Quacktacular » Photography

Summer Photography

Brendan — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 07:38:29 +0000

I haven’t stopped taking pictures, but my Flickr mortal (non-pro) account is full so I hesitated to post anything. I’m considering the upgrade, so if you’ve done it yourself please tell me what you think.

Here are some of my latest, I’m really loving the XSi (and dreaming of a 60D, one day…)

YouTube is now Quacktaculous

Brendan — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 02:57:10 +0000

I finally got around to making a YouTube account and uploading something. Enjoy this stop-motion short.

Snail Pictures

Brendan — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 23:04:33 +0000

I met a little snail in the garden the other day. He looked cool, but the first photos I took didn’t have enough colour. I tried moving him for different backgrounds, but no matter where I put him the focal point was something else. The pictures were boring.

Then I saw this flower, and to my surprise the combination of the two worked really well. The flower pulls the eye in and then pushes it over to the little snail. Separately I don’t think the snail or flower would have made for great photos on this background, but they do make a great team. Check out the rest of the photos on my Flickr.

An Important Consideration…

Brendan — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 17:41:46 +0000

When choosing a digital camera most people pay attention to its size, number of megapixels, lens or features like macro and manual ISO (exposure). Few people, even enthusiasts like myself, think about the most basic component of a digital camera; the battery. Perhaps it’s because good battery life is a given in this day and age, but as I recently discovered this is not always the case.

Many consumer and pro grade cameras that ship today do so with propriety batteries. What does this mean to you? Well it means that the only company making the battery is the one you bought your camera from. They have a monopoly over the batteries you need to make your camera work, and they can charge however much they like.

In most cases, these batteries are relatively high quality and one is usually included with the camera. The problem is that some companies (Kodak in my case) include a single non-rechargeable battery. My CRV3 battery lasted for a week and I was impressed. The $30 price tag to have one sent here is a little excessive for a non-rechargeable though, so I looked for alternatives. My Kodak Z712 IS takes good old AAs, but one set only lasts for about five or ten minutes. I lived with this frustrating inconvenience for about a year and then began looking for alternatives.

In an attempt to prevent the further lining of Kodak’s pockets, I bought a third-party rechargeable battery and charger. The price was right, but the camera won’t even turn on. So now I’m back where I started: pay the obnoxiously high price for a genuine Kodak battery or live with the terrible performance of AAs.

The moral of this story is to consider the basics of your camera before pulling the trigger. I got burned by proprietary batteries and you could too.