tips for Europe trip

[dave61]

The 24-70 should be good enough to general photos of buildings and landscapes, the extra aperture of the 35 Art is good for interiors and night-time. I love my 70-200/2.8 but I don't normally carry it around cities because the weight vs. frequency of use doesn't work for me. A tripod is nice to have but a pain to carry around on a trip like this. Bring a few zip-loc bags, and when you arrive buy some dry beans or pulses, for a cheap and cheerful rest.

 

[d]

The 24-70 should be good enough to general photos of buildings and landscapes, the extra aperture of the 35 Art is good for interiors and night-time. I love my 70-200/2.8 but I don't normally carry it around cities because the weight vs. frequency of use doesn't work for me. A tripod is nice to have but a pain to carry around on a trip like this. Bring a few zip-loc bags, and when you arrive buy some dry beans or pulses, for a cheap and cheerful rest.

That's a cool tip to use the zip-loc bags with beans/pulses as a camera rest. Rice would probably work nicely as well. Many years ago I bought a purpose-made camera bean bag to use in place of a tripod. It came with out with me on a couple of local shoots, but I've never taken it traveling with me due to it's weight. Your suggestion is a great alternative!

Cheers,
d.

 

[ahsanford]

Some more great shots there too. The two Notre Dame shots caught my eye straight away, in particular. Just as comparison, would be very interesting to see what you could have done with that shot of the facade with your FF camera and TS lens.

Thanks!

Here are a couple of the front of the cathedral with the 1D X and TS-E 17L. Even a long exposure can't blur out people just 'hanging out'.

Neuro, nice shots.

Question: does anyone here use PS's median filter to eliminate tourists from view? I've seen a few tutorials on it -- it looks simple enough, but I didn't know if (in practice) it had major drawbacks other than requiring a tripod and multiple exposures. Do you have to take so many shots that lighting has shifted? Does the IQ suffer from this?

I ask b/c some vistas are effectively 'unshootable' without people in view -- the entry to Notre Dame, Fallingwater, Piazza San Pietro in front of the Vatican, etc. I appreciate that you don't want to sterilize or scrub the tourist reality from a collection of travel photos, but sometimes you just want the structure.

- A

 

[ahsanford]

The 24-70 should be good enough to general photos of buildings and landscapes, the extra aperture of the 35 Art is good for interiors and night-time. I love my 70-200/2.8 but I don't normally carry it around cities because the weight vs. frequency of use doesn't work for me. A tripod is nice to have but a pain to carry around on a trip like this. Bring a few zip-loc bags, and when you arrive buy some dry beans or pulses, for a cheap and cheerful rest.

That's a cool tip to use the zip-loc bags with beans/pulses as a camera rest. Rice would probably work nicely as well. Many years ago I bought a purpose-made camera bean bag to use in place of a tripod. It came with out with me on a couple of local shoots, but I've never taken it traveling with me due to it's weight. Your suggestion is a great alternative!

Cheers,
d.

Yep. My sandbag is usually filled with small potting/planter stones. But if air travel is involved, I dump the contents, pack it flat and fill it on-site with something readily available and cheap/free. I usually bring it for tripod stablilization purposes, so I go for density, but you surely could make it a lens support with something tiny and rigid like beans, rice, etc. as Dave suggested.

- A

 

[krisbell]

Question: does anyone here use PS's median filter to eliminate tourists from view? I've seen a few tutorials on it -- it looks simple enough, but I didn't know if (in practice) it had major drawbacks other than requiring a tripod and multiple exposures. Do you have to take so many shots that lighting has shifted? Does the IQ suffer from this?

I ask b/c some vistas are effectively 'unshootable' without people in view -- the entry to Notre Dame, Fallingwater, Piazza San Pietro in front of the Vatican, etc. I appreciate that you don't want to sterilize or scrub the tourist reality from a collection of travel photos, but sometimes you just want the structure.

Yes I have used it (or identical workarounds to achieve median filter) and it is excellent. If tourists are lurking or sitting it obviously isnt going to work on them but so long as the light isnt changing rapidly you can usually eliminate all but a small handful of areas of tourists by waiting a few mins between shots, which leaves a much more manageable amount of manual cloning to clean the remainder.

Tourists or no tourists, if you are trying to achieve the highest image quality possible and are able to do so, then using the median technique will get you the absolute highest quality possible image regardless of the ISO level. It works great on ISO 100 shots.

 

[Valvebounce]

Hi Folks.
A good filling for a camera bean bag that you can take with you is the polystyrene beads for the big bean bags we use to sit on like these.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Bean-Bag-Refill-Fire-Retardent-Polystyrene-Beans-Filling-TopUp-Filler-Booster-/271220580682?var=&hash=item3f2601a14a:m:mKm8EZiO1fLEiJE0DyRVkNw

Cheers, Graham.

Yep. My sandbag is usually filled with small potting/planter stones. But if air travel is involved, I dump the contents, pack it flat and fill it on-site with something readily available and cheap/free. I usually bring it for tripod stablilization purposes, so I go for density, but you surely could make it a lens support with something tiny and rigid like beans, rice, etc. as Dave suggested.

- A

 

[AlanF]

Hey jd7,

Just to provide an alternative view on the necessity of a tripod for night shots, with decent technique you can get plenty of keepers handheld at night.

Here's that famous tower at night, shot handheld with the Canon 35mm 1.4L II on a 1DX, 1/40 @ f/2.0, ISO 1600. Your 6D + Sigma 35mm would give pretty much identical results.

Cheers,
d.

You have broken French copyright law - the Eiffel Tower lit up is considered by an obscure EU law to be a work of art and subject to copyright. Beware the midnight knock by the French Foreign Legion. Neuro is petrified, by the way.

 

[d]

Hey jd7,

Just to provide an alternative view on the necessity of a tripod for night shots, with decent technique you can get plenty of keepers handheld at night.

Here's that famous tower at night, shot handheld with the Canon 35mm 1.4L II on a 1DX, 1/40 @ f/2.0, ISO 1600. Your 6D + Sigma 35mm would give pretty much identical results.

Cheers,
d.

You have broken French copyright law - the Eiffel Tower lit up is considered by an obscure EU law to be a work of art and subject to copyright. Beware the midnight knock by the French Foreign Legion. Neuro is petrified, by the way.

Why do you think I don't sign my full name...

- d.

 

[jd7]

Hey jd7,

Just to provide an alternative view on the necessity of a tripod for night shots, with decent technique you can get plenty of keepers handheld at night.

Here's that famous tower at night, shot handheld with the Canon 35mm 1.4L II on a 1DX, 1/40 @ f/2.0, ISO 1600. Your 6D + Sigma 35mm would give pretty much identical results.

Cheers,
d.

You have broken French copyright law - the Eiffel Tower lit up is considered by an obscure EU law to be a work of art and subject to copyright. Beware the midnight knock by the French Foreign Legion. Neuro is petrified, by the way.

Why do you think I don't sign my full name...

- d.

As an aside - and without being able to comment on the Eiffel Tower situation specifically - buildings are copyright items in many (all??) countries. That said, it is usually (always??) the case that it is generally OK to photograph buildings. For example, in relation to Australia, see http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ca1968133/s66.html

Of course, sometimes there are specific laws relating to particular buildings or places.

 

[ahsanford]

...
Question: does anyone here use PS's median filter to eliminate tourists from view? I've seen a few tutorials on it -- it looks simple enough, but I didn't know if (in practice) it had major drawbacks other than requiring a tripod and multiple exposures. Do you have to take so many shots that lighting has shifted? Does the IQ suffer from this?
...

https://luminous-landscape.com/making-people-and-other-things-go-away/

Appreciated and bookmarked. If only I though to do this at Fallingwater a few years back...

- A

 

[George D.]

Great EF lens samples here. Above night shots are 8-10secs long exposure, you can't do without a tripod. Also these sights are usually full of visitors, to set up tripods and all you have to go out after 9-10pm on a working day (though recent events have made everyone more reserved). I can't imagine Notre Dame ever without people during Easter holiday for example.

To attract less attention and have less weight to carry around I use a Gorillapod SLR-Zoom (supports max.3kg gear, certainly good for EF24-70, and its ballhead comes with a convenient bubble level) - though for users of large cameras like the 1DX I guess a tripod is the only alternative. I also use the RC-6 remote controller, very handy with family shots when you want to put your self in the picture and the self-timer just makes you anxious. Flash, not really needed, however I do take the small 270EX-II just in case of us in a bar or something.

I wouldn't worry too much about gear though, the best camera is your eyes.

 

[George D.]

I haven't been to Europe, but spent 5 days on Easter Island, a full day at Machu Picchu, and 3 weeks in Alaska in the last 2 years. Just an aside, Easter Island was wonderful, and our guide fantastic.

The idea I have of some of the places you mention is through the movies of Werner Herzog. These places are larger than life, in addition maybe Iceland too which is a short trip from Scotland. However, there is no such thing as an ordinary trip. It's up to you to make it extraordinary and maybe the lesser gear you take the better.

 

[C_Raven]

Hey jd7,

Just to provide an alternative view on the necessity of a tripod for night shots, with decent technique you can get plenty of keepers handheld at night.

Here's that famous tower at night, shot handheld with the Canon 35mm 1.4L II on a 1DX, 1/40 @ f/2.0, ISO 1600. Your 6D + Sigma 35mm would give pretty much identical results.

Cheers,
d.

You have broken French copyright law - the Eiffel Tower lit up is considered by an obscure EU law to be a work of art and subject to copyright. Beware the midnight knock by the French Foreign Legion. Neuro is petrified, by the way.

Why do you think I don't sign my full name...

- d.

As an aside - and without being able to comment on the Eiffel Tower situation specifically - buildings are copyright items in many (all??) countries. That said, it is usually (always??) the case that it is generally OK to photograph buildings. For example, in relation to Australia, see http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ca1968133/s66.html

Of course, sometimes there are specific laws relating to particular buildings or places.

In general it is OK to photograph buildings or other landmarks, but not to make commercial use of the images. A good source of information on the matter are the rules and guidelines of stock photography sites, there are lists of specific buildings and places that cannot be posted.

 

[dave61]

Yep. My sandbag is usually filled with small potting/planter stones. But if air travel is involved, I dump the contents, pack it flat and fill it on-site with something readily available and cheap/free. I usually bring it for tripod stablilization purposes, so I go for density, but you surely could make it a lens support with something tiny and rigid like beans, rice, etc. as Dave suggested.

- A

Yup, you can use anything dry that flows freely: rice, sand or fine soil. Basically whatever is available. Fill the bag about 2/3 or 3/4 full, fold over the flap and tape closed (minimise risk of accidental opening) and put inside a second bag (in case of leakage).

BTW long rice tends to poke at the bag so I prefer something more rounded.

 

[oscaroo]

Gday.

I have not travelled to Europe since buying my DSLR kit, but I have travelled elsewhere.
I always travel with 6D, 24-105L, 70-300L, 8-15mm L fisheye, flash, tripod, polarisers, flash hat (phong hat)

I have found that:
- I use the 24-105L most of the time.
- the fisheye is next most popular. If i was going to europe with lots of pointy buildings, maybe i'd take my 8-16mm sigma rectilinear lens instead of the fisheye. I typically use the fisheye for landscapes.
- lastly, the 70-300L is sometimes used.

- *most* importantly however, is ... I barely, ever, ever use my flash.

- oh - and ... I use my Sirui T-025X tripod *a lot*. Its lightweight, holds the equipment, packs into a backpack.
I deploy it quickly for a photo of me and friends in many places. Having a lightweight+compact+useful tripod means you actually get to use it.

As for your gear, i'd leave the 70-200 at home, the flash too. At night, i'm either eating or sleeping and neither is interesting. I'd get a sirui T-025x tripod though

 

[oscaroo]

I plan to do a "test pack", ie pack everything (not just camera gear!) I am taking so I can see how heavy/large it all is, and then make a final decision about camera gear.

Anyway, enough of my rambling. Thank you to all who have posted for your thoughts and information, including about places to see. I am slowly getting together my list of places/sights to visit, and the hardest part is trying to work out what I can fit in and what I will have to skip simply for lack of time.

Gday ... as for your test pack. I strongly suggest you pack under whatever airline carry-on allowance you'll be subject to. My 6D, 24-105, flash, 8-15mm fisheye, 70-300mm, battery, charger, laptop and backpack weigh around 8.5kg. I am over the 7kg but i can always take the laptop out and say its separate and they've been ok with that in the past.

In my last holidays my luggage was lost, and i was very sad about potentially losing my sirui tripod, luckily they found my luggage. Next time - ... i'll give the girlfriend my tripod to carry

 

[Coldhands]

Some more great shots there too. The two Notre Dame shots caught my eye straight away, in particular. Just as comparison, would be very interesting to see what you could have done with that shot of the facade with your FF camera and TS lens.

Thanks!

Here are a couple of the front of the cathedral with the 1D X and TS-E 17L. Even a long exposure can't blur out people just 'hanging out'.

Neuro, nice shots.

Question: does anyone here use PS's median filter to eliminate tourists from view? I've seen a few tutorials on it -- it looks simple enough, but I didn't know if (in practice) it had major drawbacks other than requiring a tripod and multiple exposures. Do you have to take so many shots that lighting has shifted? Does the IQ suffer from this?

I ask b/c some vistas are effectively 'unshootable' without people in view -- the entry to Notre Dame, Fallingwater, Piazza San Pietro in front of the Vatican, etc. I appreciate that you don't want to sterilize or scrub the tourist reality from a collection of travel photos, but sometimes you just want the structure.

- A

I've attempted this technique (as well as manually blending layers) to remove people for photos before, and while it can work fairly well, I often find the results less-than-pleasing. A public place completely devoid of people seems somehow unnatural and alien to me.

What I prefer to do is use a ~10 stop ND to achieve a long exposure which causes any moving people to disappear and the "lurkers" to blur just a bit since even they usually move around a little. This makes them less of a distracting element in the image, but the remaining shapes maintain a degree of humanity. An example, since you mentioned the entry to Notre Dame


Untitled by Colin Whittaker, on Flickr

 

[romanr74]

Living in this Europe place, I fully agree with Neuro (and tx for the nice argument supporting pictures). If you're concerned about amount of gear you best leave the 70-200 at home. I have two 16-35 in my set which are primarily for European city photography. I also want to get the 11-24 rather sooner than later because the 16mm sometimes is just not wide enough. Places in european medieval cities are pretty tight. I for the same purpose got the 17 ts-e, which is great. I believe I would get and bring a 16-35 f/4 IS in your place, at least if you are remotely into "architectural" photography, together with the 24-70.

All pictures below shot with 17 ts-e...

 

[romanr74]

I know i'm in the risk of starting a religious debate here, but in my opinion you don't need a tripod, unless you want to do long-time exposure at night or with ND during dailight to blur out people. In the places where you'd benefit from the tripod the most, inside buildings (e.g. churches) you're usually not allowed to bring the tripod.

 

[Ladislav]

A lot of comments about Paris. So let's talk a bit about London.

I assume that you want to do regular sightseeing and take pictures of traditional tourists locations. Since you are not going for photography trip you will not be researching right time and right place to take picture of individual locations but just try to get best of what actually is in front of you (weather included).

First of all be prepared that London compared to Paris and Vienna has pretty messed up city architecture - there is literally no order and guidelines considering how a new building will fit into its surroundings. There is also nothing like real old/historic city center. Old and new is mixed up a lot and buildings can be very close to each other. Even famous landmarks are often squeezed among other buildings. Eg. St. Paul's Cathedral or Monument has really little space around. London is also a huge construction site with lot of cranes in the skyline and lot of lorries on roads.

You either like it or not. Either way there is a lot to see in London and if you are going only for a short trip you need to decide upfront what you really want to see and if it is enough to visit those places or if you for example want to take a tour inside. I live near London for almost 3 years, I work in City of London and there is still a huge list of places I even didn't visit once.

Some museums and galleries have free admission but places like Tower of London, St. Paul's Cathedral or Westminster Abbey are not the cheapest ones (you can't also take pictures inside Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's Cathedral) and it takes considerable amount of time to visit them. Transport in general is expensive as well. Depending on how long you are going to stay and what areas of London you plan to visit, there can be some cheaper options for transport.

If you don't mind walking a lot, I can recommend one walk we do with almost all friends when they visit us for the first time. The whole walk is about 9km but expect something like 12km. It is sightseeing walk which will still allow you taking pictures but since you are not going for photography trip you will not have ideal light for most of them. It will take you most of the day even without visiting any of the landmarks you will pass:

- Start in Green Park (tube station)
- Walk through Green Park to Buckingham palace - if you plan properly and visit in the morning you can see changing guards but be prepared for one of the most crowdy areas you can normally find in London (the worse is probably only underground in morning peak times). Dates for changing guards: https://www.royalcollection.org.uk/visit/buckinghampalace/what-to-see-and-do/changing-the-guard
- Continue to The Mall and under Admiralty Arch to Trafalgar Square where you will see Nelson's column and National gallery
- Optionally you can go through St. James park instead of The Mall. There are few nice views of Buckingham palace and there should also be a local Pelicans "colony". You will leave the park at Horse Guards parade and you can get back to The Mall
- From Trafalgar Square continue to Whitehall. You will pass Downing Street and get to Parliament Square - by this time you saw probably the biggest squares you can find in central London
- Westminster abbey, Palace of Westminster (House of Parliament) and Elizabeth tower (Big Ben) are all nicely visible from Parliament Square and you can take some nice pictures even without UWA lens
- From Parliament Square cross the river over Westminster bridge. Again nice view of Palace of Westminster and Big Ben and also London Eye. Palace of Westminster is currently ongoing partial renovation so don't expect to make postcard style picture
- Once you get to the south bank just turn left to London Eye and continue till you get to Tower bridge (about 6km)
- During this walk you will see many other landmarks and points of interests including:
- London eye
- Southbank Skate park
- Oxo Tower (I've never been there but there should be a public viewing platform next to the restaurant)
- London Blackfriars (Bridge which is a Train station)
- Skyscrapers in City of London (Gherkin, Walkie Talkie, Cheese Greater)
- Distant view of St. Paul's Cathedral
- Shakespeare Globe
- Tate Modern
- Millennium Bridge - If you feel tired here you can just cross the bridge and walk towards St. Paul's cathedral where you will find a tube station. You can do rest of the walk another day. If you continue another day I would recommend adding Borough Market as well - it is on London Bridge close to Shard.
- Golden Hinde II
- Shard
- HMS Belfast
- Tower of London
- City hall and More London
- Tower Bridge - if you are lucky you can see bridge lift. Check http://www.towerbridge.org.uk/lift-times/ for planned lifts

If you don't cross Tower bridge and continue a bit you can also see interesting Shad Thames street. Otherwise you can just cross the bridge and end your walk in Tower Hill tube station.

It is nice both during the day and in the evening/night and since you will be taking a lot of pictures over the water 24-70 zoom range will be good and you will also find use of 70-200.

If you don't like walking so much, interesting option can be using Hop on Hop off bus (I think there is multiple providers, just search on Google) because that will take you around all important landmarks.

Apart from the mentioned walk another popular places for tourists include:
- Getting closer to St. Paul's cathedral
- Oxford street and Oxford circus (it is mostly about shopping)
- Piccadilly circus (I found it extremely boring but people usually want to visit it)
- China town (close to Oxford street and Piccadilly circus)
- Hyde park, Marble Arch, Wellington Arch, Kensington gardens and palace
- Harrods (department store in impressive building)
- Natural history museum - another impressive building
- The British museum
- Covent Garden
- Portobello Market in Notting Hill
- Madame Tussauds
- Greenwich

Be ready to have option for both good and bad weather or take an umbrella and camera rain cover. Spring and summer in London are not too rainy but just in case ...

My walk around set for London usually does not include 24-70 zoom. I always take 16-35 and usually 70-300 and tripod.