My Top 10 Pictures

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Inspired by this article at The Online Photographer, I set up my own Top 10 pictures as a SmugMug gallery. Many of the pictures are the same as in my Reify and Redact project and all are included in my Blurb book, "My Best and My Favorites".

The basis for selection is simply that this is my best work. That is, an editor – not myself – would make the same choices. If I take a better picture tomorrow, it will replace one of these selections.

Of these ten pictures, 3 are B/W and 2 are the polar opposite High Dynamic Range (HDR). Six pictures were taken with film cameras and four with digital cameras. All of the B/W pictures were taken on film. Of the film cameras, four were 35mm format and two were medium format. The four digital pictures were taken with a DSLR (Canon 20D). The film cameras were Konica T2 for 35mm and Yashica 12 for medium format.

A self editing project like this is a very useful exercise. Try it.
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Predicting the G11

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Last year about this time, I made predictions about the upcoming G10 – not a wish list but predictions. Why? “Because I wanted to” is the only reasonable answer. I thought I had a bit of insight from Canon’s notes to software developers and newspaper articles about CMOS but this information turned out to be misleading (mis-interpreted is probably a better word). Even so, my G10 prediction wasn’t all that bad. Time now for the G11 prediction.

First of all, whereas last year I thought that the G Series might go away – if not in spirit then as a product name -- now I think that the G Series remains for the G11 and perhaps beyond. In spite of early criticism about the high pixel count and noise at high ISO, the G10 is a very capable and popular camera – even among professionals. Since its introduction, I’ve linked to several articles and reviews to the G10 including Luminous Landscape, The Online Photographer and others. Surely Canon will take advantage of the good G10 name and its successor will be named the G11.

If the G11 is to be successful as Canon’s flagship compact non-DSLR camera then it must be competitive with the Four Thirds System being developed by Panasonic and Olympus. Panasonic even had the audacity to name one of their cameras the “G1” ! In fact, it is this very G1 and its successor, GH1, which threaten to replace the G10 as the compact camera of choice in the hands of serious photographers.

With all the above in mind, here are my predictions for the G11. Please note that I have absolutely no insider or proprietary information on which to base these predictions.

The G11 will resemble the G10 in form, general appearance, controls, etc. but be a little larger. Right - larger not smaller. The G11 will have to be a bit larger than the G10 because it will have a larger sensor. The sensor will be a 12 MP CMOS design that is manufactured by Canon. It will be somewhat larger than the current 15 MP CCD (said to be manufactured by Sony) of the G10 but not as large as the 4/3 system sensors.

The G11 will not have an articulated LCD display screen much to the chagrin of those who love one. (I sure liked this feature on my G3 and would welcome it on the G11.)

The G11 will have HD video much like the SX1-IS: 1080p at 30 fps. In addition to the larger sensor and high ISO, HD video will be a major selling point for the G11.

Speaking of ISO, the G11 will have ISO up to 3200 (which will really be a software push of 1600) and pixel binning for 6400. In practice, the usable ISO will be 800 but pixel peepers will complain that even 400 is too noisy.

The G11 lens will be similar to the G10 lens except that it will be a new design to account for the larger sensor: focal length of 28 – 140 mme; f2.8 to f4.5. Image stabilized, of course. A new, larger, adapter will be necessary for filters.

Shutter lag and acquiring focus will be only marginally faster than the G10.

Sadly, external flash in manual mode will be the same as the G9/10; that is, camera manual mode will still also mean external flash manual mode.

The G11 will have RAW file format available when in full Auto exposure mode. Another feature will be variable highlight recovery for in-camera JPEGs.

So the G11 will be yet another step in the evolutionary development of the Canon Powershot G Series. All in all, the G11 will be “better” than the G10 just as the G10 is “better” than the G9, etc., etc. The G11 will be announced in mid-September 2009 and available in late October. The G11 will be more expensive than the G10 but less expensive than the Panasonic G1.
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SAK Repair Team

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Some jobs are just too big for one Swiss Army Knife.

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Modopocket Tripod

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“Tripod” doesn’t seem to be the most applicable word but it is certainly understood and descriptive of Manfrotto’s “Modopocket” camera support. As shown here, the Modopocket is very compact -- if not tiny. In fact, Manfrotto claims that its Modopocket is the world’s smallest tripod. The Modopocket is also very simple. The instruction manual measures only 4 x 2.5 inches and basically contains only pictures.

I became aware of the Modopocket months ago but couldn’t find one to purchase and nearly forgot about it. It now is readily available. I bought my Modopocket last week and played with it over the weekend. I think it will be a useful tool and have promoted it to my kit. (By now I can barely zip up my kit bag but the Modopocket fits conveniently in a side pocket.)

The Modopocket is so small that it can be kept on the camera. It even has its own tripod mount! All the same, the Modopocket is so easily removed that I doubt mine will be permanently attached to my G9.

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As can be seen in these pictures, there is a nice range of adjustment with the Modopocket but, realistically, it is mostly for pointing straight ahead while sitting on a flat surface. Still, that service is very useful and greatly appreciated.

So far, my only complaint is about the string. My Modopocket had a thin black string tying the front “leg” to the back “leg”. I think this string was meant to limit the separation of the legs. Anyway, I promptly broke the string the very first time I opened the legs. Fortunately, the string doesn’t seem to be necessary with my G9. The instruction manual indicates that the Modopocket is limited to one pound of load so perhaps the string is necessary for heavier cameras.

Manfrotto has other “modo” products that can be seen at http://modo.manfrotto.com/.

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+1, +2, +4, +10

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The G9 does macro! OK, in the current use of the term “macro”, all cameras seem to have macro capabilities. A previous post, showed how to get even closer closeups (should that be closer macros?) by using reverse mounted lenses or a +4X diopter attachment on the G9. A key consideration is to getting enough distance between camera and subject to adequately light the subject. Closeup lenses are much smaller and easier to use than reverse mounted 35mm lenses. This post compares four lenses: +1, +2, +4 and +10 diopters; each lens looks like a thick filter and is simply screwed into the Lensmate adapter.

The G9 was set at ISO 80, tungsten white balance, Av mode, maximum zoom, small Flexizone focus frame, auto focus , evaluative metering, raw+jpeg with color saturation turned slightly down for the jpeg, and mounted on a tripod. (To digress a moment, just think about all those options!). The Franiec cable release was used to minimize camera movement. The scene is lit from each side with continuous lighting at roughly a 45 degree angle. The camera is also angled at roughly 45 degrees to the scene. The camera and tripod were manually moved and realigned for each shot by trial and error to obtain a minimum focus distance to the mid point of the scene (the 3” label on the scale).

Knowing that limited depth of field is a problem with close-ups, the G9 was set for f5.6 – even though diffraction would not be minimized.

The image below is the basic scene as photographed with the G9 without any attachments. The front of the G9 camera body is about 20 inches from the scene. This image (and all images in this post) is uncropped but reduced in size from the in-camera jpeg.



Next, the +1 diopter lens was screwed into the Lensmate adapter and the camera moved closer. In the image below, the front of the camera is about 15 inches from the scene.



For the shot below, the +1 diopter lens was removed and replaced with a +2 diopter lens. At this distance, the G9 exposure system was tricked a bit by the black scale so I dialed in an exposure compensation of -2/3. The camera was 12 inches from the scene.



Next, the +2 was replaced by a +4 diopter lens. For the image below, the camera was moved to about 10 inches from the scene and exposure compensation changed to -1.

Next, the +4 diopter lens was replaced by the +10 lens. The camera was moved to 6 inches from the scene and exposure compensation was changed to minus 1-1/3. The two shots below were taken by moving the scene. Notice the extremely short depth of field. In fact, by moving the scene around a bit and playing with manual focus, I found that the subject must be within a distance of 6 to 7 inches when the G9 is at max zoom and fitted with the +10 diopter lens.

For the last shot, I returned to the +1 diopter lens but decreased the zoom. Placing the G9 in macro focus mode, I zoomed in until the “flower” (focus icon on the G9 LCD) turned gray (just short of the yellow line on the zoom display). Then the camera was placed as close as possible to the scene while still obtaining focus. This distance was about 10 inches (had been 15 inches at max zoom).


The built-in macro feature of the G9 is very useful but a simple set of screw-in close-up lenses can improve macro capability and flexibility significantly – and are easy to use. Try it!
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First Easter Lily

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This is the first Easter Lily of the season for my house. Traditionally, the Easter Lily is supposed to blossom at Easter; however, this is largely controlled by commercial growers who use greenhouses to match the variations of the Easter schedule. This particular Easter Lily was transplanted last year from three potted plants placed in our garden three years ago. Those three plants produced lots of bulbs and I moved many of them to other places. Surprisingly (I don't have a green thumb, to say the least), every bit of a bulb that I transplanted has survived. The original site is probably overpopulated but we'll soon have many more Easter Lilies.

This picture was taken with the Canon G9 and converted from the raw file using Adobe Camera Raw in a rather straightforward process.

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Visual Science Lab

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I just added Kirk Tuck's "Visual Science Lab" blog to my list of favorite blogs. Kirk Tuck is a professional photographer -- among other things -- and the author of "Minimalist Lighting" which I found helpful and a good read as well for flash photography. Not to mention that he enjoys using a G9 and G10 as needed or just for the challenge of compact camera photography. His blog is a bit different and thought provoking as well.
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