Canon EOS 500N

[blue_angel_12]

At the moment, I have a Canon EOS 500N with a EF 35-80mm zoom.

My main question is:

What is it that you adjust in order for how fast a picture is taken; is it the shutter speed or ISO Equivalent?

Will my Canon EOS 500N take pictures as fast as someone running in an athletics carnival to capture them as if they have stopped - without it going blurry (like very clear/high quality)! for example: http://www.punahou.edu/uploaded/images/ ... -track.jpg // http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/4240 ... p14da4.jpg

What other lense are there I can get so I can zoom very close - ie. a concerts if I sit far away (and still get a high quality photo)

thanks in advance!!

[marxz]

errrrrrrr....... well given the Canon EOS 500N is a film camera adjusting ISO might require "more than a little" effort than just cranking the ISO dial.

but increasing shutter speed is the goal so faster film would allow a faster shutter speed, also a wider aperture would do the same job, combining the 2 would allow even faster shutter speed.

80mm is very short telephoto so not much use at sports or concerts unless you're with in a few dozen meters. 200mm would probably be what most sports/event photographers would consider to be the minimum reach for a telephoto zoom, 300mm and 400mm being more common for outside sports work.

Trouble is to get a fast enough lens for sports work you start to pay quite substantial amounts of money (ie local prices have the 70-200mm 2.8 at over three times the cost of the 70-200 f4).
However the 70-200 f4 (IS or non IS), the 70-300 f4-5.6 IS or the 100-400 f4.5-5.6 IS can all be used for outside (daylight) sports but would not be very usable indoors for concerts (though when used with a 40D or 1d MkIII you could push the ISO up to 1600 and get fair to good shots.

[sheila]

You might have to bite the bullet and "go" digital which will enable you to change the ISO to suit the conditions. One of the biggest pluses in the digital world is the ability to change ISO at a flick of a switch!

To capture images such as that posted you will have to shoot faster and use fast film.

Marxz is 100% correct in his advice.

Cheers
Sheila

[blue_angel_12]

yeah thanks for your replies

so... how much would a Canon EF 70-200 f4 approximately cost? in AUS dollars. I might as well get a Canon EOS-1D Mark III or a Canon EOS 5D eh?

[sheila]

Check out EBay Australia to see how much the non-IS 70-200 f/4 L is going for (I have had both and there is very little difference between the IS version and non). You can probably pick up a new non-IS version for around $900.00. I highly recommend the 5D as its certainly one of the very best dSLRs that Canon has produced (to date). I don't recommend the 1DMarkIII until they fix the focus bug.

I recommend this outfit in North Sydney (they will also deliver)

http://www.d-d-photographics.com.au/can ... m#70-200f4

Cheers
Sheila

[marxz]

yeah thanks for your replies

so... how much would a Canon EF 70-200 f4 approximately cost? in AUS dollars. I might as well get a Canon EOS-1D Mark III or a Canon EOS 5D eh?

LOL I wish I could throw such money around.... (though I do dream)

good news is that the 70-200 f4 is cheap, that is "cheap for a professional lens", cheap but good, this is rated as being one of the best zoom lenses ever made, a good copy rates as good or better than many highly regarded L series primes and even average copies are still very good (and as such this is my next purchase (to go with a new 40D) sometime early next year)

Street price ballparks around $1200 AUD for the non IS and a little under $1600 AUD for the IS.
I'd go the IS model, the f4 has generation 3 IS so will allow hand held shots up to 3 or 4 stops slower than the non IS - personally I think IS is the best thing bar the digital camera and wouldn't flinch at the price difference.

FYI for the f2.8 with IS the cheapest I've seen street price is around $3400.... (though maybe cheaper in larger cities or ebay stores) if I was primarily interested in shooting sports I'd start out getting the f2.8 and a 40D rather than the f4 and the 1D mkIII, then 2 or 3 years later keep the lens and upgrade the camera.

Also if you "get out" of photography later then good lens' and particularly any of the 70-200 lens' keep their value quite well (and for a long time) were as your camera will be almost worthless resale wise after 3 or 4 years. (eg: my D60 body was worth well over $3000 AUD in 2002, they now sell on ebay for under $400 - and that's usually with a battery grip (original cost $300), 2 or 3 spare batteries (add $150 original cost), and a cheap non L lens (say $300) thrown in to sweeten the deal.

Note though, of course, the IS will not help with stopping sport/action though for slower moving or nearly stationary subjects on stage you could find your self shooting handheld there (with say ISO 800 or 1600).

[marxz]

Check out EBay Australia to see how much the non-IS 70-200 f/4 L is going for (I have had both and there is very little difference between the IS version and non). You can probably pick up a new non-IS version for around $900.00. I highly recommend the 5D as its certainly one of the very best dSLRs that Canon has produced (to date). I don't recommend the 1DMarkIII until they fix the focus bug.

I recommend this outfit in North Sydney (they will also deliver)

http://www.d-d-photographics.com.au/can ... m#70-200f4

Cheers
Sheila

Actually they _say_ they have fixed the "bug" - apparently it was a faulty sub mirror unit (that is used for AF tracking), only certain ranges of serial numbers were affected and they are being recalled.

now back to the original question

In the broader context of the question I don't think you could consider the 5D a "sports" camera. however many reviewers are calling the 40D as being equal to the 5D in terms of image quality. Though of course if you want/need full frame size then it's the 5D or the $12,000 1Ds MkIII (or a $6,000-$8,000 second hand 1Ds MkII)

As good a camera as the 5D is the 3 frames per second rate is slow, 5fps is considered to be the good starting rate for sports use.

The 40D gets about a very respectable 6.5 fps and the 1D MKiii has 10fps as a maximum and 2 programable modes that can be set between 1 and 10 fps)


ALSO... back to lenses don't dismiss some of Canon's telephoto primes.

as a possible alternative to the 70-200 .... (not dissing the 70-200 f/4 at all as that is THE lens I'd recommend for versatility and quality, just the f4 speed may be a drag and you might want to "supplement" it with another faster lens for indoor work)

for relatively close sports use there's the L series 200mm f/2.8L II USM which street price should be around $1100 new.

The 135mm "soft focus" f2.8, which despite its name is actually very sharp without the difuser enabled street price is less than $700 new. build quality is OK to good.

For indoor shooting

I have the 100mm f2 which I love - super sharp - you can pick them up for under $800 new or less than $500 on ebay. this is good for concert work if you're no more than, say, 20 or 30 meters back. Build quality is solid really nothing you can fault at all, you could probably use it to club a bear to death then put it back on your camera and shoot away.

Canon EF 85mm f/1.8 is only available used (no longer made) so you'll need to hunt for them on ebay (I paid just over $350 but I've seen them go for a lot more), image quality on my copy is /not quite/ as good as the above mentioned 100 f2 but some people say it is better than the equivalent L series that replaced it (and costs 3 times more) build quality is as good as the 100 f/2.

Lastly the 50mm 1.8 is effectively an 80mm short telephoto lens and is very good for close work (front of stage, portraits) can be got for $120 new street - every one should have one - its construction sucks but image quality is surprisingly good - very good in fact. Due to build quality I wouldn't buy this one used but for $120 new you're not going to save that much anyway


None of these primes have IS and of course they are not zooms but image quality is excellent on all of these and most of these are over 2 stops faster than the 70-200 f4 so a shot at 1/100th sec on the f4 could be taken at 1/400th sec or faster on an f2 or faster lens. ( I was just taking some shots in a very dark corridor at work with the 50mm f/1.8 and was able to shoot at 1/500 of a second at ISO 800, admittedly there I was going for shallow DoF rather than speed (but they are two sides of the same coin).

[blue_angel_12]

wow. thanks for all your suggestions but i can't really "throw" my money around like that i've looked the prices up for both the Canon EOS-1D Mark III & Canon EOS 5D and the prices aren't what i had expected... much higher but i guess that's why the two camera's are so good.

so.... do you guys recommend any cameras that aren't that expensive? the main things i'm looking for are:

- fast shutter speed so i can capture photos without it going blurry and that it seems like that person has stopped moving
- sharp clear images
- zoom close in

i have also got a Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W7, but the results aren't sharp and i get a lot of blurry pictures.... i tried changing the shutter speed but the same thing happens!

thanks in advance

[thelund]

so.... do you guys recommend any cameras that aren't that expensive? the main things i'm looking for are:

- fast shutter speed so i can capture photos without it going blurry and that it seems like that person has stopped moving
- sharp clear images
- zoom close in

Any SLR, digital or analog will be able to get you fast shutter speeds! Actually your current 500N will be enough, all you need to do is use a high speed film, for example ISO 1600.

Sharp images and zoom-range is all about the lens and NOTHING about the SLR!
A EOS 300D which is considered old and obsolete will give you crystal clear and sharp images with a good lens, at least as long as you use fairly low ISO.

However at high ISO film will become more grainy and digital images will be more noisy, this will cause you to loose some detail and sharpness.
New DSLRs generally handle noise better than previous generations. Allso larger sensors will perform better than smaller ones. The EOS 1Ds MK III and EOS 5D have fullframe sensors, this means it is the same size as your film negative, the 1D MK III has a 1.3 times cropped sensor, the 40D and 400D both have 1.6 times cropped sensors.

So handling ISO noise the 1Ds and 5D will outperform the 1D which in turn will outperform the 40D and 400D. However even the 400D handle noise pretty well.

I think a 400D with a good lens would be all you need, maybe a 400D with a 200mm f/2,8L!


Brian

[marxz]

wow. thanks for all your suggestions but i can't really "throw" my money around like that i've looked the prices up for both the Canon EOS-1D Mark III & Canon EOS 5D and the prices aren't what i had expected... much higher but i guess that's why the two camera's are so good.

so.... do you guys recommend any cameras that aren't that expensive? the main things i'm looking for are:

- fast shutter speed so i can capture photos without it going blurry and that it seems like that person has stopped moving
- sharp clear images
- zoom close in

i have also got a Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W7, but the results aren't sharp and i get a lot of blurry pictures.... i tried changing the shutter speed but the same thing happens!

thanks in advance

LOL we are men with computers liking expensive gadgets is what we do... may as well ask why fish swim and birds fly....

in my case, though I'm not a professional photographer I started of as a darkroom tech and then got in to IT tech support and have worked or supported a number of photographic departments in my time, that and fact the (<cough>overpaid <cough>) executive's like to buy such toys and then need my help to work out how to play with them I've seen and used a lot of expensive photography equipment that I can but dream of (like a 400 IS DO lens - about $9000 worth, that a senior exec bought recently to take pictures of his race horses)... it makes it hard to be grounded and look at cheaper sollutions.


OK more realistically I can recommend

1: the 400D (XTi Rebel) - most of my co-workers have this and while I prefer my 20D the 400D is a great camera for what you pay. I prefer the build quality of the 60D/20D/30D/40D but the 300/350/400D's are all going to get better quality captures than compact camera or (dare I say it - film SLRs) and their price is less than half that of it's bigger brothers (you can get 2 for the price of a 40D and 6 for the cost of a 1D Mk III.

2: lens wise I can not hesitate in recomending the 70-300 IS - unlike it's non IS predecessors that were optically poor at best this is an amazing lens optical quality wise. Build quality is a bit low but good enough, it's a bit soft after about 250mm but very sharp up to there , the IS is a dream works wonders.
combine these two, set the ISO to 400 or 800 and you can shoot outdoor sports, kids playing and pets with ease, even do some bird shots if you can get close enough - see my galleries shot with it using a D60 and 20D

http://www.pbase.com/marxz/that_bird - taken from about 10 to 15 meters away and not one to blow my own trumpet but here you can see handheld images taken at 220mm+ with shutter speeds of 50ms or slower that are very sharp (except for the deliberately blurred background water or where the bird shook its head (IS can't stop that)

http://www.pbase.com/marxz/peewee - taken from about 4 meters away

Further more most of the shots in this gallery (anything over 70mm) were also shot using the 70-300 IS lens Shots at 70mm or below were taken with a L series 28-70mm f2.8 so you can compare the two quite easily here.

http://www.pbase.com/marxz/gion_matsuri_24_july_2006

as you can see this is no kit lens, It's no L series but for all it's shortcomings it is outstanding value for money image quality wise and I'll be holding on to mine even after I get my big bucks $$$$ L series 70-200 IS. Serious bang for your buck stuff.

this lens can be picked up for around $700AUD on ebay (mine cost $740 almost a year and a half ago).


FOr indoor work pick up the ultra cheap ($120'ish AUD) 50mm 1.8 lens - combine it with 800 ISO and you can shoot with no flash in a reasonably well let room.