My family, friends and acquaintences pretty much all know that I get a lot of mileage out of eBay, even though it's not what it used to be (but what is anyway). It's just a great place to find stuff, especially hard to find stuff! And, at times, I've used it as a virtual garage sale to get rid of things that are either piling up or I just don't need any more. However, moving to the city (vs. living in Lubbock) has been a revelation in terms of what can be done with Craig's List. We use it all the time for any variety of things such as a secondary refridgerator for the garage, to getting somebody to take an old, big and broken projection TV away so I could park in the garage again!
But this isn't a post to extol the virtues of either eBay or Craig's List, but on how the interaction between the two can be made to work for you.... or in this case, me. As the regular reader (or readers if there is more than one now), know, I've been on this "Strobist" kick lately, trying learn how to control photographic lighting by using some small flash units from off-camera and acquiring all the necessary parts to do this wirelessly. And in this effort, I've used my frugal philosophy to acquire some old and cheap Sunpak flashes and a set of wireless triggers that originally came off of eBay, but which i bought from a Craig's List ad for less than $50. So with the eBay flashes, Craig's List triggers, and garage sale tripods, I had a rudimentary sub-$100 "strobist" rig. Not a good one, not a powerful one, but a cheap one!
So, I'm done right? Move on, shoot lots of nicely lit family pictures and "call it a day". Nope, not by a long shot! There's always the never-finished quest to "upgrade": in this case, upgrade to the flash units that David "the Strobist" Hobby recommends as being the most powerful and flexible for the money... Nikon strobes....specifically the SB-26 (and possibly current models like SB-600, and SB-800). Unfortunately, not only are these things expensive since they are made by the "hand-of-Thor" otherwise known as Nikon, but since David Hobby started his blog, all the best Nikon strobes for remote function have become eBay gold! So the price of the SB-24s & 25s are typically around $90-110 and the "holy grail", SB-26 (with the built-in optical slave function) goes for somthing like $125 or more.
This is where eBay is really useful as a research tool on current market conditions. So after a few days of looking on eBay in both "live" as well as "completed" auctions, I was able to determine what the typical selling price of those flashes run and what the range of price fluctuations tend be as well. Meaning that, if you want an SB-26 (holy grail remember?), you pretty much have to expect to pay over $100 unless you are phenominally lucky. Therefore, with that piece of information in hand, I kept an eye on the local Craig's List..... and "loe and behold", an SB-26 appears one day with an asking price of $50! You wanna bet I jump all over that and drove my happy little butt up to Plano (45 min.) and picked that puppy up that afternoon!?! About a week and a half later, I found an SB-600 (current model Nikon flash) on CL for $175. It was in Ft. Worth, but I got the guy to take the transaction through PayPal and ship it to me for $5.
In the end, this post isn't all about how you can get a good deal on Craig's List and that eBay costs more. It's really more an illustration that if you know what the market is (based on a relatively stable entity..eBay), then you know when a REALLY good price is there for the taking. In the first case; it was pretty extreme. I got a really nice flash unit for anywhere from 30 to 40% of the market price. In the second case, it was about a 20 to 25 % discount which is nothing to be sneered at these days. But the main thing is that, by using information from both, I was able to upgrade to much nicer flash units than what I had to start with. AND, I'll be able to do the same thing I did with the D70, where I took my old equipment and sell it for quite probably more than I gave for it to start with and thus defraying the costs of upgrading even more!
All my Hi-Tech Blogging has been temporarily interrupted by some unexpected car buying! I might have to write about that experience, but not today.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Other Stuff I Carry Around and Netbook "Rant" Part 2
Let me start off by finishing up with where I left off on "netbooks" vs. "ultra-portables" and I'll get to the rest of the misc. items. The reason that there is a "Part 2" is that I just had a bit of an epiphany the other day in regard to my "Super-Netbook" concept (AKA IBM X41). The one I have came with an "extended" battery meaning that not only did I get extended run time (around 3-5 hrs), but also, I had a little 1" shelf sticking out the back of this sleek machine, plus a fextra half-a-pound of weight to carry around. As a matter of fact, IBM was so certain that people wanted the extra run-time that they shipped the X4x and later ultra-portable series with these "extended" (8 Cells) batteries as opposed to the 4 Cells battery. In the interest of trying to get as small and light as possible, I really wanted to see what having the "regular", non-extended battery would do to the machine. I found an aquaintence on the ThinkPad Forum that wanted an extended, but had an extra regular battery, we were a perfect match and agreed to swap.... just as soon as he got back from vacationing on Cape Cod at the end of the month. Me being a little antsy about this got on eBay and found a seller with a cheap (less than $10) regular battery. I knew the battery would be either dead or mostly dead, since that seller deals in computers, but in their description swears that it's "untested". On eBay, this means DEADER than DEAD! It turned out to be the case, but it does what I want it to do which is tell me what this machine would "feel" like with a 4-cell and to fill the battery hole when I'm home and have the machine plugged up to the A/C all the time. I'll get into why I do that in another post.
Anyway, the upshot of all this is that the X41 (despite being a full-blown computer) is as light (somewhere between 2.5-3lbs), deeper (due to the 4:3 screen format vs. 16:9), but thinner. I was really surprised by the weight thing though! Oh yeah; I was able to use the dock to watch movies on, this week when I was at the hospital with my wife. So it's exactly like I said last time: this thing is more capable, better built, cheaper and nearly as small as what you can find out there in a new netbook!
Now; on to other useful devices. First of all is the ubiquitous iPod. That's so obvious you say! And you all know that I'm SO NOT ABOUT OBVIOUS! So, what gives? Let me start by saying that I simply didn't even consider the stylishly small, Nano, or Mini or whatever they're calling it that year. I'm all about the big honkin' regular hard drive based iPod. And for a non-professional photographer who's carrying around a laptop anyway, it makes the perfect backup device. An unfortunate side-effect of the digital age is that we are all pretty dependent on our HDDs and with virtually all our family (and other) images on one drive, we're pretty much a heartbeat away from data-disaster! So, when professional photographers are out in the field, they dump their pictures every night off of the memory cards, onto not one, not two, but sometimes onto 3 different devices and many times will burn a copy on DVD as well! So where does that leave us, who can only assume that our non-photographer spouses can tolerate only so many devices. Which is why I started this discussion with the iPod! In my case, I bought an 80Gb iPod Classic model in a nice flat black that matches my ThinPads and Nikon! With 80Gb, it can not only hold virtually all the music I'd want to tote, but serves as a small backup drive to my travel laptop as well. On top of that, since it'll charge via the computer (my RAZR charges via the computer as well), that eliminates an A/C adapter and it does a superb job of fullfilling it's original mission...play music!
Here's the other half of it: I bought mine (and a 2nd for my wife) locally on Craig's List for $100 less than retail (is there any other price for an Apple product?) which was less than a year old. Admittedly, it's not as simple as all that (there are market forces at play here). I started looking when the 2nd (less expensive, and larger memory) iPhone came out! What? What does the iPhone have to do with a used iPod. Hang with me on this: given that the iPhone is an attractive product (practically irresistable to Yuppies- and we have lots of those around Dallas), granted that it was an extremely expensive at first, but this was mitigated somewhat by the arrival of the 2nd version. So what you had was a situation where a bunch of people would want an excuse to get the iPhone, and the concept of convergence is an AWESOME excuse! "Hey; I can sell my almost new iPod for most of what it will cost to buy an iPhone!" So, it was a great time to get on CL and pick up a current model iPod that could serve as a multi-use device for a great price.
As an aside from these reasons, here are some other thoughts on iPods in general. They are OH SO CONVENIENT! After I buying my wife her first iPod (30Gb) for Christmas 3 years ago, I spent the rest of the holidays ripping virtually all of our over 400 CDs into it. It really is nice to just be able grab that thing when we are headed out of town instead of looking through all of the CDs to find 24 or so to go with us (not to mention the little 24 cd album that I lost in Madison, WI a few years ago). In fact, we use it on a regular basis at home through a "dock" that's connected to our home theater system. We also have a portable speaker system by Logitech for it that has a built-in battery which allows it be taken almost anywhere. It was "refurbished" via eBay for a third of the retail price. These things are so ubiquitous that we found that our hotel in Vancouver on our latest trip had a clock/radio with a iPod dock in it.
So, if you haven't taken the plunge yet, get out there and pick up a "previously loved" iPod (full sized) that some 20-something has cast aside for a sparkling new iPhone.
Now, back to photography. One of my latest projects (my wife says obsession), has been to try and gain control of light. Does that mean I'm going to buy studio lights and take over our office or living room? No; I've become a devotee of the concepts of David Hobby, otherwise known as "The Strobist". I won't get into it too much today, but what he espouses is the concept that photographers can do their own controlled lighting by using regular "shoe-flashes" mounted "off-camera" wherever you need them. To give a brief synopsis; what you do is to get several old flashes, some light stands with various ways to "modify" that light, and a way to trigger those flashes. Of course, you gotta know that I need to do this, as "frugally" as possible.
This started by me finding a shoe-flash that would work with my Nikon camera's flash system (iTTL). Of course, buying the appropriate Nikon flash would be too easy, not to mention too expensive! Nikon has 3 compatible flashes ranging from $150 to $600! There seemed to be a number of "3rd Party" manufacturers with compatible models, however they seemed to run anywhere from $100 to $300 themselves. ....So off to do more research (meaning a lot of watching eBay). What I found was that a well-known 3rd-Party company (Sunpak) had apparently "OEM'd" their PZ-40X-II to Ritz Camera under that company's "Quantaray" brand. And apparently, that model has been replaced/upgraded, so they were all over eBay, new, in prices ranging from $50 to $150! So I did what any good frugal propellerhead would do.... wait until I could buy a $50 one!
Then, from Craig's List came a set of wireless flash triggers. The cheap ones from China. eBay again for an old Sunpak Auto 411 (from the 1970s), for around $20, and a garage sale tripod that looked like it had never been used for $7! Now I just have to find a filter/defuser set for the 411 and I'll be ready to go for this fall when we do our family pictures at the Dallas Arboretum! Actually, I added another Sunpak (Auto 422D) flash from eBay for another $25 that comes with a filter set.
I also bought my photographic filters from eBay since the price on a quality one such as Hoya tends to run about half of retail. It's also a great place to find older Nikon autofocus lenses that people have forgotten about as well. At less than $200 total outlay, I now have a Nikkor 28-80mm/f3.5-4.5, that's small and light which easily functions as an vari-focal normal for around the house. It was $40 after shipping, It's a good match for the old Nikkor 70-300mm/f4-5.6 which was the nice ED version with the special glass to control chromatic aberrations which came in at $150. Don't forget that these lenses translate to 42-120mm, and 105-450mm on a DX sensor'd Nikon DSLR.
The last really important important item? Rechargeable AAs of course. Today's quality nickel-metal hydrides (NiMh), are usually around 2500mah and last hundreds of recharges. The EveryReady or Duracell 8 cell sets can be had from Sam's Club complete with charger for around $25. Not only do flashes use (and last longer with faster recycle times) them, but the vertical "grip" for my camera has a battery carrier that will take those.
Yeah, I know; it's not easy to be frugal. It takes lots of planning, research and patience as well as a little luck, but it's worthwhile. The practice has allowed me to not only make myself a very respectable camera system, but then to remake and upgrade it as well. Not only is is very satifying in and of itself, but it allows me to be able to keep a running record of my kids' breakneck growth, but to do things that would otherwise be very expensive. We shoot virtually all of our own family pictures (as well as my wife's sister's family), eachy year. This allows us to print exactly what we need and do more interesting things like the annual family calendar that has personal pictures for each month.
To me; my hobbies aren't studies in isolation, but needs to be integrated as parts of our lives and hopefully enrich them. And it helps when those hobbies don't take a bite out of your monthly budgets too!
Anyway, the upshot of all this is that the X41 (despite being a full-blown computer) is as light (somewhere between 2.5-3lbs), deeper (due to the 4:3 screen format vs. 16:9), but thinner. I was really surprised by the weight thing though! Oh yeah; I was able to use the dock to watch movies on, this week when I was at the hospital with my wife. So it's exactly like I said last time: this thing is more capable, better built, cheaper and nearly as small as what you can find out there in a new netbook!
Now; on to other useful devices. First of all is the ubiquitous iPod. That's so obvious you say! And you all know that I'm SO NOT ABOUT OBVIOUS! So, what gives? Let me start by saying that I simply didn't even consider the stylishly small, Nano, or Mini or whatever they're calling it that year. I'm all about the big honkin' regular hard drive based iPod. And for a non-professional photographer who's carrying around a laptop anyway, it makes the perfect backup device. An unfortunate side-effect of the digital age is that we are all pretty dependent on our HDDs and with virtually all our family (and other) images on one drive, we're pretty much a heartbeat away from data-disaster! So, when professional photographers are out in the field, they dump their pictures every night off of the memory cards, onto not one, not two, but sometimes onto 3 different devices and many times will burn a copy on DVD as well! So where does that leave us, who can only assume that our non-photographer spouses can tolerate only so many devices. Which is why I started this discussion with the iPod! In my case, I bought an 80Gb iPod Classic model in a nice flat black that matches my ThinPads and Nikon! With 80Gb, it can not only hold virtually all the music I'd want to tote, but serves as a small backup drive to my travel laptop as well. On top of that, since it'll charge via the computer (my RAZR charges via the computer as well), that eliminates an A/C adapter and it does a superb job of fullfilling it's original mission...play music!
Here's the other half of it: I bought mine (and a 2nd for my wife) locally on Craig's List for $100 less than retail (is there any other price for an Apple product?) which was less than a year old. Admittedly, it's not as simple as all that (there are market forces at play here). I started looking when the 2nd (less expensive, and larger memory) iPhone came out! What? What does the iPhone have to do with a used iPod. Hang with me on this: given that the iPhone is an attractive product (practically irresistable to Yuppies- and we have lots of those around Dallas), granted that it was an extremely expensive at first, but this was mitigated somewhat by the arrival of the 2nd version. So what you had was a situation where a bunch of people would want an excuse to get the iPhone, and the concept of convergence is an AWESOME excuse! "Hey; I can sell my almost new iPod for most of what it will cost to buy an iPhone!" So, it was a great time to get on CL and pick up a current model iPod that could serve as a multi-use device for a great price.
As an aside from these reasons, here are some other thoughts on iPods in general. They are OH SO CONVENIENT! After I buying my wife her first iPod (30Gb) for Christmas 3 years ago, I spent the rest of the holidays ripping virtually all of our over 400 CDs into it. It really is nice to just be able grab that thing when we are headed out of town instead of looking through all of the CDs to find 24 or so to go with us (not to mention the little 24 cd album that I lost in Madison, WI a few years ago). In fact, we use it on a regular basis at home through a "dock" that's connected to our home theater system. We also have a portable speaker system by Logitech for it that has a built-in battery which allows it be taken almost anywhere. It was "refurbished" via eBay for a third of the retail price. These things are so ubiquitous that we found that our hotel in Vancouver on our latest trip had a clock/radio with a iPod dock in it.
So, if you haven't taken the plunge yet, get out there and pick up a "previously loved" iPod (full sized) that some 20-something has cast aside for a sparkling new iPhone.
Now, back to photography. One of my latest projects (my wife says obsession), has been to try and gain control of light. Does that mean I'm going to buy studio lights and take over our office or living room? No; I've become a devotee of the concepts of David Hobby, otherwise known as "The Strobist". I won't get into it too much today, but what he espouses is the concept that photographers can do their own controlled lighting by using regular "shoe-flashes" mounted "off-camera" wherever you need them. To give a brief synopsis; what you do is to get several old flashes, some light stands with various ways to "modify" that light, and a way to trigger those flashes. Of course, you gotta know that I need to do this, as "frugally" as possible.
This started by me finding a shoe-flash that would work with my Nikon camera's flash system (iTTL). Of course, buying the appropriate Nikon flash would be too easy, not to mention too expensive! Nikon has 3 compatible flashes ranging from $150 to $600! There seemed to be a number of "3rd Party" manufacturers with compatible models, however they seemed to run anywhere from $100 to $300 themselves. ....So off to do more research (meaning a lot of watching eBay). What I found was that a well-known 3rd-Party company (Sunpak) had apparently "OEM'd" their PZ-40X-II to Ritz Camera under that company's "Quantaray" brand. And apparently, that model has been replaced/upgraded, so they were all over eBay, new, in prices ranging from $50 to $150! So I did what any good frugal propellerhead would do.... wait until I could buy a $50 one!
Then, from Craig's List came a set of wireless flash triggers. The cheap ones from China. eBay again for an old Sunpak Auto 411 (from the 1970s), for around $20, and a garage sale tripod that looked like it had never been used for $7! Now I just have to find a filter/defuser set for the 411 and I'll be ready to go for this fall when we do our family pictures at the Dallas Arboretum! Actually, I added another Sunpak (Auto 422D) flash from eBay for another $25 that comes with a filter set.
I also bought my photographic filters from eBay since the price on a quality one such as Hoya tends to run about half of retail. It's also a great place to find older Nikon autofocus lenses that people have forgotten about as well. At less than $200 total outlay, I now have a Nikkor 28-80mm/f3.5-4.5, that's small and light which easily functions as an vari-focal normal for around the house. It was $40 after shipping, It's a good match for the old Nikkor 70-300mm/f4-5.6 which was the nice ED version with the special glass to control chromatic aberrations which came in at $150. Don't forget that these lenses translate to 42-120mm, and 105-450mm on a DX sensor'd Nikon DSLR.
The last really important important item? Rechargeable AAs of course. Today's quality nickel-metal hydrides (NiMh), are usually around 2500mah and last hundreds of recharges. The EveryReady or Duracell 8 cell sets can be had from Sam's Club complete with charger for around $25. Not only do flashes use (and last longer with faster recycle times) them, but the vertical "grip" for my camera has a battery carrier that will take those.
Yeah, I know; it's not easy to be frugal. It takes lots of planning, research and patience as well as a little luck, but it's worthwhile. The practice has allowed me to not only make myself a very respectable camera system, but then to remake and upgrade it as well. Not only is is very satifying in and of itself, but it allows me to be able to keep a running record of my kids' breakneck growth, but to do things that would otherwise be very expensive. We shoot virtually all of our own family pictures (as well as my wife's sister's family), eachy year. This allows us to print exactly what we need and do more interesting things like the annual family calendar that has personal pictures for each month.
To me; my hobbies aren't studies in isolation, but needs to be integrated as parts of our lives and hopefully enrich them. And it helps when those hobbies don't take a bite out of your monthly budgets too!
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Not Just a Place to Dump Your Digital Pictures and My Rant Against Netbooks!
As any serious photographer knows (and not so serious ones like myself as well), the hobby tends to accumulate "STUFF".... and I mean a lot of it. It was worse in the "old days", what with film, multiple bodies (holding the different types of film), a BUNCH of lenses (because most zooms pretty much stunk) and it got much worse if you had a darkroom! In today's world, it's actually much better (don't ask my wife though)! The film is gone, replaced by a few small memory cards. The multiple bodies are gone, since you can make the file look like most anything (color, saturated color, black & White, etc.) in the "post-process". And best of all; the dark room is now digital! In fact, I'm typing this in my "darkroom", which is in fact, my desktop PC workstation! Yaaaaa, no more stinky chemicals in the fridge and trays taking over one entire bathroom!
However, that being said; there's still "stuff" and lots of it. The one inescapable reality of the digital age is that those photographs are computer files and have to be handled in a computer eventually. Although, you don't really NEED a computer other than the one you have at home as your digital darkroom, there are a lot of advantages to having another (smaller) computer that you can take with you.... wherever. In our case this last month, we really didn't have much choice but to take a laptop with us to Alaska and BC since we were going to be gone for 2 weeks and expected to take a couple of thousand images. This gave me a place to dump the pictures, look at them (delete the half that were bad) and my wife to check her email and post to her Blog that allowed folks to keep up with what we were doing. Beside, this fed into one of my other hobbies and allowed me to have a good reason to own another computer!
So, what are the needs of this computer and how do you fit something like this into the grand scheme of frugality? Obviously, this machine needs to be relatively small and light with decent storage and enough graphic capability so that you aren't waiting around for images to render just in the viewer! At this point it lets off, most of the "Netbooks" that are so popular. You might be tempted buy them since they are so cheap and popular Walmart even sells them. First of all, let me go on my little netbook rant for just a minute (or 10)and I'll be better....I promise.
They are not $300! Only the really low end (is there such a thing when the entire class is low end?) ones are that price. That means, if you really want to pay that much, you get, the least amount of RAM (absolutely critical for us Windows people) and a small, cheap hard drive or even smaller SSD. And this is not to mention the 85% size that is typical for the class and the "piece" keyboard that is also typical of the class and the invention of Satan, the touchpad.... that is typical of the class. Everything about them screams cheap! It's like buying a new trailer house; it's new, but it's a trailer house.
Now to the real technical issues other than my personal ones. They mostly run on the Atom processor, which is Intel-speak for their stripped-down, low-powered (consumption and ability) mobile-CPU that is basically good for email (which is really what these things are designed for) and some web-surfing, although I really wouldn't stream too much video that's a bigger file than YouTube. Secondly, they typically either have a VERY small SSD or a relatively small and slow HDD and a sub-10" low resolution screen (but it's in that COOL wide-screen aspect ratio so they can put a big "Wide-Screen" sticker on it....like anybody is going to put 2 spreadsheets side-by-side on one of these things). Oh, the really cheap ones usually come with some sort of Linux on it. I did say that they are cheaply built didn't I? Soon they are going to look like the computer version of the AMC Pacer or the Clinton Presidential Library!
So, what to do? We could buy the more expensive (read nicer) ones with better spec and keyboard, like the Dell or HP, loaded with actual Windows and bump up the RAM..... and get the bigger HDD. Don't forget to buy the external optical drive for $80-120 so you can load things that aren't downloadable since most folks who buy them don't know how to share and map a drive from another machine over a network. At this point you will have realized that you are bumping up against the $500 price-point, Walmart doesn't sell this version and it's still...just a netbook!
Now, don't get me wrong; there are people who they will be perfectly happy with them. If you are somebody that just want to use it to keep in touch while out at the local Starbucks and absolutely won't do anything more than email and some light web-surfing; knock yourself out! That's why they are small and fun colored! They will look "stylish" as they ride in your cool-colored bag along with the miniature dog.
So, what about the rest of us who might actually do some work on our travel machine? Well; if we are well-heeled, or childless, or one of the 18% of college grads who got a job last year; then you run down to an actual computer store (read- NOT Best Buy), buy a ThinkPad X301, Sony (impossible to remember combination of letters & numbers) or Apple MacBook Air, and call it a day! You'll have a state-of-the-art, do-everything cool computer that you won't be embarrassed to have next your iPhone!
For the rest of us, there is the vast (relatively) untapped world of corporate hand-me-downs; otherwise know as "off-lease" machines! When I look through these things (usually on eBay), I feel like Captain Kirk among that episodes, interestingly-colored women! (I digress) Anyway....I'll wait till a future Post to talk about that segment of the computer market and get back to what will work for a "travel" machine and why.
Notebook computers are roughly divided up in classes, by weight, function, and size (not always directly correllated to weight). The class we are interested in is the "sub-notebook"- typically meaning that the machine would weight less then 5 pounds (usually closer to 3), have screens less then 14" (usually closer to 12"), and 1 built-in drive (the hard disk drive). There are some exception to this, but these are the general parameters. So, what is so special about these machines that make them the best target?
First of all, we want to look for "corporate" machines; that means computers sold by the "big boys" (IBM/Lenovo-ThinkPads, Dell- Latitudes not Inspirons, HP and some Toshibas) in large numbers directly to large wholesalers that you've never heard of, or directly to the big companies that use them. Typically, they are not actually sold at all, but are leased on a 1 to 3 year cycle, which fits neatly with the warranty life of the machines. The warrantees goes out, the machine goes away. Mostly, these big companies uses "thin-and-lights" (5 pounds, 14-15" screen, 2 drives- HDD & Optical), but they do use the sub-notebooks for specific applications. So every few year, literally thousands of these machines, "hit the streets", they've been replaced by new ones and some company has been PAID to take them away or they've be returned to the leasing arm of the wholesaler. At that point, many of them hit eBay and the rest of the "secondary" market. So, on a regular basis, you can find 2 to 3 year old machines (lots of the same model and spec), selling on eBay for a cheap price (far below what the original price was). Remember, they've already been paid for once, and they didn't cost the company what that same machine would have cost you anyway since they either bought or leased them by the thousands! So, you end up with machine that originally cost somewhere between $2000 to $3000 per unit (retail of course), selling for something between $200-300. That's right: 10% OF THE ORIGINAL PRICE!!! I know this well, I worked in IT for a number of years and one of my jobs was to buy computers by the hundreds....every year.
OK, so let's assume that I've convinced you, from the dollar standpoint anyway of why you should buy one of these "driven only on Sunday by Grandma" computers. What does this have to do with why they are a better deal than a netbook? First of all, pretty much, most any REAL computer 2-3 year old computer will out-perform a new netbook. Secondly, I've shown you that they can quite often be had for less than the price of even the cheapest netbook. So, the only real barrier is if you really can't handle the less than 1 pound different and the inch or two difference in size. Assuming that you are open to carrying the difference....then read on.
Now, down to the crux of why for someone like myself (a photographer), or anyone who might have to do some work on a travel machine. What do you get for the 1 pound and 1 inch penalty. First, there are more choices; there are any number of different models sold by all the big boys in the industry. Want tablet functionality? Fujitsu or IBM Want a eraser-nub instead of a (devil's invention) touchpad? IBM/Lenovo Want both? Dell/HP Want dedicated graphic processor? Sony, some Dells and IBMs .....and it just goes on. Also, virtually all of this class of machines have a "media-base" designed for them. What does that do and why do I want it, you ask? It's like a little slim dock that you snap your machine into that usually holds an optical drive and gives you a bunch of port and stuff. Sometimes they will have even more features on them, but they are usually very cheap, since the computers they were designed to support went out of production. The one I got more my IBM ThinkPad X41 cost $15 on eBay.
The thing to remember on these is that are they cheap, but but not built like a cheap $300 dollar machine, but like a $3000 machine since that's what they sold for 2-3 years ago. And not only that, but they were designed to take every imaginable accessory which are usually easy to find as well. The last thing is, remember that these are supported by the "big boys" and sold to huge corporations that expected the support to be perfect. Just go onto the Lenovo, Dell or HP support site and look around. Compare that to the Asus, Acer and even Dell's support for their consumer line and see the difference.
Next time; the other stuff that I end up carrying around.
However, that being said; there's still "stuff" and lots of it. The one inescapable reality of the digital age is that those photographs are computer files and have to be handled in a computer eventually. Although, you don't really NEED a computer other than the one you have at home as your digital darkroom, there are a lot of advantages to having another (smaller) computer that you can take with you.... wherever. In our case this last month, we really didn't have much choice but to take a laptop with us to Alaska and BC since we were going to be gone for 2 weeks and expected to take a couple of thousand images. This gave me a place to dump the pictures, look at them (delete the half that were bad) and my wife to check her email and post to her Blog that allowed folks to keep up with what we were doing. Beside, this fed into one of my other hobbies and allowed me to have a good reason to own another computer!
So, what are the needs of this computer and how do you fit something like this into the grand scheme of frugality? Obviously, this machine needs to be relatively small and light with decent storage and enough graphic capability so that you aren't waiting around for images to render just in the viewer! At this point it lets off, most of the "Netbooks" that are so popular. You might be tempted buy them since they are so cheap and popular Walmart even sells them. First of all, let me go on my little netbook rant for just a minute (or 10)and I'll be better....I promise.
They are not $300! Only the really low end (is there such a thing when the entire class is low end?) ones are that price. That means, if you really want to pay that much, you get, the least amount of RAM (absolutely critical for us Windows people) and a small, cheap hard drive or even smaller SSD. And this is not to mention the 85% size that is typical for the class and the "piece" keyboard that is also typical of the class and the invention of Satan, the touchpad.... that is typical of the class. Everything about them screams cheap! It's like buying a new trailer house; it's new, but it's a trailer house.
Now to the real technical issues other than my personal ones. They mostly run on the Atom processor, which is Intel-speak for their stripped-down, low-powered (consumption and ability) mobile-CPU that is basically good for email (which is really what these things are designed for) and some web-surfing, although I really wouldn't stream too much video that's a bigger file than YouTube. Secondly, they typically either have a VERY small SSD or a relatively small and slow HDD and a sub-10" low resolution screen (but it's in that COOL wide-screen aspect ratio so they can put a big "Wide-Screen" sticker on it....like anybody is going to put 2 spreadsheets side-by-side on one of these things). Oh, the really cheap ones usually come with some sort of Linux on it. I did say that they are cheaply built didn't I? Soon they are going to look like the computer version of the AMC Pacer or the Clinton Presidential Library!
So, what to do? We could buy the more expensive (read nicer) ones with better spec and keyboard, like the Dell or HP, loaded with actual Windows and bump up the RAM..... and get the bigger HDD. Don't forget to buy the external optical drive for $80-120 so you can load things that aren't downloadable since most folks who buy them don't know how to share and map a drive from another machine over a network. At this point you will have realized that you are bumping up against the $500 price-point, Walmart doesn't sell this version and it's still...just a netbook!
Now, don't get me wrong; there are people who they will be perfectly happy with them. If you are somebody that just want to use it to keep in touch while out at the local Starbucks and absolutely won't do anything more than email and some light web-surfing; knock yourself out! That's why they are small and fun colored! They will look "stylish" as they ride in your cool-colored bag along with the miniature dog.
So, what about the rest of us who might actually do some work on our travel machine? Well; if we are well-heeled, or childless, or one of the 18% of college grads who got a job last year; then you run down to an actual computer store (read- NOT Best Buy), buy a ThinkPad X301, Sony (impossible to remember combination of letters & numbers) or Apple MacBook Air, and call it a day! You'll have a state-of-the-art, do-everything cool computer that you won't be embarrassed to have next your iPhone!
For the rest of us, there is the vast (relatively) untapped world of corporate hand-me-downs; otherwise know as "off-lease" machines! When I look through these things (usually on eBay), I feel like Captain Kirk among that episodes, interestingly-colored women! (I digress) Anyway....I'll wait till a future Post to talk about that segment of the computer market and get back to what will work for a "travel" machine and why.
Notebook computers are roughly divided up in classes, by weight, function, and size (not always directly correllated to weight). The class we are interested in is the "sub-notebook"- typically meaning that the machine would weight less then 5 pounds (usually closer to 3), have screens less then 14" (usually closer to 12"), and 1 built-in drive (the hard disk drive). There are some exception to this, but these are the general parameters. So, what is so special about these machines that make them the best target?
First of all, we want to look for "corporate" machines; that means computers sold by the "big boys" (IBM/Lenovo-ThinkPads, Dell- Latitudes not Inspirons, HP and some Toshibas) in large numbers directly to large wholesalers that you've never heard of, or directly to the big companies that use them. Typically, they are not actually sold at all, but are leased on a 1 to 3 year cycle, which fits neatly with the warranty life of the machines. The warrantees goes out, the machine goes away. Mostly, these big companies uses "thin-and-lights" (5 pounds, 14-15" screen, 2 drives- HDD & Optical), but they do use the sub-notebooks for specific applications. So every few year, literally thousands of these machines, "hit the streets", they've been replaced by new ones and some company has been PAID to take them away or they've be returned to the leasing arm of the wholesaler. At that point, many of them hit eBay and the rest of the "secondary" market. So, on a regular basis, you can find 2 to 3 year old machines (lots of the same model and spec), selling on eBay for a cheap price (far below what the original price was). Remember, they've already been paid for once, and they didn't cost the company what that same machine would have cost you anyway since they either bought or leased them by the thousands! So, you end up with machine that originally cost somewhere between $2000 to $3000 per unit (retail of course), selling for something between $200-300. That's right: 10% OF THE ORIGINAL PRICE!!! I know this well, I worked in IT for a number of years and one of my jobs was to buy computers by the hundreds....every year.
OK, so let's assume that I've convinced you, from the dollar standpoint anyway of why you should buy one of these "driven only on Sunday by Grandma" computers. What does this have to do with why they are a better deal than a netbook? First of all, pretty much, most any REAL computer 2-3 year old computer will out-perform a new netbook. Secondly, I've shown you that they can quite often be had for less than the price of even the cheapest netbook. So, the only real barrier is if you really can't handle the less than 1 pound different and the inch or two difference in size. Assuming that you are open to carrying the difference....then read on.
Now, down to the crux of why for someone like myself (a photographer), or anyone who might have to do some work on a travel machine. What do you get for the 1 pound and 1 inch penalty. First, there are more choices; there are any number of different models sold by all the big boys in the industry. Want tablet functionality? Fujitsu or IBM Want a eraser-nub instead of a (devil's invention) touchpad? IBM/Lenovo Want both? Dell/HP Want dedicated graphic processor? Sony, some Dells and IBMs .....and it just goes on. Also, virtually all of this class of machines have a "media-base" designed for them. What does that do and why do I want it, you ask? It's like a little slim dock that you snap your machine into that usually holds an optical drive and gives you a bunch of port and stuff. Sometimes they will have even more features on them, but they are usually very cheap, since the computers they were designed to support went out of production. The one I got more my IBM ThinkPad X41 cost $15 on eBay.
The thing to remember on these is that are they cheap, but but not built like a cheap $300 dollar machine, but like a $3000 machine since that's what they sold for 2-3 years ago. And not only that, but they were designed to take every imaginable accessory which are usually easy to find as well. The last thing is, remember that these are supported by the "big boys" and sold to huge corporations that expected the support to be perfect. Just go onto the Lenovo, Dell or HP support site and look around. Compare that to the Asus, Acer and even Dell's support for their consumer line and see the difference.
Next time; the other stuff that I end up carrying around.
Monday, July 13, 2009
"Window of Opportunity" and The Nikon D200
So, why the upgrade in such a (relatively) short amount of time? Here-in lies many of the issues when applying upgrading technology to frugality. It's all about taking advantage of relatively small "windows of opportunity" and jumping through them when that opportunity presents itself.
Putting aside the technical reasons (I'll get to that later) as to why I'd want to upgrade a perfectly good camera that had just proven itself on an extended trip where it shot over 1800 images, let look at the fundamental realities of market, price, and product life cycles.
You should all know by now that I rarely buy new on most anything, but especially on items that have a short life cycle (relatively speaking), like electronics. And in today's camera world, the digital SLR is rapidly moving from the 1960-70, piece of mechanical (with some electronics) art that represented an "investment", which was expected to last decades (if not a life-time) with periodic adjustment etc. (much like buying and owning a Mercedes or Rolls Royce). Instead, they are headed the other direction, given it's increasing electronic nature more toward computers. You know, "Moore's Law", dropping prices, and $300 laptops being sold at Walmart. Don't believe me, look at the dramatically shortened product replacement cycles of the top manufacturers (Nikon & Canon), even for their "top-of-the-line" professional cameras! It's INSANE! It took Nikon around 4 years or so to come out with the titular replacement for the D100 in the D200, whereas the product that replaced that camera, the D300 came out in half the time! What this does, is to constantly create obsolescence before the camera ever breaks! My D200's shutter is rated at around 150,000 acuations.....it has a little over 4000 on it.
So, what this does for guys like me who love the newest and greatest, but can't afford, or refuse to pay retail (the D200 was $1800, 3 years ago), is to create those much sought-after "windows of opportunity". There are always those, who are willing to, or simple because a few thousand dollars is irrelevent to them, to pay the current going rate for the latest and greatest. So, about 3 years ago, somebody paid somewhere around $1800 for my D200 and about $250 for the MB-D200 battery/vertical grip for it, shot few images on it in 3 years than I did on my D70 in the last 2 months. And ultimately sold it to the person who I bought it from, for (probably) somewhat less than the $580 that I paid for it!
The tricky part to playing this game is this. Kenny Rogers! Meaning; knowing "when to hold them, and when to fold them". So how do you do that? I always keep an eye on my equipment. No; I don't mean my actual equipment, but what "my equipment" is doing in the market place, while at the same time any equipment that I might be interested in upgrading to. So, while I was seeing that the asking price on my D70 on Craig's List was still around the $300-400 range, that I had originally paid (a good thing), the selling price on eBay was dropping to somewhere in the $200-300 range (a bad thing). Usually, eBay's prices are a little bit ahead of where Craig's List is, so that meant that if I wanted to get my money back out of the D70, I had a little bit of time to get my camera sold (summer is a great time for cameras for obvious reason). The second half of that equation is that I was seeing the price of D200s dropping like the proverbial rock. The selling price was inconsistent over a wide range, meaning that it was the beginning of a major adjustment on market price, so I should be able to find something at a really good price....if I was patient. The price on them seemed to run anywhere from $800 all the way down to around 600 or so.
If you saw what I did with the D70 in terms of selling it as a package (from the last post), you'll know that I ended up spending a little more on it ($90 in the form of 2 good, but inexpensive lenses) and sold it for $550. This turn out to be only $130 less (minus the $90) than what I was able to get the D200 for, complete with the vertical battery/grip! In fact the cash outlay will end up being less than that when you take into consideration that I still have the "after-market" battery/grip from the D70, an extra battery, and IR remote yet to sell off! So, how the heck did I get that D200 so cheap!?! The whole story is enough for another post, but the short story is: look for poorly written ads that discourage other buyers from bidding.
In the end, it's not just about upgrading to a camera with "professional" build quality and features as well as a significant upgrade in resolution. But it's really more that the OPPORTUNITY presented itself due to a convergence of market conditions (introduction of the D300 and D700) causing a bunch of people to dump perfectly good (4000 shutter acuations!!!) D200s for a ridiculous price while at the same time still allowing me to sell my D70 for a good price. The reality is that for a "Frugal Propellerhead", if those conditions had not of present themselves, I wouldn't have upgraded and still be a happy owner of a D70.
Putting aside the technical reasons (I'll get to that later) as to why I'd want to upgrade a perfectly good camera that had just proven itself on an extended trip where it shot over 1800 images, let look at the fundamental realities of market, price, and product life cycles.
You should all know by now that I rarely buy new on most anything, but especially on items that have a short life cycle (relatively speaking), like electronics. And in today's camera world, the digital SLR is rapidly moving from the 1960-70, piece of mechanical (with some electronics) art that represented an "investment", which was expected to last decades (if not a life-time) with periodic adjustment etc. (much like buying and owning a Mercedes or Rolls Royce). Instead, they are headed the other direction, given it's increasing electronic nature more toward computers. You know, "Moore's Law", dropping prices, and $300 laptops being sold at Walmart. Don't believe me, look at the dramatically shortened product replacement cycles of the top manufacturers (Nikon & Canon), even for their "top-of-the-line" professional cameras! It's INSANE! It took Nikon around 4 years or so to come out with the titular replacement for the D100 in the D200, whereas the product that replaced that camera, the D300 came out in half the time! What this does, is to constantly create obsolescence before the camera ever breaks! My D200's shutter is rated at around 150,000 acuations.....it has a little over 4000 on it.
So, what this does for guys like me who love the newest and greatest, but can't afford, or refuse to pay retail (the D200 was $1800, 3 years ago), is to create those much sought-after "windows of opportunity". There are always those, who are willing to, or simple because a few thousand dollars is irrelevent to them, to pay the current going rate for the latest and greatest. So, about 3 years ago, somebody paid somewhere around $1800 for my D200 and about $250 for the MB-D200 battery/vertical grip for it, shot few images on it in 3 years than I did on my D70 in the last 2 months. And ultimately sold it to the person who I bought it from, for (probably) somewhat less than the $580 that I paid for it!
The tricky part to playing this game is this. Kenny Rogers! Meaning; knowing "when to hold them, and when to fold them". So how do you do that? I always keep an eye on my equipment. No; I don't mean my actual equipment, but what "my equipment" is doing in the market place, while at the same time any equipment that I might be interested in upgrading to. So, while I was seeing that the asking price on my D70 on Craig's List was still around the $300-400 range, that I had originally paid (a good thing), the selling price on eBay was dropping to somewhere in the $200-300 range (a bad thing). Usually, eBay's prices are a little bit ahead of where Craig's List is, so that meant that if I wanted to get my money back out of the D70, I had a little bit of time to get my camera sold (summer is a great time for cameras for obvious reason). The second half of that equation is that I was seeing the price of D200s dropping like the proverbial rock. The selling price was inconsistent over a wide range, meaning that it was the beginning of a major adjustment on market price, so I should be able to find something at a really good price....if I was patient. The price on them seemed to run anywhere from $800 all the way down to around 600 or so.
If you saw what I did with the D70 in terms of selling it as a package (from the last post), you'll know that I ended up spending a little more on it ($90 in the form of 2 good, but inexpensive lenses) and sold it for $550. This turn out to be only $130 less (minus the $90) than what I was able to get the D200 for, complete with the vertical battery/grip! In fact the cash outlay will end up being less than that when you take into consideration that I still have the "after-market" battery/grip from the D70, an extra battery, and IR remote yet to sell off! So, how the heck did I get that D200 so cheap!?! The whole story is enough for another post, but the short story is: look for poorly written ads that discourage other buyers from bidding.
In the end, it's not just about upgrading to a camera with "professional" build quality and features as well as a significant upgrade in resolution. But it's really more that the OPPORTUNITY presented itself due to a convergence of market conditions (introduction of the D300 and D700) causing a bunch of people to dump perfectly good (4000 shutter acuations!!!) D200s for a ridiculous price while at the same time still allowing me to sell my D70 for a good price. The reality is that for a "Frugal Propellerhead", if those conditions had not of present themselves, I wouldn't have upgraded and still be a happy owner of a D70.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Really Nice Digital Age Progression
I guess other than if it could have happened before our trip to Alaska instead of after, my DSLR upgrade couldn't have gone smoother. As I was saying in the last post, I really liked my Nikon D70 and felt like it did a great job for the year and a half that I had it. I would certainly recommend it to anyone who is (or would like to be) a serious photographer as a first DSLR. It took nice pictures pretty much every time I held up my end of the bargain. However, it went to a new home today, and not only the transaction (locally through Craig's List), but my progression in it's use went well.
It was a great camera for me at that time since I was in the process of learning what the difference (in a photographic sense) was between an SLR and a DSLR. It's main attributes being that it was competent at virtually anything, didn't cost too much, allowed me to get started in one of the 2 "big time" DSLR systems (Nikon), and was able to retain enough value that I got out of it, what I paid for it. I can't tell you how HUGE that is in today's world of break-neck technological upgrades making things obsolete in short order.
As far the the nuts and bolts are concerned, I ended up getting the money out of it that I put into it, which is not something you can say very ofter regarding electronics! After studying Craig's List for a few days, I came to the realization that a lot of people are upgrading and selling DSLRs. The bulk of them are Canons and Nikons (as the retail sales numbers would indicate). What happens in these sales is that they show up with a very terse ad, with either one very poor picture or no picture at all, and no lens. That is what I think is the killer....NO LENS! Basically, the clientel that you are marketing your product to is someone who is serious enough to buy a DSLR, however not some one willing to run out and pay full retail (in neighborhood of $400-800) for an entry level camera with lens. The reason someone is looking on Craig's List instead of going to Best Buy is that they would prefer to save a couple of hundred dollars, so when you present that person with a camera (which might be very good), but then they have to run out and spend possibly several more hundred dollars to buy a lens; that's just not very smart salesmanship! However, if you give them a "package" that's "turn-key", that have a fixed figure that is a KNOW quantity. Even if this figure is relatively high, they KNOW for a fact that they can run out with that camera and take pictures....RIGHT NOW....without spending one more dime!
So what was my solution, to this issue? As you know from my previous posts, I love my Nikon 18-200mm VR lens and built my "system" around it. I ran out (figuratively since I did this on eBay) and bought 2 complementary lenses that would do a good job on that camera and allow me to sell it as a package. One was a Quantaray 28-80mm/f3.5-5.6 zoom that covers a 35mm eq. of 42-120mm, and the other was a Quantaray 70-300mm/f4.0-5.6 zoom that covers a 35mm eq. of 105-450mm. So this person knew they'd be able to take their "new" camera out and shoot pictures of everything from indoor party-pics to a kid's sporting event. I spent a fews extra days to find those lenses at a reasonable price, have them shipped and they did exactly as I intended. Within 1 day of my listing the ad, a teacher (oddly enough) from the other side of Dallas drove over and bought it from me. I believe they were instrumental in the sale going quickly and well and they paid for themselves.
And so this little extra bit of "due dilligence" has enabled me to get everything I could (in a financial sense) out of the D70 and allow me to pay for my upgrade to the D200 with a minimum of extra cash to fund the difference. Can I just say right now that: I Love the D200!!! It's "pro" build quality is evident immediately on picking it up. Since it's been here for a couple of days while I was selling the D70, I've been able to compare the differences between the 2 side-by-side, and it's not close. I really liked the D70 and it did it's job for my transition into DSLRs as well as taking excellent pictures, but it just doesn't have the same feel. It's like trying to compare our Honda Civic with the BMW M5 that I once owned. One is utilitarian and the other is....well.....special.
Next time- the D200.
It was a great camera for me at that time since I was in the process of learning what the difference (in a photographic sense) was between an SLR and a DSLR. It's main attributes being that it was competent at virtually anything, didn't cost too much, allowed me to get started in one of the 2 "big time" DSLR systems (Nikon), and was able to retain enough value that I got out of it, what I paid for it. I can't tell you how HUGE that is in today's world of break-neck technological upgrades making things obsolete in short order.
As far the the nuts and bolts are concerned, I ended up getting the money out of it that I put into it, which is not something you can say very ofter regarding electronics! After studying Craig's List for a few days, I came to the realization that a lot of people are upgrading and selling DSLRs. The bulk of them are Canons and Nikons (as the retail sales numbers would indicate). What happens in these sales is that they show up with a very terse ad, with either one very poor picture or no picture at all, and no lens. That is what I think is the killer....NO LENS! Basically, the clientel that you are marketing your product to is someone who is serious enough to buy a DSLR, however not some one willing to run out and pay full retail (in neighborhood of $400-800) for an entry level camera with lens. The reason someone is looking on Craig's List instead of going to Best Buy is that they would prefer to save a couple of hundred dollars, so when you present that person with a camera (which might be very good), but then they have to run out and spend possibly several more hundred dollars to buy a lens; that's just not very smart salesmanship! However, if you give them a "package" that's "turn-key", that have a fixed figure that is a KNOW quantity. Even if this figure is relatively high, they KNOW for a fact that they can run out with that camera and take pictures....RIGHT NOW....without spending one more dime!
So what was my solution, to this issue? As you know from my previous posts, I love my Nikon 18-200mm VR lens and built my "system" around it. I ran out (figuratively since I did this on eBay) and bought 2 complementary lenses that would do a good job on that camera and allow me to sell it as a package. One was a Quantaray 28-80mm/f3.5-5.6 zoom that covers a 35mm eq. of 42-120mm, and the other was a Quantaray 70-300mm/f4.0-5.6 zoom that covers a 35mm eq. of 105-450mm. So this person knew they'd be able to take their "new" camera out and shoot pictures of everything from indoor party-pics to a kid's sporting event. I spent a fews extra days to find those lenses at a reasonable price, have them shipped and they did exactly as I intended. Within 1 day of my listing the ad, a teacher (oddly enough) from the other side of Dallas drove over and bought it from me. I believe they were instrumental in the sale going quickly and well and they paid for themselves.
And so this little extra bit of "due dilligence" has enabled me to get everything I could (in a financial sense) out of the D70 and allow me to pay for my upgrade to the D200 with a minimum of extra cash to fund the difference. Can I just say right now that: I Love the D200!!! It's "pro" build quality is evident immediately on picking it up. Since it's been here for a couple of days while I was selling the D70, I've been able to compare the differences between the 2 side-by-side, and it's not close. I really liked the D70 and it did it's job for my transition into DSLRs as well as taking excellent pictures, but it just doesn't have the same feel. It's like trying to compare our Honda Civic with the BMW M5 that I once owned. One is utilitarian and the other is....well.....special.
Next time- the D200.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
The Process of Handling Digital Media
Today, I'll take a break from talking about the equipment (mostly), and concentrate on what I've established so far as "my process" of handling all this digital media that I've accumulated. I decided to write about this subject since it's something that rears it's ugly head at all of us and the modern world of digital media.
It all started a few years ago when Camille decided it'd be a great idea if we were able to put all our CDs in one place; namely an iPod. So, magically, Santa brought her one that Christmas and Santa was able to spend virtually the entire holiday ripping our library of 400-500 CDs into her laptop to sync with that iPod! Santa: he's a great guy. That has been one of the best things we ever did since, every time we leave for a trip, instead of laboriously going through the CDs and pulling out 20 or so (never the right ones), we have all of them with us. And we don't have to worry about doing something stupid like leaving an entire CD folder (24) of them on the roof of our car as we drive off from seeing our neice at college in Madison, WI! Almost as good as having all the music is the fact that it can be put into "playlists" and then you don't have to run off the road scrolling through the menu.
As a matter-of-fact, the iPod thing has been so great, we now have 3 (Camille has 2, 30Gb ones, and I have a newer 80Gb "Classic" one). Camille has 2 so she can keep our music library on one and experiment with podcasting on the other at school. They are identical with the exception of the fact that one is black and the other white so she can tell them apart. I have some music on mine, but it's mostly a mobile data storage device. On our trip to Alaska, it was great in that I was able to double up on it's function as both a personal music device on the plane as well as the picture file backup to the laptop that the camera's memory cards were dumped into. It was perfect for that! In fact; these days we are so iPod-centric that we have a dock for our main A/V system so when people come over, we can just start a playlist, in the office we have a Logitech speaker-dock that is portable with it's own battery (10 hours), and Camille has a Sony radio with a dock as well! I even have a smaller Logitech speaker-dock in my classroom too.
Wow, that sounds like a lot of equipment and doesn't sound too "frugal", does it. Here's where the frugality comes in. With the exception of Camille's 30Gb one, none of the other devices were bought at retail or even "on sale". Both of the other 2 iPods were bought used off of local Craig's List. Her white one as an "older/non-current" model that costs $100, mine was current, but it came right after the big iPhone migration when LOTS of folks were replacing their virtually new iPods with those. It was $165. I bought the really nice Logitech dock/speaker "refurbished" on ebay for less than a third of retail ($50 vs. $200) and the other smaller Logitech was after Christmas clearance from Walmart for $16! The home theater dock was one of those eBay "Hong Kong Specials" that costs about $25 after shipping, vs. the DLO or Griffen dock that you pay $159 for at Best Buy. For the life of me, I can't understand why, otherwise intelligent people would pay retail for this kind of stuff. Electronics are the perfect products to buy used since people are conditioned to having the latest and greatest. Just because it's not "the latest" doesn't mean that it's not any good any more.
Now that I'm done with my iPod segment, what exactly do I do with the rest of this media? Actually, I'm in an in between stage. Ultimately, I understand that I will have to either put a file server or a Network Attached Storage device on my system. So right now, all I have is a bunch of random USB 2.0 portable HDDs from drives that I've salvaged after upgrading a laptop and adding a cheap or "free-after-rebate" case. Those are great for temporary storage and moving things, but certainly can't be considered long-term solutions. What I do have is a home-built desktop that functions as my main media workstation. It has a pair of 160Gb, 7200rpm drives in it, where I use one as the main drive and the other as a file backup. Yeah, I know; precarious; but hey, at least they are on a salvaged APC Smart-UPS!
So yes, I do back up my important files (as well as my "client" files). I'll get to my "clients" in another post. One of my summer projects burn DVD backups over all my important files. Although my HDDs are good "server rated" units and they don't have many hours on them, you never know.
At some point in the fall, I will start the process of doing a network storage solution, but right now, during the summer, photography is so much more immediate. Speaking of; the D200 arrived yesterday and it was a classic case of the good and bad of eBay. I'll devote an entire post to the new baby after it's first real "shakedown" cruise and I know more about it. Surfice to say that the look, heft and feel of it is wholely "professional" and I love it!
It all started a few years ago when Camille decided it'd be a great idea if we were able to put all our CDs in one place; namely an iPod. So, magically, Santa brought her one that Christmas and Santa was able to spend virtually the entire holiday ripping our library of 400-500 CDs into her laptop to sync with that iPod! Santa: he's a great guy. That has been one of the best things we ever did since, every time we leave for a trip, instead of laboriously going through the CDs and pulling out 20 or so (never the right ones), we have all of them with us. And we don't have to worry about doing something stupid like leaving an entire CD folder (24) of them on the roof of our car as we drive off from seeing our neice at college in Madison, WI! Almost as good as having all the music is the fact that it can be put into "playlists" and then you don't have to run off the road scrolling through the menu.
As a matter-of-fact, the iPod thing has been so great, we now have 3 (Camille has 2, 30Gb ones, and I have a newer 80Gb "Classic" one). Camille has 2 so she can keep our music library on one and experiment with podcasting on the other at school. They are identical with the exception of the fact that one is black and the other white so she can tell them apart. I have some music on mine, but it's mostly a mobile data storage device. On our trip to Alaska, it was great in that I was able to double up on it's function as both a personal music device on the plane as well as the picture file backup to the laptop that the camera's memory cards were dumped into. It was perfect for that! In fact; these days we are so iPod-centric that we have a dock for our main A/V system so when people come over, we can just start a playlist, in the office we have a Logitech speaker-dock that is portable with it's own battery (10 hours), and Camille has a Sony radio with a dock as well! I even have a smaller Logitech speaker-dock in my classroom too.
Wow, that sounds like a lot of equipment and doesn't sound too "frugal", does it. Here's where the frugality comes in. With the exception of Camille's 30Gb one, none of the other devices were bought at retail or even "on sale". Both of the other 2 iPods were bought used off of local Craig's List. Her white one as an "older/non-current" model that costs $100, mine was current, but it came right after the big iPhone migration when LOTS of folks were replacing their virtually new iPods with those. It was $165. I bought the really nice Logitech dock/speaker "refurbished" on ebay for less than a third of retail ($50 vs. $200) and the other smaller Logitech was after Christmas clearance from Walmart for $16! The home theater dock was one of those eBay "Hong Kong Specials" that costs about $25 after shipping, vs. the DLO or Griffen dock that you pay $159 for at Best Buy. For the life of me, I can't understand why, otherwise intelligent people would pay retail for this kind of stuff. Electronics are the perfect products to buy used since people are conditioned to having the latest and greatest. Just because it's not "the latest" doesn't mean that it's not any good any more.
Now that I'm done with my iPod segment, what exactly do I do with the rest of this media? Actually, I'm in an in between stage. Ultimately, I understand that I will have to either put a file server or a Network Attached Storage device on my system. So right now, all I have is a bunch of random USB 2.0 portable HDDs from drives that I've salvaged after upgrading a laptop and adding a cheap or "free-after-rebate" case. Those are great for temporary storage and moving things, but certainly can't be considered long-term solutions. What I do have is a home-built desktop that functions as my main media workstation. It has a pair of 160Gb, 7200rpm drives in it, where I use one as the main drive and the other as a file backup. Yeah, I know; precarious; but hey, at least they are on a salvaged APC Smart-UPS!
So yes, I do back up my important files (as well as my "client" files). I'll get to my "clients" in another post. One of my summer projects burn DVD backups over all my important files. Although my HDDs are good "server rated" units and they don't have many hours on them, you never know.
At some point in the fall, I will start the process of doing a network storage solution, but right now, during the summer, photography is so much more immediate. Speaking of; the D200 arrived yesterday and it was a classic case of the good and bad of eBay. I'll devote an entire post to the new baby after it's first real "shakedown" cruise and I know more about it. Surfice to say that the look, heft and feel of it is wholely "professional" and I love it!
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Living the Fairy Tale: Life with a Nikon D70
Where I left off last post was that I had finally rectified my mis-steps into the world of "Super-Zooms" and had bought myself a D70 with a Nikon 18-200mm/f3.5-5.6 VR lens attached. I've had this camera for over a year now and have shot literally thousands of images with it. It has taken lots of kid pictures from the "spur-of-the-moment" to the family portraits that we've had printed out or put in our annual calendars that get sent out to everyone. It has also gone on vacations to Sea World, Harlingen and Alaska/British Columbia. And indeed, I can say unequevically, it's been a great camera for the money! $350 was money well spent (in fact you can get almost as much for it today as I spent over a year ago). Also, the "experts" were pretty much right on when they said that 6mp is basically enough resolution for most cases.
I've accumulated several accessories for it that are great "bang-for-the-buck" items. One is the flash. Apparently, either Ritz Cameras is going under or they are replacing a flash that Sunpak OEM'd for them, because all manner of people are selling new, dedicated for Nikon iTTL flash, CHEAP! I doubt I really have to tell anyone that you start buying Nikon, Canon or for that matter Olympus branded accessories, it's going to run into a lot of money. And further more, anyone who's has used the little dinky "pop-up" flash on consumer DSLRs can tell you; they are better than not having one, but not by much! They work after a fashion, but give "red-eye", terrible lighting and don't have much range. So it's common knowlege among photographers that you really need a shoe-flash that has bounce capability. The issue is that Nikon's current iTTL flash system is very good and quite sophisticated, but they start at $200+! So after some looking around, I saw that my old standby, Sunpak has a couple of models that will work with this system. Unfortunately, the model (PZ-40x II) that has good power and a bounce head was something like $150! After patiently waiting for my research to bear fruit (read, watching eBay religiously), I started seeing the Quantaray (Ritz Camera house brand) labeled Sunpak flash in question pop up ranging from $50-$100. Naturally, I waited till I could snag one at $50 and it's been a very nice flash indeed. Yesterday, I was able to get a generic (read, random Chinese factory) "soft-box" attachment for it at Micro Center for $11, so I'm really happy that I'll at long last be ready to do "fill-flash" when we do our family pictures at the Dallas Arboretum this fall! Now I'm working on adding remote flashes to the equation, but that's another topic.
Any other D70 success stories? I'm glad you asked; there is of course the 70-300mm/f4-5.6 ED Nikkor lens that I bought for our trip to Alaska. Remember that one of the reasons that I bought an older D70 instead of a newer D40 was that it had the built-in focusing motor? Anyway, that paided off when I decided that I really needed something longer than the 200mm (350mm, 35mm eg.) that was the max on my main lens. Besides, it tends to be a little soft at that focal length anyway (especially wide open). What I'd have bought if I were a rich man (sounds like a play, doesn't it) is either the Nikon 80-400mm (120-600mm, 35mm eq.) VR (very rich) or the Tokina 80-400mm (slightly less rich), but since neither one fit my budget (or lack there-of), I had to find something that would do. So I started digging around on the internet (otherwise called research) and found that the Nikon zooms that top out at 300mm (450mm, 35mm eq.) could be had fairly cheap (sub-$200) and they were really pretty nice performers. The issue was that there were 3 versions! The current "G" model, the older "D" model and the "ED" model. Different reviewers had differing opinions, but it looked like the current model faired the worse in performance and build-quality, while the oldest "D" model was the nicest build and had a built-in tripod mount (inconsequential for me) but hardest to find. However, the "ED" model had the best performance, was pretty easy to find and had some of the special ED glass elements in it's design so I snagged on off of eBay for about $150.
So, how'd it perform? It was a little slow focusing at times, but it allowed me to get some wildlife close-ups that I would otherwise not have gotten. So it was definitely worth the money (not that much) and the planning ahead to be able to have the option of using that lens. Score one for the little guys! Now, some day, I'll really want to get one of the 80-400mm zooms, but not any time soon, and in fact it may fall behind a 12-24mm (18-36mm, 35mm eq.) lens. That one could be a money-maker as hired out to real estate folks wanting interior shots that make rooms look huge!
Of course, there are some other little things like, buying filters on eBay which is much cheaper. I was able to get a Hoya Circular Polarizer for my main lens before we left for Alaska for $35 or so. I used that puppy a lot! I picked up a monopod at Walmart for $15 and didn't use it at all. In fact, I so rarely used it that I forgot it somewhere on our trip! Rechargeable Nimh AAs that you can get anywhere are awesome. I get the 2300-2400mah Eveready ones that you can find anywhere.
So is that the end of this post? Not on your life...read on.
I love the D70, but it has some warts that can't be resolved without getting into a different camera. That being said, if you aren't like me (and not many people are), then they may not be an issue to you and you'll happily go on this this camera for years to come.
One (and there are many) of the odd things about me is that I'd rather shoot pictures with a bigger/heavy camera and if it has buttons for vertical (portrait orientation) shutter release and control, so much the better. I find these "grips" (called motor drives or winders in the old days) help me to be steadier, especially with a bigger lens. And since I shoot the majority of my images of the kids, "portrait" or vertical mode is a pretty common form of shooting for me. This was a major deficiency of the D70 as far as I'm concerned; Nikon never developed a grip for it and since the model wasn't new, finding an after-market version was difficult and expensive. I did find a NOS (new old stock) one on eBay that wasn't too bad (and it's been nice to have 2 batteries in the machine), but it's kind of a kludge. You see, Nikon didn't just NOT design a vertical grip for it, but there was no electronic or mechanical means to couple exposure control or shutter release from it. The only "remote" release that it was designed for is an infrared controller. So these after-market grips did some of what I wanted, namely add mass and extra battery time, but in order to use the vertical release, you had to add a little fiber-optic cable from the grip that (sort of) attached to the IR receiver on the outside of the camera! Not really a very elegant solution. Anyway, it was nice to be able to put either 2 regular batteries, or 6 AA Nimh in it and go for days of shooting.
The other thing was that although, 6mp is OK for most things, I just spent 2 weeks in Alaska and BC which amounted to lots of images of SPECTACULAR scenery and I really would have liked more resolution. This is not something you can even sort of fix, without replacing the camera.
So, in the interest of gathering no moss, I've started looking at ways I can get my money out of my D70 and into a D200 (why D200? I'll get to that in another post later). In fact, I've already started that process. I noticed that there's a bunch of folks trying to upgrade their DSLRs on Craig's List. You can tell it's an upgrade situation when there's no lens sold with the camera. And in the low end of the market, those are hard to sell since beginners don't want to buy a camera and be confronted with the need to figure out what lens to buy for it! And since I just want to upgrade my camera and want to keep my lens, I'm in an awkward position. So, I've been on eBay yet again, and bought not one, but two lens to sell with the D70. Both of them are Quantaray (not great, but useable) lens, one a 28-80mm that basically would be the normal, and a 70-300mm that is typically a first step up for most people. Now I can sell the thing as a "ready to go" package for more money.
One thing I have learned about being frugal but trying to keep up technologically is that you have to keep moving and learn when to get rid of something, because holding on to something just a little too long can mean you can't get anything for it at all! You watch the people treading water and it doesn't look like they are doing anything, but under the surface is where all the action is!
I've accumulated several accessories for it that are great "bang-for-the-buck" items. One is the flash. Apparently, either Ritz Cameras is going under or they are replacing a flash that Sunpak OEM'd for them, because all manner of people are selling new, dedicated for Nikon iTTL flash, CHEAP! I doubt I really have to tell anyone that you start buying Nikon, Canon or for that matter Olympus branded accessories, it's going to run into a lot of money. And further more, anyone who's has used the little dinky "pop-up" flash on consumer DSLRs can tell you; they are better than not having one, but not by much! They work after a fashion, but give "red-eye", terrible lighting and don't have much range. So it's common knowlege among photographers that you really need a shoe-flash that has bounce capability. The issue is that Nikon's current iTTL flash system is very good and quite sophisticated, but they start at $200+! So after some looking around, I saw that my old standby, Sunpak has a couple of models that will work with this system. Unfortunately, the model (PZ-40x II) that has good power and a bounce head was something like $150! After patiently waiting for my research to bear fruit (read, watching eBay religiously), I started seeing the Quantaray (Ritz Camera house brand) labeled Sunpak flash in question pop up ranging from $50-$100. Naturally, I waited till I could snag one at $50 and it's been a very nice flash indeed. Yesterday, I was able to get a generic (read, random Chinese factory) "soft-box" attachment for it at Micro Center for $11, so I'm really happy that I'll at long last be ready to do "fill-flash" when we do our family pictures at the Dallas Arboretum this fall! Now I'm working on adding remote flashes to the equation, but that's another topic.
Any other D70 success stories? I'm glad you asked; there is of course the 70-300mm/f4-5.6 ED Nikkor lens that I bought for our trip to Alaska. Remember that one of the reasons that I bought an older D70 instead of a newer D40 was that it had the built-in focusing motor? Anyway, that paided off when I decided that I really needed something longer than the 200mm (350mm, 35mm eg.) that was the max on my main lens. Besides, it tends to be a little soft at that focal length anyway (especially wide open). What I'd have bought if I were a rich man (sounds like a play, doesn't it) is either the Nikon 80-400mm (120-600mm, 35mm eq.) VR (very rich) or the Tokina 80-400mm (slightly less rich), but since neither one fit my budget (or lack there-of), I had to find something that would do. So I started digging around on the internet (otherwise called research) and found that the Nikon zooms that top out at 300mm (450mm, 35mm eq.) could be had fairly cheap (sub-$200) and they were really pretty nice performers. The issue was that there were 3 versions! The current "G" model, the older "D" model and the "ED" model. Different reviewers had differing opinions, but it looked like the current model faired the worse in performance and build-quality, while the oldest "D" model was the nicest build and had a built-in tripod mount (inconsequential for me) but hardest to find. However, the "ED" model had the best performance, was pretty easy to find and had some of the special ED glass elements in it's design so I snagged on off of eBay for about $150.
So, how'd it perform? It was a little slow focusing at times, but it allowed me to get some wildlife close-ups that I would otherwise not have gotten. So it was definitely worth the money (not that much) and the planning ahead to be able to have the option of using that lens. Score one for the little guys! Now, some day, I'll really want to get one of the 80-400mm zooms, but not any time soon, and in fact it may fall behind a 12-24mm (18-36mm, 35mm eq.) lens. That one could be a money-maker as hired out to real estate folks wanting interior shots that make rooms look huge!
Of course, there are some other little things like, buying filters on eBay which is much cheaper. I was able to get a Hoya Circular Polarizer for my main lens before we left for Alaska for $35 or so. I used that puppy a lot! I picked up a monopod at Walmart for $15 and didn't use it at all. In fact, I so rarely used it that I forgot it somewhere on our trip! Rechargeable Nimh AAs that you can get anywhere are awesome. I get the 2300-2400mah Eveready ones that you can find anywhere.
So is that the end of this post? Not on your life...read on.
I love the D70, but it has some warts that can't be resolved without getting into a different camera. That being said, if you aren't like me (and not many people are), then they may not be an issue to you and you'll happily go on this this camera for years to come.
One (and there are many) of the odd things about me is that I'd rather shoot pictures with a bigger/heavy camera and if it has buttons for vertical (portrait orientation) shutter release and control, so much the better. I find these "grips" (called motor drives or winders in the old days) help me to be steadier, especially with a bigger lens. And since I shoot the majority of my images of the kids, "portrait" or vertical mode is a pretty common form of shooting for me. This was a major deficiency of the D70 as far as I'm concerned; Nikon never developed a grip for it and since the model wasn't new, finding an after-market version was difficult and expensive. I did find a NOS (new old stock) one on eBay that wasn't too bad (and it's been nice to have 2 batteries in the machine), but it's kind of a kludge. You see, Nikon didn't just NOT design a vertical grip for it, but there was no electronic or mechanical means to couple exposure control or shutter release from it. The only "remote" release that it was designed for is an infrared controller. So these after-market grips did some of what I wanted, namely add mass and extra battery time, but in order to use the vertical release, you had to add a little fiber-optic cable from the grip that (sort of) attached to the IR receiver on the outside of the camera! Not really a very elegant solution. Anyway, it was nice to be able to put either 2 regular batteries, or 6 AA Nimh in it and go for days of shooting.
The other thing was that although, 6mp is OK for most things, I just spent 2 weeks in Alaska and BC which amounted to lots of images of SPECTACULAR scenery and I really would have liked more resolution. This is not something you can even sort of fix, without replacing the camera.
So, in the interest of gathering no moss, I've started looking at ways I can get my money out of my D70 and into a D200 (why D200? I'll get to that in another post later). In fact, I've already started that process. I noticed that there's a bunch of folks trying to upgrade their DSLRs on Craig's List. You can tell it's an upgrade situation when there's no lens sold with the camera. And in the low end of the market, those are hard to sell since beginners don't want to buy a camera and be confronted with the need to figure out what lens to buy for it! And since I just want to upgrade my camera and want to keep my lens, I'm in an awkward position. So, I've been on eBay yet again, and bought not one, but two lens to sell with the D70. Both of them are Quantaray (not great, but useable) lens, one a 28-80mm that basically would be the normal, and a 70-300mm that is typically a first step up for most people. Now I can sell the thing as a "ready to go" package for more money.
One thing I have learned about being frugal but trying to keep up technologically is that you have to keep moving and learn when to get rid of something, because holding on to something just a little too long can mean you can't get anything for it at all! You watch the people treading water and it doesn't look like they are doing anything, but under the surface is where all the action is!
Saturday, July 4, 2009
The Next Step- DSLR
Last time was all about mistakes, one mistake after another. They say that the only good thing about mistakes is what you learn from them. Well; here's what I learned!
At this point, I drove my wife crazy over then next month or so, constantly researching, watching eBay and Craig's List. During all that research, I came across 2 sites that were a great help: http://www.kenrockwell.com and http://www.bythom.com (more about them later). All that research led me to the following conclusions:
This left the 2 big dogs: Nikon and Canon. Nikon was old-school and Canon was a little more cutting edge. After reading quite a bit, I decided that I (mostly) agreed with Ken Rockwell (the Thom Hogan site backs up most of what he has to say, but in a more even-handed way) and that Nikon wasn't the end-all-be-all of resolution, but tended to operate faster and more accurately when speed is of the essence. Personally I think this is due to the half-a-century of mostly making equipment for professional photographers where it was more important to get the picture under any circumstances vs. getting the best technical picture. I'll have to warn any readers that reading Ken Rockwell isn't for everyone; he's HIGHLY opinionated and kind of irritating, but for me, he was basically right on the money. Remember, my original development in photography was photo-journalism.
OK, so now we have a brand, so which model. Well that turned out to be a backward question (remember, glass first). What I really wanted to do was to minimize the possibility of dust on the sensor and the number one way to stop that is to minimize lens changes. At that time, Nikon and only Nikon had a "do everything" lens with VR; the 18-200mm/f3.5-5.6 (27-350mm 35mm equivelent!). That's a lens that goes wide to long-telephoto with decent speed and the ability to be hand-held like a lens 2 stops or more faster! This lens alone made the Nikon/Canon decision for me (of course, Canon has since come out with their own version). After lots of looking, it looked like I would be able for buy one used in Exc or Mint condition for $600-700 making my camera decision a lot easier. $1000 minus $600-700, leave $300-400.
During that time, what $300 to 400 could buy you in a Nikon was either a new/almost-new D40, a used D70 or D100. All 3 camera used the same 6mp sensor. The D40 was the newest (read newest firmware & other electronics), smallest and lightest. The D70 was older/heavier design, but has similar electronics as the D40 (meaning the iTTL flash system). The D100 was Nikon's semi-professional offering that was a little long-in-the-tooth with older electronics. But since it was designed as a "semi-professional" offering, it had some features I really liked such as the ability to add a virtical grip that housed an extra battery. Not only was this a huge plus in taking portraits, but the added mass is a real bonus when using longer lenses in helping to dampen camera shake. This is were frugalness comes into play. I had to plan ahead to be frugal! I had read that some of the older Nikon mount lenses wouldn't work on the D40 since it's size and weight advantage came from eliminating the onboard auto-focus motor, so REQUIRED the newer lenses. This would eliminated the huge used market of older Nikon auto-focus lenses out there that are fairly cheap at this point.
So, a combination of finances, research, planned frugality and specification led me to the D70. I did indeed buy the 18-200/f3.5-5.6 VR lens which is every bit as good (for my needs) as advertised and almost never comes off the camera! I did in fact take advantage of the built-in focus motor on the D70 by finding a good deal on an older 70-300/f4-5.6 ED lens that allowed me to take some amazing wildlife pictures on our trip to Alaska a few weeks ago in June!
So it all worked out, but am I living the fairy tale "happily-ever-after" with the D70? ....or is there more in living with that camera....which is what I'll get into next time.
- I was perfectly happy with the Nikon glass. Whenever I did my part the picture looked great.
- I LOVED VR (vibration reduction).
- I HATED the all-in-one format of camera, especially in a "compact" style that crammed everything together and made handling compromises.
- I couldn't care less about the "scene modes" that they put in consumer cameras. Whenever I used them (which wasn't very often), I spent most of the time overriding this and that on them.
At this point, I drove my wife crazy over then next month or so, constantly researching, watching eBay and Craig's List. During all that research, I came across 2 sites that were a great help: http://www.kenrockwell.com and http://www.bythom.com (more about them later). All that research led me to the following conclusions:
- It's all about the sensor size. When you get a big DSLR sized sensor (typically APS-C or otherwise known as DX size), megapixels aren't all that important and 6Mp is about all you need for typical picture taking and printing up to around 11 x 14. There are of course bigger sensors like the FX (full 35mm film size, or even bigger like on the Hasselblad digital back), but those are priced for people who make money with their equipment and ridiculously rich people.
- Glass is the important thing, not the electronics (body) since that's going to be out of date within a few years anyway. Good lenses will outlive several camera bodies and so, unless you want to lose lots of money replacing your lenses, you'd better love the system you buy into. Because, it's just like the old days (with few exceptions), the different mounts aren't interchangeable.
- The hated enemy of digital SLRs is dust!
This left the 2 big dogs: Nikon and Canon. Nikon was old-school and Canon was a little more cutting edge. After reading quite a bit, I decided that I (mostly) agreed with Ken Rockwell (the Thom Hogan site backs up most of what he has to say, but in a more even-handed way) and that Nikon wasn't the end-all-be-all of resolution, but tended to operate faster and more accurately when speed is of the essence. Personally I think this is due to the half-a-century of mostly making equipment for professional photographers where it was more important to get the picture under any circumstances vs. getting the best technical picture. I'll have to warn any readers that reading Ken Rockwell isn't for everyone; he's HIGHLY opinionated and kind of irritating, but for me, he was basically right on the money. Remember, my original development in photography was photo-journalism.
OK, so now we have a brand, so which model. Well that turned out to be a backward question (remember, glass first). What I really wanted to do was to minimize the possibility of dust on the sensor and the number one way to stop that is to minimize lens changes. At that time, Nikon and only Nikon had a "do everything" lens with VR; the 18-200mm/f3.5-5.6 (27-350mm 35mm equivelent!). That's a lens that goes wide to long-telephoto with decent speed and the ability to be hand-held like a lens 2 stops or more faster! This lens alone made the Nikon/Canon decision for me (of course, Canon has since come out with their own version). After lots of looking, it looked like I would be able for buy one used in Exc or Mint condition for $600-700 making my camera decision a lot easier. $1000 minus $600-700, leave $300-400.
During that time, what $300 to 400 could buy you in a Nikon was either a new/almost-new D40, a used D70 or D100. All 3 camera used the same 6mp sensor. The D40 was the newest (read newest firmware & other electronics), smallest and lightest. The D70 was older/heavier design, but has similar electronics as the D40 (meaning the iTTL flash system). The D100 was Nikon's semi-professional offering that was a little long-in-the-tooth with older electronics. But since it was designed as a "semi-professional" offering, it had some features I really liked such as the ability to add a virtical grip that housed an extra battery. Not only was this a huge plus in taking portraits, but the added mass is a real bonus when using longer lenses in helping to dampen camera shake. This is were frugalness comes into play. I had to plan ahead to be frugal! I had read that some of the older Nikon mount lenses wouldn't work on the D40 since it's size and weight advantage came from eliminating the onboard auto-focus motor, so REQUIRED the newer lenses. This would eliminated the huge used market of older Nikon auto-focus lenses out there that are fairly cheap at this point.
So, a combination of finances, research, planned frugality and specification led me to the D70. I did indeed buy the 18-200/f3.5-5.6 VR lens which is every bit as good (for my needs) as advertised and almost never comes off the camera! I did in fact take advantage of the built-in focus motor on the D70 by finding a good deal on an older 70-300/f4-5.6 ED lens that allowed me to take some amazing wildlife pictures on our trip to Alaska a few weeks ago in June!
So it all worked out, but am I living the fairy tale "happily-ever-after" with the D70? ....or is there more in living with that camera....which is what I'll get into next time.
Friday, July 3, 2009
How I got into the Digital end of photography.
I guess this is as good of a time as any to do an explanation of how I got into the digital end of photography.
As long as I can remember, my dad always took pictures and at a very young age (about 6 or 7), he started teaching me how to take pictures. Of course, back in the dark ages, photography was done on VERY manual.... and in our case, VERY German cameras! My parents grew up and lived during the time of the Japanese invasion and occupation of China before and during WWII, so that should help explain their attitudes. Anyway, the camera was a leaf-shuttered Voigtlander Bessamatic. It was a "coupled, match-needle" camera with exactly one lens. A 50mm/f2.8. So I learn photography from the standpoint of having to understand light, aperture, shutter speed, film sensitivity and how it worked together. Therefore, it's not surprising that I not only use "manual" setting regularly, but have knee-jerk negative reactions to anything that's purely automated.
So, for a very long time, I carried traditional film cameras and manual focus lenses. It wasn't always like that and since I've always been a "gadgeteer": when I started buying my own equipment (with my brother's help and a part time job), I bought a Canon A-1 which as arguably the most electronically advanced camera of it's time. This camera was along with Abernathy High School's Canon AE-1 was used mostly for annual staff photography. This means the VAST majority of my photography was spontaneous photo-journalism. Understanding all this as my photographic background should explain a lot about how I see photography and camera equipment. Of course I lusted after Nikons (who didn't?) since that what "professionals" used, but absolutely couldn't imagine affording it. My best friend Eric's mom had a Nikon F with several lenses and our instructor, Milton Adams at Photography camp (how geeky can you get!) being a professional newspaper photographer used the "Holy Grail" F2s.....with Motor Drives! My brother ended up with the A-1 and I ended up making a HUGE mistake in photographic equipment, but that's another story for another time.
In the first 10 years after college when I had a real job and no family, I began building my camera system again. At this time, I was living and working in Lubbock and their was this little second-hand camera shop out on the Levelland Highway. It was run by a Sheriff's Office dispatcher and his friend who was a part-time camera repair guy. One day I went in and came across a Pentax MX with 50mm/f1.4 lens in "mint" condition. More importantly, it was much more affordable (teacher, remember?) to me than a Nikon FM (which was what I REALLY wanted) when you take into account the cost of real Nikon glass. ....and really, is there a point to buying Nikon and not putting on Nikon glass!?! A fact that is not well know is that most of the mainstream Japanese manufacturers of the late 60's, 70's and early 80's had excellent glass! They were all pretty close to the "big boys", Nikon, Canon & Minolta. Even the companies that generally specialized in the consumer end of the market such as Asahi Pentax, Olympus, Konica, Mamiya, Yashica even the lesser known such as Miranda, and Topcon. Of course the Germans were good at glass, but their camera's were over priced, and really, even the Eastern Bloc glass was very good as well, it's just that their cameras were way behind the times. In that industry, everybody copied everybody else and really in that age of pre-computer design, the Germans had already done it all and everybody else just copied it. So, my decision making due to feature set and price, came down to Olympus and Pentax. Both made excellent camera with "near-professional" features and quality, and above all else, had good glass that was cheap (because it wasn't Nikon). So over a period of about 10 years, I accumulated 2 Pentax bodies (1 Black MX and 1 Black ME Super), something like 10 Pentax SMC-M lenses, motordrives, flashes, etc.
I happily went on like this for a number of years. Around 2000, I added a digital camera; a 3.1 Megapixel, Kodak 4800. It was a very nice starter camera and I took lots off pictures. However, this camera didn't fit the bill for a "do everything" SLR replacement. And by the a few year later, I realized that the only pictures I ever did anything with was the digital ones and my great Pentax rig that took me a decade to accumulate was collecting dust. About 3 years ago, around the birth of our second child, I decided to "bite the bullet" and go completely digital. Meaning that I'd have to sell ALL the film camera equipment to fund a digital camera that would do everything I wanted. As a result of carrying around 2 bodies and 10 lenses for so many years, I decided to go "whole hog" the other direction.
At this point, I made a HUGE mistake: I bought on features and specification. I decided that I'd force myself to be less "camera-centric", by purchasing a "Super-Zoom" type of digital camera (mistake #1), that was compact, thus meaning it had a lens which had only electronic controls (mistake #2) that had the most Megapixels on the market for they type (mistake #3).The theory was good, buy something that had every concievable feature built in so I wouldn't be buying stuff, changing lenses, adding attachment etc. Great idea right? Just not even a good idea for ME and the my approach to photography and how I expect my equipment to operate.
I bought a Nikon Coolpix 8800VR. An 8 Megapixel camera with a 35-350mm (35mm equivalent) Vibration Reduction (awesome feature- I highly recommend it) lens built in, with the ability to save RAW files as well as JPEG, Nikon's newest iTTL flash exposure control, really cool swing-out view screen that has the ability to twist in virtually all directions, all built into a magnesium-alloy chassis! What's not to like....right? Little did I realize that "Super-zooms" use "consumer" camera sized sensors (read small) and 8 Megepixels make the situation much worse since that many photo-sites are crammed into the little dinky sensor just creates more noise problems when you use a ISO speed higher than 200. To exacerbate things, it turned out to be a verrrry sloooooow operating camera. I didn't research enough (imagine that), and didn't realize that this class of camera have a very small or no memory buffer at all, so every time you take a picture and the camera is writing the HUGE file to the memory card, your camera is locked-up! On top of which, since ALL lens controls were electronic in the body, it is much slower than being able to handle your own lens.
For somebody who cut their teeth on photo-journalism, it just was not a good situation. Don't get me wrong, it's a very nice camera with excellent optics and resolution; however, it was the wrong camera for ME. So it was one of those divorce type things: "It's not you...it's me".
Next time, I'll get into how I resolved this rather big photographic problem.
As long as I can remember, my dad always took pictures and at a very young age (about 6 or 7), he started teaching me how to take pictures. Of course, back in the dark ages, photography was done on VERY manual.... and in our case, VERY German cameras! My parents grew up and lived during the time of the Japanese invasion and occupation of China before and during WWII, so that should help explain their attitudes. Anyway, the camera was a leaf-shuttered Voigtlander Bessamatic. It was a "coupled, match-needle" camera with exactly one lens. A 50mm/f2.8. So I learn photography from the standpoint of having to understand light, aperture, shutter speed, film sensitivity and how it worked together. Therefore, it's not surprising that I not only use "manual" setting regularly, but have knee-jerk negative reactions to anything that's purely automated.
So, for a very long time, I carried traditional film cameras and manual focus lenses. It wasn't always like that and since I've always been a "gadgeteer": when I started buying my own equipment (with my brother's help and a part time job), I bought a Canon A-1 which as arguably the most electronically advanced camera of it's time. This camera was along with Abernathy High School's Canon AE-1 was used mostly for annual staff photography. This means the VAST majority of my photography was spontaneous photo-journalism. Understanding all this as my photographic background should explain a lot about how I see photography and camera equipment. Of course I lusted after Nikons (who didn't?) since that what "professionals" used, but absolutely couldn't imagine affording it. My best friend Eric's mom had a Nikon F with several lenses and our instructor, Milton Adams at Photography camp (how geeky can you get!) being a professional newspaper photographer used the "Holy Grail" F2s.....with Motor Drives! My brother ended up with the A-1 and I ended up making a HUGE mistake in photographic equipment, but that's another story for another time.
In the first 10 years after college when I had a real job and no family, I began building my camera system again. At this time, I was living and working in Lubbock and their was this little second-hand camera shop out on the Levelland Highway. It was run by a Sheriff's Office dispatcher and his friend who was a part-time camera repair guy. One day I went in and came across a Pentax MX with 50mm/f1.4 lens in "mint" condition. More importantly, it was much more affordable (teacher, remember?) to me than a Nikon FM (which was what I REALLY wanted) when you take into account the cost of real Nikon glass. ....and really, is there a point to buying Nikon and not putting on Nikon glass!?! A fact that is not well know is that most of the mainstream Japanese manufacturers of the late 60's, 70's and early 80's had excellent glass! They were all pretty close to the "big boys", Nikon, Canon & Minolta. Even the companies that generally specialized in the consumer end of the market such as Asahi Pentax, Olympus, Konica, Mamiya, Yashica even the lesser known such as Miranda, and Topcon. Of course the Germans were good at glass, but their camera's were over priced, and really, even the Eastern Bloc glass was very good as well, it's just that their cameras were way behind the times. In that industry, everybody copied everybody else and really in that age of pre-computer design, the Germans had already done it all and everybody else just copied it. So, my decision making due to feature set and price, came down to Olympus and Pentax. Both made excellent camera with "near-professional" features and quality, and above all else, had good glass that was cheap (because it wasn't Nikon). So over a period of about 10 years, I accumulated 2 Pentax bodies (1 Black MX and 1 Black ME Super), something like 10 Pentax SMC-M lenses, motordrives, flashes, etc.
I happily went on like this for a number of years. Around 2000, I added a digital camera; a 3.1 Megapixel, Kodak 4800. It was a very nice starter camera and I took lots off pictures. However, this camera didn't fit the bill for a "do everything" SLR replacement. And by the a few year later, I realized that the only pictures I ever did anything with was the digital ones and my great Pentax rig that took me a decade to accumulate was collecting dust. About 3 years ago, around the birth of our second child, I decided to "bite the bullet" and go completely digital. Meaning that I'd have to sell ALL the film camera equipment to fund a digital camera that would do everything I wanted. As a result of carrying around 2 bodies and 10 lenses for so many years, I decided to go "whole hog" the other direction.
At this point, I made a HUGE mistake: I bought on features and specification. I decided that I'd force myself to be less "camera-centric", by purchasing a "Super-Zoom" type of digital camera (mistake #1), that was compact, thus meaning it had a lens which had only electronic controls (mistake #2) that had the most Megapixels on the market for they type (mistake #3).The theory was good, buy something that had every concievable feature built in so I wouldn't be buying stuff, changing lenses, adding attachment etc. Great idea right? Just not even a good idea for ME and the my approach to photography and how I expect my equipment to operate.
I bought a Nikon Coolpix 8800VR. An 8 Megapixel camera with a 35-350mm (35mm equivalent) Vibration Reduction (awesome feature- I highly recommend it) lens built in, with the ability to save RAW files as well as JPEG, Nikon's newest iTTL flash exposure control, really cool swing-out view screen that has the ability to twist in virtually all directions, all built into a magnesium-alloy chassis! What's not to like....right? Little did I realize that "Super-zooms" use "consumer" camera sized sensors (read small) and 8 Megepixels make the situation much worse since that many photo-sites are crammed into the little dinky sensor just creates more noise problems when you use a ISO speed higher than 200. To exacerbate things, it turned out to be a verrrry sloooooow operating camera. I didn't research enough (imagine that), and didn't realize that this class of camera have a very small or no memory buffer at all, so every time you take a picture and the camera is writing the HUGE file to the memory card, your camera is locked-up! On top of which, since ALL lens controls were electronic in the body, it is much slower than being able to handle your own lens.
For somebody who cut their teeth on photo-journalism, it just was not a good situation. Don't get me wrong, it's a very nice camera with excellent optics and resolution; however, it was the wrong camera for ME. So it was one of those divorce type things: "It's not you...it's me".
Next time, I'll get into how I resolved this rather big photographic problem.
Video in DSLRs
I wasn't planning to write on this topic, but I had a question about this from a friend so here goes!
What's the point of having video on the DSLRs that seem to be the new "must have" feature on current models? Apparently, it's for people like my friend Rachel, who's the mother of two young children that takes on the role of family historian and wants to have video, but doesn't want to lug around a big ole video camera. Coincidentally, I just finished reading a review on the new Nikon D5000, which is the current model of the D40, D40x, D60 progression in their product line. My thought on this could just as well apply to the Canon T1i which occupies the same spot in their product line.
Basically this is the lower end of the industry's "serious" cameras; that's DSLRs (Digital Single Lens Reflex) cameras. These cameras tend to be not much more expensive than the upper end of the "consumer", "Superzoom" digital camera that people buy (within $200 or so). This allows people who are the most likely to want video to have this ability within a relatively small lighweight camera. Most folks who are more serious about photography or videography tend to want highly specilized "single purpose" cameras for their work/hobby.
The D5000 is a great example of this type of equipment, it has the ability to take casual video that is better than something like the HD Flip for example and of course gives the users the ability to take high quality still images which is what is generally of great use most of the time. Without getting into the specific abilities of this particular model, you can look at the economics of the equipment at hand. If it is a given that the person is open purchasing a DSLR for their photographic needs, they are looking at $500-600 outlay for that piece of equipment. Then throw in something that is small and has the ability to do simple vid capture such as an HD Flip for example (at $200), then you have an outlay of $700-800 and carrying around as well as learning to use 2 devices. So for less than $100 more, this profile of consumer would have the ability to capture simple video as well as high quality still imagery and far greater flexibility.
Now, if you already have a DSLR (or other camera) that is perfectly adequate, then by no mean let me talk you into changing. Just understand that these types of devices have a few limitations and that there are alternatives.
What's the point of having video on the DSLRs that seem to be the new "must have" feature on current models? Apparently, it's for people like my friend Rachel, who's the mother of two young children that takes on the role of family historian and wants to have video, but doesn't want to lug around a big ole video camera. Coincidentally, I just finished reading a review on the new Nikon D5000, which is the current model of the D40, D40x, D60 progression in their product line. My thought on this could just as well apply to the Canon T1i which occupies the same spot in their product line.
Basically this is the lower end of the industry's "serious" cameras; that's DSLRs (Digital Single Lens Reflex) cameras. These cameras tend to be not much more expensive than the upper end of the "consumer", "Superzoom" digital camera that people buy (within $200 or so). This allows people who are the most likely to want video to have this ability within a relatively small lighweight camera. Most folks who are more serious about photography or videography tend to want highly specilized "single purpose" cameras for their work/hobby.
The D5000 is a great example of this type of equipment, it has the ability to take casual video that is better than something like the HD Flip for example and of course gives the users the ability to take high quality still images which is what is generally of great use most of the time. Without getting into the specific abilities of this particular model, you can look at the economics of the equipment at hand. If it is a given that the person is open purchasing a DSLR for their photographic needs, they are looking at $500-600 outlay for that piece of equipment. Then throw in something that is small and has the ability to do simple vid capture such as an HD Flip for example (at $200), then you have an outlay of $700-800 and carrying around as well as learning to use 2 devices. So for less than $100 more, this profile of consumer would have the ability to capture simple video as well as high quality still imagery and far greater flexibility.
Now, if you already have a DSLR (or other camera) that is perfectly adequate, then by no mean let me talk you into changing. Just understand that these types of devices have a few limitations and that there are alternatives.
Frugal Propellerhead?!?
So what is it that made me a Frugal Propellerhead and what exactly is that? Basically it works like this: although I love most things technology oriented and what it does for me, I hate (actually, I pretty much will not) to pay the "going rate" for them. In fact, you can thank my friends and upbringing for this aspect of my personality.
A) I hate waste! I'm not a "greenie" per se, but I really believe in the concept. You know those pages that print out with 1 or 2 lines at the top when you send a print job of a webpage? Yeah, I keep those for scratch paper. But really, the thing that I really love to do is to save older things that are still useable and actually find a use for them. This is especially true of the electronic world where changes and "upgrades" happen so quickly that things aren't anywhere close to being worn out before they are replaced or discarded. I actually come at environmentalism from another angle; one that says that it's stupidly expensive to be wasteful.
B) Growing up, I spent lots of time with my older brother, Daniel (who's an engineer by profession as well as inclination), who thinks he can fix or modify anything.... and he can. Most of my friends growing up and in later adult life are mostly the same way. Bob, my father-in-law is a great example...there's a reason we call him "Bob-the-Builder". Between he and my friend Pat, half the furniture in our house is "home built" and not bought.
C) Life experience of working in IT, stereo/home theater and education has taught not only some skills, but the philosophy that yes indeed, you can teach yourself most anything if you keep at it. This I learned mostly from my some of my students and wife.
D) As a educator, by profession (and choice), I simply don't have the financial resources to buy the latest and coolest thing that just came out. And, interestingly enough, I found that I get far more enjoyment out of figuring a way to get what I want (meaning the outcome instead of a product), by the least $$$ (actually $ in my case) expended. I'd much rather spend the money going to, or taking the kids somewhere instead.
E) Lastly, my wife thinks (and I agree) that I'm really at least as interested in the "hunt and kill" than the actual consumption; whether that's getting what I want for the price I want on eBay or Craig's List. Not to mention, that when my parents decided to move us to the United States when I was 7, it was a givin that we'd behind a life of much higher standard of priviledge and leisure. The 2 maids and driver weren't the only thing we gave up when we moved from Hong Kong to Hallettsville, Texas in 1968! Mom didn't even know how to cook for peat sake, much less do laundry and clean house!
Next time, the transition from film photography to serious (or as serious as I get) digital photography.
A) I hate waste! I'm not a "greenie" per se, but I really believe in the concept. You know those pages that print out with 1 or 2 lines at the top when you send a print job of a webpage? Yeah, I keep those for scratch paper. But really, the thing that I really love to do is to save older things that are still useable and actually find a use for them. This is especially true of the electronic world where changes and "upgrades" happen so quickly that things aren't anywhere close to being worn out before they are replaced or discarded. I actually come at environmentalism from another angle; one that says that it's stupidly expensive to be wasteful.
B) Growing up, I spent lots of time with my older brother, Daniel (who's an engineer by profession as well as inclination), who thinks he can fix or modify anything.... and he can. Most of my friends growing up and in later adult life are mostly the same way. Bob, my father-in-law is a great example...there's a reason we call him "Bob-the-Builder". Between he and my friend Pat, half the furniture in our house is "home built" and not bought.
C) Life experience of working in IT, stereo/home theater and education has taught not only some skills, but the philosophy that yes indeed, you can teach yourself most anything if you keep at it. This I learned mostly from my some of my students and wife.
D) As a educator, by profession (and choice), I simply don't have the financial resources to buy the latest and coolest thing that just came out. And, interestingly enough, I found that I get far more enjoyment out of figuring a way to get what I want (meaning the outcome instead of a product), by the least $$$ (actually $ in my case) expended. I'd much rather spend the money going to, or taking the kids somewhere instead.
E) Lastly, my wife thinks (and I agree) that I'm really at least as interested in the "hunt and kill" than the actual consumption; whether that's getting what I want for the price I want on eBay or Craig's List. Not to mention, that when my parents decided to move us to the United States when I was 7, it was a givin that we'd behind a life of much higher standard of priviledge and leisure. The 2 maids and driver weren't the only thing we gave up when we moved from Hong Kong to Hallettsville, Texas in 1968! Mom didn't even know how to cook for peat sake, much less do laundry and clean house!
Next time, the transition from film photography to serious (or as serious as I get) digital photography.
I've been inspired!
Due to my wife's (Chen's Corner) and Jeffrey Friedl's Blogs, I've finally managed to motivate myself to give it a try. So what is a propellerhead and what is "Frugal Propellerhead" all about?
For anyone who's known me for any amount of time, you'll know that I love anything technical, thus "propellerhead". And of course, being a teacher and a father of 2 kids, the "frugal" part is pretty obvious too!
So, what are my writing topics going to be? Since my wife Camille already is doing a Blog on the family stuff, I'll concentrate most of my writing to the interests I spend most of my free-time (and I use that term loosely) doing: which are photography/camera equipment, computers, and audio/video.... mostly. Of course, it is a Blog, so I imagine that I'll ramble and get "off-topic" (read rant) as well on occasion.
Where do we start? We recently returned home from an Alaska vacation which included, a land tour, week-long cruise and a few extra days in British Columbia before we came home. The fact that it's summer, and this 2 week trip called virtually all aspects of my various hobbies into play makes it a great place to start. Obviously, there were lots of photographs and since these were digital, and in excess of 1800 files, involved carrying a notebook computer as well as other storage solutions to handle them. This had the added benefit of allowing us internet access whenever we were in port and the various parts of the trip on land!
In the next post, I'll start with the camera equipment part.
For anyone who's known me for any amount of time, you'll know that I love anything technical, thus "propellerhead". And of course, being a teacher and a father of 2 kids, the "frugal" part is pretty obvious too!
So, what are my writing topics going to be? Since my wife Camille already is doing a Blog on the family stuff, I'll concentrate most of my writing to the interests I spend most of my free-time (and I use that term loosely) doing: which are photography/camera equipment, computers, and audio/video.... mostly. Of course, it is a Blog, so I imagine that I'll ramble and get "off-topic" (read rant) as well on occasion.
Where do we start? We recently returned home from an Alaska vacation which included, a land tour, week-long cruise and a few extra days in British Columbia before we came home. The fact that it's summer, and this 2 week trip called virtually all aspects of my various hobbies into play makes it a great place to start. Obviously, there were lots of photographs and since these were digital, and in excess of 1800 files, involved carrying a notebook computer as well as other storage solutions to handle them. This had the added benefit of allowing us internet access whenever we were in port and the various parts of the trip on land!
In the next post, I'll start with the camera equipment part.
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