drueki, tsunamiboy: i've been to cold country, my bro is in england during winter, all our camera is fine. there are many people in cold places uses camera. need more convincing? go youttube, google search for A33/55 winter video and see how they shoot video in snow.

drueki: the batt, need to be keep warm, even the batt not in camera, but on the table during winter, the power will drop to zero iether way, no matter its sony, energizer or car battery (that why u see a lot ppl jump start their car after leaving their car several days in winter)

tsunami, there is only 2 SLT in the world right now, and both uses the same battery, infact, the A55 has gps theorically, it take up more batt. so conclusion, A33 is not the lowest batt life among SLT

well, how many shots u going to snap anyway each day? 100? 200? 300? and best part is, sony battery indicate to 1% accuracy on the lcd, unlike other with "batt bar" which 1 bar may indicate 20% or 1%. why worry? summore today battery technology, allows us to charge the batt even it is not empty and will not damage the battery. but mosy people who owned A33 worry bout the battery life brought a spare one (cheap only) but most of them hardly uses the spare anyway because the 1 batt is enough somehow.

translucent is the future

good luck with that, coz its world shortage now! sold till kosong. A33 everywhere la. it seem the world wont mind paying USD100 more for A55. so is malaysian paying rm400 more for A55~ that why sony now is skeptic to even push A560 into the market as people rather pay rm300 more for A580.

i hear there will be another one in kuching real soon

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Added on February 14, 2011, 10:35 pmevilhomura89: love the cactus! and good job with the lighting!

yuhi : sony till now is experimenting with the market, they have their own factory for most part, so no need worry, unlike other company has to make decision 2-3 months in advance to confirm order for the parts from 3rd party manufacturer. sony anytime can turn and make TV instead if they wanted to, since sony Alpha is only mere 2% of their total sales monthly. seriously, they are selling 10 LCD TV to 1 alpha!

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 14 2011, 10:35 PM

+1

the feature is overwhelming la. give me also i not sure i able to use all also

tak mahu, i wan A99

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 14 2011, 10:44 PM

paying good price for good filter, or using cheapo filter is a very subjective argument, like having high end G/CZ vs normal/3rd party lenses. although the argument will bend towards G/CZ lol so will better filter.

i personally will take B+W (or cz) for its pure clearness. even hoya has a minor grey tint. people tend to think hoya os the best filter in the market, but there is so many even more stronger brand.

reason i rather pay rm200-300 for B+W because it high scratch resistant, anytime i can use my shirt to wipe it without worry, since i used rm50 filter before, within 1 year, it got many minor scratch (and cause lining in photo under flaring condition), and another cheapo rm50 filter cause -2/3 stop for my 50mm! (F1.4 becomes F1.7 LOL)

some people dont think it degrade quality, well, go try have a long exposure night shooting (F8-22), it causes ur camera AF to be 1mm off sometimes, having a sharp building or a soft building. it could be affected AF, light diffraction cause by filter make AF off or the filter itself making it soft. shoot one without the filter, and u will be surprise the increase of the sharpness.

WB issue, yes, some cheap filter has tint, i shot sample of it few weeks ago, some has green. or blue, or red(no, not skylight filter, it was declare as neutral filter). it does affect WB. because the WB is auto between the 'preset mode' eg: tungsten AWB, where the kelvin doesNT goes below 3k, only manual(CWB) can access. so if u have even a 500k tungsten/red filter, u get really reddish photo even tungsten AWB. or even if u use flash, ur flash AWB 5500k will turn up to 6000k because of the filter of 500k (tungsten-ish)

thanks evilhomura89 for finding back the link

but here the gimmick, i rather go filter-less for lens under 1k. because for less under 1k lens(including 50 F1.7 and F1.8), its IQ isnt the best already, having cheap filter will make it worst. also its not really wise to invest 30% of its value into another filter. summore, lenses under 1k is more or less a kit lens, u WILL eventually replace it with better Kit replacement, which will cost u over 1k. so even it got scratch, ur heart also not that pain anyway, and will decide to upgrade, but for filter, u will haiya, need buy another filter. or leave it on having bad iq photo, then blame it on the lens or body.

lens over 1k (50F1.4 etc) will definately spend a decent good filter for it. because u do not what have a scratched front element(glass/optics) because it will cause u more then 1k to get a new one. 1k make a huge diff in buying/funding better lenses. not mentioning lenses over 3k eh, so its better off u spend 200-300 for a good filter.

so, expensive filter is not for all lenses. cheap filter is not for any lenses at all.

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Added on February 15, 2011, 3:17 pmbtw, i did another one with cz filter, it seem the cz filter is even clearer then B+W and hoya~ but i dunno where i put the photo LMAO

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 15 2011, 03:48 PM

ahpinko: brighter... its kinda too under, coz the KLCC suppose to have the ID4 ray into the sky... and try turn ur WB to 2500. see what will happen

that the point, blue light look so much sweeter then tungsten light. imagine all the great night shots u shoot... even night sky look better in blue and KLCC suppose to be blue even in daylight, so night time, the ori color is still blue

ahpingko, iso800, F2.2 in a normal house room, 1/32 is too much.

put to iso100 and shoot

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 15 2011, 05:30 PM

ahpingko, ur understanding with exposure is wayyyyy off, this i can say.

here the few keys,

why iso800? and u know how it affect ur photo and WB? with and without flash.
why F2.2? and u know how it affect ur photo and WB? with and without flash.

do u know when mount flash and fire, the AWB is lock to Flash AWB? hence its fixed 5500k. and it was affected by above 2 settings?

i think i going to write a long article bout AWB with and without flash, and how below F4, and above iso800 affect the color of ur WB.

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 15 2011, 06:15 PM

give me sometime, i now composing what to wring on WB. might use it for my workshop someday.

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Added on February 15, 2011, 7:02 pmeh, this is so wrong. u only make it worst if u do not know where to start and how to end.

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 15 2011, 07:02 PM

ahpinko, when using flash, u introduce another EV into the whole system, the flash EV do not affect ur basic EV (the basic triangle EV for the camera, aka, ambiance EV aka BG eV) so now u have 2 eV.

the flash power stays the same from slow shutter up to sync speed (1/160 for model below A5-series) so 1/16 power is the same through out 1sec, 1/10, 1/60, 1/100, 1/160! the sensor physically pick up the SAME amount of 1/16 light! but once HSS activated, the whole formula changes.

aperture affect amount of flash power, so F2.2 actually allow too much light from the flash, + light from ambiance.

it is NOT easy to balance BG EV and subject EV with flash. NOT EASY. but u once u have grasp on the basic knowledge, u will know how to work around it. even in under bright sunlight! (ray ng manage to cope till this level already)

ahpingko, i know u wanted to capture the ambiance light, another quick way (a little like cheating) is use REAR Sync Flash, set ur flash ev to +0.3 or 0.7 depend on ur liking, and fire, see how it is. its hope that the flash will be a little stronger and overwrite the initial ambiance color that is read by the sensor. but its very tricky as the ambiance change or surround or terms (distance, zoom, area, etc) the whole setting might need tweaking.

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 15 2011, 07:10 PM

1/20, that when i mention the REAR sync (was it 2nd curtain, i keep forgeting the terms and names) comes it, if the flash is fired after the BG exposure, it will 'tries' to overwrite the initial exposure, and flash travels as UBER speed, so it will have a 'final' sharp overwrite exposure. u get a soft blurring moving effect + final sharp exposure creative shot! i'd say

yuhi, kopitiam : well, as long as u are not over the 'sync speed' and above aperture 'F11' and subject farther then '5 meter' from u. else, the problem is that flash cant lit that far under those settings.

zstan: he is confuse with flash eV, not exactly setting.

ahpingko: why not, try from F4, iso400 first? that is basic, although u might have a little darker/white background. the issue here is not eV, its more of the AWB messed up.

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Added on February 15, 2011, 10:23 pmhahaha william, his problem is at high iso + large aperture allows more light in to overwrite the 5500k WB~ causing the picture very tungsten-ish. what u show is with F4.5 apeture, surely he wont see the ambiance light as much, but i hope he see the point

actually, ahpingko, u went over too far already, basic flash start from auto iso, F4.

anything below F4 with flash, the the white flash light with get overwrite by the ambiance light (turning ur picture NOT white)

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 15 2011, 10:24 PM

the whole WB and flash might take a long while,. because it is not short. maybe i will put it in some blogspot later so easier reading later so in future can use as references.

sztan: thank you! u gave me a simplier idea what to write and, no, ur method is far from a 'right method', its a "can do/use method" aka, survival method.

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 15 2011, 11:25 PM

william, nice one! later i show one with WB kacau one~

hiansitt:
-1) the flash distance is not excately determine that way, it has a very very sophisticated "model" to see. but i duno how to show it. wait till i found a 15 meter wall, i will make a cheatsheet (sample model) for u guys to see.

1) that is if u notice ur fire arent firing enough, u add it so u get the flash to reach the area u wan. because the TTL sometimes caught the light in a foreground subject and reduce the power drastically.

3) more then enough. provided u have a ceiling for the light to actually bounce down, that why it called bounce flash in the first place. u cant bounce the moon and back

4) the zoom does zoom around when u zoom ur lens in bounce mode. hear it properly

zstan:

2) because my a300 has a tendency to underexpose due to metering limitations. use QLV to shoot, it has 1200zone metering, which give more accurate eV and FeV metering.

3) erm, bounce card, read my answer to wlliam

4) wrong. read reply for hiansit, if u mount a 50mm prime, it will zoom to 50mm flash

wliam: catchlight, correct point, but not the main purpose . throwing the 'fill light' to remove the shadow cause by bounce(nose eye and hair), is the main reason.

hiansitt: bigger size of the light source is better, not the card. u mistaken the point. but i can tell u this, the bounce on the ceiling, that ceiling bounce light source is larger then ur bounce card.

but yes at some point, people tend to think, making the card bigger, thus making the light source from front larger~ but that will mess up the bounce light, because u will be directing more front fill then bounce, cause making less soft bounce light, more harsh frontal light (since the ceiling bounce source is Larger then the biggest card u can hold on ur flash)

a lot pro force me to get a demb diffuser, and i dont get the point, until i get it... i feel, disappointed, its worst then using bounce card only. too much frontal light spoil the soft bounce from the ceiling. (and it tend to make BG darker!) its useful Only if u have no ceiling to bounce, eg. outdoor wedding.

the build in bounce card usually throw around 15% light forward. just enough to cast away the shadow cause by the bounce light from the ceiling.u dont have to worry bout oily face, it wont show (unless u shooting 50cm away). the light is really soft, enough to cast away shadow, but wont be enough to cause oily face to pop.

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Added on February 16, 2011, 4:21 ammmm i think i have decide to dedicate some of my time to write a erm, learning/sharing blog to share for the new comers to learn. so i hope your my friends, will contribute or help out (spelling check or web programming, i am not good with it). or open topics or share some knowledge that i might be missing, im not perfect rite? please point out any mistake i made.

this one small part, Basic WB >>>>here <<<<(albnok, if u think its good enough u may use it and link it on the first page of the alpha thread)

and zstan, this is for u (and others can read too)


the first set is shot with my toilet light off, and the wall tiles are actually milky color, so the bounced light will seem milky colored.
you will notice, with constant flash power, the aperture, allows the flash light comes in more when opened wider. causing the F2.8 photo to be overexpose (so ahpingko, yours is F2.2 with iso800, what makes u think ur photo will not overexpose when ur setting is 2 stop brighter then this setting , now, try lower it to iso100 or 200 to start again)

the 2nd set, with my toilet light on (tungsten)
see how F5.6, the tungsten dont really show up. (and lets assume the flash fired at 1/16 like the first set sample, because it seem to have the same exposure)
when turn to F4, the tungsten slowly overwrite the ambiance light. (*not all LCD monitor will see this)
and at F2.8 (1 stop larger then F4) the tungsten totally overwrites the flash light!!! but if i were to turn off the flash @ F2.8, the 1/60 will show a very underexpose photo.

and, if i were to manual the flash at 1/16 @ F2.8, even with the toilet light on, it will still overexpose the whole picture like the 1st set F2.8~

so zstan: can u see how the F4 being overwrite by ambiance tungsten light? and i cant use manual flash because it will overexpose the photo (ur method, that to overexpose the subject hoping the ambiance light wont overwrite it is wrong)

do u know why i said ur setting is surviving method? if u lack of the understanding, u are just same as shooting blindly and hope, finger crossed to get a good photo. if u understand the setting/theory well, u could have easily overcome the tungsten cast issue instead of blast the flash stronger which is so inconsistence that you get overexpose photo sometimes. come, build up ur skill with the right knowledge

and the solution is actually what albnok been sharing with you guys who had TT with him. i really really appreciate my first and only TT with him, i learned so much from that single TT. you guys so lucky can TT with him so many time, but still cant catch what he trying to share.

the Tungsten Gel Card Albnok DIYed will solve that tungsten issue!!!!! now, go bug albnok for another TT to learn how to really use that tungsten gel

This post has been edited by ieR: Feb 16 2011, 09:51 AM

spam 1 pic... lol. got bored and took some old pic to edit (although only taken 10 days ago)