Fisheye Lenses

[WDWFigment]

How about going with something completely separate?

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/515484-REG/M_Audio_9900_52278_00_MicroTrack_II_Professional.html
I don't know why but I found myself looking at these last friday at the B place. At $153 you'll get much better quality that you would never find on most in-camera Audio recording devices.

The memory card storage option makes it a breeze to edit with on the 'puter

Marlton Mom
PS I have no experience with this either....

Down the road, I could see doing this if the initial project is successful, but it’s too much to spend on an “experiment”.

Well I'm not Jeff but I've got a comment about the MF fisheye.. we've always said how the DoF is so huge that it's actually hard to mess up focus, I looked up the numbers...

At 8mm, f/3.5, the hyperfocal distance (closest distance you can focus and have infinity still be sharp) is ~3.2 ft. I just use the distance scale on the lens to set focus just past the hyperfocal distance (like 3.5 ft just to give myself a margin of error), then everything from ~1.7 ft to infinity is in focus. I just leave it on that focus point unless I need to get really close. But even at 1 ft at f/3.5, the DoF is still about 0.7 ft.. huge margin of error.

That makes me feel a lot better about this. I don’t know why I didn’t think of this before, but this is something I can easily test…I’ll just use the Tokina fisheye MF on Sarah’s D40. Now I’ve got something to do tonight!

Sound levels are like exposure levels. Your recording device has to get the level right or the result is too loud/bright or too quiet/dark. Sound levels and exposure levels can be set automatically or manually. When recording audio in auto mode, the recording device has to guess whether quiet moments are simply breaks in the conversation or whether the levels need to be increased. The result is that during quiet passages it boosts the audio level and you hear stuff like camera handling sounds and background noises become much louder. If you can override the auto adjusting of sound levels, you can pick a reasonable level for a scene and stick with it. That's not as good as being able to make adjustments during a shot, but it'll be much better than shooting in auto. Does the D7000 allow you to set audio levels? I don't know. If it does, you're probably OK and a mic would help. If it doesn't, I'd rather by a field audio recorder and record my audio separate from the video and sync up in post. You can use the mics in the audio recorder (which are worlds better than the mics in VDSLRs) or you can attach external mics to that.

This makes sense now. I will figure out whether I can turn that off.

Let me also add that I find good video to be very hard. Maybe I'm just slow witted or don't have a knack for it, but it is much harder than good photography. Then again, a National Geo story usually has a handful of people working on the photography and a simple commercial usually has a dozen or more people working on the video. A photograph generally captures a moment whereas video occurs over time. That means that you have to deal with smooth camera movements, audio, changes in light levels, flash can't help you, focus changes during the shot, etc. It may not be any more artistically challenging than photography, but it seems to be much more difficult from a technical standpoint. Oh, and you are also going to lose RAW for video (for now, for no-Red users), which means much more limited ability to fix things in post. My advice - don't make commitments to produce video until you've made a few attempts first.

I totally agree with you regarding good video. My think is that since this will be tripod-mounted, non-moving subject, it shouldn’t be THAT bad. But I haven’t made any commitments because I really have no idea. I’m just guessing and could be totally wrong.

Here are some samples from my Nikon 10-24.


http://www.dpreview.com/galleries/4949354431/albums/10-24-hawaii/slideshow

For best results click the Full Screen link and do not click Enlarge Small Images.

BTW - I am probably returning the D7000 and sticking with the D90. IQ is pretty much the same between the two, even at ISO 3200. IMO the D7000 is not worth the upgrade. The D7000 has more buttons, dials, and some new features, but in some respects I actually prefer the D90.

I do like that Nikon 10-24, but it’s probably not worth it for the difference in cost. I don’t need the higher end of that range, so I’ll probably stick with the Tokina. I wish there were a 10mm f/2.8 prime!

You forgot "Pro-Optic" which is what I got for about $260 at Adorama- "Samyang" is just a more fun word to say. And I like it a lot- I think it's very good for the price- which sounds kind of bad of course but I'm not saying it like it's a crappy lens I'm settling for- it's just a fisheye is kind of a specialty thing and a little bit goes a long way etc. etc. so in the past when I have had a more expensive fisheye in the bag I always had a nagging feeling of cost vs. use and feeling like I never got that much out of it- KWIM? So I think for longevity I will have a good/cheap fisheye longer than I had a really good / expensive one if that makes any sense.

As for manual focus it's absolutely no problem at all. I hardly ever even touch the focus ring unless I want to get really close to something. The rest of the time it's just sitting a little bit back from infinity and everything in every frame is in focus.



I picked it out because it was the cheapest B&H had I could find with a hot-shoe attachment. I will defer to Mark for all technical microphone talk since I have no dang idea.



Yeah- the filter thing plus the whole big front element sticking out there waiting to get scratched or smashed was just kind of a negative. Plus there seemed to be a lot of really weird distortion across the range- more so than with any of the other UWA's I have had. Really I can't explain everything I didn't like so much- all I know is I used it for a week and just did not get a good vibe so I sent it back to B&H for a refund. YMMV.

As for the 10-24 I am really pleased with it. I don't feel like I'm missing anything not having the 8-10mm. Not only does it take filters- it takes 77mm filters which is what I already have so I didn't have to buy anything else. There are some great examples on Flickr also.

http://www.flickr.com/groups/nikon10-24mm/




Okay- Ew-

Just sayin.

My initial reaction to the star filter was the same thing. However, I think I can get a couple decent shots with it, and have some fun. For $10, it’s a throwaway purchase. Oh well.

This Sigma 8-16mm decision has been torturing me. Part of me wants to buy it, test it out, and return it if I don’t like it, but I don’t know. It’s a bit pricey new. I think I might be better buying used, and reselling if I don’t like it.
I got my Tokina fisheye for <$300, so I really didn’t feel too bad about buying such a niche lens (I know I could sell if for quite a bit more than that, though). I use the fisheye way too much. Hoping to cut back on that, this trip.

Is it really that awful for you? Have you considered sending it in for servicing?


Probably not, since you'd be going for a special look when using it. I bought a cross screen filter in my early DSLR days, and while I almost never use it (ie, I think I have no keepers with it since my first WDW+DSLR trip, and even then, it was only one or two), it's nice to know it's there.


I believe Samyang is the original manufacturer of the lens (along with a bunch of other currently-available and upcoming manual focus lenses), so it's probably best to refer to it as a Samyang for consistency...

And a little bit may go a long way for some people, but I haven't had that problem. Neither have you, judging by the ratio of Samyang to non-Samyang photos on Flickr lately, eh?

The Tokina fisheye isn’t terrible, nor is there anything wrong with it, it’s just that I don’t “feel it” with that lens. On multiple occasions, I’ve bumped the zoom ring and it’s wound up at 11mm or 12mm and because of that, shots have been screwed up (I have an odd way of using the fisheye that causes this to occur). The zoom does me no good, so I’d rather have a prime. Plus, 8mm would be nice. I probably rag on the Tokina way too much. It’s a nice lens, just not what I want.

 

[foolishmortal]

wrong thread, sorry