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Bit the Bullet now Buyers Remorse!


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#1 Sam

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Posted 25 March 2014 - 02:39 PM

Well I finally bit the bullet and got the Canon T3i, only thing is now I am having buyers remorse and wondering if I should have spent that kind of money for it. Considering taking it back but I do not want to got me in a quandary as to what to do......crying in my beer so to speak. Anyone else experience this syndrome?


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#2 Photographa

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Posted 26 March 2014 - 05:31 AM

I've felt that before but never about my T3i! You're getting a fantastic DSLR with a huge bang for your buck! In terms of the value you're getting per dollar spent, the T3i is very nicely seated near the top of the list of DSLRs. It's also the most popular camera for light enthusiasts and beginners which means there's a lot of competition in the marketplace for accessories, and there's high demand if you ever choose to resell it.

 

Have you ever plunged into photography before? :D


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#3 Sam

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Posted 26 March 2014 - 03:53 PM

Yeah I have but that was back when they were using old 35mm film and not digital cameras. What I spent on this one is way more than I spent on my other 3 old 35mm cameras. You seem to know your stuff so how will this camera do for macro-photography?


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#4 Photographa

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Posted 26 March 2014 - 06:04 PM

I've never had a macro lens for it. I use a 24mm - 105mm right now, the only "issues" I've ever had are that the shutter is fairly loud when compared to other cameras and there's noise if you need to use extremely high ISOs. (My lens has a max. aperture of f/4 so I can't really do well in low light situations).

 

If you're using that stock lens kit it's a loud and slow one but don't let it deter you from the camera. The T3i is incredible in my opinion , especially when you swap out lenses.


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#5 Sam

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Posted 27 March 2014 - 03:17 AM

Yeah I was considering another lens 70-110mm or something like that. Right now the camera is still in the box I will not have time to play around with it until the weekend. I think at this point I have decided to keep it.


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#6 Photographa

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Posted 27 March 2014 - 06:18 AM

Yeah I was considering another lens 70-110mm or something like that. Right now the camera is still in the box I will not have time to play around with it until the weekend. I think at this point I have decided to keep it.

 

If it's still in the box and you wanted to switch to a different lens and not use the stock one you could sell it as new! I sold that stock lens kit at used and got around $70 on eBay.

 

The camera uses an EF-S lens mount so you're future proof when you buy a lens because all of Canon's higher-end cameras also use these same lenses.

 

If you need to do very high speed shooting, I also found out that it supports UHS-1 SD cards at the 100MHz bus speed. (I purchased a UHS card at the 208MHz speed and it can't be fully utilized but it was a great price.) I haven't noticed the buffer clearing significantly faster but it's noticeably faster than a Class 10.


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#7 Sam

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Posted 28 March 2014 - 03:22 AM

No I am going to keep the lens that came with it. Who knows it may come in handy for something especially while I am learning to use it. Do you use any filters? What do you recommend?

 

I got a 55-250mm lens today for a pretty good price so I cannot complain. Got to say though you will not learn everything this camera has to offer in one day thats for sure.


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#8 Photographa

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Posted 30 March 2014 - 11:32 AM

I don't usually use a lens filter at all. The lens hood is on my camera all the time and I feel that offers much better protection. The lens filter wouldn't really do much if an object hit the camera head-on.

 

I did use a lens filter for the first time this week, it was a 77mm AFGA that I got for $9 to protect my primary lens...I photographed at a color festival so I used the filter along with many ziplock bags and gaffer's tape and and plastic wrap (something like this, but mine was very carefully crafted and I had two layers over the entire camera). The camera protection was incredible and I'll keep the lens filter for when I photograph color throwing events in the future, and it could also be useful when I go to the ocean and wade through the waves to try to get good shots.

 

I hear B+W filters are the best and many photographers love them. I just feel like I don't want an extra layer of glass between me and my subjects (most people use them for protection, but I don't think it'll offer much protection if something hits your camera, and my L-series lens is weatherproof anyway).

 

Go get a lens hood, I'd recommend it much more than a filter for its effectiveness and protection!


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#9 Sam

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Posted 30 March 2014 - 01:19 PM

Thanks for all the help but I have decided to return the camera for a refund I just do not have the patience its going to take to learn to use it. Took some photos with it today and they were horrible to say the least though I should not have had it in manual mode that did not help. Nothing wrong with the camera there is just a dumb ass behind it. All this shutter speed, Depth of field and ISO along with these f/stops are just confusing as hell and the more I read the more dumfounded I become....


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#10 Photographa

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Posted 30 March 2014 - 02:16 PM

Thanks for all the help but I have decided to return the camera for a refund I just do not have the patience its going to take to learn to use it. Took some photos with it today and they were horrible to say the least though I should not have had it in manual mode that did not help. Nothing wrong with the camera there is just a dumb ass behind it. All this shutter speed, Depth of field and ISO along with these f/stops are just confusing as hell and the more I read the more dumfounded I become....

 

Aww man, that's a bummer.

 

I'm almost always in either a semi-automatic or fully-automatic mode. I'll PM you some shots I took yesterday, they were all in full auto on the T3i.

 

The manual modes are more so to create creative effects. For example, if you want to do depth of field shots you'd go into Aperture priority and open up the aperture (and the camera will set everything else to make your photos expose correctly). If you wanted to give your photos a creative blur at night you could go to Shutter priority and set it, and the camera will set everything else to give you a proper exposure.

 

I've almost never shot in full-manual. The camera does wonderful in full auto (I shoot in RAW and then I can do post-processing in Lightroom or Aperture to get the colors and exposure I want) or if I want some specific effect or I'm in a specific situation I'll use one of the semi-auto modes where I tell the camera what I want set and it dynamically changes everything else for me so the exposure is correct.


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#11 Sam

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Posted 30 March 2014 - 02:24 PM

Great shots! And you did that in auto? So let me get this straight, I can set say the ISO and the camera does the rest? Well how does it know what I am shooting? And what about a telephoto lens? How does that work in auto if you do not manually adjust it?


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#12 Photographa

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Posted 30 March 2014 - 04:17 PM

Great shots! And you did that in auto? So let me get this straight, I can set say the ISO and the camera does the rest? Well how does it know what I am shooting? And what about a telephoto lens? How does that work in auto if you do not manually adjust it?

 

Aperture, Shutter Speed, and ISO are the three factors that affect your exposure (how bright or dark your photo becomes).

 

Aperture Priority mode lets you set the aperture manually, and your shutter speed and ISO will be determined automatically from shot to shot.

Shutter Priority lets you set the shutter speed manually, and your aperture and ISO will be determined automatically from shot to shot.

 

In any mode other than full-auto, you can choose to have the ISO set manually or you can leave it on auto. 

 

There's no case where you'd want the ISO set manually and have everything else automatically. Your camera wants to use the lowest ISO possible while maintaining a perfect exposure.

 

It's no different with telephoto.

 

The camera doesn't know what you're shooting, that's exactly why it's important to know how aperture and shutter speed and ISO all affect your photos. Say you're shooting a sports event on full auto. Your camera has no idea this is a sports event. If it's a sports event, you'll probably want to freeze motion so there's no blur. If you want to freeze motion, you could use shutter priority mode to set the camera to capture at 1/4000 of a second. In this mode, your camera would use the widest aperture and probably a higher ISO to compensate for this extremely fast shutter. Your photos would hypothetically be exposed in the exact same way, but there would be no blur in your photos (there may be slightly more noise because of the higher ISO, but there's ways to correct for that in post-processing).

 

In a contrasting example, say you're photographing a stream. Full auto mode will capture the stream okay, but say you want to use a show shutter speed so you can make the water blur while everything else stays sharp. You could use shutter priority mode to set the camera to capture at 1/2 of a second. If you're outside and you're trying to do this, you'll think "Oh my god this is going to be extremely overexposed!" Fear not, in shutter priority your camera will know "He wants a .5 second exposure, let's make it so less light hits the sensor by using the smallest aperture and let's use an extremely low ISO so the photo can be exposed properly."

 

Does that all make sense? Those are two examples where you could use full auto, but if you know how to use shutter priority mode you can easily get better photos. Same with Aperture Priority. When you learn which mode works best where you can get really good shots.

 

Almost nobody will use full manual unless they have it on a tripod in a studio or something. Otherwise you'd be changing settings before every single photo!


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#13 Sam

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Posted 31 March 2014 - 03:06 AM

OK, I want to eventually do macro photography  and close up work so how does the camera know how close to an object you are? All of what you posted makes sense I just cannot figure out how the camera determines distance when you want a closer shot. Especially if its on auto or some other predetermined setting.


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#14 Photographa

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Posted 31 March 2014 - 08:18 AM

OK, I want to eventually do macro photography  and close up work so how does the camera know how close to an object you are? All of what you posted makes sense I just cannot figure out how the camera determines distance when you want a closer shot. Especially if its on auto or some other predetermined setting.

 

The camera doesn't really need to know how close to an object you are, unless I'm not understanding what you're asking.

 

Macro ability is determined by the lens minimum focus distance. For example, my 24-105mm f/4 L can focus as close as ~40 centimeters. You can either manually focus or let the camera autofocus to get the shot. If you prefer to have it autofocus on a specific point, you can tell the camera exactly which focus point to use. I think the T3i has nine autofocus points, and you can tell the camera exactly where to focus (center, left, right, etc.).

 

If you're referring to the smooth blur that you see behind a lot of macro shots....that's due to the large aperture size that's being used when photographing something up close.

 

Macro performance is determined by the lens  :)


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#15 Sam

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Posted 31 March 2014 - 02:54 PM

The camera doesn't really need to know how close to an object you are, unless I'm not understanding what you're asking.

 

Macro ability is determined by the lens minimum focus distance. For example, my 24-105mm f/4 L can focus as close as ~40 centimeters. You can either manually focus or let the camera autofocus to get the shot. If you prefer to have it autofocus on a specific point, you can tell the camera exactly which focus point to use. I think the T3i has nine autofocus points, and you can tell the camera exactly where to focus (center, left, right, etc.).

 

If you're referring to the smooth blur that you see behind a lot of macro shots....that's due to the large aperture size that's being used when photographing something up close.

 

Macro performance is determined by the lens  :)

 

Are those the little dots that I see in the lens? The 55-250mm lens sadly I had to return it. I found a EF 28-90mm f4-5.6 macro and bought it. Read some pretty good reviews about it being a great starter lens and the price was right......What about a tripod? Should I get a regular one?


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#16 Photographa

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Posted 31 March 2014 - 04:41 PM

A tripod is really up to you based on the type of photography you intend to take! Haha I had one for a while and I used it so much it broke, and I haven't found a reason to use one since. It was nice during the summer when I did a lot of long-exposure photography in the evenings.

 

I'm glad you found a lens you like! The general consensus around the photography community is that it's much better to invest in a good lens than in a good camera body. Camera bodies come and go but lenses can be used for decades...and lenses retain their resale value extremely well. There have been tests done on using a crappy lens with a high-end body (think $5,000 camera body) vs a crappy body and a high-end lens and the high-end lens yields very nice images even with a poor body.

 

It seems to me that now you're all set on gear and you're ready to go out there and start shooting! :D


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#17 Sam

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Posted 07 April 2014 - 03:14 AM

My final Macro Rig....finally got it together.

 

IMG_0048_zps80a8a1f9.jpg


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#18 Photographa

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Posted 07 April 2014 - 08:44 AM

What are all those accessories on the camera?


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#19 Sam

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Posted 07 April 2014 - 04:46 PM

What are all those accessories on the camera?

 

The flash is a Yongnuo YN-14ex lite ring, the three black rings are extensions made by Fotodiox and the silver looking thing is a Canon 28-90mm macro lens.


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#20 Photographa

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Posted 07 April 2014 - 07:29 PM

I guess you'll be doing lots of macro photography :D


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