den32837

I have used Shutterfly since 2009. I always do hardback, generally do black page backgrounds, and always do it manually...positioning my own shots. I have done seven 8x8 books and nine 10x10s. For larger trips, I would wait for an unlimited pages offer and go up to 100 pages or more. I celebrated years ago when they improved their process to enable gorgeous two page spreads. Since then I have used a few in each book. One of the finest features is their 100% guarantee. I f you find they made a glitch, they do another one free.

Now, THAT is a neat shot!

To each his own. Instead of paying $10/mo for another processing program, taking multiple exposures and stitching them together, I preferred to spend $400 one time for the capable Tokina wide angle, take one shot at f13 and crop top and bottom. Result is easily sharp enough to print an 18x46 print hanging over our couch in the living room. BTW, here is my Cabo:

Too much work

The Tokina 11-16 is my go-to wide angle. I bet real estate agents use it. Shoot rooms in a house and the place looks as big as the Houston Astrodome! One thing I like to use the WA for is to shoot a likely outdoor scene (e.g.,Stonehenge) then crop off the top and bottom for a great looking panoramic.

A 135 works well for portraits, but I find I cannot beat a range like the Tamron 18-400. It is on my Canon most of the time while traveling, as it handles everything from mild wide angle to tele w zoom, and very good image quality. When traveling, you can't beat that flexability w/o having to carry a full camera bag w extra lenses. You can be off ship w just the camera on a strap and handle almost any photo opportunity you discover. And...on a crop-sensor camera, the max range is equivalent to 640mm!

When we travel, my photos are my souvenirs. The best shots end up as canvas prints on the walls at home. We have Antelope Canyon, Amsterdam, Rome, Washington DC, New York City, Neuschwanstein, Stonehenge, Monument Valley, Zaanse Schans windmills, Bar Harbor Maine, and Alaska whales and eagles on the walls. With 32 up, not much space remains. I have the cell phone and a compact $100 Canon along, mostly for snapshots on board and shots of friends, while I use a Canon 70D for photographs off ship. Favorite lenses include a Tamron 18-400, which fetched wonderful shots of eagles on blue icebergs in Alaska and the Statue of Liberty on approach to NY harbor, and a Tokina 11-16 which nailed my all-time-favorite shot at Stonehenge, and comes in handy in museums and other close-quarters venues. The fact is, though, if you have a decent eye, get a good composition and have the requisite sharpness of image, many different cameras will suffice. Example: during this pandemic, while we were unable to travel, I dug out some old film shots, exposed in 1971 in DC and while stationed in Germany in the early 80s, digitized them , used modern computer photo-editing software and came up with wonderful prints for the wall, of Washington DC monuments and Mad King Ludwig's castle. They were originally shot with a Fujica ST-701 SLR. on Kodachrome. For the folks satisfied with only a cell phone camera, I will say the most pitiful sight I ever witnessed was my fellow passengers trying to shoot the Statue Of Liberty (at distance) from a cruise ship with a cell phone .