New Camera
Aug. 22nd, 2009 08:16 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
urbpanSo I finally got a new camera to replace the Canon S1 that I dropped in the river. As it turns out, dropping a camera in a river voids its warrantee, so I didn't end up getting the updated version of that camera.
Instead I got a Pentax K100D, a digital slr. It was very reasonable (factory refurbished, body only) and it happens to work with my old k1000 lenses. (An aside: I own two Pentax K1000 manual SLRs, the best camera ever made. With the digital photography revolution, they were transformed into sentimental paperweights. I may keep at least one of them forever, just as a place to store my extra lens. Perhaps on my desk, keeping papers from blowing away.)
So I'm learning to use a digital slr while at the same time relearning how to focus my own photographs (manual lenses, you see). I'm actually doing a lot better than I thought I would, but there are still some bumps to iron out. For some reason, about half of the photos I took yesterday, didn't transfer to iPhoto (it gave me an error message about file type or something). Alexis thought maybe iPhoto needed updating, so I did that. No dice.
Then she suggested that I actually use the software that came with the camera (Pentax Photo Browser and Pentax Photo Library). I did that, but still can't make heads or tails of it. Then I read the manual for the software, and it said I needed to manually drag the folder from the camera (the camera appears as a folder on the desktop when its plugged into the computer) into whatever file folder I want the pictures in. That worked, although those files were messed up, probably because when I first plugged the camera into the computer I unplugged it without dragging the camera folder icon into the trash, like you do with an iPod or it erases all your music. (With the Canon cameras I've used, I never had to do that.)
Anyway, now I know more, and I'll try again today. I'm a little disappointed at how many extra steps it seems to take, but it will probably become second nature, as it did when I first started doing digital photography.
Per Murphy's law, the best Muddy River pics from yesterday were the ones that didn't transfer over, so the first project picture from the new camera is not great. It shows how hazy it was yesterday at least (but that may be partly because I didn't manually focus it very well).
Instead I got a Pentax K100D, a digital slr. It was very reasonable (factory refurbished, body only) and it happens to work with my old k1000 lenses. (An aside: I own two Pentax K1000 manual SLRs, the best camera ever made. With the digital photography revolution, they were transformed into sentimental paperweights. I may keep at least one of them forever, just as a place to store my extra lens. Perhaps on my desk, keeping papers from blowing away.)
So I'm learning to use a digital slr while at the same time relearning how to focus my own photographs (manual lenses, you see). I'm actually doing a lot better than I thought I would, but there are still some bumps to iron out. For some reason, about half of the photos I took yesterday, didn't transfer to iPhoto (it gave me an error message about file type or something). Alexis thought maybe iPhoto needed updating, so I did that. No dice.
Then she suggested that I actually use the software that came with the camera (Pentax Photo Browser and Pentax Photo Library). I did that, but still can't make heads or tails of it. Then I read the manual for the software, and it said I needed to manually drag the folder from the camera (the camera appears as a folder on the desktop when its plugged into the computer) into whatever file folder I want the pictures in. That worked, although those files were messed up, probably because when I first plugged the camera into the computer I unplugged it without dragging the camera folder icon into the trash, like you do with an iPod or it erases all your music. (With the Canon cameras I've used, I never had to do that.)
Anyway, now I know more, and I'll try again today. I'm a little disappointed at how many extra steps it seems to take, but it will probably become second nature, as it did when I first started doing digital photography.
Per Murphy's law, the best Muddy River pics from yesterday were the ones that didn't transfer over, so the first project picture from the new camera is not great. It shows how hazy it was yesterday at least (but that may be partly because I didn't manually focus it very well).
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no subject
Date: 2009-08-22 01:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-22 01:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-22 06:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-22 01:27 pm (UTC)Congrats on the new camera -- I looked really closely at the Pentax when I went dSLR, but since I already had Nikon lenses from my 35mm FG ...
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Date: 2009-08-22 01:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-22 01:44 pm (UTC)I too have an ancient K1000 SLR, I agree, best camera I ever had. So I wanted another Pentax. It's great that the lenses are compatable. That was my first requirement in getting a new camera, I didn't want to have to buy a whole new system of lenses and whatnot.
eta: One thing I noticed that was different from my other digital camera was how fast the autofocus is on the Pentax. I ended up getting one autofocus lens with the camera body as a package deal. I still use the manual focus lenses, but it did take some getting used to and practice to get back in the habit of actually focusing the lens.
no subject
Date: 2009-08-22 03:25 pm (UTC)did you ever load the canon drivers? i've never had any flash or other device that was hot swap like you're describing on my apples. with pcs, sure - pcs do hot swap better.
there might be software you can find for free that will grab the corrupted files and fix them. something to play with.
good luck.
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