[Johnny Brown]

Very good in-depth overview of Lightroom here, highlighting many features I hadn't yet worked out. One interesting point is that he expects it to be priced very competitively against Apple's Aperture - if this is true it will be an absolute bargain, I might even buy it.  Yowzer

[Johnny Brown]

Lightroom V1.1 released on Tuesday. Updated yesterday D-Y-N-A-M-I-T-E

Extended unsharp mask - now with FOUR controls and an genius alt-preview function that shows in B+W whats affected.

'Clarity' function - essentially local contrast enhancement. I'd prefer a radius and amount for this, but it works as it is.

Libraries now 'catalogues' - ie can be swapped between laptop and main easily.

I think its only about £120 now n'all. Bought mine as soon as it was released.

Good info site here

[Yossarian]

Hmmmm...  I'm just about to (finally) move from doing most of our work photography from film to digital. I've been using iView Media Pro to catalogue everything up to now, which has been brilliant.  I would like to carry on using this, together with CaptureOne Pro for the RAW conversions.  Are any of you guys familar with this, or are you all totally sold on this Lightroom thing?

[Johnny Brown]

I've played with them, but Lightroom does the work of both, in a very nice interface. If you've already built up a big library in iView it might be a pain swapping though. Do you do everything in RAW?

[Yossarian]

I'm not sure yet. I expect I probably will do most of it in RAW. I've got a free copy of CaptureOne LE to test anyway, so I think I might have a play with that first.

I must admit that it's been quite a reluctant move, going from a Hasselblad Flexbody to a D200 with 35mm shift. I'm sure it'll all work out fine, but I am still a bit unsure. I certainly wasn't prepared to fork out for a digi back.

[Johnny Brown]

What do you do, photograph food? Flexbody sounds good, how wide a lens can you use on that? have been researching tilt lenses for my 645 but haven't found much. I guess the dof on the D-format will take care of loosing tilt then?

[Yossarian]

Furniture, and I don't really use the tilt very much. It's the shifting that's key, and although there's only 15mm it's still really useful. It's a bit like shooting architecture in minature. I use an 80mm and that works fine for what we need. Saying that, I would've prefered using 5x4 - you can always (or at least, could always) tell the difference, especially at A3.

[Johnny Brown]

Ahh, no probs then, plenty of shift lenses for Nikons. They'll not be much fun with the miserable little viewfinder though, not at all suited to slow, considered composition. I'm sure you'll miss the 'blad finder.

[Yossarian]

the finder with the flexbody is a pain actually. i used to use a prism finder, which you had to stand on a box to see down. i now use the ground glass screen and a loupe.

what i want to investigate is shooting tethered to my laptop - if i could do that straight into some kind of utility with a grid then it would make things quite a lot easier. i think capture used to let you do something similar, but not sure about the new version.

[dave]

Ahh, no probs then, plenty of shift lenses for Nikons.

for the price of a nikon shift lens you could probably buy a 5x4 view camera, lens and a shit load of film.

[Johnny Brown]

£250 quid on ebay? Seems cheap to me. I suppose you could get a shit 5x4, with an even shitter lens. Even a decent one, new, though, is a bargain compared to a 'blad flexbody. None of which gets me any closer to your point, which was?

I think with the Nikon software you can control the camera from the computer, no doubt there will be a grid function available. It won't give you a live view though, if that's what your after it might be worth waiting, I'm sure its in the pipeline if only to keep up with Olympus and canon.

[dave]

If you can get one (presumably the 35mm cos its the cheapest) that works for £250 then great, though i know the 28mm is more like £4/500 used (and about a grand new). yeah that money would likely only get you a shit view camera (like a crown graphic etc) with few movements, but since with the shift lenses you literally only get shift (no tilt/swing etc) then its probably comparable. even the shittest large format lenses are likely to be pretty fucking good, especially stopped down etc.

Controling the camera can be done from computer, as long as you accept you've got to stop down the tilt lenses manually as theres no aperture linkage, and depending on the camera you'll have to meter with the lens unshifted (you might be able to get around this with the D200). No idea about the grid.

[Yossarian]

my uncle has a couple of sinars, both a 4x5 and a 10x8, with a load of lenses, plus various other view cameras besides. that was where my plaubel came from too. but life is too short to start again with that lot.  10 years ago i would've done. (i spent my formative years in his darkroom, mixing cyanotype ingredients at age 7, spilling chemicals, revising the scheimpflug principle, jumpers for goalposts, etc)

i've just got the d200 in the post this morning, and according to the manual the 35mm PC lens i've got isn't compatible.  but it seems to work alright. there goes my warranty.

[dave]

I don't see why the 35mm PC lens would not be compatable. If so thats news to me. The D200 should work and meter with virtually every F-mount lens they've ever made from 1959 to today. Pre-AIS lenses might get slightly off with the exposure cos the stop-down lever may not be perfectly linear in relation to the aperture, but thats it as far as I know. You should be fine.

[Johnny Brown]

I don't think shift lenses generally have an automatic aperture. Usually they rely on manual stop-down metering, which would probably make them tick the incompatible box in the manual.

The D200 should work and meter with virtually every F-mount lens they've ever made from 1959 to today.

Are you on commission?

[cofe]

wow. i need to read more about photography.

[Yossarian]

I don't think shift lenses generally have an automatic aperture. Usually they rely on manual stop-down metering, which would probably make them tick the incompatible box in the manual.

The D200 should work and meter with virtually every F-mount lens they've ever made from 1959 to today.

Are you on commission?

i think that's it. the book says the certain older 35mm PC lenses are incompatible - i'm sure it's to do with the maunal stop down, as you say. i'm setting it all manually anyway, cos i prefer using a hand-held meter and measuring incident.

[dave]

Are you on commission?

Aye, commission impossible. Perhaps a good problem name?

[Johnny Brown]

wow. i need to read more about photography.

In a similar vein, I spent a while this weekend trying to explain swing lenses to Sharpholds this weekend, ie to give the 'toy soldier' effect the american mags seem to like. After a while he said, 'oh, I know, you mean them babylens things?'

[cofe]

genius.

[dave]

I have actually taken some RAW recently when doing landscape stuff to see if its worth the effort. not done any prints yet though to compare, which is the real test. so the jury is out. using it by default all the time still seems barmy to me - theres a time and a place (whihc i believe is what i originally said). On a side-note I have recently done some large-ish prints from 6mp jpegs (11"x14", chich is cropped so effectively 5mp), and they looked pretty fucking good, so I'd still have a few words for the jpeg bashers.

[Jim]

what lens you using these dayz d-dog?

[dave]

lenses. the 10-20 spends a lot of time on the camera, as do the 50 and 24. long lens use more on holiday etc.

[Jim]

which 10-20 have you got?
I haven't used my 50 that much yet

[dave]

the only one available! sigma. its fairly weapon.