Unlike all the lucky sods that can afford to spend oodles on sophisticated camera gear, I have to watch my budget fairly carefully.
So I was confronted with a choice… save for a brand spanking new Canon G9 (which, as a “media activist”, I want desperately so that I can not only have a cam with me all the time, but can also “point & shoot” surreptitiously if the need arises and – and here’s the deal-maker – as a photo freak I want cos it’ll shoot in RAW) or for a somewhat better telephoto zoom lens than the kit one that comes with the humble Canon EOS400d.
Well, occasionally sanity prevails, and such was so in this case. Meaning that I took delivery of my brand new Canon EF-S 55-250mm IS lens today!
(Ok, maybe its not the bees’ knees, but those of us on limited budgets have to make do with what we can get and, according to a review in this month’s PhotoPlus, its a significant improvement on the kit lens.)
I’ll add a rider here to the effect that this purchase was prompted by the rather upsetting discovery (after having bought it of course – typical me) that the 400d has no anti-shake mechanism.
Now for someone of my shaky grip that’s a significant disadvantage… the “IS” of this new lens stands for “Image Stabilisation”… need I say more?
Anyway, here I am… brand new lens and demo to attend (for anyone interested, it was the antifascist demo in London protesting the recent violent treatment dished out by right-wing nutters in cahoots with the police (seemingly) to demonstrators in Greece).
So I’m thinking to myself, “What could be simpler? Just plug it in and go. And get some really good, sharp, blur-free pics for once.”
Ho hum. Didn’t realise lenses had a learning curve! What I ended up with was a load of crap photos, all pretty much out of focus (and completely unusable of course).
Now in fairness it could have been a combination of my own innate incompetence, poor lighting (when it wasn’t drizzling with rain it was still quite overcast), and the pressures of the moment (never too sure who was gonna have a go at me first… the demonstrators – none of whom I knew – or the cops). Whatever.
But the lesson I took away with me was that its always gonna pay to have a practise session with a new lens before using it for real.
In this particular case it seems to me (that is, my impression is) that the autofocus function on this new lens takes a tad longer than the telephoto zoom kit lens I was using. The difference may only be a matter of microseconds, but its something worth bearing in mind.
This impression was to some extent confirmed when I got back home, became suicidally despairing when I inspected the results of my efforts in Lightroom, and then did a few test shots.
Immediate impressions are that when lighting conditions are good the lens works fine, but in less than ideal lighting wait just a tad longer for the autofocus to kick in.
Dammit, photo-wise yet another day wasted!
However, I did manage to salvage a couple of relatively decent shots…
6 comments
February 13, 2008 at 01:33
Testing the new lens « Adventures of an Idiot - occasional notes of a photo freak
[...] Bedford High Street today to give the new lens a bit of a better workout than the first time (see previous post on [...]
February 21, 2008 at 01:39
forkboy1965
While not related to photography you gave me a wonderful stroll down memory lane with the use of the word “demo”, which isn’t used in America in the same way as you are doing here. The first time I heard “demo” was on The Young Ones, which was first broadcast here back in the mid 80’s or so. Took me days to figure out what it meant.
February 21, 2008 at 01:53
fotdmike
That’s really curious. Never occurred to me that there’d be an alternative context for it. Here it sort of equates to “protest”. How do you use it over your way?
February 21, 2008 at 17:08
forkboy1965
Stateside a “demo” would most often be called a march. Demonstration is used as well, but not as often in this context, but more for when a person shows others how to do something with a given product.
It’s not unlike the British use of “scheme” to mean plan. Stateside the word “scheme” also means plan, but typically has a very negative connotation associated with it.
Isn’t it lovely how we are a common people, but don’t really always understand each other? I guess I’m at a bit of an advantage when it comes to British slang and such as I watch a fair bit of British television. Americans, on the whole, do not enjoy as much of modern British television as you do of ours. Or so I’ve been inclined to think.
February 22, 2008 at 03:01
fotdmike
This lingo thing’s quite fun. There’s a serious side to it of course in that you could have a coupla people talking to each other and thinking they’re understanding each other when in fact they’re talking about completely different things, which could have unfortunate repercussions. In most cases I’d think unlikely it’d be quite that extreme, but I can see it could be a very real concern when discussing conceptual things.
Anyway, back to “demo”. Yeah, we too use it in that sense and its equally as prevalent in that way as the other. More than anything else the giveaway is context… and who’s using it. Were I a salesman or something I’d probably use it predominantly in the “demonstrating a product” sense. But being involved with the activist community my default is to use it in the way… well, you know how.
February 23, 2008 at 06:00
forkboy1965
Yeah, I know.