My favorite memorial statue in Mt. Hope Cemetery. Split toned in Lightroom 2.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 55mm, 1/60 at f/5.0, ISO 200.

Weeds in Buckland Park. Made with Matt’s Soft Focus Level 2 preset in Lightroom 2.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 30mm, 1/200 at f/10.0, ISO 200.

Looking up inside hoppers in an abandoned building by the railroad tracks in West Henrietta.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 35mm, 1/250 @ f/10.0, ISO 1600. RAW image processed in Lightroom.

Hi everyone, welcome to my blog and thanks for looking. Here you will learn the truth about dpreview.com, well some of it anyway. I don’t have the time to point out everything that’s wrong with that site and some of the idiots in the forums there. If you think I’m making up anything here please feel free to go to dpreview and see the truth for yourself.

So, to get started about dpreview I’ll say that it is one of the biggest fanboy sites on the web. In this case, fanboys (including fangirls) are people who are in love with a certain brand or model of something and will promote and defend it way beyond what any sane person would do.

Some or all of them are probably paid by a manufacturer to be a shill (viral marketer) for their products and to attack and insult anyone who doesn’t say the absolute nicest things about that brand or model. Where dpreview comes in is that they allow and encourage the fanboys and will ban people who speak out against them.

Dpreview makes a lot of money from the manufacturers of the camera gear they review through advertising dollars and they also get free camera gear on loan from the manufacturers. Their so-called reviews are blatant examples of bias and favoritism and I’m sure it’s based on which manufacturer pays them the most or loans them the most gear. I wouldn’t be surprised if they take bribes too.

The dpreview forums are run by gangs of fanboys who viciously attack and try to silence anyone who doesn’t agree with them or blindly praise the brand or model they love and are promoting and defending, and especially Canon products, which are plagued with many inexcusable defects by the way. I think that dpreview may even pay some of the fanboys to help promote and defend certain products or to stir up controversy so that there are more hits on the forums, which generates more clicks for more advertising dollars. Either that or some (or all) of the fanboys could just be regular employees at dpreview.

Dpreview has a big monetary interest in promoting and defending brands and models so that interest in those brands and models is high and more people may go to dpreview and either click on the reviews or go to the forums. Of course people love to see a train wreck, which is just what the dpreview forums are, and the fanboys always seem to outnumber anyone who speaks realistically about brands or models and it makes it appear that the fanboys are always right.

The fanboys work hard to silence anyone who doesn’t agree that their beloved brand or model is the very best and dpreview will ban people who don’t submit and agree. dpreview also selectively deletes posts that reveal the truth about fanboys and camera gear.

If you go to the dpreview forums take a good look at how the fanboys argue endlessly that their beloved brand or model is perfect and way better than all other brands or models and they will use the most inane and nitpicky things to bolster their maniacal, idiotic claims. Fan comes from the word fanatic and it certainly applies to some of the people on dpreview, and especially in the Canon DSLR and lens forums.

If anyone says anything negative about a Canon product, even when it’s true, they are attacked as though they deliberately insulted the fanboy’s mother or kids. I think some of those fanboys value their cameras or lenses more than their mother or kids and that at least some of them sleep with their cameras or lenses and I really don’t mean sleep.

Fanboys must have very low self esteem to depend on owning or lusting after a camera or lens to make themselves feel like they’re important. Some of those people virtually live on forums, promoting and defending their beloved brand or model and rarely if ever take any pictures. They think that just owning or lusting after a certain brand or model will automatically make them a great and world renowned photographer.

If or when they actually do post pictures, the pictures are almost always junk, or mediocre at best. Many of them go on and on about how perfect and awesome a certain brand or model is but the next day they’re often asking which lens they should buy or which settings they should use for their vacation in Disneyland. Anyone who doesn’t know which lens or settings to use for certain things isn’t in a position to promote or defend any brand or model.

The dpreview forums are full of wannabe photographers whose self esteem is based on being in a brand or model cult. They have the cult, mob, gang mentality and dpreview encourages it by letting them stay and banning people who speak out about it.

dpreview is a joke, and I’m apparently not the only one who is figuring that out. Amazon bought dpreview in May, 2007. At that time dpreview had over 7 million unique visitors per month. Last month (OCT. 2009) they only had about 1.3 million even though new, popular cameras (to fanboys) were announced or released, which usually generates more hits on any camera review website. dpreview deliberately lies on their site and they still say that they get 7 million unique visitors every month.

They say: “These days the site is one of, if not the, premium digital photography site with an audience of seven million unique visitors a month..”

Here is where they say it:

http://www.dpreview.com/misc/about.asp

See here for the real facts:

http://www.crunchbase.com/company/dpreview

I wonder if Jeff Bezos regrets the purchase?

It won’t surprise me if dpreview or Amazon do everything they can to get this blog removed. If it disappears, you’ll know why, and if it does I’ll just start it somewhere else on the web.

NAE AGM photo shoot, originally uploaded by UrBen Images.

I decided to include a informative illustration of my typical photography set-up when capturing events.

Canon 100mm f2.8 for portraits and interesting macro photography.
This is my favourite lens in terms of image quality and it I like how it often encourages me to look for the small details. I often capture something a little different with this personal favourite and when used with the MR-14EX it produces excellent results.

Canon 50mm f1.8 for natural light photography, I find this prime lens is a lot easier to work with when capturing an event as with the 100mm I can miss a lot of the moments/action. It is so light and small, it is perfect as a second camera round my neck so I can choose between the Canon 100mm and 50mm as quickly as possible.

So to clarify, I have the Canon 100mm on the 30D and the Canon 50mm on the 400D. Both with me at all times.

I also use the Nikon D90 with a Sigma 10-20mm for dramatic wide-angle photography. This can be the most fun lens to use however the distortion around the edges can be a bit weird for photos such as group shots. I think lots of straight lines tend to work well in these photos. I also have the option to film some interesting video snippets which can be useful when producing a highlights/promotional video type production.

I have decided to also carry a few light stands and a shoot through umbrella in case I decide to use numerous flashes. There may not be time or it simply isn’t practical and I might decide to simply use the Canon 30D with the MR-14EX ring flash and 100mm f2.8 and the 50mm f1.8 with natural light. I like to have the options though.

A view of my backyard in High Dynamic Range.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 18mm, ISO 400. Built from three exposures in Lightroom using the LR/Enfuse plugin.

This waterfall is part of Norton Brook. Brewer’s Landing Trail near Seth Green Drive.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 53mm, 1/60 @ f/5.6, ISO 200. RAW image processed in Lightroom.

Abandoned playground near the Rochester Psych Center.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 44mm, 1/125 @ f/8.0, ISO 200. RAW image processed in Lightroom.

Abandoned playground near the Rochester Psych Center.

Modified with Matt’s Surreal Edgy Effect 4 in Lightroom. Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 35mm, 1/80 @ f/7.1, ISO 200.

Photographed by Piotr Pawłowski

old photo, but still expressive.

– License

Berlin. Ot, taka wycieczka na zakończenie lata.

Photographed by The_Smiths

No, I haven’t taken up a tobacco habit, but I did buy my first Zippo yesterday. To be honest, I’ve always wanted one, despite not ever having a good reason to own one. There’s just something sexy about the way it feels in your hand and the click it makes when you flip it open and shut. Not to mention that it produces FIRE, which is one of man’s fundamental and critical technological masteries. Me being the techno-fetishist, how could I NOT want one?

Strobist Info: A single 580exII camera left at 1/32 power and a piece of foam board camera right. The Zippo is sitting on a piece of glass on my dining room able.

– License

This weekend’s game marked our third ESPN night game in a row. There was also a 90% chance of rain. Thankfully, I had the foresight to have my dad send his rain gear to me so I could borrow it for the game. It really, really came in handy though it was a little on the large side. The radar looked pretty ominous and at 45 minutes before game time there was a lightning warning so everyone was shuffled off the field. I went out to shoot some photos of the stands. More after the jump.

I didn’t make any worthwile photos in the pouring rain, but this is what the stairs at the bottom of the student section looked like.

Now thoroughly wet, I went back inside to wait until closer to game time. It wasn’t long after that until they let the players out on to the field. I went back out, this time with my 300, but the wind was so strong that it was blowing water inside of my lens hood and onto the front element of my lens, clouding up everything. I had no choice but to run inside and wipe it off. After I got it clean, I went and asked for an extra arm band to extend the length of my lens hood a bit, which solved my problem. The team was getting ready to go out on the field and I noticed a very unhappy Uga near the goal line in the rain. I don’t usually shoot photos of him, but this time I had to.

The team did their usual run out thing. I didn’t have a wide lens this week because of a lack of bodies and the rain, so I backed up and tried to make something with my 70-200. It worked out alright and the lens compression made for something interesting.

About that time I noticed some very wet and formerly painted fans. They deserved a frame.

The game finally started. I managed to make a few good frames this week. I’ll add a description when I deem necessary.

Caleb king decided he would start running again this year.

Rennie on a nice tackle.

AJ Green caught a nice TD pass. I got totally blocked on the actually pass, which was a pisser because I had a really nice frame lined up. The same thing happened last week too…

Kyle Williams on a kick return.

Joe cox looks back before a play.

Cox gets some nice blocking from his line and Clint Bowling.

Tavarres King makes a nice run after catch. I liked the guy, who was blocked by Michael Moore, flying through the air. Adds a lot to the frame.

Nice tackle on a kick off.

Justin Houston goes after Danny Sullivan.

AJ Green makes a nice bobbling catch.

Danny Sullivan makes a hand off.

Reshad Jones hit Jovon Williams so hard the ball came flying out of his hands. Reshad keeps coming with with the crushing blows every week.

Montez Robhinson barely holds on to Dimitri Nance.

Justin Houston with the pressure on Danny Sullivan.

I tried to make a picture of Mark Richt. Not sure if I failed or not.

Joe Cox behind the line.

Cox makes a pass.

Munzenmaier lays just short of the goal line.

Baccari Rambo with a nice tackle.

Geno Atkins with a big hit behind the line on Dimitri Nance.

Fans yell at during the game. I tried to keep the Arizona QB in there for some depth.

Houston, everywhere this game, goes after Dimitri Nance.

AJ Green makes a nasty, nasty falling catch. I wish I had had a better angle on this.

Set up by AJ’s catch, Blair Walsh came in and kicked the game winning field goal. Before the play I set up right on the line of scrimmage because I knew he would jube towards the Georgia bench.

Christina Swoope and the rest of the drum majors were dancing after the victory. Except for the guy on the right, anyway, he looks distracted.

During all the celebrations the team got up on the cheerleader’s stage and started dancing. I didn’t have a wide angle so I ran out to mid field and shot the celebration with my 70-200. It worked out and I made a nice frame.

Until next time. I’ll try to get photos from the South Carolina and Arkansas game posted soon.

Looking northward along Victor Road near Lollypop farm.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 18mm, 1/640 @ f/16.0, ISO 800. Raw photo processed in Lightroom 2.

This past Sunday, we had a cold front move in. A spectacular rainbow was produced (see a few post below) as well as an okay sunset. Since I was on break at work, and had little luck getting sunsets for the past couple weeks, I decided to have at it. I ended up stitching 7 frames together for a 17,000+ pixel wide image. Shot hand held with the 50mm f/1.8 lens.

Summers end Panoramic sunset

Of course, this is a shrank down version, but clicking on it will bring up a larger view

The other night, home from work, I was eager to pull my camera from the bag to upload the shots I had taken earlier in the day onto my computer. Since I did not have a real photo bag, I needed to remove the second lens from the bag to get to the camera. That second lens was the tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 UWA and well, and on that lens, a B+W circular polarizer, a Kaesemann, was also on the lens. The lens cap on the tokina does have a habit of coming off a bit too easy. I guess you can see where this is going… The lens slipped and my fingers knocked the cap off and on go my finger prints on the filter. Bummer.

So now, never really cleaning a filter before, I guess I need to do some reading so I can give my polarizer a de-finger printing. Guess it could have been a 600 dollar lens that could have gotten finger smudges on it. Oh well.

I know I wanted a pelican case, I still do, but recently I have been taking my camera to work with me for those “break time snapshots” so it needed to fit in my locker. I also needed some additional room since the recent purchase of a 300mm f/4L IS totally finished taking up room in my Nova 5 AW. So at Bestbuy today while buying a blu-ray disc, I walked by the clearence area and seen a nice looking Rezo 190AW with its price cut in half. Bestbuy wanted 80 for the bag regular price, but had it marked down to 40. Go figure, only one left, so I grabbed it. It does indeed fit in my locker at work, and holds a good amount of stuff, my gripped 30D, a couple lenses and a couple filters. Nice! The bag also helps as a bit of an “overflow” a bit of upgrade to the little bag I was using that barely fit the 30D with the 50mm f/1.8 and Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8

Tried something else this afternoon. Wondered (thanks to an inspired post by someone else earlier on the Talk Photography forums) how difficult it would be to photograph a spinning coin, indoors. The answer was of course bloody difficult. Especially as the lens I was using just wouldn’t, or couldn’t maintain focus on the coin. Ended up focussing manually, in AV mode at a variety of shutter speeds. No flash used in this one, but like the water droplets, am quite keen to try this again with Flash and Without.

Zdjęcie,  które wzięło udział w projekcie 999 organizowanym przez portal digart.pl

Wrzucam z braku laku.

Sunrise over the canal, shot from the Clinton Avenue bridge.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 35mm, 1/250 @ f/11.0, ISO 200. Raw photo processed in Lightroom 2.

Sunrise over the canal, shot from the Clinton Avenue bridge.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 35mm, 1/200 @ f/11.0, ISO 200. Raw photo processed in Lightroom 2.

Seperti yang kita ketahui, bahan dasar dari semua pakaian adalah benang. Untuk suatu benang menjadi kain kaos, harus melalui proses dirajut atau knitting. Baik jenis benang maupun tipe rajutan pada kain kaos berbeda-beda.

 JENIS BENANG

 1. BENANG 20S.

Biasanya dipakai apabila kita menghendaki ketebalan atau gramasi bahan kaos antara 180 sampai dengan 220 Gram/Meter persegi untuk jenis rajutan Single Knitt.

 2. BENANG 24S

Biasa dipakai apabila kita menghendaki ketebalan atau gramasi bahan kaos antara 170 sampai dengan 210 Gram / meter persegi untuk jenis rajutan Single Knitt.

 3. BENANG 30S

Biasa dipakai apabila kita menghendaki ketebalan atau gramasi bahan kaos antara 140 sampai dengan 160 Gram / meter persegi untuk jenis rajutan Single Knitt atau Gramasi 210 sampai dengan 230 Gram / meter persegi untuk jenis rajutan Double Knitt.

 4. BENANG 40 S

Biasa dipakai apabila kita menghendaki ketebalan atau gramasi bahan kaos antara 110 sampai dengan 120 Gram / meter persegi untuk jenis rajutan Single Knitt atau Gramasi 180 sampai dengan 200 Gram / meter persegi untuk jenis rajutan Double Knitt.

JENIS RAJUTAN

 1. SINGLE KNITT (Contoh. Combed 20′S, S nya adalah single knitt)
Pengertian teknisnya adalah rajutan jarum single. Penggunaan hanya satu permukaan atau kaos tidak bisa dibolak-balik (2 permukaan). Jenis rajutan rapat, bahan padat, kurang lentur (stratching). Sebagian besar produk kaos yang ada di pasaran adalah memakai jenis rajutan Single Knitt.

2. DOUBLE KNITT (Contoh. Combed 20′D, D nya adalah double knitt)
Pengertian teknisnya adalah rajutan Jarum Double sehingga penggunaannya bisa dibolak-balik (atas bawah tidak masalah). Jenis rajutan tidak rapat, bahan kenyal, lembut, dan lentur. Produk kaos yang biasa memakai rajutan jenis ini adalah pakaian untuk bayi (baby) dan anak-anak (Kid’s). Ada sebagian orang menyebut bahan ini dengan sebutan Interlock.

 3. LACOSTE
Pengertian teknisnya adalah rajutan texture / corak. Penggunaan tidak bisa dibolak-balik. Jenis rajutan bertexture, bulat, kotak, atau menyerupai segitiga kecil-kecil. Sebagian orang ada yang menyebut bahan ini Pique atau Cuti, dan hanya lazim digunakan untuk Polo Shirt atau Kaos Kerah.

 4. STRIPER atau YARN DYE
Pengertian teknisnya adalah rajutan kombinasi benang warna (Yarn Dye). Penggunaan tidak bisa di bolak-balik. Jenisnya bisa Single Knitt maupun Double Knitt. Finishing harus openset / belah. Orang awam menyebut bahan ini dengan sebutan bahan salur / warna-warni. Biasa digunakan untuk produk kaos dewasa (Pria, Wanita, T-Shirt, maupun Polo Shirt).

5. DROP NEEDLE
Pengertian teknisnya adalah rajutan dengan variasi cabut jarum. Penggunaannya bisa di bolak-balik. Jenis rajutan texture garis lurus vertikal, lembut, dan lentur. Produk kaos ini banyak digunakan untuk Rib Leher (T-Shirt), Ladies T-Shirt Body Fit, dan kaos singlet.

Sumber: www.andalasclothing.com

Shwedagon Pagoda is in Yangon, Myanmar. At 326 ft, it is considered to be the largest pagoda in the world. Depending on what is being looked for, large structures may demand a good vantage point to be seen from. While a close-up look (from the base of the structure) with a wide angle could infuse perspective & artistry, a telephoto shot from a good vantage point from some distance gives a big picture of how it stands (gigantically) among others on the surface of the Earth. Usually, a vantage point is higher or at least at half the height, at some distance.

I didn’t plan for this. I came to have dinner at the apartment of my friend’s. Then, there was this view seen from where we sat. The stage had been set. All that required was a camera and a tripod which I had at that time. The night time shifted all the focus to the pile of gold dazzling with the spotlights. I cropped top & bottom a bit to give it a (slight) panoramic feel.

Location: Yangon, Myanmar
Camera: Canon EOS 30D
Lens: Canon EF-S 17-85mm f/4-5.6 IS
ISO: 100
Exposure: 8s
Aperture: f/5.6
Focal Length: 85mm
Filter: N/A
Flash: No
Tripod: Yes

Engine detail on an old Norton motorcycle.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 40mm, 1/100 @ f/6.3, ISO 200. Raw photo processed in Lightroom 2.

When the roads were open and the cities far apart, some dared cover the distance faster than the rest.

But now the roads are crowded, the cities have grown together and those who dared can only dream of speed.

Canon 30D with EF-S18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 USM at 50mm, 1/200 @ f/11.0, ISO 200. Raw photo processed in Lightroom 2.