what would you take to the carribbean??

[Devananda]

so as life has it I will be leaving the beautifull mountains of jaskson wyoming, the tetons and yelloewstone to will be sending this wenter in the carribbean! so my Question is: I am thinking of buying more photo stuff with the $$ I get back from my desposit. would like some feedback on what lens/lenses or "stuff" you would want if you were 2 stay down there for around 6 months or so.

I have Nikon D80 18-70mm, 80-200mm and a kenco 2X TC and a kata backpack to hold it all.

I shoot a lot of landscapes, wildlife ok anything that I think is cool.....

my frist thought was to get an underwater housing for it but then I sawthe price...wow so i think I will get a P&S coolpix w/ the housing for that.

so if you were in my shoes would you want a fish eye like the nikor 10.5
a mirco like 105 or smothing or go with the one lens does it all type of thing like the sigma 50-500mm so you don't have to change lenses on the beach.

any thoughts on how to spend my hard earnd $$...lol and why you would go that way would be great.
thanks Guys & gals :hugs:
Deva

 

[Devananda]

oh and if the rental gives it all back I should have around $900 US

 

[soylentgreen]

I just got back from the islands and wish I had something wider than the 24-105 i took along so an ultra-wide wouldn't be bad.
Also wish I had underwater gear. They make those thick vinyl bags that you can just stick your camera in for snorkeling but I couldn't get one in time for my trip. It will protect your gear up to 10-15m. The hardcases are for the scuba folks, but that stuff cost more than the camera!

 

[Devananda]

yea I don't think I am ready the take my D80 underwater....will just get a point and shoot for that. the new nikon coolpix is 7MP and they make a sucba case for it think will go that way for under water photog..
humm you think a super wade would be a good choice...
would the fish eye be to much?
cheers

 

[soylentgreen]

It really depends on what you intend to shoot. On land for the nature stuff you have it covered up to 400mm with your 2X TC. The Sigma 50-500 overlaps the current lens you have now. Also a huge piece of glass to lug around. 18-70mm really isn't as wide as I would like on a crop sensor more of a 28mm. To really get nice and wide landscapes, seascapes, etc. I wish I had an ultra-wide in my bag. Say around 10-16mm. I haven't used a fish-eye lens so cannot offer my opinion there.

 

[Devananda]

true true but what about panorama software..that would slove the wide angle issue. or does that make it to wide??

also would like to get a nice cP filter any advice?

 

[soylentgreen]

I personally do not use my Circular polarizer anymore. It slows the lens down too much in my opinion. You will lose 1-2 stops. I will just tweak the color and contrast in Photoshop later. I would reccommend a good UV haze filter. I was surprised at the amount of glare I encountered on my trip. I use a Hoya Pro1 Digital UV Haze filter and my pictures came out awesome. I rarely had to tweak the contrast in postand the color was not muted. It's a bit pricey but I thought it was well worth it. Besides, your lens is only as good as the cheapest piece of glass.
As far as stitching software, they are fine I guess. Just use a good tripod so you have consistent panning shots. A bit of color and contrast correction in post will adjust any irregularity in the images.

 

[Devananda]

you know I was woundering if you could do with out the CP filter and addjust the it in post processing...I use PS elements 5.0 not that good with it yet.
well I was thinking of getting a UV CP & ND filter...
there is a lot to choose in that depo...
you said you got a lot of glare but it's that what a CP filters do??
I thought UV did not do much on Dig.?? besides help protect the lens.?

would love to see some of your work.. got a gallery somewere?

 

[soylentgreen]

Though the majority of UV filters are just for protection and glare, the supposed "digital" multi-coated one do offer a bit of help in regards to contrast where a digital sensor is concerned. My understanding is because most sensors are metallic they do reflect some light back and do not absorb it like regular film would. Someone correct me if I am wrong. I noticed that I lost a bit of contrast and color saturation when I used film lens on my 20D. Easily corrected in photoshop, but annoying. Since newer "digital" lenses have coatings to cope with the sensor this is becoming less of an issue. I am being really nit-picky here in this regards. Most people will not even notice the slight shift, but since my work is for design and print I have to zoom down to minute details. Also my perfectionist mentality. I only use the multi-coated filter on my non-digital lenses incidently.
I did not mean glare as in lens flare or enything. Its just that the tropical sun reflecting off the water, buildings, windows, really wash out everything. The haze filter did eliminate it almost entirely, to my surprise, since I rarely had to adjust contrast or anything.
I posted some of my stuff on flickr.com/photos/roninstudio. Mostly wildlife stuff and some stuff from my cruise.

 

[Neuner]

any thoughts on how to spend my hard earnd $$...lol and why you would go that way would be great.
Deva

No matter what setup you use, if you haven't already, I think I would look into how to take HDR photos. The D80 has an easy bracketing program setup that will fire off 3 shots with one push of the button. Wish I knew about this earlier for some of my trips.

 

[Alex_B]

Though the majority of UV filters are just for protection and glare, the supposed "digital" multi-coated one do offer a bit of help in regards to contrast where a digital sensor is concerned. My understanding is because most sensors are metallic they do reflect some light back and do not absorb it like regular film would. Someone correct me if I am wrong.

Reflections between the sensor and the rear lens groups can occur. But a UV filter does not help here at all, since it is not between the lenses and the sensors. Even if it was in between it would not help since it is the lens surface which reflects. Only proper coatings on the lens can prevent such reflections.

The sensor does not need a UV filter since it has a filter attached to it anyway as far as I know.


Oh, and you cannot mimic all effects of a polariser with software by the way ...

 

[Devananda]

No matter what setup you use, if you haven't already, I think I would look into how to take HDR photos. The D80 has an easy bracketing program setup that will fire off 3 shots with one push of the button. Wish I knew about this earlier for some of my trips.

yea I don't know a think about HDR, becides that I seen some great shoots. will have to look in to it, I am still trying to break out of program modes..LOL

 

[Devananda]

oh and BTW I decided to go with a sigma 180mm macro lens
a pelican case
some UV filters prob. hoya "green" fot the 18-70 & 80-200mm lenses
at lest one CP for my 18-70mm lens prob. go with hoya pro
and a lens sencer cleaning set up
or yea and some silica to keep it all dry