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I'm looking for some advice on digital photography of fireworks. I'd
like to keep it cheap and I'd like to trigger the camera remotely. Can
anyone suggest some older digital cameras that might fit the bill?

Allen

On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 18:22:47 -0700, John McWilliams wrote:

>> I'm looking for some advice on digital photography of fireworks. I'd
>> like to keep it cheap and I'd like to trigger the camera remotely. Can
>> anyone suggest some older digital cameras that might fit the bill?
>
> Why remotely?
>
> IAE, each year about this time this question is posted and info and
> misinfo exchanged. You could Google the archives of this very NG
> to get a head start.

It allows the use of cheaper, less expensive tripods. Otherwise,
smooth arcs can get the 'wigglies'. Not that they don't sometimes
make interesting shots. This effect can really be accentuated by
shooting handheld!

On Wed, 25 Jun 2008 14:21:07 -0700, John McWilliams wrote:

>> It allows the use of cheaper, less expensive tripods. Otherwise,
>> smooth arcs can get the 'wigglies'. Not that they don't sometimes
>> make interesting shots. This effect can really be accentuated by
>> shooting handheld!
>>
>
> Yes, that's the conventional wisdom, but unless one is stabbing at the
> shutter, or breathing heavily, or is palsied, I've not found that a
> careful pressing of the shutter while camera is mounted on a decent- or
> even poor- tripod introduces any movement. Then again, my main lenses
> have VR.

Perhaps. I can't say for sure how carefully I pressed the shutter
yesterday (while testing several cameras/lenses), but one shot went
off without the expected time delay. I don't recall "stabbing" the
shutter, but since I was using a cheap Sunpak tripod that was on
hand instead of my usual Manfrotto, I decided to immediately re-do
the shot using the self timer. The shot taken without using the
self-timer (it used a 3 second exposure) had a very obvious double
image caused by camera movement. VR helps quite a bit, but using a
tripod with VR disabled usually produces much better images than
shooting handheld with VR turned on, except when using exceptionally
fast shutter speeds.

I think that I'll try to pick up the Manfrotto tripod some time
next week to see whether the double image can be easily duplicated
when the self timer isn't used. As bad as the Sunpak is, it beats
handheld shots by a wide margin if the exposures are long enough.

On Jun 25, 11:21*am, John McWilliams <jp...@comcast.net> wrote:
> ASAAR wrote:
> > On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 18:22:47 -0700, John McWilliams wrote:
>
> >>> I'm looking for some advice on digital photography of fireworks. I'd
> >>> like to keep it cheap and I'd like to trigger the camera remotely. Can
> >>> anyone suggest some older digital cameras that might fit the bill?
> >> Why remotely?
>
> >> IAE, each year about this time this question is posted and info and
> >> misinfo exchanged. You could Google the archives of this very NG
> >> to get a head start.
>
> > * It allows the use of cheaper, less expensive tripods. *Otherwise,
> > smooth arcs can get the 'wigglies'. *Not that they don't sometimes
> > make interesting shots. *This effect can really be accentuated by
> > shooting handheld! *
>
> Yes, that's the conventional wisdom, but unless one is stabbing at the
> shutter, or breathing heavily, or is palsied, I've not found that a
> careful pressing of the shutter while camera is mounted on a decent- or
> even poor- tripod introduces any movement. Then again, my main lenses
> have VR.
>
> --
> john mcwilliams

I have had that problem using a pretty good tripod, a cable release is
the way to go IMO.

Scott

Scott W <> wrote:
> On Jun 25, 11:21?am, John McWilliams <jp...@comcast.net> wrote:
>> ASAAR wrote:
>> > On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 18:22:47 -0700, John McWilliams wrote:
>>
>> >>> I'm looking for some advice on digital photography of fireworks. I'd
>> >>> like to keep it cheap and I'd like to trigger the camera remotely. Can
>> >>> anyone suggest some older digital cameras that might fit the bill?
>> >> Why remotely?
>>
>> >> IAE, each year about this time this question is posted and info and
>> >> misinfo exchanged. You could Google the archives of this very NG
>> >> to get a head start.
>>
>> > ? It allows the use of cheaper, less expensive tripods. ?Otherwise,
>> > smooth arcs can get the 'wigglies'. ?Not that they don't sometimes
>> > make interesting shots. ?This effect can really be accentuated by
>> > shooting handheld! ?
>>
>> Yes, that's the conventional wisdom, but unless one is stabbing at the
>> shutter, or breathing heavily, or is palsied, I've not found that a
>> careful pressing of the shutter while camera is mounted on a decent- or
>> even poor- tripod introduces any movement. Then again, my main lenses
>> have VR.

> I have had that problem using a pretty good tripod, a cable release is
> the way to go IMO.

If you're using a long enough lens and a big enough display/print
within a certain range of exposure times you can see the blur
introduced by mirror vibration. A very good tripod will reduce the
range of exposure times over which this mirror slap vibration blurs
the image, but doesn't remove it.

Unless you're using an optical laboratory's granite tripod of course


--
Chris Malcolm DoD #205
IPAB, Informatics, JCMB, King's Buildings, Edinburgh, EH9 3JZ, UK
[http://www.dai.ed.ac.uk/homes/cam/]

On Jun 24, 9:22*pm, John McWilliams <jp...@comcast.net> wrote:
> arpad wrote:
> > I'm looking for some advice on digital photography of fireworks. I'd
> > like to keep it cheap and I'd like to trigger the camera remotely. Can
> > anyone suggest some older digital cameras that might fit the bill?
>
> Why remotely?

I was trying to keep things simple.

I'd like to do stereo photography of fireworks using digital cameras.
Since cost is definitely an object I'd like to start with a single
camera. Once I'm assured that I've got the camera that'll do the job
I'll get a second, identical camera. To do stereo I've got to be able
to synchronize the cameras. Hence the requirement for remote trigger
capability.

I'm not entirely averse to hacking into a camera to enable me to
remotely trigger but I'd prefer not too.

> IAE, each year about this time this question is posted and info and
> misinfo exchanged. You could Google the archives of this very NG to get
> a head start.

I've done some digging although not in this newsgroup. I'll do that.

Allen

"arpad" <> wrote in message
news:d365e2f8-d232-4e3e-a810-...

> I'm not entirely averse to hacking into a camera to enable me to
> remotely trigger but I'd prefer not too.

All you need: http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/Downloads

--
Jeff R.