* The Weekly Image Thread 25 09 15 #995 *

That is quite the collection! Colourful and thankfully none of those can be found in our local garden shops or I would have my own collection as my wife likes to add stuff like those, other than the sun worshipper! She looks quite large! Thankfully also that would place her outside of or price range for 'garden art'!

Andrew

Well I was a bit of a dumb A Chris! I had the lens set to f/4 instead of wide open at F.2.8. I did likewise for the stage shots shooting at f/1.8 instead of wide open at f/1.2. Oh well, maybe they will fire me and find a new photographer! One can only hope! Not sure how well the shallower depth of field would have played out though. Perhaps worse as the cameras had some difficulty focusing and I think I need new batteries for the flash. They seemed to wear down faster than in the past.

Andrew

An enjoyable set Rich! Not sure I would enjoy that hotel room! The VRBO lacks goats on the roof! What?? And alas, no donkeys there! As to the bike in the last, I see it has pedals so if you run out of petrol you can leg it home! Have to wonder how much of the year they get to use a motor bike there!

All enjoyable still Rich so share what you have! If not, I will have to post more shots from the fashion show!

Andrew

All nice Chris. Have to confess that I have never heard of a Steyr! A fine looking automobile for the time!

Andrew

Your old friend looks like he was a little prickly in his youth... :-D

Alas you can't stand in the way of progress (profit). Onward and downwards...

Banana AI is a sycophant. This is a photo of my sister on one of her last fishing trips. Her son had to hold the fish for the photo!


Whenever we went fishing she always caught the biggest fish. :-O

The fish is a barramundi a prize table fish in Aus.

The whale migration is just starting but I got this photo of a Humpback cow and calf for you while I was walking along the beach.



Dicky.

Nice to see the photo Charlotte.

As to the other post, I think I am done here at DPR. I may make it to #1000, or I could be suspended because of my posts in that thread. I may join the ranks of Steven Colbert and Jimmy Kimble.

I still look in at DPRevived, now The Photo, and on rare occasion contribute to the C&C thread there. I better start looking for a new home or I will have nothing to do with a lot of time.

Not sure what is driving those knuckle heads to the direction they are going but I am not interested in a Facebook, Instagram, or other similar experience. They say they can not maintain the software in use but I suspect that is not the reason at all and someone is blowing smoke where it should not go!

I am sad! This is worse the second time around than it was the first. Another kick in the teeth by DPR!

I joined here in 2007 so I could post. I was an observer here for years before that. The site started in 1998. I visited the site when it was still owned by Phil Askey and his wife. I will miss this but I will not stay if it becomes non-threaded!!

Andrew

DickyAus said:

Alas you can't stand in the way of progress (profit). Onward and downwards...

Click to expand...

The profit comes from ads, right? Traffic comes from Google. The articles and reviews can't possibly drive that much traffic today. Better can be found elsewhere and plenty of them. The forum can attract traffic. Google just about any photography related question and you are bound to get hits here on the forum. If threads go so will many of us and and the discussions will be (even) slower. Less new content means less profit. Things slowed down here already after Amazon tried to kill the site. I predict this move will kill it, at least as some kind of active platform. Good luck with making a profit with less users and less traffic from Google.

Cool sister. And cool whales - if they are real. ;-)

Alas dprevived left a not so pleasant taste in my mouth. I really believed in it, but it turned into a bickering feast pretty quickly and leadership seemed to enjoy that. There were other things too, that didn't feel good about it. I've seen things have calmed down, but that taste in my mouth has stayed.

The other alternatives that popped up at that time were even worse.

I didn't see you had posted in that thread. I'll go read.

I'm sad too. We lost people the last time and things slowed down. It's like the shadow of close down has hovered over the forum since then and I think there has been an awareness that the end will come, we just haven't known when.

19andrew47 said:

They say they can not maintain the software in use but I suspect that is not the reason at all and someone is blowing smoke where it should not go!

Andrew

Click to expand...

As someone who has some experience in the world of computers and programming, I understand the need to change systems. Old, patched-up software becomes more and more complicated and harder (and more expensive) to keep running properly. But it is obvious me that they totally blew it by making the change a fait accompli without first finding out what the user base wanted and needed.

I hope you continue here as long as the old system is in place. My world would be a sadder and smaller one without being able to visit my friends here and enjoy the images they post.

Lynne

I too would be lost without DPR, the other forums I used to frequent were never as good. "Cambridge in colour" had a thread structure but not as good as DPR's and a much smaller audience.

Alas that original thread is locked so we can't see what was said.

As to 25yo software - yes it is probably tortured and passe and written in now obsolete languages and databases. But today's AI is very powerful; it could untangle and convert it to today's languages, database structures and hardware in the blink of an eye. That would minimise testing and redevelopment costs. I now use AI when writing something new; in reality it is nothing more then a new high level language - English. It has vast libraries of routines to do just about everything you can think of.

Since I've already made one OT post I can just as well make another.

I've had my eye on the Laowa Zero D lenses, but I haven't thought I can justify the cost. When I browsed a Swedish auction site the other day I found a 9mm at what I thought was a really good price, SEK 2200 (US$233/€199/£2523), supposedly in prime condition.

The price for new lenses directly from Laowa is $399.00 for the 9mm and $349.00 for the 10mm. Considerably more of I would buy new in country and if I buy from Loawa 25% VAT and also other fees would be added.

Turned out the seller and I live in the same city. I've contacted him and we'll meat up soon.

I have the 7.5mm, so I would have preferred the 10mm for that reason. But I wasn't aware of the other differences.

The 10mm is designed for m43 while the 9mm is APS with a m43 mount. So larger and heavier. On the good side - less stellar edge performance will be cropped off.

The 10mm have chips. EXIF and all the other goodies. The 9mm is totally manual. I do prefer an aperture ring over that darn wheel on the camera, but I also enjoy EXIF and to see what aperture I'm at in the viewfinder.

The aperture ring on the 9mm is declicked, which I loath! But LensTip says: "You can change the aperture smoothly as the ring is clickless, but when you hit full values you feel the ring falling into a kind of groove" and they usually don't like clickless either, so maybe the "grooves" are enough.

The 10mm is f/2.0 while the 9mm is f/2.8. According to LensTip again the 9mm is sharp in the center wide open. They haven't tested the 10mm, but according to Laowa's own test the 10mm also is (AFAICU).

I'll be able to feel the grooves myself soon. But what to you think otherwise? Is 9mm too close to 7.5mm?

Justification image. Of this there has been nothing this year. That also saddens me.


NO AI! Just a very bad phone camera.

OLEF641 said:

19andrew47 said:

They say they can not maintain the software in use but I suspect that is not the reason at all and someone is blowing smoke where it should not go!

Andrew

Click to expand...

As someone who has some experience in the world of computers and programming, I understand the need to change systems. Old, patched-up software becomes more and more complicated and harder (and more expensive) to keep running properly. But it is obvious me that they totally blew it by making the change a fait accompli without first finding out what the user base wanted and needed.

I hope you continue here as long as the old system is in place. My world would be a sadder and smaller one without being able to visit my friends here and enjoy the images they post.

Click to expand...

Problem is there seem to be no plug and play forums with threaded view today.

But I got the impression they've hired programmers. I understand if they won't have them write a forum software from scratch. But If they had chosen an open source or at least "free to modify" forum, maybe it would have been possible to implement thread view. With their chosen one, XenForo, I think that's out of the question.

DickyAus said:

I too would be lost without DPR, the other forums I used to frequent were never as good. "Cambridge in colour" had a thread structure but not as good as DPR's and a much smaller audience.

Alas that original thread is locked so we can't see what was said.

As to 25yo software - yes it is probably tortured and passe and written in now obsolete languages and databases. But today's AI is very powerful; it could untangle and convert it to today's languages, database structures and hardware in the blink of an eye. That would minimise testing and redevelopment costs. I now use AI when writing something new; in reality it is nothing more then a new high level language - English. It has vast libraries of routines to do just about everything you can think of.

Click to expand...

What thread is locked?

I used to read at Cambrige in Colour, but never posted. There was also a mod/admin/whatever there that sat on a too high horse, always criticizing images people uploaded in an "I know best how things should be" tone.

What on earth is that orange thing? A trumpomobile?

Cool design though. I've always liked broad "footsteps" (english?) like that.

meow said:

DickyAus said:

I too would be lost without DPR, the other forums I used to frequent were never as good. "Cambridge in colour" had a thread structure but not as good as DPR's and a much smaller audience.

Alas that original thread is locked so we can't see what was said.

As to 25yo software - yes it is probably tortured and passe and written in now obsolete languages and databases. But today's AI is very powerful; it could untangle and convert it to today's languages, database structures and hardware in the blink of an eye. That would minimise testing and redevelopment costs. I now use AI when writing something new; in reality it is nothing more then a new high level language - English. It has vast libraries of routines to do just about everything you can think of.

Click to expand...

What thread is locked?

Click to expand...

The TSHHTF tread on "News & Rumors talk" forum

meow said:

I used to read at Cambrige in Colour, but never posted. There was also a mod/admin/whatever there that sat on a too high horse, always criticizing images people uploaded in an "I know best how things should be" tone.

Click to expand...

Yes the mod/admin was a bit over the top - but I have a thick skin. :-D

Never let the cost be an overriding factor in decision making. You're not going to live forever - enjoy what you can while you can!

PS. I won't be buying the 50-200mm (AU$5,000) I would if I had a need for it, but What I have already got covers 99% of my needs. I'm still tempted by the macro lens with IS being the big attraction; but I haven't been motivated enough with macro shots of late. Perhaps Santa might deliver this year if the Xmas discounts are generous and the 60mm trade-in price is good.

Beautiful set of images Rich. I just love the place.

An interesting place with a touristy feel to it. The area down by the water looks nice.

That's quite spectacular Bruce and I love the dog running in to the picture.

Nice set Chris. I do like the orange one.