The Pro-Kit performance lowering springs were installed with the Original Equipment BMW dampers. Whenever installing performance lowering springs, spring manufacturers recommend replacing the stock dampers, especially on higher mileage cars. Because the suspension has to be disassembled anyway to install the new springs, there is typically no additional labor cost to install new dampers at the same time. More importantly, aging factory dampers may not be up to the task of controlling the movements of the performance lowering springs, which can lead to a harsh, bouncy ride if not replaced.

The factory dampers on the BMW 330Ci are very capable to begin with, and our test vehicles have relatively low miles on them, so we opted to equip this vehicle with Eibach Pro-Kit springs and the stock dampers, simulating what owners of newer cars often elect to do. Installing Pro-Kit springs on most vehicles results in approximately 1.25-1.6″ lowering in the front and rear. Because the 330Ci coupe already sits somewhat lower than the sedan version, our coupe test car was lowered about half the usual amount.

Out on the road, the car equipped with Pro-Kit springs felt somewhat more nimble than the stock suspension. This vehicle had less body roll when carving around the off ramps, and steering response felt more crisp. The Pro-Kit-equipped car did ride more firmly over choppy pavement, but was not rated as being harsh by our team. On the track, feedback to the driver was enhanced over the car equipped with the stock suspension. Steering response was improved, as was steady state cornering around the skid pad portion of our test track. Time and speed gains were made in all areas, with the average lap time improving nearly 0.250 second over the stock suspension.

Hawaii is one of the best places to get out and spend quality time away from the rush of life in the city. Hawaii is the only state in the union that is separated from the mainland by water, and is located in the Pacific about five hours away by plane. With the beauty of its surroundings in the Pacific, Hawaii is a place of amazing sights and scenery of nature.

The serene beauty of Hawaii cannot be described in mere words. Imagine sitting on a beautiful beach, with a cool breeze of air whistling in your ears, and watching that unforgettable moment when the sun becomes an eclectic hue of orange and red color, resembling like a ball, and falling into the lap of the ocean. Well, just a thought of such a heavenly beauty would charm your senses. Isn’t it?

Fortunately, with Hawaii vacations all this, and more, is possible. There truly is no other place on earth that comes close to matching the natural beauty of Hawaii. The islands are home to some of the most beautiful beaches in the world. The splendor of the sparkling blue water and shimmering sandy beaches cannot be matched.

A vacation in Hawaii need not be expensive. Vacation packages offer many types of Hawaii vacations. Depending on the package, they may also offer lodging, sight-seeing and complimentary airport shuttle service. Hawaii is one of the few trans-Pacific stopover points, so it is well served by international airlines.

Do you enjoy resting on warm beaches? Do you like stunning scenery, gorgeous sunrises, exciting adventures? How about more physical activities such as scuba diving or windsurfing? If your answer to any one of those questions is yes, you ought to consider Maui vacation packages. With its wide range of activities and perfect climate, Maui is an ideal vacation spot. Whether you want to stand at the top of a 10,000 foot volcano or swim with dolphins under the sea, there’s something for you in Maui.

No article on Hawaii would be complete without mention of the island of Oahu. It is also in the vicinity of Hawaii and offers the opportunity to see Pearl Harbor. While there, if you take advantage of Oahu vacation packages, you’ll get to tour the famous Diamond Head crater overlooking Waikiki beach. All of the islands offer luxurious hotels and beautiful resorts with only the finest of features and amenities. So get ready to drink in the gorgeous scenery of the islands with a Hawaii travel package.

Introduction

Welcome to Part Two of Hints and Tips on Big Cat Photography. Here we continue to look at equipment and common mistakes encountered when photographing Big Cats.

Lenses

Here you have quite a few choices , these points are discuss below.

Specific Lenses

Macro – a close focusing lens ranging from 50 to around 110mm in focal length – the longer the focal length the further away from the subject you can be. The drawback – foreshortened depth of field – you have just a few millimetres to get the focus point right – so you’ll need a still subject matter. But you can get some amazing close ups of teeth and paws.

Standard Close Focusing – this would apply to a 30mm or 50mm prime lens but one that has the ability to focus down to around 8 to 12 inches. These lenses can give you close dramatic images when on a Big Cats Experience Day.

Standard Zoom – for me this would be a lens similar to an 18 – 70mm or the 17 – 55mm. Similarly there are some longer standard zooms such as the 24 – 70mm or even a 24 – 120mm. The choice is yours and it comes down to which part of the zoom range you want to operate within, remember on a DX body the lens will be multiplied by a factor of 1.4 to 1.6 depending on which brand of camera body you have. So your 17 – 55mm multiplies up to around a 25 – 82mm when compared to a 35mm film camera or an FX digital body. On an FX body – being full frame the focal length is as stated. But remember if you use a DX lens on a FX body you’ll get a darkening of the edges, called vignetting.

Fast Zoom Lens -by this we are looking at how much light the lens can let in at its widest aperture. For example a lens with a minimum aperture of F6.3 will let in far less light than one of F2.8. Remember the smaller the number the bigger the hole in the lens and the more light it lets in. This then gives you quicker shutter speeds, which you need with longer focal length lenses, for example those over 200mm. Tip – you should always keep your shutter speed over your focal length – so if you‘re at 200mm, you need 200th of a second, but hang on you’re using a DX body and lens so you need to add in the crop factor multiply by 1.4 to 1.6 so at 200mm you really need 320th or 400th of a second. Even some standard zooms with F2.8 aperture used by the professional photographer can still be expensive, for example the Nikon 17-55 F2.8 is around £900.

Standard Telephoto – this would be something like a 70 – 300mm lens or some of the more all day lenses – like an 18 – 200 or 55 – 200, all day lenses are covered below. You can get a 70 – 200 F2.8 but these are pricey , most standard telephotos range from F4 to F5.6 in terms of speed and are good all round lenses, just watch the light levels. OK you can up the ISO but again remember the noise compromise.

Super Telephoto – this would apply to either a lens over 300mm or one that I feel is a prime lens, fixed focal length, that sits around F4 or F2.8. These are very expensive lenses and entry levels are around £2,000. Personally I like to use the 200 – 400mm VR lens from Nikon, now selling at a suggested selling price of £5800, but I didn’t pay that for mine, I got in before the 2009 price rise.

All Day Lenses

A Definition – by this we are talking about an all in one lens, a lens that will zoom from wide angle to standard telephoto, for instance an 18- 200mm.

The Benefits – it gets you all the shots you need, no swapping lenses no down time. Often light and compact they are not much to carry about.

The Compromise – optical quality! You’re asking this lens to do a lot . A prime will always out perform a zoom. And an all day lens has to do a job at all levels through the zoom range, the edges of the image will suffer and so too will the speed of the lens, remember the F number and the amount of light it needs. You don’t find professional lens made at F2.8 or faster that cover that wide a range – and there has to be a reason for that – optical quality – Pros carry 2 or more camera bodies with a shot and a long lens set up using matched equipment.

Depth of Field

Depth of Field (DOF) – if you are fortunate enough to own f2.8 maximum aperture lenses then be mindful as to how short the DOF can be, especially if the subject comes within the zone where the distance to subject is under the focal length – for example, the DOF on a 200mm lens will be further foreshortened if the subject is inside a 2m (2000mm) range in front of the lens. Some 200mm lenses will focus as close as 1.5 – 1.8m so the impact of this is that you may focus on the nose of say a tiger only to find the eyes are blurred, or out of focus.

Shutter Speed

As a commercial photographer – remember this law as we mentioned earlier – keep your shutter speed above the focal length of your lens, e.g. 200mm shoot at 250th sec or more, allowing for the crop factor I’d suggest at least 320th sec on a 200mm lens.

RAW or Jpeg

This is probably as much discussed on the camera forums as brand names, each has its advantages and disadvantages. Personally I shoot RAW as it gives you a safety zone if the shot is slightly out. Added to that I personally think it gives you more editing options. The choice as they is yours. I do shoot Jpeg for press work but only because you don’t have the time for post production.

Image Composition

Detail – this is great option, stripes, spots, eyes, ear noses and tails – there is so much choice.

Action – running, jumping, pawing for food on the ground or in the air, lost of options. And when it all kicks off with the three male lions make sure you’re ready.

Portraits – sitting, lying down with a full belly and a low sun in the sky and the lions look great. Contrast that with an angelic Tiger that just can’t be bothered. All of these give you great options for images.

Close Up – teeth, paws and claws, similar to the details shot but much closer, using macro photography.

Use of flash – this is an option , watch out for green or yellow eye, this is the same as red eye in humans and it’s a lot easier to get and harder to get rid of due to the size of the cats eyes. Also watch out for the bars , make sure the flash gun is a fill to the available light and close to the wire else you get wire stripes.

Common Errors

Wire – while the gauge of wire will have an effect on what can be done, I still see many shots with the wire right through the middle of the shot. It’s best to get the centre of the lens lined up with the square of the wire – i.e. the hole. Ensure you don’t have a vertical or horizontal wire passing in front of your lens or worst still a join, giving a big cross in the shot.

Background – try to get the background as natural as possible use close up shots or a short depth of field to bur the background. Also use any landscaping in the enclosure to mask the cage behind or above. Remember to get down low, take the cats perspective.

Machine gunning! – is the photographer that presses the shutter button for long periods of time, shooting continuously without checking the shots back. This will fill up your memory cards very quickly and give so many similar images to edit, when all you really need are short bursts of 3 to 6 shots. Take your time.

Metering – Try and avoid average metering and use spot or centre weighted, remember to metre off the subject. Matrix metering is too general for Big Cats.

Accessories

Tripods – these are not really usable around the Big Cats enclosures as they are cumbersome and you don’t have the flexibility to move.

Monopods – these are very useful on longer lenses and have the ability to be more manoeuvrable.

Laptops – if you have one it’s a good idea to backup your shots half way through the day. Alternatively use the laptop to check shots back, say at lunchtime, and see how you are getting on. Also remember to back up your cards – the last thing you want is a card failure and no images.

Extra cards – a very good idea, keep them smaller, now-a-days around 4GB. 16GB cards are all well and good but if it fails, that’s a lot of lost data. 1GB used to be considered large, a while back, now using this card in a modern DSLR and it more resembles the number of shots you’d get on a roll of film.

Clothing – Check the weather before you go. Take a selection to allow for a change in the weather or for getting down on the ground.

Author : Peter Davey MA DipM

Lets face it, most of us want to have a great physique but a number of different problems get in the way of it, including time and money. It takes a lot of time for us to go to the gym, work out on a regular basis and then make sure that we are sticking with the newest things as far as work out is concerned. If you work out at the gym, you are not only going to have to worry about the membership fees, you are going to have to worry about buying clothes and some other accessories.

One way that you can fix this is by exercising at home and skipping some of the frustrations and cost that are usually associated with working at the gym. As a matter of fact, you don’t even need any expensive equipment in order for you to get started. All you really need is the body that you carry around with you every day. As a matter of fact, bodyweight exercises are one of the most healthy things that you can imagine.

It’s good to make sure that you start out slowly whenever you are doing these types of exercises. Your body is going to get used to the new exercise regime that you are doing without too much time passing but don’t overdo it from the start. Simply do exercises such as push-ups, crunches, pull ups and burpees. Not only will you build excellent muscle, you will also be cutting body fat rather quickly if that is your goal.

Exercising with your body weight is an excellent way for you to get fit and to keep yourself in shape for the long-term. Make sure you use it to your benefit and workout with your body every day.

Display Stands

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Can you imagine the buzz created when you are the first to own one? Meyda Tiffany fireplace screens enhance any room and can be created by you to suit your individual taste. If we do not have it, we can certainly design it. That is the beauty of fireplace screens that not only light up a room, but give your room a little touch of your personality shining through.

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Make your evening in one that you will enjoy and one all your guests will treasure, look into a Meyda Tiffany Fireplace Screen today. Find that perfect custom component to enhance the beauty of your perfect space.

Hot News

The Oakland Athletics are a professional baseball team based in Oakland, California. The Athletics are a member of the Western Division of Major League Baseball’s American League. From 1968 to the present, the Athletics have played in the Oakland Coliseum.

The “Athletics” name originates from the late 19th century “athletic clubs”, specifically the Athletic of Philadelphia. They are most prominently nicknamed “the A’s”, in reference to the blackletter “A”, a trademark of the team and the old Athletic of Philadelphia. This has gained very prominent use, and in some circles is used more frequently than the full “Athletics” name. They are also known as “the White Elephants” or simply “the Elephants”, in reference to then New York Giants‘ manager John McGraw’s calling the team a “white elephant”. This was embraced by the team, who then made a white elephant the team’s mascot, and often incorporated it into the logo or sleeve patches.

One of the American League’s eight charter franchises, the club was founded in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1901. Then the Philadelphia Athletics, the team moved to Kansas City in 1955 and became the Kansas City Athletics. It was not until 1968 that the team moved to Oakland.

The Athletics’ name originated in the term “Athletic Club” for local gentlemen’s clubs-dates to 1860 when an amateur team, the Athletic (Club) of Philadelphia, was formed. (A famous image from that era, published in Harper’s Weekly in 1866, shows the Athletic players dressed in uniforms displaying the familiar blackletter “A” on the front). The team later turned professional through 1875, becoming a charter member of the National League in 1876, but were expelled from the N.L. after one season. A later version of the Athletics played in the American Association from 1882-1891.

The team name is typically pronounced “Ath-LET-ics”, but their longtime team owner/manager Connie Mack called them by the old-fashioned colloquial Irish pronunciation “Ath-uh-LET-ics”. Newspaper writers also often referred to the team as the Mackmen during their Philadelphia days, in honor of their patriarch.

The Winner