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Tracy Mack utilizes her background in photojournalism and as a photography instructor to chronicle her family's life with Tamron's 18-250mm F/3.5-6.3 Di II lens. |
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| AF18-250mm
F/3.5-6.3 Di II
by Andrew Darlow |
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Newspaper staff photojournalist, picture editor, photography instructor, freelance photographer and "resident mom photographer" are all words that have described Tracy Mack over her twenty year career in photography. "I began as a photojournalist in the early 1990's at two newspapers in Syracuse, NY in the days before digital cameras. At that time, we shot film and did most of our own processing, and most people wrote their captions on typewriters! It wasn't that long ago, but times sure have changed since then." Mack also met her future husband, (also a photographer), while on the job in Syracuse. "We would often listen to the police scanner and then photograph breaking news stories together." |
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Mack recalls what life as a photojournalist was like, including the amount of equipment that was necessary. "I shot in color and black and white, which required carrying both color and black and white film, and I covered just about anything that was happening in the region. On an average day, I might cover an elementary school in the morning, then a college sporting event, then a car accident, then a piano recital, and in the evening, maybe a protest in front of city hall. With such a wide range of assignments, I needed at least three lenses to cover it all. Today, I could have done everything with a digital SLR and a lens like the Tamron 18-250mm F/3.5-6.3 Di II lens." Also important to note is that the lens was specially made for cameras with APS-C size sensors, such as the Nikon D70s, and the lens' focal length is actually equivalent to a 28-388mm lens in 35mm terms. |
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"I use the 18-250mm with a Nikon D70s DSLR and find it to be solidly built, yet compact and light (just 3.3 inches in length and weighing just under a pound)," says Mack. "The lens is super-sharp across the entire zoom range, and it produces beautiful out of focus backgrounds, especially when I shoot with wider apertures (from about F/3.5 to F/8). Throughout my career I've been used to shooting with very high quality glass, and I'm totally blown away by this lens. I also like the fact that the lens is not proprietary to one camera company and I would recommend the lens to owners of any compatible camera from Canon, Nikon, Pentax or Sony.
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Some of the other issues that many photographers face are unpredictable weather and a need to react quickly when news or something unexpected happens. "Apart from just the flexibility and extreme zoom range of the 18-250mm lens, there are great advantages to not having to change lenses when snow is falling, or when dust is in the air. It's also easy to be caught off-guard at sporting events, or by your own children, which can result in a lens possibly being dropped on the ground. Needless to say, if I don't have to change a lens , I'm very happy."
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Nowadays, Mack is more likely to be found photographing her family and teaching her two children about photography in their backyard or at a local playground–and that can take just as much (or more) energy as a front-page news assignment. "My oldest son is four, and he not only loves to be photographed, he also loves to turn the zoom and see the effect it has in the viewfinder. And like many kids under ten who have never seen a photograph taken with a film camera, they expect to immediately see the photo appear on the back of the camera. The Tamron 18-250mm is especially fun for him because he can see such a variety of photos that I take of him and his brother. Examples can be seen in a recent series (below) of portraits I did of my four year old son at multiple focal lengths. They were shot at 18mm, 70mm, 100mm, 155mm and 250mm." |
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Mack also discovered some of the lens' finer points when taking photos around her home. "The lack of flare or chromatic aberration at all zoom levels on the 18-250mm, even in bright conditions, such as directly shooting in front of window blinds or with strong backlighting from the sun is impressive. It's great to know that the archive I'm helping to make of my family will continue for generations." |
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1. Aim for a shutter speed of one divided by the focal length or faster (for example, 1/250 sec or faster at the 250mm zoom setting). 2. Use a tripod or monopod with a good quality tripod head. 3. Find something to brace yourself against, such as a wall or tree. Also keep your legs spaced about shoulder width apart with your elbows tucked in. 4. Place your hand under the lens to better stabilize it. 5. Raise your ISO level. Many of today's DSLRs can produce images with minimal noise at ISO levels of 400 or above. Tip 2: Tip 3: Tip 4: |
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