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Messages - miskolin
26
« on: April 16, 2009, 08:13 »
I got the guy down to about $460 shipped, if he was to post it on ebay buyitnow. Find them on forums and say "hey if you post it on ebay buyitnow I'll buy it" and then negotiate the price. They will have to pay additional fees to sell through ebay, but if the percentage on the live.com discount is high, it will be worth it.
$460-115 rebate = 345 shipped.
The live.com rebate amount was 25% back at the time. Right now it's only 9%, but wait until it goes back up. It was at 14% last week. The thing fluctuates. www.cashbackr.com
You can land a steal on a 5d mkii. Maximum discount per item is $200 off, though. My friend ended up getting a brand new 580 EX II flash for like $250 back when I picked up the 70-200.
You have to sign up for a live.com cashback account. Then go to live.com, and type in a keyword like "ipod" or something. The ad links come up at the top of the search results. Click the ebay banner that shows the cashback amount, and that brings you to ebay. Log in, and you will see the little banner at the top of the screen showing the cashback % amount
I took a look but I see that this is for US-only (at least live.com cashback account). It looked to good to be true for us Europeans  But thanks for the info anyway.
27
« on: April 16, 2009, 01:40 »
Thanks icefront for your post. To graficallyminded: You can get them used for $500 but I swung a live.com rebate deal with ebay buyitnow and landed this one for $350. Could you tell me more about what you did? I didn't quite get it how you landed on $350.
28
« on: April 14, 2009, 03:43 »
Thanks for all your input. The sigma 70-200 has 2 major problems compared to Canon:
1. Lack of contrast. This results also in very poor color reproduction so even if you shoot raw, boosting the colors/contrast is simply not the same than capturing the colors/contrast.
2. Sharpness. Compared to Canon, the sharpness at f2.8 is bad.
Also chromatic aberrations are a problem but they are correctable. What isn't correctable it's the fringe (green-cyan halo around bright spots/areas)
That is what I heard too. What's the point using f2.8 if it is not usable. I have already sigma 18-50 2.8 and am well aware of that problem-the images are all soft and there is no clear focal point. There is also bigger chance of getting a version with front/backfocus and so on... I believe Canon made that better. I did think also of Canon 2.8 option, but the price for IS is to high for me. Without IS is a bit expensiver as f4 with IS. But since I don't shoot indoor sport or something similar I believe i really don't need that one stop... And when shooting with studio strobe there is no need for that 2.8 or am I wrong? The good thing is that you can get canon f4 without IS for as much as 600 on ebay. And for that money you have the L series of canon lens! I know you did not ask about this, but if you do not need a zoom, I highly recommend the 200 2.8 prime. It's not very expensive and is not very heavy and beats any 70- 200 zooms in quality. It is similar build as the legendary 135 L, just a tad longer.
thanks for your suggestion, but since I don't have the area from 50-200mm covered yet a prime wouldn't be option for me at the moment. So the only decision to make is now I guess whether to choose IS or not. I will buy the 70-200 f4 IS because shoot handheld a lot. However if I only shot from a tripod I would buy the non IS version because I believe them to be sharper and of course a bunch cheaper.
Do you think for handheld shooting the IS is a must? (I heard that the mm number tells you the longest shutter speed-in this case the lowest speed should be 1/200 for handheld)
29
« on: April 13, 2009, 02:24 »
Hi, It's been a while now, since I started looking for an upgrade of my (kit) tele-lens. After browsing for options I'm now choosing between those: Sigma 70-200 f/2.8 EX DG Macro HSM II or Canon EF 70-200 f/4L USM (IS-not sure about that). What would you recomend using for stock. I heard a lot of good about Sigma, but a big cons of that lens is chromatic aberation they say. on the other hand Canon is very sharp, with much better handling of chromatic aberation, but is only f4. Also if I were to chose canon-is the IS for it worth the 400 more or is the "plane" version without also good enough for stock? So what would you suggest-sigma or canon? and if canon with or without the IS? btw i'm going to use it on eos 350D for now (after that i'm looking for full-frame, but not quite sure when) Thanks for your answers in advance, miskolin
30
« on: April 07, 2009, 13:08 »
The most rejections I had lately were not (surprisingly) for keywords, but for "artifacting when viewed at full size". I don't get it, but lately my acceptance ratio is somewhere near 20% of all images I submit. It used to be much better. Just don't know if I'm getting worse or the inspectors are more and more strict.
31
« on: December 19, 2008, 03:36 »
I also was designer for a calendar 2009 this year. I made everything in photoshop, then saved it as .TIFF, and sent it to the cheapest printing house I found (I sent a lot of demands around earlier).
For 100 pcs, a bit smaller than A3 format (EDIT: The calendar had 13 pages) it cost me somewhere about 5,5 per piece, but as I said this was the cheapest I found (prices were also 2 or 3 times higher).
The problem is if you only need let's say 10-20 pcs. - the price per piece would be in that case much higher as I was told (even though I ordered digital print).
Oh and about quality... even though I used just 240ppi not 300 as usual, the quality was great. ofcourse if you watched images from 10cm you could see some faults, but who looks at calendar from that close?
It's just an amateur work that I did, but when you see the enthusiastic faces of people you give this calendar it's just great.
I also got an invitaiton to join a newspaper house (that covers 1/4 of my country-ok Slovenia is small but whatever hehe) as a photographer, and I am really and only hobby photographer.
So that could be great publicity for you if you decide to make the calendar as a new year gift for example, not only for your family use (but that of course depends on images you printed).
Regards,
miskolin
32
« on: December 16, 2008, 16:01 »
but most of the rejections are for edges Yeah the same for me too... but the next time I got all the same images (nothing changed in the mean time) accepted. Some time ago it happened that the whole series of photos was rejected for artifacting, even though they were taken in different locations under different light conditions (from sunny, cloudy day outside to studio photos). In addition post proces was only slight improvements, nothing spectacular (which would cause artifacting). EDIT: when talking about rejection for edges i had in mind 3d renders
33
« on: November 26, 2008, 09:45 »
well i already tried some appz before in trial version and a friend of mine owes a 3ds max so i also tried it there... 3d space has never been a problem for me... but as you start exploring it can be too much one could handle at the first visit in application. @hali: yeah those applications do require quite a lot of computer power... making 3d with my older computer would never be an option while it hardly worked with photoshop opened But i found a great deal off ebay last month and now own a core2quad processor @2.4GHz each with 8G of ram (of course on 64bit windows)... another question: i heard of mental ray... is this in 3ds max only or can you find it in other appz too? what is the point of it... rendering more realistically as some standard renderer?
34
« on: November 26, 2008, 02:10 »
well thank you for all the posts that you wrote since my last visit. time vs. effect was also one of my dilemma about starting 3d rendering, but as already mentioned if you do simple stuff it could be worth it. I see some of you here have serious exprerience on this field well i guess i'll slowly try to learn some basics and then decide wether it is worth for me or not... one year i think could already tell me something. and besides that i don't have plan to make any animations...
35
« on: November 25, 2008, 16:59 »
I don't know if you're talking about me , but I spent 9 years working for Disney Animation as a CG modeler. Learned from the Maya manuals. Very useful stuff.
You are definitely one of them... I totally admire your work (not only 3d but also photography). Anyway... I guess those 9 years would I be able to catch in something like.... 90 years? I believe that must have been an adventure working for Disney huh? I think that already was discussed but what would be the best application to learn in terms of input (how though is it to learn) vs. output (how good quality you get). I hope you understand what i mean.
36
« on: November 25, 2008, 16:30 »
Hi everybody...
I'm watching some of your 3d images and am very impressed about your work.
What I wonder is where did you learn all those things you use in your renders? forums, books, tutorials?
what do you recommend to a beginner? how did you start?
37
« on: November 13, 2008, 14:05 »
For me Istock better this month than October... thanks to the first EL sale Otherwise it would be really sad...
38
« on: November 07, 2008, 02:48 »
Thank you very much for this. I'd also suggest you to put some adds on site or maybe add a donation button, if not more at least for hosting and domain to pay. I used to learn some programming, but I could never put something like that together. So thank you again and I hope you will spread joy among stock photographers for long time!
39
« on: October 29, 2008, 02:08 »
Besides speed being the same do you see any improvements in CS4? Is it worthwile of upgrading or not?
40
« on: September 30, 2008, 13:04 »
I had a picture of child holding wheat in her hands... Zymmetrical said: "Great concept... ugly hands"
41
« on: August 29, 2008, 02:47 »
I'm still waiting for StockXpert to start making sth (since february), but my images doesn't seem to get many views... I have 2 which has about 300 views and all the others have less than 30. I'm not sure why... is it my keywording? but I keyword images for all sites the same (except istock) and they work well.
42
« on: July 26, 2008, 13:56 »
thanks for your reply. i'm looking forward to first payout here
43
« on: July 26, 2008, 01:26 »
Hello,
I would like to know whether there is any possibility that Zymmetrical will start making their payouts also through Moneybookers not only Paypal?
A lot of us contributors can't have our own Paypal acc. which you already know, so MB is our best alternative.
Maybe suggestion to Zymm team for implementation...
Thanks!
44
« on: June 10, 2008, 05:40 »
45
« on: June 10, 2008, 02:14 »
46
« on: June 09, 2008, 07:30 »
47
« on: June 09, 2008, 07:16 »
updated
miskolin -> you need to put the banner in your images.
Ups... sorry didn't check the first page... Did this now... thank you
48
« on: June 08, 2008, 16:54 »
49
« on: May 22, 2008, 12:13 »
Thank you! 
50
« on: May 21, 2008, 17:14 »
I also had the same trouble with fotolia, but do not know yet for istock while that image is still pending there. But this is the image that is really my weekly winner by earnings... but some think that they dont need it anymore... And I always thought that there is never enough of good stuff...  I guess it's just me who thinks that this one is good... and maybe a "few" buyers...
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