The M8, in contrast, is years behind other cameras—a photojournalist’s tool that cannot white balance, consistently expose a picture or deliver reasonable low-light performance–and one which has poorly designed controls.As I said earlier, I do not write this because I dislike Leica, quite the opposite. I have used their cameras for 23 years and invested tens of thousands of dollars in their products. When working in war zones, however, my first rule is to eradicate all the uncertainties from my kit. There are enough uncertainties when the shooting starts. The M8 introduces numerous uncertainties into the photography equation. For a working photojournalist in a combat situation, I would judge the Leica M8 to be unusable.

http://web.mac.com/kamberm/Leica_M8_Field_Test,_Iraq/Page_1.html

And at $1700, I might have to.

It’s even more than the premiere Nikkor 2.8 tele zoom of the 90s, the 80-200mm 2.8 ED, which was $1200. I had one, and it was great.

and a D3 to go with it.

Nikon 14-24

Nikon D3

That pair looks insanely good together.

Nikon ML-L3 Wireless Remote Control (Amazon link) for Nikon digital SLR cameras has decreased from $13.12 to $10.55. Even at $20 it’d be an absurdly good value, a no-brainer.

I use mine when I’m making interior home shots on a tripod. I set my D80 to bracket, and shoot 3 frames as fast as the shutter speeds will allow using my remote.

What’s the benefit? With the remote,  I don’t touch the camera, which makes each frame an exact dupe of its sister frames, except for exposure. This gives me in Photoshop the ability to layer blown out/muddy shots into the final delivered shot. I use the clone tool to clone non-blown highlights from a darker layer to the lighter one.

They’re durable, tiny, and mine have never needed new batteries.

Below is a question I answered for friend and pro photographer Adam Smith, shoe photographer extraordinarire. I thought I’d share it to help clear up some grey areas about SEO vs. fancy websites.

Minimalist photography sites and SEO are natural enemies of each
other, like mongooses (mongeese? mongi?) and snakes.

If you do it minimally with Flash, you usually have no spiderable text. If you do it
minimally without Flash, you usually have no spiderable text either. Don’t even think about hiding text by making it the same color as the background, the search engines will burn your site at the stake. So that leaves us without our best weapon, but importantly, with other good weapons.

1. Real World

I always recommend this as The Number One SEO Thingy™.
The best SEO is only half on computers; the other half is you talking to people, reminding
them you’re a photographer and to check out your site AND LINK TO IT
from their site. Carry cards and give them out. Talk, listen, hang out,
get numbers, network. You know the drill. This is just a reminder.

2. Be an Authority

Blog about shooting shoes. You know more about it
than 99.9% of humanity. You’re an authority, and the value of that
cannot be overstated. If you look at ANY successful blog, it’s because
the author is an authority on the subject. Turn that authoritarianism into
money by luring peeps to your site with valuable information that right now is sadly locked in
your brain, waiting to get out through your fingers/keyboard.

3. Text on Other Pages

Your photos should be, and are, displayed very
cleanly with no text. That doesn’t mean we can’t have you write a few
paragraphs, or better a few pages, of text with keywords of niches you
want to target like “product photography”, “Seattle”, “fine art
photographer in Seattle” and the like.

4. CPC

Buy clicks to your site from AdWords. Bid $.06 per click. Your
terms will have to be very “nichey”, but you can get cheap traffic. Cap
it at a few dollars a day and it’ll be worth it: don’t pay much and don’t
expect much, but one of those clicks one day could lead to a $1000
job. Buy terms like “Seattle shoe photographer”.

5. WordPress

It just lets you do all this stuff easier. There’s other content management systems out there, I’m just a fan of WordPress.

Shooting interiors:

• Get the widest lens you have and put it on your camera, it probably won’t come off until you’re done. 18mm is ok, but 12mm is better.
• If it’s a big job, maybe rent a wide if you don’t have one. It shouldn’t cost more than $30 or so for a day. Doesn’t have to be “pro”, just 12mm.
• Use a tripod, and your camera’s self timer, because shutter speeds will be in the 1 second range.
• Better, use a remote. My remote that works with my Nikon D70 and D80 was $16.
• Turn on  all lights in the room, and close blinds. Turn fire places on.
• Use your lowest ISO.
• Shoot into corners — 45 degrees — or straight on — 90 degrees.
• Shoot verts and horizontals, or whatever the client wants (ask).
• Adjust your tripod so that the camera is about 4-5 feet off the floor and ensure your lens is pointing level, not up or down. If you don’t do this you’ll get the dreaded “fun house” effect.
• If you don’t have software (usually Photoshop) to put together multiple exposures, don’t worry about them, but DO shoot both on, under-, and over-exposed frames. See http://www.dpreview.com/learn/?/key=auto+bracketing
• Practice at home.
• If you spend 5 hours shooting you’ll probably spend 5 hours sorting, correcting and choosing shots, so charge accordingly and let the client know there’s time involved in “post processing”.