Camera Wrestling... Still

[wm3798]

The plan was to work on figuring out the Hubble Space Telescope that Bryan lent me, but after spending the morning marveling at its capabilities down at the wildlife refuge...





...well, long story short, I forgot to turn off the camera, so the battery crapped out.  While recharging, I got out the little L20 again to see if I could make any sense out of it.



The color balance still plum evades me, and after playing with the image in Picasa, then a little more in MS Picture Manager, this is the best I could come up with.  It's not awful, but it's definitely not my best work.  I'm going to try the same set up in the morning with the D100 and some extra lighting and see what happens...

Oh, and five points to the first person that correctly figures out what you can't see in the picture.  Dave Vollmer gets the first guess!

Lee

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Lee, try using picnik.com. It's an online version of photoshop which, I believe, will let you work directly with color balance.

And the answer to the question is a single one of your OWN locomotives.

[wm3798]

Close, but no cigar, Ed...  Think "Fig Leaf"...

[seusscaboose]

i dont see any hand throws for switches

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Close, but no cigar, Ed...  Think "Fig Leaf"...

I sure hope you were wearing pants when you took it, nobody needs a repeat of this:
http://www.snopes.com/photos/risque/kettle.asp

[wm3798]

BINGO!  The cleverly placed Gondola and REA truck mask the offending Caboose ground throws...  Thanks for playing along at home!

Messing with the Picnik as we speak... So far it's not any better than Picasa...

Lee

[Dave V]

Lee, I'm going to be installing HO scale ground throws just to piss you off.... ;D

[Ed Kapuscinski]

BINGO!  The cleverly placed Gondola and REA truck mask the offending Caboose ground throws...  Thanks for playing along at home!

Messing with the Picnik as we speak... So far it's not any better than Picasa...

Lee

Fine then.

Go check your email.

[Ian MacMillan]

Job ticket: Problem exists between monitor and chair.  ;D

[TiVoPrince]

Job ticket: Problem exists between monitor and chair.  ;D

Ticket closed:
Technician reports a hardware issue, found a nut loose at the  keyboard...

[wm3798]

Same set up using the D-100



And from the other angle...


The color and exposure control are a bit better, but the focus still looks a little soft to me.  This high end camera doesn't have the handy little Macro Flower button, so you're on your own to get a good tight shot.  This is challenging, because all of the viewfinding is through the viewfinder!  There's an LCD display that lets you look at what you've done, but it doesn't appear to let you zoom in on the image to check for focus and DOF until you're sitting at the computer.  This is more of an inconvenience than anything, because you can make minor adjustments and just keep firing away... it's not like you only have 24 shots on a roll...

Still, I'm not seeing a clear path to get shots like the Canon S-2 gave me:


And don't even get me started about the size of the camera body as it relates to getting any kind of trackside view...  Just the same, I'm learning a few more tricks each time I use this....  Like for instance, turn it off when you're done so the battery doesn't crap out!

I can see this being a great camera for railfanning.  The clarity in natural light is amazing, and the action-stopping shutter speed is impressive.  But photographing small models so far continues to be a challenge.

Lee

[Puddington]

Not sure what look you're going for but...........

[wm3798]

I'm looking for the richness of color and crispness of focus apparent in the older shot.  I mean, I want without a doubt to know that I forgot to apply the damn number boards!

Lee

[Mark5]

Same lighting in all model photos?

If so I see what you mean about the color.

Mark

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I'd be happy to help if you're over on this side of the bay again in the near future.