Flowers...

[spinaltap]

I'm an extreme newbie to the world of digital photography, and am still learning my way around my new 350D. I used to use an ancient Pentax K1000 that was my dad's, until it broke, so i do have some knowledge of how to handle an SLR and other photographic skills and all, but am in no way greatly experienced.

Anyway, I bought my 350D this weekend and decided to run out and take some shots from around my neighborhood, and i was surprised as to what i could get out of the camera and its stock lens. Opinions and tips are greatly appreciated.

I put my pics up on webshots to more easily share with my family, so if you guys dont like that place around here I apologize :(.

Flower and Bee
(http://community.webshots.com/photo/416314480/417478591IViKIR)Flower (http://community.webshots.com/photo/416314480/417823400WiNwRh)
Lilypads and Dragonfly (http://community.webshots.com/photo/416314480/417824066xMNUxs)

Enjoy!

[scrumpy]

Hi Spinaltap Welcom,
Nice first time pictures. And we don't care where we have to go to see them.

[Dragonslayer]

The expsoures look pretty good on the flowers but you might notice that the centers are soft and not focused on the shots most likely caused by to large of an aperture. The lilys and dragon fly image are soft also. Not sure how much you have worked with images in the digital or even from a scan but you will need to sharpen most images when resizing and such. Try a smaller aperture for things that you have depth to them. Also try reading up on your image editing software about USM "unsharpmask and also sharpening. I can tell you that I do not like that site you have the images on as they have many popups and I personally do not like any site with popups on them.

[spinaltap]

The expsoures look pretty good on the flowers but you might notice that the centers are soft and not focused on the shots most likely caused by to large of an aperture. The lilys and dragon fly image are soft also. Not sure how much you have worked with images in the digital or even from a scan but you will need to sharpen most images when resizing and such. Try a smaller aperture for things that you have depth to them. Also try reading up on your image editing software about USM "unsharpmask and also sharpening. I can tell you that I do not like that site you have the images on as they have many popups and I personally do not like any site with popups on them.

Ahh i played around with those settings but wasn't sure how high i should go on them. I also was just using the plain ol "macro" option on the 350D since I'm just in the beginning stages of learning the camera. I cant do any real work with it until i go buy some diopter adjustments, since I'm practically blind (not really, but it feels that way) and i cant see clearly enough through the viewfinder to manually focus, even after adjusting the diopter thats on the camera already.

Should i sharpen before or after I resize? Is there a general rule of thumb about how much sharpening to apply? Do you have a good reference for unsharp masking, etc? Sorry to ask so many questions but like i said I'm new to the digital photog stuff, and I previously only used an ancient 35mm SLR that was pretty much ya got what ya shot and that was it. Its only now that i want to get serious about my hobby...

As a programmer myself I completely understand about the distaste for site popups and that stuff. Do you have a good repository site thats easy to use and lacks that..ahem..feature? I only placed them on that site because my family wanted to see them and they live across the country and are not particularly technologically astute.

[Dragonslayer]

Ahh i played around with those settings but wasn't sure how high i should go on them. I also was just using the plain ol "macro" option on the 350D since I'm just in the beginning stages of learning the camera. I cant do any real work with it until i go buy some diopter adjustments, since I'm practically blind (not really, but it feels that way) and i cant see clearly enough through the viewfinder to manually focus, even after adjusting the diopter thats on the camera already.

Should i sharpen before or after I resize? Is there a general rule of thumb about how much sharpening to apply? Do you have a good reference for unsharp masking, etc? Sorry to ask so many questions but like i said I'm new to the digital photog stuff, and I previously only used an ancient 35mm SLR that was pretty much ya got what ya shot and that was it. Its only now that i want to get serious about my hobby...

As a programmer myself I completely understand about the distaste for site popups and that stuff. Do you have a good repository site thats easy to use and lacks that..ahem..feature? I only placed them on that site because my family wanted to see them and they live across the country and are not particularly technologically astute.

I thought the 350 had a dioter adjustment on the viewfinder? I know the d-30 does and the 10, 20d do.

You always sharpen an image after you have done all your other adjustments, many people will use a lesser level on the USM adjustment and make several small passes, hard to tell how much one will need on each pass, but if you notice the image getting what looks like more noise in it and the edges of the image start to get what looks like a halo then you have taken it to far, I normally use two passes but I use an oddball software editor for image editing and not sure my settings would translate correctly for your software.

As far as images you I have web space but I am asshamed to link to is since most of my images are two years old and I have so many more images that are better. As far as for hear I just use their hosting to upload the image here and then you do not have to link off site to show them.

[spinaltap]

I thought the 350 had a dioter adjustment on the viewfinder? I know the d-30 does and the 10, 20d do.

It does, but its not quite strong enough, maybe two more steps up would match my glasses prescription for my left eye :(

Thanks for the tips on sharpening and stuff, i appreciate it :)