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Advice From the Airwaves
Childhood buddies and cohosts of a popular West Coast radio show share a common history, a passion for photography, and an appreciation for the finer things in life—like the Tamron 18-200mm and 28-300mm zoom lenses.
Mike Garcia and Howard Lipin have known each other, as they joke, since they both “had hair.” The friends not only took pictures for the same high school yearbook—they also attended college together and served as the best man at each other’s weddings.
These days the photographic partners co-host Photo Talk Radio, an Internet radio talk show that airs every Saturday from San Diego, inviting both amateurs and pros alike into their photographic forum with questions, comments, and suggestions. “It’s a show for everyone interested in photography,” says Lipin. “We try to bring knowledge, education, and, of course, fun to the airwaves.”
And while they’ve honed their image-making skills in different ways (Garcia is a noted wedding and portrait photographer in the San Francisco Bay Area, while Lipin has toiled in the field for nearly 30 years as a renowned photojournalist), both of these pros rely on two of Tamron’s fast zoom lenses: the 18-200mm XR Di II, and the 28-300mm XR Di.
AF18-200mm F/3.5-6.3 XR Di II
by Jennifer Gidman Zumpano
Model: A014 Angle of View: 75°-7° Minimum Focus: 17.7 " Macro Mag. Ratio: 1:3.7
Filter Diameter: Ø62 Weight: 14 oz. Diameter x Length:
Ø2.9 x 3.3 in		 Mount: Canon-D, Konica Minolta-D, Nikon-D, Pentax

Versatility With the 18-200
Garcia, who shoots with a Nikon D100 digital camera, enjoys the flexibility he’s able to get with the 18-200mm lens. “When I was shooting weddings with the Hasselblad, I had fixed lenses,” he says. “Now I can just put this one lens on my camera and shoot without ever changing. I can shoot something wide and then quickly zoom in. Plus the wide angle is not so wide that it will distort. But the biggest thing for me is the weight. It’s very light compared to the other lenses I had used before this. And the focus is so quick, and the sharpness fantastic.”
Garcia was able to put the lens to good use during a photo shoot for Photo Talk Radio with Gary Bernstein, who was introducing a Chimera Lighting reflector. “This sequence shows the flower shot both with the reflector and without the reflector,” he says. People think, ‘Well, I’m shooting nature, I don’t really need a reflector.’ But I was able to pop the light in and really put some highlights on the dark area of the photo. But the really nice thing was that I was able to get a closeup of the flower and then zoom back without ever having to move to get the setup shot.”
Doing an assignment for a property management company also put the lens to the test. Commissioned to show a burned-out medicine cabinet, Garcia was able to get the wide view of the entire cabinet, and then zoom in real close for the macro shot of the burn impact.
The 18-200’s low-light capabilities are also impressive, says Garcia. “I wanted to show a day in the life of people for the radio show, so I went to the heart of Silicon Valley to get an image of the traffic and all the people going home, from places like Cisco Systems and McAfee,” he says. “I sat on the edge of an overpass, and was probably there for a good hour, testing until I finally got what I wanted. I used the very wide end of the lens, and I actually had to zoom in a little bit, because it was a little too wide. The exposure on this shot was probably a good second or two, at about f/22. I wanted to get the long exposure of all the cars looping onto the overpass. I was able to get this shot because it focuses so well in the dark. In wedding situations, with other lenses I’ve used, I constantly am bouncing in the focus and have to go to a manual focus; with this lens, I don’t have that problem.”
AF28-300mm F/3.5-6.3 XR Di
Model: A061 Angle of View: 75°-8° Minimum Focus: 19.3" Macro Mag. Ratio: 1:2.9
Filter Diameter: Ø62 Weight: 14.8 oz. Diameter x Length:
Ø2.9 x 3.3 in		 Mount: Canon-D, Konica Minolta-D, Nikon-D, Pentax

The Unobtrusive 28-300
Being a photojournalist, Lipin always has to be on the ready to capture the action, wherever it may take him. With this Canon 1D Mark II in hand, he’s discovered that the light weight and versatility of the 28-300mm Di lens has never let him down when he’s had to get the shot.
“Every opportunity I get to downsize and lighten up the load at the same time without compromising quality is something I’m always looking for,” he says. “All photographers are looking for that, especially folks from the news business who have to carry all their equipment around all the time. So when the 28-300 came out, I was amazed at how small it was. A comparable fixed-focal-length 300mm lens weighs multiple times what the Tamron 28-300 does. I keep that lens with me at all times in my beltbag, and I don’t feel as though I’m ‘naked’ in the sense that I know have the versatility and flexibility of a long lens. I always keep that 28-300 with me because I know I have it, it works, and it works well.”
This portability worked especially well for Lipin during the long, grueling day of photographing the recent San Diego Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon. “We had three photographers on the race, and we had different areas where we knew there would be a lot of activity, but there was still an incredible amount of walking involved. Having a traditional 300mm lens and walking for five or six miles in a relatively short period of time is not my idea of fun. I knew the 28-300 would give me everything I needed, so I left the fixed focal length in the car.”
In fact, not only did the lens save his back at the endurance event—it also saved one of his images. “The image of the runner being carried across finish line on stretcher could have been a lost cause picture, because I was fooling around doing some blurs and slow shutters, and I saw he collapsed and immediately honed in on him from a photo bridge they had,” he says. “The original image is actually very underexposed, and I was able to bring it up because of the Canon camera itself, but also in large part the optics and quality of the Tamron 28-300 lens allowed me to save that picture. The image actually appeared in the San Diego Union Tribune, as a half-page picture, so it was blown up to about 9 inches wide by 14 inches deep, and it looked great.”
His fascination with airplanes (“I’m an aviation fanatic”) often leads Lipin down to San Diego International Airport with his 13-year-old son to capture some of the giant winged creatures on camera. For one shot of a FedEx plane taxiing down the runway, Lipin was able to use the lens to get a nice sharp image of the jumbo jet while keeping the background nice and blurred. “I slowed the camera down and waited for the airplane to start its takeoff roll, and then I panned the camera from right to left, following the path of the plane as best I could from the limited angle I was at,” he explains. “There were numerous frames I shot that were not in focus, not because of the lens, but because the camera was slow and I wasn’t panning at the right speed. But the images that worked, worked extremely well, and in large part that was because that lens can track a moving subject very well.”
Maintaining a low profile at a local ordination of three priests was also important, as Lipin found himself crammed into a church with nearly 1,500 other parishioners and not the greatest lighting situation. “I had been to this church before shooting weddings, so I knew how dim the light in the church was,” he says. “I took my name-brand 300mm f/2.8 into the church, turned around, went back to my car, and got the Tamron 28-300. It was wall-to-wall people inside, and my fixed-length 300mm lens was quite big. Plus, I’ve been programmed for the last 30 years as a photographer in the news business that low light means big fstops. Because the fstop range on the 28-300 is 3.5 to 6.3, I thought I might not have the speed I needed. What I did, though, was increase my ISO to around 1000, and I shot that image at around 1/100th of a second, f/5.6, around 150mm. It worked great, I was able to get the shadow detail and the highlights, the accuracy and speed with which the lens operated was quite pleasing, and I saved myself some grief by not having to lug around that fixed-focal-length 300mm.”


Tip Box

Blur on the Tarmac
Howard Lipin wanted to create an unusual effect on the runway with a FedEx plane he had previously shot as it prepared for takeoff. “As the airplane was continuing to roll down the runway, the camera was between 1/15th to 1/40th of a second—it was quite slow. As I depressed the shutter, I swung the zoom ring real fast to try to get the zoom effect as the shutter was open. I then hopped over the fence and ran after the airplane, but it got in the air before I was able to get to it. I wasn’t able to get back before the cops got me!” (We know he’s kidding about that last part, airplane aficionado that he may be.)