I finally did it.

G

greenfreak

New Member
I went digital.

Rusty and I went today, spent a whole lotta money on my dream setup. So much money, in fact, that by the time we drove straight home from the camera store, we already had a message from Visa Fraud Prevention, worried that his card had been stolen. :laugh:

Camera: Nikon D70 with extended warranty


Lenses: Nikon AF-S DX Zoom 18-70mm F/3.5-4.5 G IF
Tamron AF 70-300mm F/4-5.6 LD Macro

Memory Card: SanDisk Extreme III 2GB 133x
Accessories: Merkury 2.0 USB card reader
Nikon wireless remote
Nikon camera bag
Hoya Polarizing filter
Hoya UV filters

I'm also considering another macro lens with a halo light flash, but I think I need to do a little more thinking and investigating.

This is one of the first photos with the Tamron lens, using the macro feature. I can get a pretty good shot, for being about 5 feet away from it at the time.

pot_buranabeauty_mar.jpg
 
Congrats! :toast:

Being that I just got hired by a broker, I'm now in the market for a wide angle lens. It's going to cost around 1/4 what I paid for the camera itself!
 
I'm guessing by the capacity of that memory card that it's CompactFlash. Good investment, going with the bigger card. There's nothing more aggrivating than running out of space and having to decide what to get rid of... although you'll probably find that won't be too much of an issue because the LCD screen will let you know right away if the picture is really blurry or something, which means you don't need to take 3-4 shots of the same thing to make sure you have one that comes out how you want it.

I'd recommend having a second card on hand, though. Not necessarily 2GB, of course, but something extra just in case you do run out of space or if the card goes bad. It's exceedingly rare for a card to go bad, but it is possible... just ask Mr. Bishop. SLRs usually don't ship with a card in the box, so you'd need to get another one. My Sony came with a 32MB card, and I also bought a 256.
 
Also, good investment with the card reader. I absolutely love having one (my old camera used SD cards and the new one uses memory sticks, but the reader I have can do both). It really makes it nice because if I need to get a shot of something real quick for the board, it's quicker and easier to do than using the camera's software... which I haven't installed.
 
just looked up that camera online. have no idea what most of the spec sheet says, but it sounds very impressive :retard:

i take it you'll be updating the web site soon?

enjoy your new toy :)
 
Thanks guys! :)

Cat, I don't have a high end printer... yet. :D I have a great developer closeby to work so anything I want to print, I'll take to them. I get discounts from them too so it won't be overly expensive. Especially compared to the thousands of prints I've developed with them over the years!

Boo, Congratulations!!!! That's great! Now the fun really begins huh? I guess you'll find out soon enough if it's something you want to stick with. Good luck! When do you start? Oh and about the lens, I did a lot of research online and found that B&H has the best price for their reputation (besides the place I bought from, but I didn't think you would want to take the train all the way out here!) 42nd Street Photo has better prices than anyone but I found a lot of bad reviews about them.

Inky, yes it's a CompactFlash. On the highest quality (RAW), I can fit about 190 photos on the card, for JPG fine about 600, for "normal" about 1000 and for "basic" about 2000. That's a good point about getting a second backup, maybe we'll get a 1gb just in case. We got the 2gb because when I go to the botanical gardens, I used to take 8 rolls of film or more. That's 200 pictures right there. Typically, those are the pictures I'll want to enlarge too so if I take them in RAW, I'll have plenty of room.

I installed the software that came with the camera but you're right, the card reader is a great thing. I just wish I had a USB port on the front of my computer. It would make it easier to transfer between Rusty's computer and mine.

Mare, thanks! :) That is one of my orchids, named Potinara Burana Beauty. I guess she decided to bloom just in time to be my first flower subject. She smells really good too, like a cross between lavendar and lilac.

Spot, the spec sheets are a little too much for me too. I have a pretty daunting manual to read through also. I know how to do basic things like change the ISO, quality, photo modes and such but there's all this wild stuff like whitebalance control and histogram control. It's going to take me a while to sort through everything it can do.

And YES I will be updating the website a hell of a lot more than normal. With spring just around the corner, that means photographing my own garden, visiting botanical gardens, flower shows, family parties and photo-taking day trips. I finally got my homepage redirected to my new blog and I'm already getting referrals from google on my content. Next is figuring out how I can combine my photo gallery with my blog. I know I can do it, but it involves some coding in PHP and CSS, so it might take some time to figure out.

Well, I just finished filling out all the warranty cards and rebate forms ($200. rebate on the camera/lens) so I can start reading the manual, find out what this baby can do.
 
Printing your own photos is more expensive than a lab. That's why CD/DVD's were made.
 
Gonz said:
Printing your own photos is more expensive than a lab. That's why CD/DVD's were made.
Click to expand...
Not really I think, when you get into the 8x11 size :confused: is it?
I have to consider a 30mile round trip too, on gas. :alienhuh:
 
Longevity of the print, cost of the ink, photo paper & wear & tear...we printed our own, for awhile. The cost became prohibitive, especially compared to $.21 copies at Wal-Mart.
 
greenfreak said:
Boo, Congratulations!!!! That's great! Now the fun really begins huh? I guess you'll find out soon enough if it's something you want to stick with. Good luck! When do you start? Oh and about the lens, I did a lot of research online and found that B&H has the best price for their reputation (besides the place I bought from, but I didn't think you would want to take the train all the way out here!) 42nd Street Photo has better prices than anyone but I found a lot of bad reviews about them.
Click to expand...
Thanks!! I actually begin training on Wednesday night, and it should last three nights in a row. That means I'm on my own thereafter. I'll let you know how it goes. :cool: I'm about to order the Olympus WCON-07 (.7X) Wide Conversion Lens and adapter, plus a camera bag. Good thing my independent contractor status will allow me to write all these things off. :D
 
Gonz said:
Longevity of the print, cost of the ink, photo paper & wear & tear...we printed our own, for awhile. The cost became prohibitive, especially compared to $.21 copies at Wal-Mart.
Click to expand...
well yeah, if I had 10 or more i might do the wally world thing too.
But like the other day, I needed 1 photo of the house to send to the mortgage co.
It came in handy for that. Also periodically one of my mom's customers wants
a pic of their work too/
It just comes in handy for one or 2 pics, when needed.
 
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