[Lancaster] LancsLUG Meetup This Wednesday!

[Ken Hough]

Dave Smith wrote:
> Ken,
>
> Following up from mentioning it before, I figured I'd fire the link
> through for LightZone:
>
> http://lightcrafts.com/linux/index.html
>
> Looking at the site now, it appears that it got stable enough for them
> to decide to make moneys from it... *sigh*... but there's a 30 Day
> Fully Functional Trial to see if it works out for you!
> As I said this evening, in all the time I've had it sat on the laptop
> I've never had a chance to use it. Given that I'm interested in
> getting a DSLR at some point though I would be interested in hearing
> of your experiences with it!
>
> Best,
>
> Dave
>
Ho Hum! That's life, but thanks for the info'. I guess that I'll stick
with cdraw/ufraw with gimp and occasionally cinepaint or Kritta (KDE).

WRT to choice of DSLR, you should have a fairly free hand. Pretty well
all of the big name cameras are recognised by dcraw (provided you use
the most up to date version). BTW, ufraw is based on dcraw, and both can
be used in standalone and gimp plugin mode.

I began with the old Pentax *istD and more recently bought the Pentax
K10D. My system wouldn't recognise the K10D until I installed an updated
version of dcraw/ufraw, but no problems now. My choice of camera is
governed by the fact that I already have a range of Pentax fit lenses.

If you will be starting from scratch, then Canon or Nikon are probably
the names to look at. That's not say that Pentax are second rate. I rate
the K10D as a very good camera indeed, and a fair match for the
competition. Astronomers tend to favour Canon, because historically,
these cameras generated the least amount of 'digital noise' which
becomes a problem on very long exposures (ie 10 minutes or more -- not a
considoration for 'normal' photography). Although the old Pentax *istD
is lacking in this respect, I've found the K10D to be practically as
good as the Canons in this repect. I expect the even newer K20D to be on
a similar level.

Using Linux with DSLRs does mean that you will not be able to use the
software packages provided by the camera maker. These typically include
for operating the camera remotely via the USB connection. That's one
reason why I still have Win2000 handy.

Regards

Ken Hough