It might just be my computer or the software I use to view images, but large folders of hundreds and thousands of images tends to cause problems.

One sort of compromise solution to this, which would probably get to the nub of it for me at least, would be if FP would be able to look up the size of the directory it's going to put the files into, then move onto the next one if it exceeds a particular size. Bonus points if one can select the size and double bonus points if there's a list of the popular optical disk sizes.

I'd love to be able to label my directories like:
DVD_00-2009_03-2009_05
DVD_01-2009_05-2009_07
DVD_01-2009_07-2009_09

Or something similar, even if it were just the first bit, it would be quite helpful.

And to make things a bit more confusing, Canon is apparently in the process of releasing a new "L" macro which is largely similar to the older 100mm macro except with IS and presumably some other optical upgrades.

It's expensive, but it looks like they updated the USM to be a bit quicker. I'm not necessarily sure whether it's a worthwhile upgrade over the older 100mm, but it's nice to see a lens in the gulf between the 100mm and the 180mm lenses.

A few reasons, first off, it makes it easier to split up a collection of photos between DVDs. I like to have a copy of my old photos on DVD as a backup against my online backup and hard disk copies going bad. And second it tends to be much faster to load when you've got huge numbers of pictures in your catalog.

And it's not necessarily that much of an issue to find photos for those of us that use programs like iMatch to catalog the images.

My personal plan is to use FlashPipe to download the images to my hard disk and then something else to copy them to a final resting place.

I'm noticing that my THM files are not being included with the CRWs. They do get copied when I set a rule for other files, but then they end up in the misc folder rather than with the raw files themselves.

I think that it really depends on the subject matter and technique. A few years back I was scanning some older photos for one of my parents friends. It happened to be in black and white, but what was sort of notable was that the original print had been done incorrectly, resulting in the image being mirrored around the way that it shouldn't be. I showed it to her the proper way and she had me just leave it the way that she'd looked at it. It's sort of weird how photos come to become the memory rather than just representative of it.

Sometimes I have photos which just work better as a black and white photo. If I ever get around to it, I'd like to get a set of color filters and go around Ansel Adamsing everything, because who doesn't love a guy with a beard. But for me the color is always going to be an important portion of the photo. It's a totally different way of looking at things, I'm not personally convinced that it's better, but there is indeed something about a well executed black and white landscape or portrait.

Really it's a style thing more than anything else, sort of like that school of photography from a few years back where they were using the cheapest worst equipment possible and turning hundreds of the photos into collages.

I don't use lightroom, but one thing you want to keep in mind is that Qimage uses a few buddy files to store the associative filters. As a result you may need to change settings so that lightroom knows about them, or plan to spend time moving and renaming them manually.

It's more of a gotcha than necessarily anything else and if you don't make adjustments in Qimage it's a complete non-issue.

It's most likely because IS shouldn't come into play. IS isn't normally supposed to be active when the camera is on the tripod. I've noticed sometimes if I've got my tripod completely extended that the IS will kick in a bit, but under normal circumstances if you're needing IS then you're probably beyond hope of macro work.

Plus macro lenses are expensive enough as is, throwing in something as expensive as IS when there's so much else that the money could go to providing in a lens is a waste.

Getting a 105mm macro isn't a bad idea, it's just a question of what one is trying to shoot and how much one values the extra working distance that the longer lenses provide. Probably the main reason I'd need the longer lens is to keep the shadow out of the area. But, I'm not sure how good of an idea natural light macro really is.

That's a good point though, if I do go that route, I'll probably splurge the extra $20 and get the 100mm f2.8 that Canon makes, from what I gather it's a better lens. I'm kind of curious why people seem to like the 150mm Sigma more than the more expensive 180mm f3.5L that Canon makes at the top end of their range.

That'll probably be the last of me thread jacking this thread. I'll have to look into it elsewhere, but I think that it looks like a good option if one can make due with one of the lower priced diopters, otherwise, if you start paying more than $150 or so, getting a 100mm macro starts to look really attractive.

Ah, that's fairly similar to my set up. Like I said earlier, those results are pretty impressive.

I have to admit, that I feel a little odd about buying the Canon close up lenses when they're as expensive as they are. I know that the Sigma 150mm macro goes for around $729, expensive, but completely the right tool for the job and I doubt that I'd ever want to upgrade it. But, with my current set up, I've got IS and can go to 200mm with it, which makes up a little bit of the difference. More likely I'll just go for the B+W close up lenses which seem to be much less expensive.

That's pretty amazing on a budget. It looks like you're getting dangerously close to true macro size with that set up.

What lenses are you using specifically and what's the sensor size on your camera. I was thinking about saving for a macro lens, but if you're getting that sort of result out of cheaper equipment, I'll probably put that off for quite a while.

Not quite, the camera that I've got experience with allows you to extract the JPG from the file itself as exactly what the camera would have done. There are additionally programs that will regenerate the JPGs on their own or duplicate the conversion.(And yes that's probably much closer to your next post)

Generally though, I'll take this position, I'll use Qimage SE to handle it in that fashion and tweak if necessary. But the main point of my post was that you get to decide after the fact while looking on a full sized monitor instead of hoping that the camera got it right. Bonus points for times when I learn a new post processing technique to make previous shots work better.

I'm sure there's a market for the system, I'm just not convinced that it's better than what I've got. And definitely not good enough to justify migrating away from Ls or other high quality glass for. But, somehow I don't think I'm the market that they're going for.

I'm sure this is a good solution for people that are looking for something that's far better than a typical P&S, but not for something of actual pro-quality. Additionally the price of real dSLRs seems to continue to go lower and lower. I'm a bit skeptical about this being a better solution for that segment than something like a basic rebel with a kit lens. Right now that's somewhat under $600 for the first time ever, and I doubt that it'll be too long before we see one under $400.

From what I gather, the two real advantages here are seeing what the camera sees and the improved focus. I'm extremely skeptical that the cost to battery life isn't going to outweigh the benefit of 100% sensor coverage. Additionally, I'm not aware of any EVFs which replicate the amount of resolution available to a standard optical view finder.

And ultimately, from what I gather the system pretty much chooses not to benefit from future improvements to large sensor technology. It could be a reasonable long term view, but I'm somewhat nervous about cutting off that sort of possibility right now.

Technically speaking you're referring to a ZLR (Zoom Lens Reflex), there are benefits to that sort of thing, but at a cost. You're stuck with the lens that comes with it for better or for worse and have to put up with a limited range of zoom. On the upside though, you're not going to have any issues with dust getting into the sensor.

Yes, there can be a significant premium over the ZLRs to get an SLR, but I'd recommend that you consider what it is that you're planning to do with the camera. For many people, the ZLRs are just fine, I mean they wouldn't sell if that weren't the case. But what you're getting by plunking down for the dSLR is primarily flexibility and quality. A long zoom is always going to result in a drop in image quality, depending  upon the manufacturer and lens it can be substantial.

It's also worth noting, that you can get a decent Rebel complete with basic lens for not that much more, and the results are probably going to blow pretty much any of the ZLRs out of the water. I'm a Canon guy, but I'm sure that Nikon has similar offerings at this point, and really you're probably better off looking at their offerings than a lot of the competitors.

Honestly, I'd just shoot RAW unless there's a compelling reason to do otherwise. While you do save compression losses by doing that, there are a couple of other good reasons to do so.

I've noticed that I need that extra head room, I tend to shoot outdoors almost exclusively, and having the extra stop or two makes it much less likely that I'll lose detail to blown highlights or lost shadow detail. A proper exposure often times involves giving up detail on one side or the other, raw helps me limit that somewhat. And it allows me a little bit of wiggle room if I want it to be somewhat between stops.

I've also noticed that for some sorts of images you'll lose the yellow, red at the high end unless you under expose. Basically choosing between exposure and proper color, not a decision I like to make in the field.

You've since you've got all the color information there, you can decide whether or not the camera's being faithful to your vision, rather than the other way around. This may or may not be important, there's definitely something to be said for guessing what the camera's going to do, but you can always opt for that later on.

Additionally you can make an informed decision about how much sharpening to apply when you're sitting in front of a full sized monitor rather than hoping that the camera will get it right, this will very somewhat depending upon the type of photography and gear, but you can see the results rather than trying to second guess the camera.

Hope that helps somewhat, there may well be no apparent image quality loss, but unless you start working with the RAW files you're not likely to notice what you're not getting. At least with RAW you can change your mind later and go for the quicky auto conversion.

I think that you're probably overstating it quite a bit. When it comes to monster cables there is no difference at all, the things they're charging for tend to make as much difference as arrows to show the electrons where to go.

When it comes to filters, there's more that can be done, there's the quality of the ring, regularity of the glass, is the glass laminated or colored through and through. Will the filter over time start to come unlaminated or discolored.

That's not necessarily to say that going high end is the best in all cases, just that there's far more that can be done with a filter than with cables. The trick ultimately is to figure out which bits of luxury are actually necessary and which ones are a waste of cash. Ultimately, any image you take through the filter is going to have an additional element in front and it's worth considering whether a particular brand or filter is going to unnecessarily degrade the image.

Admittedly, I tend to take good care of my gear and usually opt to spend a bit more where possible to get more reliability because I'm outside and need gear that's going to work in the element without benefit of climate or a lot of lighting equipment.