***DSLR/Photography MegaThread***

This I think is the biggest shortcoming of Lightroom, no soft proofing. Normaly, professional printer will supply you with a printer profile (I use White House Custom Color and you actually have to proof 5 shots with them using their profile before you can open an account). So in Photoshop you can load that profile into the View -> Proof Setup, and that way you can see what it will look like when printed, and usually those pro printers are serious, so that profile is dead balls on when viewing on a calibrated monitor, it is very satisfying, what you see is what you get. And because you are looking at what it will look like from the printer, you can make any adjustments you need to make that version look good. If Lightroom had soft proofing, it would be even better because you wouldn't need a print copy and an original copy, you could make you changes in the development module and just save it as a virtual copy. So this is one of the very very few cases where I say "Boo Lightroom" - and if Lightroom did have soft proofing, it would solve the issue that we are seeing because you could soft proof in sRGB so you could make any adjustments you need. I have seen a lot of requests to get this in Lightroom (and as soon as I'm done with this, I'm heading over to Adobe to ask for it again ;) )

Once you make those adjustments, most printers want the file tagged sRGB, but more and more are down with the Adobe RGB.

White House sure is proud of their prints, eh? CHA-CHING!
 
White House sure is proud of their prints, eh? CHA-CHING!

Actually, the reason I got into them is their 5x7 price. They are pretty much more expensive on every other size, but 5x7 they are a very reasonable $0.39 with a $12 minimum (and they have all the artsy fartsy sizes and papers ;) as well as nice volume tools like ftp upload)
 
Actually, the reason I got into them is their 5x7 price. They are pretty much more expensive on every other size, but 5x7 they are a very reasonable $0.39 with a $12 minimum (and they have all the artsy fartsy sizes and papers ;) as well as nice volume tools like ftp upload)

You wrote "fartsy." huh-huh-huh
 
This is a great thread. Now I want a camera!!!

I need another hobby other than golf, especially with the kid off to college. With that in mind, maybe I can find a 1 MP Point and Shoot!!!! :)

XMAS List, hmmmm....
 
This is a great thread. Now I want a camera!!!

I need another hobby other than golf, especially with the kid off to college. With that in mind, maybe I can find a 1 MP Point and Shoot!!!! :)

XMAS List, hmmmm....

LOL you can probably find a 1mp point-and-shoot and any garage sale. ;)
 
A couple from my work day (and my overnight in Spokane, WA) yesterday.

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Heavy use of the fisheye, I know. But it works, right?

EDIT: Flipped pic #2 180 degrees. It was accidentally upside-down! Whoops!
 
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Really like looking down the tree trunk!

That was a tough shot to get!! I held the camera right against the tree trunk about six feet off the ground. That was about the fifth image I took. Every other one, you could see a part of me in the image. I literally had to make love to that tree in order to get out of the image.
 
Is the mallard on the 70-200 (judging by the sharpness)?

From apple picking weekend:
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Not mine, but I thought is was awesome. What happens when you stick a high powered strobe in your mouth:

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That one above is FREAKY! Wonder if he cooked his tonsils?

As for yours, Sam, I like the abstractness of the Halloween garland against the blue sky.

Is the mallard on the 70-200 (judging by the sharpness)?

Nope. The 70-200 is a bit too big for me to pack easily when I work. That was taken with the Nikkor ED 28-200 f/3.5-5.6 G lens that I've had forever. It's only four inches long when at 28mm and it weighs about a quarter of what the big lens does. It's okay for bright stuff, and its a sharp-enough lens (not bad DOF for f/5.6, eh?). I'll eventually replace it with the 18-200 VR, though.

Oh, and that pic, though it was pretty sharp as-shot, was detail-sharpened a tad in Lightroom.
 
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keep this thread going... I'm a lurker, only because I love photography, and with every day I'm getting more and more into it. Through work and stuff I've actually gained lots of experience with photoshop and a bit with lightroom...

yet... I can't afford to buy a DSLR yet. I've been looking at the Nikon D80 for weeks now... (I'm a Nikon guy, the Canon just doesn't sit right in my hands)...

any ideas where I can find an affordable kit?
 
Best Buy has it packaged with the 18-135 kit lens (POS) for $1300.

B&H has it packaged with the 18-55 lens (GREAT lens) for about $980.
 
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If you can hold out, hold out until Black Friday. Ritz/Wolf always has killer bundle sales.
 
Best Buy has it packaged with the 18-135 kit lens (POS) for $1300.

B&H has it packaged with the 18-55 lens (GREAT lens) for about $980.

I can vouch for this statement. It is a PHENOMINAL lens for the price.

Once I sell my other boat I'm going big time and getting the new AF-S NIKKOR 400mm f/2.8G ED VR It will be mine this christmas....kc:

I heart VRII.
 
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Anyone got any suggestions for an excellent quality photo printer that will do big stuff? Maybe 11" x14" borderless?

I'm looking (so far) at the Epson Stylus Photo R2400.

A buddy of mine has the 2400 and it does make some nice 11x14s. But nothing any better than you can get printed at Costco or Sam's Club. It always been more economical to get reprints and enlargements at those two places than paying the dough it takes to get a worthwhile photo printer.
 
I guess that's true. The problem is that anything I've ever sent out for printing has come back WAY darker than the image as I've processed it. I'm not sure if that is because of the issues that ValleyFan and I were discussing with color gamuts and such, and I haven't tried printing from image files exported under sRGB. Experimenting to get the prints to look like they should could cost major dough and time. Having my own printer here on my desk would at least save me the time factor.

There's got to be a point of diminishing returns with store-made prints after which it makes sense to own your own printer.
 
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