[dcstep]

Hi everyone. I'm Dave from Colorado. I know several of the guys here from BMW-Post.

I use Canon equipment, but think that Nikon and Sony make great stuff also. My first camera was a self-made penhole in 7th grade "Graphic Arts" class. I bought a TLR Yashica 44 (small medium format with a square 44mm format). Later I bought a Pentax Spotmatic. Afer the Yashica fell apart and the Pentax was stolen, I was hot and cold about photography, using P&S film cameras mainly on vacations and special events, but not being serious at all.

About four years ago I decided that digital photography had "matured" and bought a Canon G7. I was hooked from the start. Not only was the IQ great, but I could take hundred of images without changing film. Better yet, I could crop and do things in post that I'd always wanted to do with film, but never got committed enough to do.

My equipment and software lineup is:

Canon 5D MkII (full frame)
Canon 7D (1.6 crop sensor)
EF 24-105mm f4L IS
EF 70-200mm f4L IS
EF 400 f5.6L
1.4TC
DxO Optics Pro for RAW conversion and batch processing
PS4 for special cases (very limited)
I'm jonesing for a 500mm f4L IS (big bucks!!!)

My favorite subjects are travel, cars and wildlife, particularly birds in flight.

Here's my Silverstone II M3


I used my 400mm f5.6L to get that compressed perspective.

Macros taken with my 70-200mm f4L IS with a 25mm extension tube





Another full shot with the Rocky Mountains in backgroud



A couple of wildlife examples:





You can see that I'm from the "realist" school, trying to develop impact mostly from lighting, perspective and detail.

Here's my Flickr site

I'll be around.

Dave

BTW, I love the way this site resizes to a generous size and automatically provides a link to the original. Neat.

[Vudoo4u2]

welcome!

thanks for joining up...love the shots...and if youre ever looking to give away that 400 when you get the 500, i have a nifty thing called a donation fund and i can give you my home address

have you tried the 7D with the 400 F5.6 and the 1.4TC ??? that has to be a monsterous combo (896 mm!!!!)

question...why dXo vs LR?

[dcstep]

Originally Posted by Vudoo4u2

welcome!

thanks for joining up...love the shots...and if youre ever looking to give away that 400 when you get the 500, i have a nifty thing called a donation fund and i can give you my home address

have you tried the 7D with the 400 F5.6 and the 1.4TC ??? that has to be a monsterous combo (896 mm!!!!)

question...why dXo vs LR?

If and when I decide to dump the 400mm, you'll be at the top of the list. Unfortunately, I'll probably need money at that time, because the 500mm f4L lists North of 6-grand.

Yeah, the 1.4TC is great, but I can only use it on static or slow moving subjects, because the AF won't work with it. That's one reason I'm jonesing for the 500 f4L, the other is the IS. Still, the 1.4TC is always in my pocket. I can prefocus on subjects like very small birds and use as much DOF as the light will allow.

I think DxO does a better job of auto-adjusting for the lens/body's weaknesses. For example, it adjusts for my zoom lenses' geometric errors at each focal length and aperture. It makes my 24-105mm f4L (my weakest lens when unadjusted) look like a set of primes after processing. It's very user friendly and allows almost any global adjustment that you can do in PS. It also applies NR prior to RAW conversion, yielding one of the best NR results I'm seen.

Alas, the DxO module for the 7D is not out yet, so I'm using Canon's Digital Photo Professional for RAW conversion. It does a pretty good job of that, but not much else. I'll be getting that module as soon as it's available (before YE).

Dave

[DarkMastyr]

Sweet shots. Didn't realize BMW was using D1S these days.

[dcstep]

Originally Posted by DarkMastyr

Sweet shots. Didn't realize BMW was using D1S these days.

Thanks Dark.

I think Xenon is pretty common on BMWs now. It's stock on all the Ms and I think it's an option down into the 1-series.

Dave

[djdorifto]

welcome and nice pics

[DarkMastyr]

Originally Posted by dcstep

Thanks Dark.

I think Xenon is pretty common on BMWs now. It's stock on all the Ms and I think it's an option down into the 1-series.

Dave

Ah well I know they use Xenon, just didn't know they used D1S configuration (where the ignitor is integrated into the base of the bulb). Before I believe they were typically using D2S configuration where the ignitor was separate or built into the ballast. Sorry just a little overly nerdy specific detail I picked up when I retrofitted Xenon into my daily driver and used the components out of a BMW 3-series.

[UdubBadger]

wussup dave, welcome (what took you so long?). always enjoy the pix.

[dcstep]

Hey Udub. I guess I looked on the first day and, understandably, there wasn't much here yet.

Anyway, it looks like fun now.

Dave

[UdubBadger]

[dcstep]

It's almost time to vote over at BMW-Post for the latest contest. I'm very interested to see how that works out. There was a lot of confusion about the concept of the contest. I think it was a good concept, but the voting will be interested.

Dave

[Vudoo4u2]

Originally Posted by dcstep

It's almost time to vote over at BMW-Post for the latest contest. I'm very interested to see how that works out. There was a lot of confusion about the concept of the contest. I think it was a good concept, but the voting will be interested.

Dave

I fully expect that the votes will go as they usually do...eye-catchiness