October 16, 2008
How A $25 Investment Saved A $1700 Lens
It finally happened. After shooting the Caps for three seasons now and many other sporting events I almost broke one of my most trusted pieces of equipment, my Nikon 70-200mm/2.8 VR lens. I use it for practically everything...I can't imagine life without it.
So here is my pearl of wisdom for today. Go out and buy UV filter for every lens you own, put it on and forget about it.
That is what I did until this past Monday when I was shooting the Washington Capitals. No, I did not get hit by a hockey puck. In between periods I was going up the steps to download photos from my card, as I was going up somebody was leaving their aisle seat I sort of stumbled and dropped my camera (also know as my life). Others around the incident gasped, but I tried to be stoic and professional, picking it up and just walking on.
Later as I was alone I inspected the camera to see that it had indeed fallen and landed on the lens and there was a huge crack across the glass of my lens. My heart sunk when I then remembered that I had put on a filter and perhaps it was only damaged. To my relief that was the case, a $25 glass filter had saved one of my most prized possessions.
Some will say that you don't want to add another layer of glass in front of their lens. Intellectually you are right....If I had Nikon providing me with lenses I would be more cavalier. Unfortunately, I am not at that place yet so I am willing to make this compromise.
Posted by Allen Clark at 12:25 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
July 14, 2008
Trying Out Something New
While all the rest of my friends here at Off Wing use pretty high end equipment to shoot their photos, I've gotten by on my side of the shop with some decidedly less expensive equipment. A little more than a year ago, I purchased a Casio Exilim EX-Z850 digital camera, which, for the most part, I've used to shoot a variety of interviews. Whether I use it as a hand held, or mounted on a tripod, I've been very happy with the quality of the image I've gotten from the Casio.
Here's the latest video I shot, an impromptu interview with Washington Caps draftee Andrew Glass. I shot this early on Saturday afternoon a few minutes after the final scrimmage of this year's development camp:
With another Summer upon me, it's time to experiment again. So last night I strode into a local consumer electronics shop, and picked up the Aiptek A-HD+ 1080p, a hand held HD video camera for less than half of what I paid for the Casio Exilim.
I'll be testing the Aiptek out over the next few weeks and let you know how things work out.
Posted by Eric at 12:16 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 18, 2008
What's In My Computer?
There are a ton of stories about "what is in my camera bag" and I will no doubt do that piece also. But today I thought I would quickly share with you what is in my computer and how I use some of the applications.
First off, I have a two computer set-up, I take a Mac Powerbook into the field and have an iMac back at the office which is where I prefer to do the majority of my work.
Powerbook- Adobe Bridge & Photoshop: De-facto image editor.
- Daylite 3: Daylite is a great Customer Relationship Management project. It handles all of my contacts and calendar. It is also has project manager, notes, and tracks opportunities. What is special is that it integrates all of things and has some automation features for common tasks.
- Cyberduck: A FTP client, A great thing when you want to upload your photos "Old Skool" style to a server.
- Flickr Uploader: An application provided by flickr to upload photos.
- Browsers: Safari & Firefox, I had been a firm believer in Safari but then recently tried Firefox and was very impressed when it worked out better on some sites where I had layout issues when pages loaded.
- Image Rescue: I should knock on wood as I say this, but I haven't had to use this yet. It came with one of my CF cards from Lexar to rescue pictures from bad CF cards.
- MarsEdit: Another new tool in my belt. MarsEdit is an offline blog editor which gives me more flexibility in my writing of blogs.
- Photo Mechanic: In the field PhotoMechanic is my image management tool. I use it to bring in my photos and image browser as I look for my selects. I also use it for my captioning and keywording. It is killer fast and the work done keywording and captioning isn't lost when I bring my photos into my main digital asset manager (Aperture, see more below) on my main work machine.
- Photoshelter Uploader: An application provided by Photoshelter to upload photos.
- Soundslides: A great tool that many photojournalists use to create Flash based multimedia shows from images and sound/music.
- Aperture: I don't think that my explanation would do justice to all that Apple's Aperture. Think of it as the Swiss Army tool for digital imaging, it does more than you would expect and then a little more.
- Adobe Bridge & Photoshop: Same as above
- Daylite 3: Same as above
- Cyberduck: Same as above
- Flickr Uploader: Same as above
- Browsers: Safari & Firefox: Same as above
- Image Rescue: Same as above
- MarsEdit: Same as above
- Photo Mechanic: Same as above
- Photoshelter Uploader: Same as above
- Soundslides: Same as above
So Why The Two Machine Set-up?
Doing sports photography means that you are shooting and typically uploading photos from the field. On the upside, I have a laptop. The downside however is that it is an older 12 inch Powerbook bought when my needs were different from what they are now.
To complicate things, I also chose Apple's Aperture for my main digital asset manager. The technical requirements are too much for my little Powerbook. This is clearly not the optimal set-up, but it is what I have for the moment. I am hoping this will change soon (hint: if my wife is reading this). I am hoping to move to a single machine soon, which means a new Apple Powerbook, that I will use with a second monitor when I am back in the office.
I should also add that I have multiple external hard drives (HD) that I use to back-up my images on. Initially I had used CD and DVD's for back-up, but as the number of photos taken has increased, increased file size from my Nikon D200, I have moved to keeping my images on redundant hard drives. With the dropping price per gig of HD it makes sense to me and frees me from burning discs. Aperture's image management has also eased the management of my photos in this way.
Posted by Allen Clark at 03:58 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
December 28, 2007
Interview With Chris Rutsch Of Hartford's Wolf Pack
I came across a piece about the team photographer for the Hartford Wolf Pack, an American Hockey League (AHL) team located in Hartford Conn.
- Read the story here.
- You can view Chris' pictures here
- The story comes from Mitch Beck's"Howlings: Hartford Wolf Pack News And Commentary."
Posted by Allen Clark at 09:18 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 02, 2007
Looking For That Perfect Lens
Sigma recently announced the massive APO 200 - 500 mm F2.8 EX DG.
This morning one of the OffWing photographers posed this question, "I've been tossing around the idea of buying a lens (I've been renting) and I'd probably go with one for hockey since I think I'll be shooting more of those games, at least right now. Which brings me to my next question - what would you guys recommend? Is there anything that could be used for both hockey and field sports? Any thoughts on buying used?"
Very good questions indeed, nothing like having the right tool for the right job.
My advice was to go with is a 70-200mm f/2.8 ($1640 @ Adorama). This is a very flexible lens that has a constant 2.8 that will help you shoot in low light situations while keeping the shutter speed high enough to stop the action. This is the lens you would use to shoot at ice level for hockey.
Recently taken by me with a Nikon 200, 70-200mm f/2.8.
This is almost a must-have lens. There doesn't seem to be such a price difference on used vs. new on this lens because most people will never sell it unless they are switching from cameras.
The new model comes with vibration reduction (VR). This is very cool but I have found it is not needed for my sport shooting because I am typically using a shutter speed of 400-500, so camera shake is not that big of a deal. When shooting at 60-100 the VR would help. The VR also pulls a lot of juice from the camera's battery as it refocuses, something that happens a lot in hockey.
The other option would be a 400mm f/2.8 or 500mm f/4 . These are incredibly expensive ($3500 used - $9000 new) for most people. This is the lens that the photographers use to shoot down onto the ice from the stands. It is also what is used primarily to cover soccer, football, etc.
For me the decision came down thinking about what kind of situations I will most likely be shooting and cost. The 70-200mm f/2.8 was an investment that I basically HAD to have (I don't think my wife felt as fervently about it as I did) to do my job.
The bigger lenses are on my wishlist where they will stay until I make a lot of money with the sport stuff or find an incredible deal.
Nikon has just announced three new telephoto lenses. Check out the review over at Digital Photography Review. They also have this review of the Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8.
We happen to shoot with Nikon but Canon has comparable lenses.
Interested in the monster Sigma lens? You can read more about it here on DPReview.
Posted by Allen Clark at 04:54 PM | Comments (0)