New Toys (Lensbaby Composer & di-GPS Pro)
knapph
Registered Users Posts: 142 Major grins
I am writing this in case there is anyone out there thinking about either one of these products.
This past week was birthday week at our house. This means it was time for more photo toys. I got my wife a Lensbaby Composer and she got me a di-GPS Pro. This weekend I got to play with both of them since my wife is visiting her parents for her mother's 90th birthday.
di-GPS Pro: For some time I have been taking a hand held gps with me when we are out shooting, when I could remember to put it into my pack. This past November we took a photo trip to Egypt, Jordan, and Israel and I spent a good bit of time setting up my hand held Garmin to use for this trip. Mainly this was an addition of an external antenna and modifying my backpack to carry the antenna. I had not considered getting a camera mounted unit because we normally shoot with four cameras and I did not want to be tagging only the images from one of the cameras. The Garmin hand held worked great during the trip after some more messing around with the antenna mounting. I used Jeffrey Friedl’s Geoencoding plugin for Lightroom to sync our images to the gps tracklog and Goggle Earth to display the track of our trip. Both of these worked very well.
After returning from the trip I read some articles about the di-GPS Pro. It looked good. It has the newer generation chips, contained a data logger and was small. It also has a pass through port for the Nikon remote release and would hold its last know position when it lost the satellite signal, e.g., inside a building. The data logger could hold 260,000+ data points. Even using a 1 second logging interval this will give a lot of logging time. A 2 second interval would get us through a two week trip with some room to spare. My very nice wife noticed me doing all this reading and got it for me for my birthday.
Today before I started, I cleared the di_GPS memory to see how long it would take for it to get a cold fix. From our driveway it sometimes takes a gps unit several minutes to find itself because of the buildings around and the satellites being low in the sky from our location. The di-GPS took a minute it get its first fix - not bad for this location. A later test with memory not cleared and having been turned off for several hours, took only seconds from the same location. I wanted to test its ability to build a track log while inside a car as well as use it to tag my shots. While driving around I had the gps attached to the camera, a Nikon D300, and had both in the passenger seat of the car; I left the gps unit on having set up the gps to log a location every second. Everything worked as advertised. The location data was written into the image files and a track log was saved even while inside the car. While in the open, the gps track followed where I was walking or driving very well. The track was usually within five feet or so of where I was walking. I am not sure the maps are any more accurate than this. When I was down on a floating dock shooting, the track log showed I was in the water and not on the dock. The error was probably due to the unit being hidden from the satellites by some buildings. The altitude data was in the right range but, I usually do not expect too much from the altitude data. If I want altitude, I will take my hand held unit that has a barometric altimeter in it.
When I got home I imported the images into Lightroom and used the software for the di_GPS to upload the track. This software is very basic but it does what it needs to do, get the track from the gps memory to the computer. The di_GPS Link software has a "Convert" button in it that I tried but all I got was a message stating that GPSBabel was not configured. The manual for the software does not have anything about how to configure GPSBabel so, this is going to take some research. The file format used by the unit is not one I was familiar with, sbp, I was able to convert the file to a gpx file and kml file using GPSBabel. Double clicking on the kml file opened Google Earth and there was my track. I have not tried syncing another camera to the gpx file yet but when I opened the file, all the necessary information appeared to be there. The location info showed up in Lightroom; clicking on the location info opened Google Maps and showed where the picture was taken just like is is supposed to.
The di-GPS Pro looks like a keeper. I can leave it attached to the camera I usually shoot with and be ready to go. We can go out shooting without camera bags or backpacks and still have the images geotagged. It is too early to know what effect the gps has on camera battery life but I am not too worried about it. I use a battery grip and always have an extra battery with me.
Lensbaby Composer: My wife has liked pictures she has seen taken using a Lensbaby and that is the reason for getting her one for her birthday. I, on the other hand, like very sharp pictures and was not sure what I would get from my experiments with the Lensbaby today. Often my wife tells me I need to soften up my shots some and, she is usually right. I guess that is why she is the creative director for our shooting.
Using a Lensbaby today really slowed down my shooting - in a good way. I spent much more time thinking about composition and focus than I would have normally done for the type of shooting I was doing today. It was like going back to using film with a completely manual camera. I was using the Lensbaby Composer with the double glass optics and the f2.8 aperture. I had no trouble focusing the lens when it was pointed straight ahead. When I tilted the lens, focusing became more of a challenge and I would have to search for the in focus spot. Sometimes I found it, sometimes I didn't, and sometimes I thought I had found it but looking at the images afterward on the computer I found it was somewhere other than where I thought it was. It is quite an adventure using one of these things. The only issue I ran into, other than focusing, was lens flare - it does not handle it well and I did not think it looked very good when it was present.
In general it was fun to use and I think it will be a good addition to our lens collection. I am still thinking about what type of subjects will work will with it. After returning today I ordered the closeup optics and the wide angle attachment for it. While I was shooting I found I wanted to get closer at times and at times wanted to get wider (and I like to mess with new stuff). Following are some of my shots from today. These are jpgs straight out of the camera.
If you have any questions about either of these toys, please ask. You can see some more images taken with the Lensbaby at http://www.stonecoastphotography.com/Collections/LensBaby. Click on the Map This button above a picture to see the location.
Pilings in Portland Harbor near the Portland Co. buildings
Portland Narrow Gauge Railroad car
Portland Narrow Gauge Railroad
Ooooooh Rusty Metal!!!!
Shiny thing surrounded by rusty metal
Not too hard to find rusty metal near the ocean
Something I found
A bell bouy
Casco Bay Ferry Line
The Portland fire boat
This past week was birthday week at our house. This means it was time for more photo toys. I got my wife a Lensbaby Composer and she got me a di-GPS Pro. This weekend I got to play with both of them since my wife is visiting her parents for her mother's 90th birthday.
di-GPS Pro: For some time I have been taking a hand held gps with me when we are out shooting, when I could remember to put it into my pack. This past November we took a photo trip to Egypt, Jordan, and Israel and I spent a good bit of time setting up my hand held Garmin to use for this trip. Mainly this was an addition of an external antenna and modifying my backpack to carry the antenna. I had not considered getting a camera mounted unit because we normally shoot with four cameras and I did not want to be tagging only the images from one of the cameras. The Garmin hand held worked great during the trip after some more messing around with the antenna mounting. I used Jeffrey Friedl’s Geoencoding plugin for Lightroom to sync our images to the gps tracklog and Goggle Earth to display the track of our trip. Both of these worked very well.
After returning from the trip I read some articles about the di-GPS Pro. It looked good. It has the newer generation chips, contained a data logger and was small. It also has a pass through port for the Nikon remote release and would hold its last know position when it lost the satellite signal, e.g., inside a building. The data logger could hold 260,000+ data points. Even using a 1 second logging interval this will give a lot of logging time. A 2 second interval would get us through a two week trip with some room to spare. My very nice wife noticed me doing all this reading and got it for me for my birthday.
Today before I started, I cleared the di_GPS memory to see how long it would take for it to get a cold fix. From our driveway it sometimes takes a gps unit several minutes to find itself because of the buildings around and the satellites being low in the sky from our location. The di-GPS took a minute it get its first fix - not bad for this location. A later test with memory not cleared and having been turned off for several hours, took only seconds from the same location. I wanted to test its ability to build a track log while inside a car as well as use it to tag my shots. While driving around I had the gps attached to the camera, a Nikon D300, and had both in the passenger seat of the car; I left the gps unit on having set up the gps to log a location every second. Everything worked as advertised. The location data was written into the image files and a track log was saved even while inside the car. While in the open, the gps track followed where I was walking or driving very well. The track was usually within five feet or so of where I was walking. I am not sure the maps are any more accurate than this. When I was down on a floating dock shooting, the track log showed I was in the water and not on the dock. The error was probably due to the unit being hidden from the satellites by some buildings. The altitude data was in the right range but, I usually do not expect too much from the altitude data. If I want altitude, I will take my hand held unit that has a barometric altimeter in it.
When I got home I imported the images into Lightroom and used the software for the di_GPS to upload the track. This software is very basic but it does what it needs to do, get the track from the gps memory to the computer. The di_GPS Link software has a "Convert" button in it that I tried but all I got was a message stating that GPSBabel was not configured. The manual for the software does not have anything about how to configure GPSBabel so, this is going to take some research. The file format used by the unit is not one I was familiar with, sbp, I was able to convert the file to a gpx file and kml file using GPSBabel. Double clicking on the kml file opened Google Earth and there was my track. I have not tried syncing another camera to the gpx file yet but when I opened the file, all the necessary information appeared to be there. The location info showed up in Lightroom; clicking on the location info opened Google Maps and showed where the picture was taken just like is is supposed to.
The di-GPS Pro looks like a keeper. I can leave it attached to the camera I usually shoot with and be ready to go. We can go out shooting without camera bags or backpacks and still have the images geotagged. It is too early to know what effect the gps has on camera battery life but I am not too worried about it. I use a battery grip and always have an extra battery with me.
Lensbaby Composer: My wife has liked pictures she has seen taken using a Lensbaby and that is the reason for getting her one for her birthday. I, on the other hand, like very sharp pictures and was not sure what I would get from my experiments with the Lensbaby today. Often my wife tells me I need to soften up my shots some and, she is usually right. I guess that is why she is the creative director for our shooting.
Using a Lensbaby today really slowed down my shooting - in a good way. I spent much more time thinking about composition and focus than I would have normally done for the type of shooting I was doing today. It was like going back to using film with a completely manual camera. I was using the Lensbaby Composer with the double glass optics and the f2.8 aperture. I had no trouble focusing the lens when it was pointed straight ahead. When I tilted the lens, focusing became more of a challenge and I would have to search for the in focus spot. Sometimes I found it, sometimes I didn't, and sometimes I thought I had found it but looking at the images afterward on the computer I found it was somewhere other than where I thought it was. It is quite an adventure using one of these things. The only issue I ran into, other than focusing, was lens flare - it does not handle it well and I did not think it looked very good when it was present.
In general it was fun to use and I think it will be a good addition to our lens collection. I am still thinking about what type of subjects will work will with it. After returning today I ordered the closeup optics and the wide angle attachment for it. While I was shooting I found I wanted to get closer at times and at times wanted to get wider (and I like to mess with new stuff). Following are some of my shots from today. These are jpgs straight out of the camera.
If you have any questions about either of these toys, please ask. You can see some more images taken with the Lensbaby at http://www.stonecoastphotography.com/Collections/LensBaby. Click on the Map This button above a picture to see the location.
Pilings in Portland Harbor near the Portland Co. buildings
Portland Narrow Gauge Railroad car
Portland Narrow Gauge Railroad
Ooooooh Rusty Metal!!!!
Shiny thing surrounded by rusty metal
Not too hard to find rusty metal near the ocean
Something I found
A bell bouy
Casco Bay Ferry Line
The Portland fire boat
0
Comments
So are you going to get your own Lensbaby or just keep the wife?
Moderator of the Cameras and Accessories forums
About the data logger..........Did you consider anything like THIS from B&H or THIS also from B&H.
If so what made you go with the di-GPS PRO???
Thanx
ProjectPhotobooth
Art,
Since this was a gift, I did not do extensive research on other options. I am familiar with the Nikon gps but it did not meet one of my must criteria - having a data logger. The Holux/Red Hen unit looks interesting and I can see some advantages to it. I could see putting the gps unit in a hat to get good reception. Also I like the idea of being to continue to collect location data in the data logger when having a remote release using the 10 pin connection. I also like the idea of having fewer cables to mess with; especially since I am a bit of a fumble fingers when it come to tightening the connecting screw on the Nikon cable. If I was in the market, I would give this combo a more in depth look.
The main reason my wife bought the di-GPS was I was looking at it and some people we had talked with liked the ones they had. The Pro vs the other models from Dawn Tech was decided by my using a remote release often.
Stone Coast Photography Facebook
Ozzwald,
The Lensbaby is not a replacement for a tilt/shift lens. The Lensbaby has only one in-focus spot and everything else is very blurred. You can not make a plane come into focus or correct for perspective like with a tilt/shift.
Having the Lensbaby is not going to get us to toss our 4x5 yet.
Stone Coast Photography Facebook
thanks for sharing
It's not what you look at that matters: Its what you see!
Nikon
http://www.time2smile.smugmug.com
When the Lensbaby is tilted off the axis of the camera, there is a different type of blur. It has streaks and looks as if the camera moved but only in isolated areas of the image. I am not sure you could do this easily in Photoshop.
I like composing the shot in camera with the Lensbaby. I had much rather do it this way than do it post in Photoshop. It is fun to try shooting multiple images of the same object to see what you get. I look at it as a learning process with fast feedback.
There is a lot we have not yet explored with the Lensbaby. We have both the telephoto and the wide angle attachments. When I was shooting these images I found I wanted to go wider. My wife likes to use the telephoto attachment. We also have the macro attachments to try. I am looking forward to getting some flowers to mess around with.
Stone Coast Photography Facebook