Blog

Posted by londonsean69 on 25 Jul 2015 / 0 Comment

Why bad camera shops put people off retail

The good

Today, I went up to London, and as I knew I would be near Euston, I had a look on Calumets website to see if anything took my fancy.
I saw on their site a used Sigma 30mm f/1.4 DC for the lovely price of £215, instead of the £360 it usually retails for, so decided to pop in and have a look.
Attentive staff who were happy to talk cameras and gave me plenty of time to test the lens made me feel comfortable, they were providing 12 months warranty even though it was used (but mint), so I bought it. I had a pleasant surprise when it rang through at £199.

Calumet is a store I have used several times in the past, both online and in-store, and they have always been great.

I did enquire whilst there into price and availability of a Sigma 105mm macro for the other half’s camera (she finds the 180 macro too heavy) which was “out of stock, but it’s £379 and we can get it by Tuesday if you want one”. I declined, as it’s not urgent, but there was never any pressure or hard sell.

The bad

Walking down Tottenham Court Road, I noticed a Sigma ‘Pro dealer’, so popped in to see them and enquire about said macro lens.
The conversation lasted under 2 minutes;

“Hi there, do you have the 105 macro OS HSM in a Nikon fit?”
“Yes, we stock it, but it’s a lot more than the £369 everyone else is claiming they can sell it for as none of them have stock”
“So, what price are you doing it at?”
“£650 RRP and we have stock”
“OK, thanks, bye”

No preamble from him, straight in with the price, and lying about availability so I would think the only place to get it was there.

A quick check when I get home shows that several stores I have used in the past (all have both online and ‘real’ stores) have stock, and the price is £379.

The ugly truth

“The internet is killing off retail shops” according to some sources. Well, it’s high time the rubbish shops with surly staff did close down.

Why should I, the paying customer, pay over and above for poor service and a rubbish attitude, when I can go online, get what I want at a good price, and have it delivered to my desk at work, with easy returns and no hassle?

I love good camera shops, and have visited some great ones (Grays of Westminster is a simply magical place for a Nikon shooter), but the attitude from the guy at the “photographic shop that speaks sense” stank, and is part of the reason that I rarely buy retail, preferring to shop online.

Posted by londonsean69 on 26 Jun 2015 / 0 Comment

Back to Scandinavia

Using some of the Avios points I have built up over the past year, I am heading to Stavanger in Norway for a long weekend, the primary aim of which is to photograph the fjords in the area.

The fjords in Southern Norway are much more impressive than those in the North where I spent a few days shooting the Northern Lights recently, as part of a 10 day trip to Scandinavia.

Before any trip, I will have a look through my Lightroom catalogue and see what equipment I used, always trying to take the bare minimum of equipment.

Whilst looking at my images from the last trip, this image caught my attention, but I felt it was a little lacking, so pulled it into Photoshop and ‘had a play’.

I’m no Photoshop guru, preferring to do as much processing in Lightroom as I can, but a few adjustment layers and masks to target specific areas of the image left me with something that I felt was much improved over the original.

I am not holding my breath for the Northern Lights on this next trip, as we are going in the height of summer, but recent auroral activity had the lights showing even in the South of the UK, so I will be keeping an eye on the sky at night anyway.

Posted by londonsean69 on 23 Jun 2015 / 0 Comment

The National Trust

Here in the UK, we are fortunate enough to have a number of historic and interesting properties, many of which are managed by The National Trust. According to their website, they have 575 places in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, covering the entire country.

Places to visit range from parks and woodlands to castles and historic homes, such as Chartwell, the home of Winston Churchill.

Overlooking the lake at Chartwell, former home of Winston Churchill

Membership of The National Trust gains you access to all of these, and at £99 for a joint membership, I think this is good value, especially when you consider it also allows you free parking at most of the places they manage.

Chair next to the lake at Chartwell, former home of Winston Churchill

For those with an interest in photography, these places are a rich vein of subject material, well tended gardens, stately homes and managed open spaces all provide superb places to go for a few hours (or longer) either by yourself or with the family, and spend some time enjoying the heritage and history of the UK, whilst giving ample opportunities for creating images.

To my mind, putting yourself in the right location is more important than making sure you have every lens possible, combined with every filter ever made, just to cover every situation that ‘might’ happen. If you can create the situation, you can get the image with much less gear and effort.

Posted by londonsean69 on 10 Jun 2015 / 0 Comment

Corrupt images

My first hard drive failure occurred this week and was, as is to be expected, quite unexpected.

It wasn’t even a total failure – I was skimming through my Lightroom catalogue to find an image, and noticed some coloured banding showing on images.

Corrupted nudibranch image

Naturally, I was a little concerned, so I clicked through to explorer and opened the NEF (raw) file directly using Photoshop, and the banding was still there.

This ruled out a corrupt Lightroom catalogue, and as it only affected images in 1 folder, I can only assume it is a bad sector. Unfortunately I have no idea when this occurred, so have copied the corrupt file to both of my backup drives.

At this point in time, there is seemingly nothing I can do, so I just have to accept the loss of 14 files. Thankfully none of these files were part of my better work.

I have stopped using the drive, and a replacement is already on order from Amazon.

In the meantime, I have reviewed my backup software and from now on will accept the slower backup but greater security given by data validation.

I am thankful that only a few fairly unimportant images were lost, as I have now been forced into a thorough review of my backup procedures.

As ever, I am open to suggestions for ways to improve the backup process – such as what software are you using?

Posted by londonsean69 on 31 May 2015 / 0 Comment

Creating opportunities

On the 10th of May, 2015, I went to the Cowpie Country Show, camera in hand, as the opportunity to capture some images of farm animals, old machinery, and the farmers and workers was too good to miss.
Unfortunately, I was bitterly disappointed with the show – the entry cost was high, the turnout low and the number of animals laughable.
There were more burger vans than farm shop stalls, so my hope of getting some decent cheeses and pies was misplaced.
The whole thing left me quite disappointed, and really dented my enthusiasm for photography that day.
After barely 2 hours, I left, feeling bereft of inspiration.

Alpaca - not exactly a common UK farm animal, country shows provide an opportunity to see different animals up close

Alpaca – country shows allow you to see unusual animals

So, why the post?
It’s not just to have a moan, it’s about creating opportunities.
I create images because I enjoy it, and it gives me the opportunity (some would say excuse!) to go to some stunning locations. Unfortunately, my photography cannot all take place in exotic locations, so it is important to make the most of any opportunities closer to home.
Shows and festivals provide an opportunity to shoot several subjects in a relatively compact place, and in a short space of time, so I try to attend when I can. I will not be going back to the Cowpie however.
Thankfully, there is always the National Trust to fall back on, with their collection of over 500 buildings and managed open spaces, which will be the subject of a future post.

Future bacon

1 234 5 6 7