However, I would strongly suggest that you would try this only if the camera is broken and it’s already out of warranty. The Nikon D7000 is a fragile piece of hardware equipment and after rebuilding it, you may still have to correctly recalibrate most of its sub-systems (including AF).

Source: Vimon Camera Service, camera repair in Thailand.

• High Speed Sync for flash at any shutter speed
• Almost Free DIY Paper Diffuser (Strobist)
• High Speed Photography Studio at Home
• You also have several options to build your own flash accessories from paper:
  • DIY cutout bounce card and its PDF printout
  • Almost Free DIY Paper Diffuser



• Black Straws Snoot Grid: Part 1 and Part 2
• Macro Lighting LED Ring
• Smarten Up Your Dumb Optical Slave By Hooking it Up With Arduino

And finally, why not let yourself be inspired by all this and experiment a little with droplets like Edgerton.

A long post from Instructables (Simple Variable Neutral Density Filter) invites us to build easily a Neutral Density (ND) filter whose density can be adjusted (using only two polarizing filters).

The simple and neat idea is to flip back one of the filters in front of the other. Correctly aligned, they become nearly totally black (a very very dense neutral grey color); In opposition, they give a light grey filter. It can be set continuously between these extremes with a slight rotation.

The key point is to unmount tidily one of the filters to flip it, then to screw one onto the other.

After some years of people trying to hook big lenses onto an iPhone (like above), there is now somebody trying to make this a serious affair: Here is the prototype of something that could become a real product from Vid-Atlantic, a way to solidly attach a Nikon DSLR lens to your iPhone.

Little cameras like the ones from Sony, Nikon (soon) or Samsung, should watch this.

Source: quesabesde.com

Copyright (C) Peter Shah

At first, Peter Shah seems to be the usual astronomy photographer. He goes out at night to look at the sky with a photo camera and a very big lens on a tripod. This is actually wrong. Peter Shah is actually a perfectionist. Where most amateur astronomers learned to grind a mirror by themselves in order to build a bigger, better astro lens, Peter has perfected the art of improving the little details that make a difference between a good lens and a near perfect photo.

For example, covering the concrete pier, where the 8 inch lens is affixed, with a gold mylar sheet was a step into reducing unwelcome heat radiation that was impairing his pictures. [Peter Shah's equipment]

You should absolutely go and check his wonderful stars and nebulae’s images. Peter authorized me to copy here a photo I would love to be able to do (any time I start shooting stars, of course): A full color photo of the Horse Head Nebula (in my eyes, one of the most marvelous sight in our skies).

Now, as we are on YLovePhoto and I am always tempted to help my readers improve their photos, I also found a useful article by Jason Anderson (from Canon Blogger) posted on the excellent DIY Photography web site. You will learn how he built a DIY star tracker (very much what astro-photographers would do). But you will start by the excellent basic advice of 5 tips:

1. Use a tripod
2. Turn on the in-camera noise reduction
3. Drop your ISO to its lowest setting
4. Make sure you are working with fully charged batteries and have some spares!
5. Try to shoot in a remote area where there is not much stray light

The Create Wonderful Astrophotography Images With A DIY Star Tracker article will have you brain working. Maybe, you will try your photo camera at night, too.

photo credit: Tanozzo

This is the surprising advice given by Bruce Schneier about how you could protect your photo luggage when traveling: Pack a starter gun in your luggage. This is definitely considered as a weapon by the TSA and other flight authorities (but it is not dangerous and you don’t need a license to have this “toy gun” normally used to start an athletic race), it has to be formally declared and then it receives extra care from the airline and the law enforcement authorities.

However simple and clean, I never tried such an approach to be sure that photo bags (sturdy ones for sure) can travel correctly by plane.

Last minute thought: Of course, this is to protect checked-in luggage. No airline will ever accept a weapon in the cabin…

• Build a Closet Photo Studio
• Build a DIY Digital Camera Scanner