Carter N's Photography Advice Thread.

[DubLuv]

what is the difference between the 18-50 and 18-55 and what would company would your recommend? should i stick to canon?

[Calan]

what is the difference between the 18-50 and 18-55 and what would company would your recommend? should i stick to canon?

Usually cameras come with a 18-55mm lens - are you sure yours is 18-50mm? I have never heard of a camera coming with a 18-50mm lens, but if that's what yours came with then you would not see much of a difference between a 18-55mm and a 18-50mm (the 18-55 would let you zoom in a little bit more).

Either way, your lens is probably great to start out with for a lot of things, including car photography.

If you really want to spend some money on a new lens, I've heard many people say that a prime lens (prime means it doesn't let you zoom in/out at all) is the first lens you should buy because they're fairly cheap, but you get a lot of the benefits of a more expensive lens (low f-stop, sharper images, etc). For example, you can get a 50mm f/1.8 prime lens for $100-150. A zoom lens with a fairly low f-stop would cost you well over $1000 - for example, on an earlier page, Carter said this:

The type of lens you use has a lot to do with your style to be honest. If you want artistic a more artistic feel then perhaps something with a wide aperture would suit you. If you want highly detailed, sharp images, a prime lens may be the way to go. If I had to choose only one lens to use it would be a Canon 24-70 2.8L USM

That lens he mentioned is about $1400, so I would imagine it's a little pricey for you (certainly is too expensive for me).

Like Carter said though, there's not really one lens that would be best. See if you can find some pictures on forums or elsewhere where the photographer says what lens/equipment he used - that might help you see what benefits you'd get from one lens vs. another.

[DubLuv]

the lens that came with it was infact a 18-55, had to look at the lens to make sure
thanks for taking the time to explain and since my budget is pretty low i'm probably gonna go to the local camera shop and check out the prime lenses. as for the brand what do you guys prefer?

[CasperH]

Very nice thread, I'll be following this and sharing my thoughts as a photographer as well when I think it's appropriate.

[CasperH]

the lens that came with it was infact a 18-55, had to look at the lens to make sure
thanks for taking the time to explain and since my budget is pretty low i'm probably gonna go to the local camera shop and check out the prime lenses. as for the brand what do you guys prefer?

Buy the 50mm Canon F1.8 II. It should go around $100 and it's the best bucks I've ever spent.

[Carter N]

Buy the 50mm Canon F1.8 II. It should go around $100 and it's the best bucks I've ever spent.

agreed. it's referred to as the nifty fifty and IMO every canon shooter should have it.

[Bracknaphobia]

Hey Carter, my good friend Christof told me you were the man to come to for photo advice, critiques. This thread has been great so far!

Here are couple of my shots. Shot with a Nikon D3000.

[MaxBell]

Ok, I was looking through some of these photos. What is it that gives it that color pop, but still dark look? And what lens for that kinda depth of field?

http://www.stanceworks.com/2011/08/w...ets-sw-family/

[Travis]

^^ Not sure on the editing process but the lens used was an 85mm 1.2 or 1.4

[Kielan]

^^ not sure on the editing process but the lens used was an 85mm 1.2 or 1.4

85 1.2

[StatusError]

Any tips on these would be great, mainly Post Processing as i'm never sure i get it right.


Toyota Celica Gen 7 by Douglas Burns, on Flickr


Toyota Celica Gen 7 by Douglas Burns, on Flickr


Toyota Celica Gen 7 by Douglas Burns, on Flickr

I used a Canon 350d
2x PT-04 triggers (cheapy ebay)
2x Yonghuo flashes (cheapy)
Used lightroom to sort things out.

But now i've seen light painting i really want to give it a try.

I would love to be able to take pictures like this but i just don't know how during the day. I'm not confident in PP to do stuff like this, nor do i have the weather.




Is light painting used on them?

Cheers buddy! any tips greatly appreciated.

[CasperH]

Any tips on these would be great, mainly Post Processing as i'm never sure i get it right.

I used a Canon 350d
2x PT-04 triggers (cheapy ebay)
2x Yonghuo flashes (cheapy)
Used lightroom to sort things out.

But now i've seen light painting i really want to give it a try.

I would love to be able to take pictures like this but i just don't know how during the day. I'm not confident in PP to do stuff like this, nor do i have the weather.

Is light painting used on them?

Cheers buddy! any tips greatly appreciated.

Ok, on the Celica: if you work with flashes, try to get the exposure right for the background (how you want it to look) and light up the subject with flash (or with light painting). If you work with a tripod you can also try to combine multiple exposures. By creating a lighter background, the car comes lose out of the background.

The Continental was shot in natural light for as far as I can see, I think during the so-called golden hour. The two hours a day you have around sunrise and sunset. It also proves you don't need all the fancy stuff: it's shot using a Canon T2i and a 70-300 that cost around 150 bucks. Aperture was F5.0, shutterspeed 1/1250

The Golf / Rabbit was shot using strobist techniques, I can't read the exact data out of the picture but since the depth of field is huge, I'm guessing F16 or higher. Which means slow shutterspeeds and probably the use of a tripod and multiple exposures since there's almost no complete white or black in the picture.

[CasperH]

By the way, Carter, if this is hijacking your thread: let me know and I'll quit giving advice!

[michealis]

untitled-1-16 by Micheal Evans, on Flickr

This is my first attempt at using slave flashes. I seem to be struggling with the placement, here I had one inline with the B pillar at the same height as the roofline and another by the left hand headlight around windscreen wiper level (small tripod.)

I was wondering if you could advise where to place the flashes to get more of the car illuminated? That and do you use any kind of softbox or diffuser, or just point the flash at the car?

[eLKuRLy]

Multi shot, single strobe lighting
This style of lighting is great. You can have minimal equipment and still create a shot that appears as if you had an entire camera shop at your disposal. The downside to single flash, composite photography is that you need to be decently skilled in photoshop to make these shots work and photoshop alone is pretty expensive if you are purchasing it


Riverside | Explored #123 by Carter N, on Flickr

For a shot like this I am working with one strobe. I place the camera on a tripod (you should always do this when possible) and take multiple frames with the flash in different locations. In this particular shot I took 3 shots, car front, driver's side front, driver's side rear. Then I took one final exposure for the background. I combined those 4 shots into a composite in photoshop and blended all light and shadows.

This is an excellent thread! was looking for info on auto photography. Was wondering how did u take the final exposure for the background?
Also any tips on taking pics like engine bays, etc. (settings: like shooting in aperture mode?) during the day. For example, at a car show, meets, etc. where you don't have control over the lighting.
TIA