One thing you can do is use a little tape and a mirror to send the light up behind you if you only want the light from the strobes. It should bounce off the ceiling and be strong enough for the slave to detect. I've done this with mine and it worked fine.

I don't know if that's an issue for your setup though. One thing is for sure. With constant output strobes, you are probably going to be doing a lot of your shooting on a tripod and with manual settings. You aren't going to be able to use the flash metering system in camera regardless of brand unless you have hotshoe or PC sync. And even then, maybe not.

There are some slave flash units that are actually able to link to pc link too so you could have a single slave receiver and all your strobes would go off simultaneously.

I've seen a handful of high end pro studios that use these.

As far as Kodak's color is concerned, I can't say. I've not personally been a huge fan of them. I think they just have higher contrast and saturation default settings. That 23 mm equiv. prime lens looks to be pretty exciting, but I can't guarantee that it will work with your strobes in any way.

In the end, I guess it's up to finding a 2nd hand source for the Hotshoe or PC sync models that you originally wanted.

If there's an olympus choice with a 3x optical zoom, you will probably have a little more freedom with shooting beyond F5.6 without losing fine detail, so I would recommend that if you can use a hotshoe.

Sorry I couldn't be of more help as to which camera to use.

Message edited by author 2006-03-01 09:19:56.