PhotographyBanzai.com

I just recently finished writing a book I titled “ Convention Photography ” (affiliate link to the book, I earn from qualifying purchases!) that I will soon be releasing on the Kindle and B&N Nook electronic reader platforms. To make certain the text is as smooth and as well written as possible, I printed the book out for proofing by a family member who is excellent at that sort of thing. It's fun to see it in physical form! If you have read my blog here before you probably have an idea of what conventions are about. If not, basically put there are large events where people of a mutual hobby attend. Often people dress up in costume, and in turn others photograph them. I attend those events to photograph others, so the book is mostly about that process.

I attended C2E2 on Saturday the 19th. Of course, I spent most of the 8 hours there photographing cosplayers and walking around. As this was my first Sci-Fi convention, I wasn’t sure how things would work. It’s pretty similar to an Anime convention, but the guests who attend are even more diverse than most anime conventions. I was really impressed by the costumes, as you could tell, a lot of them required some top-notch skills. The convention had an overall different feel than an Anime convention, but with many positive aspects. My setup consisted of the Pentax K-5, battery grip, and FA 31mm f1.8 Limited. I initially was shooting in what I like to call the built-in “bokeh mode” that keeps the camera set at max aperture, but I eventually moved to aperture priority and set to a fixed f2.0 for most of the convention. You can see EXIF data on my photo site if you are interested.   I had my first outing with the Kata 3N1-22 backpack/sling bag and it worked quite well. It was ...

I recently put together a basic home studio, so I could take some self-portraits. My goal here was to make post-processing a bit faster by having a uniform background and decent lighting. As this is a self-portrait setup, I wanted to implement a few tricks to make taking the photos easier and also get some nice creative framing without much repetition. First off, the camera setup: The photos above are a Pentax K-5 + battery grip, Pentax DA 14mm f2.8 lens, Sigma DG 530 Super flash with Sto-fen diffuser, Custom Brackets CB Mini, Vagabond ball head, and Slik Pro 700DX tripod. While I have light stands and slave flashes available, I felt this single setup was sufficient. The wide angle lens means I can achieve a larger depth of field such that I can avoid any issues with focus. To take photos of myself, I use a simple wireless infrared remote. It would be best to use a remote that can auto-focus the camera, but I don’t have one. That coupled with a camera that can do face-detection in...

I hooked up my Pentax K-5 to my LCD screen a few days ago to test out the functionality. As you may well know, the K-5 and K-7 are able to display live-view to an HDMI screen (and presumably standard composite). Pentax K-5 HDMI out My little test consisted of setting up the K-5 on a tripod hooked up to the LCD. I then filmed the LCD screen with my K-7 to display what the K-5’s live-view screen looks like displayed through HDMI out. Here is the K-5 with a HDMI cable attached (technically a down-converter that turns a standard HDMI connector into one of those mini-HDMI connectors): That screen I used is 1080p, but the K-5 wasn’t able to output that resolution. I’m not sure exactly what it was running at, but it looked pretty decent and as you can tell from the video that when absolute sharpness was obtained it was easily visible on the screen. Notice how the K-5 is able to do face detection. That feature plus the use of an external screen brings up an interesting possibility of self p...

I’ve been interested in insuring my camera equipment for a while now. Considering online retail value, my gear is getting up there in total cost. So much so that in my current situation I would not be able to replace much of it if something were to happen. I’m personally focused on just insuring my equipment as I don’t really do much that deals with professional liability like a photographer that owns a studio. My research so far brings me to a few companies: Zurich North America They are said to be one of the insurance companies that is open to photographers, but there site doesn’t say anything on the subject. Hill & Usher They seem to be one of the most open companies toward photographers as their site includes a lot of information on the subject. The policy they show on their site seems geared toward professionals with studios or people that derive a lot of their income from photography State Farm I have general insurance from them, so I thought they would be a good option. ...

I’ve never been that motivated to use an external flash when doing the type of photography I usually do. I completely understand the need for additional light in most situations to uniformly expose a scene. I have a Sigma 530 DG Super flash, diffuser, two slave flashes, flash stands, and flash brackets yet I don’t use them that often. My primary reason is to avoid extra bulk and to make my gear feel less… startling… to my subjects. So I started looking for a flash that could provide me the ability to fill the foreground with a decent amount of diffuse light. My other requirement was to be as small as possible. In the same line of something like the Nikon SB-400. Metz has the mecablitz 24 AF-1 which would have been my first choice, but it isn’t sold in the USA. I saw an ebay seller, but they wanted $80 plus a lot in shipping. Too much to spend for an experiment. Promaster sells a similar item, but it is not available for Pentax. I eventually found something with the same ideals. It take...

This embedded video below is a clipped together “music video” from full 1080p HD clips I recorded with the new Pentax K-5 camera. As I was saying, I used a Pentax K-5 (1080p @ 25 FPS), at the highest quality setting. All clips were set to 40% speed and patched together in kdenlive ( kdenlive.org ) for Linux with a creative commons licensed song (see the end of video for credits). The project was rendered in H264 @ 1280×720 and uploaded to Youtube. It looks to me that my K-5 has a few troubled pixels that are stuck to a shade of red when the ISO gain is high enough. You probably won’t be able to notice them, but I’ll have to look into software solutions to see if I can easily correct those pixels.  I was using a firmware that was one upgrade back from current, so I’ll be eventually testing the new firmware and consecutive ones that are released to see if they correct those stuck pixels in video mode. The camera has a “pixel mapping” functionality that finds dead pixels and compensates f...

I just recently spent a weekend in Wisconsin to take photos at an Anime convention.  My standard setup for most of the convention:  K-5 with the DA 14mm f2.8 around the neck. K-7 with the DA* 55mm f1.4 in a camera bag. So I would take a few frames with the K-7 (portrait) and then another few with the K-5 (fully body). The setup worked surprisingly well. If you spend any time reading my blog, you will know I prefer prime lenses, hence the two camera bodies. While primes are quite challenging, I feel they best fit my style a good deal of the time.  A few videos related to the equipment I was using:  Pentax DA 14mm f/2.8 lens Pentax DA* 55mm f1.4 Pentax K-5 Playlist Pentax K-7 Playlist Here are a few highlight images: When I was going to a large sit-down event in the main programming room, I would switch to this setup in the meantime to take portraits: K-7 with the FA 31mm f1.8 around the neck for people photos. K-5 with the DA 50-200mm WR in a camera bag for the eve...

This Sigma lens came out around 2004 as a reasonably priced higher-end zoom lens specifically designed for digital SLR cameras. It has a maximum aperture of f2.8 throughout the entire zoom range, which is its claim to fame to being considered a higher-end lens. The reason it was lower priced probably had something to do with the unusual zoom range, 24mm being 6mm short of most standard kit zoom lens ranges (18-55mm).  The barrel material is standard EX fair, which is either a love or hate thing for users. I personally am not too fond of Sigma’s textured paint on plastic that they use. I bought this lens many years ago and just recently traded it in to help pay for a new camera body. My justification was that I rarely use it as I prefer prime lenses in the focal lengths it covers.  Technical specifications for the lens: Lens Mount: K-mount Lens Construction: 15 groups, 16 elements Angle of View: 84.1 – 39.6 degrees Aperture: f2.8 constant Number of Diaphragm Blades: 9 Mini...

One of the nice things about shooting with Pentax is that pretty much every lens that was made for K-mount will work on current DSLR cameras (the same can be said of M42 screw-mount with an adapter). There are probably a few exceptions, but I personally don’t know of any. This lens I’ll be looking at today is a fully manual telephoto prime lens with a large aperture.  The lens has some heft to it! A lens with specifications like this would cost hundreds of dollars if it had auto-focus and current-day lens coating. The reality is that it’s a bargain bin lens that can be had for probably around $50. I had bought this lens quite a few years ago from keh.com expecting a “generic 135mm f2.8” lens, and that’s what I got. From what I can tell, Focal was a brand-name for K-mart or Sears and MC stands for multi-coating. Technical specifications for the lens: Lens Mount: K-mount Lens Construction: black metal with rubberized focus ring Angle of View: 18 degrees (11 degrees in APS-C) Apert...