I just got back from Germany.  I start my new job on Monday, pending the snow doesn't make it impossible.  I was in Hamburg visiting my friend, Chris.  We took a short trip from Hamburg to Berlin.  It was quite a trip to Germany.  I got my wallet stolen and then recovered (with cash and cards) by the police, we were ditched by our ride back to Hamburg from Berlin, and a 45 minute flight delay because of a little snow in Hamburg caused me to stay an extra night in London.  Overall though, it was a ton of fun.

I've been shooting with the 1D Mark IV for a little under a month now and I have to say that I really like it.  It's a huge improvement overa all cameras that I've owned.  My biggest gripe is that I'm unhappy with the ISO performance as I was expecting a performance boost over the 5D Mark II that I loved and instead experienced a downgrade.  I have noticed that the files are considerably noisier than the 5D - where I wouldn't hesitate to go up to 3200, I now think twice about going to 1600 on the 1D. 

See the gallery here. 


(Canon 1D Mark IV, 16mm, 1/15, f/2.8, ISO 200)


(Canon 1D Mark IV, 16mm, f/4, ISO 200)


(Canon 1D Mark IV, 16mm, f/4, ISO 200)


(Canon 1D Mark IV, 16mm, f/5.6, ISO 200)


(Canon 1D Mark IV, 16mm, 1/100, f/2.8, ISO 200)


(Canon 1D Mark IV, 35mm, 1/2000, f/2.8, ISO 200)

I've been back from Kenya for about two weeks and I've finished my photos just in time for my trip to Germany this week.
I've really been working on my editing technique which you can see in the photos.  We had a lot of fun in Kenya; saw lots of elephants, giraffes, buffalo, baboons, lions, cheetahs, leopards, and more.  I flew into Nairobi and visited four parks while there; Sweetwaters, Masai Mara, Lake Nakuru, and Amboseli National Park. 

In total, I shot 5,366 photos, 70 videos, totaling 143GB. 

All photos are available to see in this gallery. 
The photos are geotagged and you can see them on a map by clicking on the "Map This" link above each photo or view all of them here. 
New Feature: you can now order prints of the photos right from within the gallery!

I also shot some video directly on my still camera.  The Canon 5D Mark II captures really excellent video and, although none of it is production quality because I didn't have the right supports and wasn't there to capture video, it's very interesting to watch nonetheless. 




(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 135mm, 1/8000, f/2.8, ISO 400)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 135mm, 1/640, f/2, ISO 400)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 560mm, 1/4000, f/4, ISO 200)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 16mm, 1/30, f/2.8, ISO 200)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 135mm, 1/5000, f/2, ISO 200)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 560mm, 1/640, f/4.5, ISO 640)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 19mm, 1/200, f/9, ISO 50)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 400mm, 1/250, f/4, ISO 200)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 16mm, 1/500, f/4, ISO 200)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 400mm, 1/1000, f/2.8, ISO 1000)



Update: Here are two photos of me in action.

Photos from the Rose Hill Farm Tower Shoot are now available at photos.maxwellkruger.com. 

I've recently purchased a SmugMug account and am going to begin selling photos through the above URL.  Check back in a week for my most popular photos now available for purchase online. 

Also, you might have noticed that some of the photos are starting to say Canon 1D Mark IV.  I'm now shooting with one and love it.  I sold my 5DII and now shoot with just 1D's.  I wish I had the 1DIV for my Kenya trip, but it came in the week that I returned.  Speaking of Kenya, I'm now editing my 150gb of photos and should have them up within the next few weeks. 


(Canon 1D Mark IV, 16mm, 1/8000, f/5.6, ISO 400)


(Canon 1D Mark IV, 16mm, 0.04, f/2.8, ISO 400)

Finally finished my Utah photos from my trip over Thanksgiving.  I wanted to finish these in time before I leave for Africa next week.

View the full gallery here. 


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 16mm, f/5.7, ISO 100)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 16mm, 20, f/2.8, ISO 6400)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 50mm, 1/1250, f/2.8, ISO 100)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 16mm, f/8, ISO 100)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 16mm, 1/1000, f/4, ISO 100)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 35mm, 1/1600, f/3.2, ISO 100)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 16mm, 30, f/2.8, ISO 6400)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 16mm, f/5.7, ISO 100)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 35mm, 1/8, f/4.5, ISO 1600)

I'm graduating in exactly 9 days.  I finally finished my Honors Thesis last week, the product of 2 semesters and a summer of research and work.  I've created a website for it, www.maxwellkruger.com/thesis09.  I encourage you to take a few moments to read it and share it with anyone who might be interested. 

Abstract:

How can traditional media change to embrace an evolving readership and provide a news product that readers find useful and media corporations can make profitable? Newspapers are facing tough times because of the internet news revolution - news is available instantly, anywhere, and for free. It's a no-brainer for consumers to get their news online. It no longer makes sense to wait a whole day to see the news, and even less sense to pay for it.

At the same time as readers going online for their news, they have also become capable of creating their own reporting; and at times doing a better job of it than trained professionals. This revolution has emerged from the ubiquity of camera and smart phones. In essence, every person with a camera phone (which is most everyone) is a reporter. The difference is that these reporters no longer have to be dispatched to the scene when something happens. They are already there and capable of capturing and uploading content before a traditional reporter has time to get there.

Through this thesis, I will explore this question of how traditional media can change to embrace new technologies and the concept of citizen media interactions. Although I will focus on newspapers because they are in the most trouble, these concepts can be applied to all forms of media to increase readership and become a more active member of the local community.

As a result of the research I conduct, I will create a prototype to demonstrate many of these concepts. The prototype is a multi-device platform that focuses on community involvement with news media. There will be a web interface and a fully featured mobile phone interface to allow photo, video, audio, and text contributions, discussions, and collaboration.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FULL TEXT THESIS

Here are some more overhead shots from the Women's Basketball game last night versus Monmouth.  It's a fun angle to shoot from.  I've found that I get great shots if I overexpose a little bit and focus SLIGHTLY below the rim.  I usually autofocus on the rim, then use live view, zoomed in 10x to focus it a tad bit underneath.  It would help to have someone down there to focus on, but usually, there isn't time for that.  The 5D Mark II really makes things so much easier, with it's high res screen and live view for cosuing, high resolution 21mp files for cropping, and clarity at ISO 3200.  My only complaint is its low framerate because I sometimes miss key moments. 


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 300mm, 1/500, f/4, ISO 3200)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 300mm, 1/500, f/4, ISO 3200)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 300mm, 1/500, f/4, ISO 3200)

They all scrambled for the ball at one point toward the end of the game. 

(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 300mm, 1/500, f/4, ISO 3200)

I covered the Big Ten/ACC Challenge last week.  The Penn State women's basketball team played Georgia Tech.  The first half of the game was really boring and Penn State was being dominated by GA Tech.  Penn State made a comeback in the end, but gave it away with a foul to lose by 4.  I used a remote with a 300mm lens to get some tight action from above. 


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 300mm, 1/400, f/4, ISO 3200)



(Canon 1D Mark II, 135mm, 1/1000, f/2, ISO 1000)



(Canon 1D Mark II, 135mm, 1/1000, f/2, ISO 1000)



(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 300mm, 1/400, f/4, ISO 3200)

Head Coach Coquese Washington is always so fun to photograph.

(Canon 1D Mark II, 135mm, 1/1000, f/2, ISO 1000)



(Canon 1D Mark II, 135mm, 1/1000, f/2, ISO 1000)

They almost won. The bench got so excited. 

(Canon 1D Mark II, 135mm, 1/1000, f/2, ISO 1000)

The day after the Indiana football game, I had to wake up super early and set up some remote cameras at the wrestling match.  We lowered the scoreboard in the middle of Rec Hall that was directly above the wrestling mat, and I put two cameras on it.  I used my 5DII with a 50mm and a 40D with a 16-35@16mm.  I tried to pre-focus them, but it was hard since I had to just guess.  I set wider apertures to get more depth of field. The shots are a little blurry, but pretty usable.  I had no idea what the framing of the photos would be like, which is why I used two cameras.  The 50 was a little too tight to fit in the whole Nittany Lioin logo but it got good action.  It was nice having both cameras.  Ultimately, I see myself spending $700 on a wireless file transmitter for the 5D or 40D so that I can see the framing and control the focus remotely. 


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 50mm, 1/500, f/5.6, ISO 4000)


(Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 50mm, 1/500, f/5.6, ISO 4000)


(Canon EOS 40D, 16mm, 1/400, f/4, ISO 1600)


(Canon 1D Mark II, 135mm, 1/500, f/4, ISO 1600)


(Canon 1D Mark II, 135mm, 1/500, f/4, ISO 1600)


(Canon 1D Mark II, 135mm, 1/800, f/2, ISO 800)