I know nothing about cameras so I can't help but I will say... they look like fantastic pictures as far as I can tell!

Man, I kinda wish I had the money for that...

 

Thanks guys!



I am totally broke now. I only have the money for a couple tanks of gas. I've been wanting to do this for a while now but its been such a financial leap to take... I just got this itch last week to go forward with it so I did some research and picked what I liked.

Looks good, nice improvement.
There are a couple dark-ish photos, but I don't think they are too bad. The cat one is too dark if you were trying to expose for the cat though. If you had exposed for the shadow though, the sunlight might be overexposed.

I like #7, looks like your dash is very clean.

My father just taught me how to use the metering properly so I won't have to rely on the automated features anymore. Very cool the amount of control I have this way.

#5 and #6 are the winners of the bunch, hands down. The red paint with complementary green tree background is perfect, and complete with blue sky. Awesome. Loving the macro shots. Congrats on the new camera; I'm jealous!

Have you gotten estimates on fixing your passenger door?

Macro shots are some of my favorites and I think I just blew my fund for fixing the passenger door . I'm planning to eventually get a lot of cosmetics done at once: the ding, the two rust spots, the chipping clear coat on the roof, maybe some new paint here and there.

As per request, a picture with the HU:

And a few more I have from tinkering through the day:

I did a bunch of shots playing with the light. This one is my favorite because I just flashed the high beams for a split second and I thought it turned out awesome.

 

Looks awesome, and I'm sure with some photoshop you can make any of these pics desktop-worthy. Lol, number 4 makes the steering wheel look like it's 10 feet away.

 

not bad! lookin pretty good tehre!

 

Looks good, nice improvement.
There are a couple dark-ish photos, but I don't think they are too bad. The cat one is too dark if you were trying to expose for the cat though. If you had exposed for the shadow though, the sunlight might be overexposed.

I like #7, looks like your dash is very clean.

 

#5 and #6 are the winners of the bunch, hands down. The red paint with complementary green tree background is perfect, and complete with blue sky. Awesome. Loving the macro shots. Congrats on the new camera; I'm jealous!

Have you gotten estimates on fixing your passenger door?

 

100% better

WOW. 5, 6, 7 FTW.

Very nice improvement in pictures with this camera, your legend looks amazing in those pics. :thumbsup:

 

looking nice welcome to the dslr club. 7 is so clear i can see the splattered bugs on your windshield.

 

Man I love the way those pics look.

 

Cool Pics.

 

your navi dash is killer ... do you have a pic with the HU?

If anyone has a navi setup for sale, pm me!

 

Can you put up a shot focusing on the lower part of the JDM console (where the USDM radio head is?, a little closer then the one you put up last night?). I'm very curious to see what it looks like head on...

The A/C controls seems to be slightly inset and not flush with the trim... is that just an illusion? Does the trim snap in at the top the way the USDM trim does?

Rockin camera: the more shots I see from it, the more impressed I am!

 

The JDM radio was inset in the same way but when the template was created, the pioneer radio was made to pop out a bit. I honestly don't even remember how the USDM stock radio sat anymore but I'll find that close up. The upper part of the wood clips in just as the USDM wood did but I don't have clips on the wood there. They don't make the wood sit any more flush and they make it a paint to pull the wood off. If you look closely in this photo (which is a bit old) you can see words on the template that was cut to fit the new radio.

 

Absolutely Stunning Picture Quality!!!!

 

Whenever u want to sell that navigation console, please let me know

 

Ha. From my cold dead hands.

 

Very neat. I love the picture of the tennis ball and your dog on the grass lol. I assume your using the 18-55 ? Love to see some more..

 

Yup, 18-55. I bought the XTi so it came with a lense. I don't know much about this stuff yet so I thought that'd be a great idea for starting off. I'm sure I'll have pictures up soon. I usually have a slower pace with my car photo shoots so I've run out of locales for the time being with all the photos I've been taking these last few days.

 

Shooting in low lighting is awesome. The automated focus can't get a lock on what I'm looking at and its so dark I can't see anything in the viewer to manually focus myself. I end up guessing. Its so cool because though it takes several guesses to get it right, I often end up seeing more in the photograph than I can see with my own eyes. These stars are my favorite:

/\If you look closely, you can see the big dipper/\ With my naked eye, I couldn't make out any of those background stars or cosmos clouds. Simply fantastic.

 

have you tried light painting yet?

 

Yes... but very unsuccessfully. I tried it with my cell phone, then a flash light, then a little LED light. They all turned out reflecting lines of light all over the car. I've got some ideas on how to remedy this, but I won't turn away any advise you might have.

 

when you do it shoot the car at three quarters angle so you get the front and then some of the side, or the rear and some of the side. i found that leaving the shutter open for about 2 minutes is best any longer and any nearby city even if you are 50 miles away will be start to show up in the shot. think of the led light as a fountain pen the longer you hold it on your subject the brighter it will show up. i must have done like 20 shots just to get three good usable shots. i havent tried anymore right now because the moon is very bright right now, as soon as it goes away i will try more to perfect this technique. if you want you can try to light December by just using the moonlight alone leave the shutter open longer then three minutes though. with a full moon, and leaving the shutter open it almost lights up the car like sunlight would. just a very different looking light.

heres a good website for some inspiration on automotive light painting.
http://www.kenbrownart.com/images/automotive/index.html

good luck ken!

 

The longest preset shutter time I have is thirty seconds. Honestly, I can't imagine using much more than that. Check out the below photo. Its using a 30 second shutter with the lowest aperture of 3.5, ISO is at 100 and the lense is at 18mm... the camera is letting in as much light as it naturally can. Notice the light over the tree line in the background? Thats south at 10pm. Theres not a major city south of me for over a hundred miles.

The stars shot was the only time I bumped the ISO up (its at 400). Do you really think holding the shutter for longer than 30 seconds is worth it? I can't imagine seeing anything more illuminated... maybe it would show the stars shifting in the sky though...

I'll check that website out and toy around with it. I'll figure out light painting. I've still got a bunch of ideas and curiosities about what I can do at night with long shutters.

Hey, that's a longaberger basket isn't it?

Yes.

 

Hey, that's a longaberger basket isn't it?

 

I would like to know where or how you got the dash to look OEM with Navigation. I got to have that dash. Please share you have a Diamond!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Its a JDM navigation console. Navigation was offered in japan on their 'alpha' trim legend. Theres a hand full floating around, but I'm the only one I know of in north america that actually has it installed. Shoot blingting a PM. I know hes sitting on a couple.

 

Thanks, I would love to get one from him. That dash makes the new RL techonology closer to the reality for the legend. Thanks, I have got to locate one some how. I really wish I had a contact for JDM parts. Any sugestions? Thanks for the help.

 

Just keep your eyes open in the for sale section and ebay. JDM parts are on ebay all the time.