The Photography thread - with pictures.

[Cameraman Jenn]

[Cameraman Jenn]

sorry, don't know how I double posted that.

[Shuram Gudatetris]

Nice bee pic! (pic #7)

[Cameraman Jenn]

Thanks. I love my new bee kids. They are so cute.

[Sorus]

I'd never thought of bees as being cute, but those really are.

Heck, I didn't even know there were bee stores, though it makes sense - where else would one buy bees?

[Cameraman Jenn]

I know, honeybees ARE cute. Bumblebees are too actually. Yellow jackets and wasps... not so much so. FYI, there is a bee store on 20th Street between Mission and Valencia that is dedicated solely to all things beekeeping. It's pretty cool.

[lucimay]

<------wants to see the bees!

[Cameraman Jenn]

Whatcha dooin this weekend? Sorus, you too!

[JazFusion]

I need some photography help!

I'm in the market for a DSLR and a macro lens. And I have absolutely no idea where to begin looking. I want something that will take nice pictures, is easy to use and isn't too expensive. I don't have thousands of dollars to throw around. I want to stay in the $900-$1,000 range for both the body and the lens.

Any suggestions?

[Cameraman Jenn]

I always say Canon. Canon makes the lenses interchangeable with many models so it's a safe bet that you won't be stuck with a lens years from now. Nikon is my number two choice for stills.

[matrixman]

JazFusion, I'd go along with CMJ and say you can't go wrong with Canon. I've never used a Canon DSLR myself, but my first digital camera was a Canon Powershot. Their menu systems are consistent across their line of cameras, so I can at least vouch for their user-friendliness. I now use a Pentax DSLR (which I do like very much) but its user interface is rather more awkward than Canon's.

For specific models, I suggest the Canon EOS Rebel XS. I'm only going by prices at Canadian shops, but that model seems to be Canon's least expensive DSLR. It hovers around $550 here, so I'm guessing it could be had in the U.S. for $500. It comes bundled with a standard 18-55mm kit lens, btw. With this model, you can't opt for just the camera body. Only the higher end models give you that option. However, in checking out Nikon, I see that they do sell their D3000 as a separate body, for around $430 - which is a pretty good bargain for a DSLR!

For a dedicated macro lens, I suggest the Tamron 90mm F2.8 DI-II Macro - it's available in mounts for Canon or Nikon, so it doesn't matter which you go with. I recommend the Tamron because as a third-party manufacturer, it offers lenses of near-equivalent quality to Canon's or Nikon's own premium lenses at much lower cost. I have no experience with Tamron's products, but from both professional reviews and user feedback I've read about this 90mm lens, it appears in fact to be one of the sharpest lenses on the market for macro photography, belying its relatively low price. Here, it's around $550. Canon's own macro lens with slightly more reach and same maximum aperture - 100mm F2.8 - goes for $720 here. Nikon seems to offer a fairer deal: they have an 85mm F3.5 Macro lens for $580 here. It's just a tad shorter in focal length and slower in aperture than the Tamron, but you're still getting the Nikon name, if that's important to you.

At any rate, if you mate the Nikon D3000 body ($420) with the Tamron 90mm F2.8 macro lens ($550), it's a total of $970 before tax. Here in Canada, anyway. The Canon Rebel XS ($550) with the Tamron puts you at $1,100. Still not bad, considering you're getting a "free" kit lens with the Canon.

Hope this was helpful to you, Jaz.

Hmmm...CMJ, your bees do seem cuter than the ones I've seen around here. Maybe I just keep getting them on a bad day.

And Shuram, that is indeed a fine black cat you have. Good photo as well!

A sign of spring! Okay, it's in the park conservatory.
So I cheated a little, but still...
,

And lemurs are my new favorite photographic subject at the zoo.
I love these guys!
,

[Avatar]

Ring-tailed lemurs, the most primitive of all the primates. Nice shots MM.

--A

[Cameraman Jenn]

I shoot with the Canon Rebel that MM listed. I love it. It rocks. Gorgeous shots everyone. Now I will inundate you with more bee pics. One of the kids got caught in a spiderweb and I was going to rescue him but he freed himself. Also, if you look at the big red/orange sacks on the back legs in some of the shots, those are pollen packs that the bees have collected and brought back to the hive.
















[/img]

[matrixman]

I dunno, I feel kinda sorry for the spider that he didn't get his lunch, or dinner.

It amazes me that you can just get your very own bee hive like that. Don't get me wrong, I think that's pretty cool. But I thought you needed a license for something like that?

[Cameraman Jenn]

In some places you do need a license. Jwaneeta is frantically looking into it right now. SF is super progressive and is encouraging urban beekeeping to help bring back the huge loss of colonies which threaten our local flora.

[matrixman]

True, the crash of the bee population in some areas of the world is a worry at the back of my mind. I figure there has got to be some repercussions from that, but what I don't know.

[Cameraman Jenn]

It means a severe lack of pollination of plants in a scary way. Orchards are dying off and not producing because the bees aren't pollinating the flowers. It means a serious setback on world food growth. There are two major types of insect that pollinate all flowering plant growth, bees and butterflies. Butterflies have been disappearing for decades. Bees took a serious hit in the past five years. A SERIOUS hit. Say you have an apple tree in your yard, and no bees within ten miles. The tree does not get pollinated, no fruit is produced and no seeds with which to grow more trees. It's a very ugly vicious circle, no bees, no pollination, tree stops producing, no way to entice back the bees. This goes for every plant that flowers world wide.

[matrixman]

Yep, that sounds bad.

Even with all the technology and manpower available to humankind, we can't begin to match what bees do naturally on a mass scale.

[JazFusion]

I always say Canon. Canon makes the lenses interchangeable with many models so it's a safe bet that you won't be stuck with a lens years from now. Nikon is my number two choice for stills.

JazFusion, I'd go along with CMJ and say you can't go wrong with Canon. I've never used a Canon DSLR myself, but my first digital camera was a Canon Powershot. Their menu systems are consistent across their line of cameras, so I can at least vouch for their user-friendliness. I now use a Pentax DSLR (which I do like very much) but its user interface is rather more awkward than Canon's.

For specific models, I suggest the Canon EOS Rebel XS. I'm only going by prices at Canadian shops, but that model seems to be Canon's least expensive DSLR. It hovers around $550 here, so I'm guessing it could be had in the U.S. for $500. It comes bundled with a standard 18-55mm kit lens, btw. With this model, you can't opt for just the camera body. Only the higher end models give you that option. However, in checking out Nikon, I see that they do sell their D3000 as a separate body, for around $430 - which is a pretty good bargain for a DSLR!

For a dedicated macro lens, I suggest the Tamron 90mm F2.8 DI-II Macro - it's available in mounts for Canon or Nikon, so it doesn't matter which you go with. I recommend the Tamron because as a third-party manufacturer, it offers lenses of near-equivalent quality to Canon's or Nikon's own premium lenses at much lower cost. I have no experience with Tamron's products, but from both professional reviews and user feedback I've read about this 90mm lens, it appears in fact to be one of the sharpest lenses on the market for macro photography, belying its relatively low price. Here, it's around $550. Canon's own macro lens with slightly more reach and same maximum aperture - 100mm F2.8 - goes for $720 here. Nikon seems to offer a fairer deal: they have an 85mm F3.5 Macro lens for $580 here. It's just a tad shorter in focal length and slower in aperture than the Tamron, but you're still getting the Nikon name, if that's important to you.

At any rate, if you mate the Nikon D3000 body ($420) with the Tamron 90mm F2.8 macro lens ($550), it's a total of $970 before tax. Here in Canada, anyway. The Canon Rebel XS ($550) with the Tamron puts you at $1,100. Still not bad, considering you're getting a "free" kit lens with the Canon.

Hope this was helpful to you, Jaz.

Thank you both! That was extremely helpful, MM. I'll definitely look into what Canon has to offer.

[Worm of Despite]