Club digital "salon" entries for February, 2011

[Larger images and complete EXIF information are availabe on my Web site, here]

I submitted two images for the nature category this month.  The first was taken in early October near the northern rim of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Colorado.  I like the layering effect of the foreground of grass, the colorful low bushes on the ridge, and the blue sky and puffy clouds.  Though we often think of images being divided into thirds, there are four distinct layers here.

I feel that there is not a lot here to give a sense of depth; but rather it is all about the colors in layers starting at the bottom (grass) and ending at the top (sky and clouds). 

High Plains Autumn

This second nature image was taken in the marshy area behind my office.  The heron had just finished preening itself, while standing on this little island of vegetation.

Heron After Preening

The final image was taken at a butterfly house so it doesn't meet our club's definition of a "nature" image. The same would go for animals in a zoo. So I submitted it in the "open" category.  Shot at F6.7, I wish I'd used F11 for more depth of field.  I would have liked the antennaes to be in focus, but the eye and proposcus are sharp.

Glasswing Butterfly

Panasonic LX5 tricked out with a couple of accessories - Part 1

Recently I came to the realization that (for me) the LX5 is not a pocket camera.  While my Canon S90 is such a camera because it slips into my jeans pocket (it weighs under 7 ounces and is only 1.2" thick with retractable lens and self-contained lens cover), the LX5 is a bit heavier (actually nearly 50% heavier at just under 10 ounces) and thicker (1.7" with a lens that sticks out as seen in the image below and requires a lens cap). 

I can fit the LX5 easily in my cargo pants pocket if not my jeans pocket, but I find its weight causes it to flop around too much for my liking.  I find that instead of carrying it around in my pocket, I carry it around in my hand.

Once I came to the conclusion that the LX5 would not ride in my pocket, the door was open for adding a couple of accessories.

First to be added was a lens adapter.  All you need to do is remove the small ring on the lens (foreground left in the image below) and screw on the adapter (the barrel shown on the right).  This one is a third-party brand bought through EBay for about $14.  It shipped to my home in the USA from Hong Kong in about 10 days. 

The fit and finish of this lens adapter is excellent.  It screws on rather tightly, but nevertheless very smoothly. The diameter of the end that screws into the camera is 46mm.  The open end measures 52mm.  Therefore you will need a 52mm snap-on lens cap. My lens adapter came with two cheap but adequate 52mm caps.



What's the purpose of adding such an adapter?  I can think of several: (1) It makes a good lens hood; (2) at the end of the adapter you can screw in filters, a wide angle converter lens built by Panasonic especially for the LX5, or a closeup lens;  (3) you can get a grip with your left hand that will better stabilize the camera while shooting; or (4) you can power up the camera without the annoyance of having to first remove the lens cap, and when you are done shooting you can replace the cap without having to wait for the lens to first power down.

The main downside in my opinion is that the adapter interferes with flash performance, often creating a shadow on the image [edit 2011Feb13: at 24mm, 28mm and 35mm settings.  At 50mm and longer focal lengths the shadow does not exist.]

To be honest, I have not yet used the lens adapter with the LX5. But I know I will.  I use a lensmateonline.com adapter on my Canon G9 and a Pemaraal adapter on my old Panasonic FZ8 with good success.  I see no reason why the LX5 will be any different, except that I will need a 52-58 step up ring to fit my 58mm filters.

It's all about the light

I was sorting through some old pictures (not too old, but taken last April) and came across this shot taken at 7:26 pm, just minutes before I walked into the library next door to this church, to attend a photo club meeting.  A few folks were standing and admiring the scene, but I was the only one with a camera.  This is why I love compact cameras... they're easy to keep with you.  And it's not too profound to say, "the best camera for the job is the one you have with you."

This was taken with a Canon S90 in jpeg mode.  All default settings.  P-mode.  The horizontal photo below is the original image.  Looking down the editing panel in Lightroom I see that it is uncropped and unedited.  A basic OOC (out of camera) jpeg.

What happened here is that we had had an afternoon of dark stormy clouds, but with the sun nearly below the horizon, the sun was low enough to blast through under the clouds to light up the steeply for just a few minutes.  The contrast against the dark clouds makes the church dazzle in the warm evening light.

The vertical image is the result of (1) a vertical crop and (2) a slight adjustment to the vertical distortion (i.e. steeple leaning inward) using the applicable slider in the Lightroom develop panel.

Club print "salon" entries for January

The color image was submitted as a 9"x12" print to match its 4:3 aspect ratio.  The black and white print was submitted as a 6"x12" print to match the 2:1 aspect ratio that I often use to create a landscape "panel".

The color image was taken at Cape Rosier, Maine.  It's actually a vertical panorama combined from three shots, moving the camera from the foreground to the middleground to the sky.  However, I found that for compositional purposes I cropped it back to an image I could have easily taken with one carefully framed picture, probably at the 28mm (equivalent) end of my 28-108 zoom.

Maine Coast Morning

This black and white is taken near Stonington, Maine.  I liked the contrast when converted to black and white.  It was a foggy morning, which explains why there is little (none?) detail in water in the background.  The fact that the lobsterboats are hanging on their moorings in different directions is because it was a windless day and/or perhaps there was a slack tide.

Lobstermen's Wharf

Club digital "salon" entries for January

These are my digital entries for my photo club's December digital salon:

The swallowtail photo was taken at a nearby butterfly house.  Because of limited depth of field when trying to get a good close up image, it is sometimes better to shoot when the wings are fully open so that the entire butterfly is the same distance from the lens, such as I did here.  This increases your chance of getting all parts of the butterfly in focus.

This shot was taken with available light at ISO800, 1/250th second and F8.  It was hand held.  The 70-300mm zoom was at 160mm (on my Olympus with 2x crop factor that equates to a 320mm field of view).  Because of image stabilization built into the body of the Olympus, all lenses are automatically image stabilized.  So, likely I could have taken this shot at a slower speed (such as 1/125th at ISO400) because the swallowtail seems to be motionless; but I usually shoot butterflies by setting the shutter and aperature manually at 1/250th and F8.  This freezes subject movement and gives very good depth of field.  To ensure a reasonable exposure, I then set ISO to automatic.

Swallowtail

This Great Blue Heron photo was taken in a pond near my place of work.  Though I have seen herons there for years, this was the first time I was even aware that there were fish in this shallow pond.  Same 70-300mm zoom as above, but at full zoom-in of 300mm (600mm effective field of view).  Shutter priority at  1/250th second was enough to freeze action and didn't strain the effectiveness of the camera image stabilization system.  ISO was 800 and aperature was F6.7.  I like how sharp his eye is.

Heron with Prey

Taken on the coast of Maine, on Penobscott Bay.  I liked the warm diffused light of this 7pm shot.

Classic Lobsterboat

Adding a lens adapter to a point and shoot camera - Canon G9

From time to time I have enjoyed playing around with filters on point and shoot cameras. Typically this can only be done on the higher end models, such as the Canon G series and Panasonic LX series. Also, some of the all-in-one superzooms, such as the Panasonic FZ8 also allow for the use of filters. To get the job done, a special tube attachment called a lens adapter is usually required, and the camera must have threads at the base of the lens unit, designed to accommodate such an attachment.

With dSLR lenses, it is pretty simple to add a filter to a lens. That is because interchangeable lenses nearly always have threads on the outer end. For example, a typical kit zoom lens might take a 58mm diameter filter. Filters of similar size can then be screwed into the lens threads. If you only have, say, 62mm diameter filters, these too can fit, by adding a "step up" ring (sized at "58-to-62"). These thin metal rings can be purchased from all the online vendors or from ebay, often for under $5, and are placed between the lens and the filter.  In this case, one side of the ring has 58mm threads to screw into the end of the lens, and the other side is tapped to receive the 62mm threads of the filter.

Reverse-mount rings can also be used. These allow a photographer to reverse a second lens and attach it to the end of the camera lens, in nose-to-nose fashion.  Sometimes two lenses are better than one! For example, using the same 58mm diameter dSLR kit lens mentioned above I can reverse mount an old 50mm f1.4 Nikon lens that has 52mm threads by using a "58-52" reverse mount ring. With a reverse mount ring, both sides have threads. The resulting setup can result in extraordinary macro capabilities.

This all works easily on dSLRs; but compact cameras present problems. Usually the lens retracts inside the body and a protective cover automatically slips over the lens. Using a filter would interfere with this action. And most of the time the lens has no filter threads.

To solve these problems, some of the higher end compact cameras are designed to use a special tube attachment, called a lens adapter. These are designed to be as small as possible but large enough so the zoom lens can operate within the area provided by the tube. The filter or supplemental lens is then threaded onto the end of the tube where it remains stationary while the zoom moves in and out.

In addition to using filters, supplemental lenses are available, which when added can provide one of the following: wider angle of view, a more zoomed in field of view, or better macro capability. For me, the most common use of the lens adapter is for a Canon 500D closeup lens. Though it looks like a filter, it is in fact an acromatic lens about the thickness of two filters and made with two pieces of high quality glass fused together and designed to minimize distortion. The Canon 500D lens can be used on any camera, and it comes in several diameters.

The 500D closeup lens is designed to provide focus at 20 inches (i.e. 500mm distance). Once your subject is in focus, you can frame the image by zooming in or out; however, the focusing distance will remain at 20".

Below are examples using a Canon G9 camera with a Lensmate 58mm adapter:

G9 with lens extended after powering up, without lens adapter

G9 with lens adapter attached. This one is made by lensmateonline.com. It is a high quality aluminum fitting.

G9 with lens adapter and D500 Canon closeup lens. No step up ring was required because both fittings are 58mm.

This gives you an idea of the closeup capability, with lens fully zoomed at 210mm focal length. Working distance was measured at a comfortable-to-work-at 20 inches. At this distance and zoom length, you can focus on a subject as small as 3.5". This is perfect for butterflies, dragonflies and flowers.

Amazingly, I found if the G9 is switched to macro mode with the D500, it will focus at any distance between 10" and 20", making this a very versatile set up. I always use autofocus. At 10" you can capture a 2" wide subject, which is nearly equivalent to a 1:1 macro.

G9 and Nikon 50mm standard lens can be reverse mounted for macros.  I am holding a reverse-mount ring, threaded with 58mm and 52mm diameter threads.

G9 with Nikon 50mm lens reverse mounted.

With this reverse mounted setup, I can fill the frame with a subject that is 3/8" wide! But note that depth of field is minimal. I focused on the center of the image, right on the "dot" that the "2" starts with. Everything closer and further away is blurred due to the shallow depth of field.  This in unavoidable at such magnification.

Club print "salon" entries for December

I was pleased with how these two images came out.  The color entry was an after-thought.  I was reviewing my images from a 2009 trip to Colorado, and found myself attracted to this picture of autumn aspen trees. After making a vertical crop from the original horizontal image I decided it would make a nice print.  I liked the simple composition and of course the colors.  There is a bit of drama in the sky and just a patch of blue, all of which helped make a fairly even exposure. What I find interesting is that when, a few minutes ago, I went to my Web site to see my 50 favorites from this trip, this image wasn't even included!  This is why I think it is smart not to initially discard too many images. (I am going to add this image to the 50 favorites right after I finish this post!)



The black and white was taken on the same day as the color image.  This was along a gravel road to Crested Butte, Colorado.  I take all my images in color and do the conversion to black and white in photoshop.  It is difficult to know which images will look good in black and white.  I usually experiment with a dozen or so images before I find one that looks reasonable in black and white.  Here I only wish that the solid blue sky was behind the aspens on the right to provide greater contrast against the light bark of the aspens.  Nevetheless, the whispy clouds add to the image in my opinion.... I just wish the clouds were on the left instead.



Club digital "salon" entries for December

These are my digital entries for my photo club's December digital salon. 

The elk was an early morning shot in Rocky Mountain National Park.  The lighting isn't particularly great, but I did get this bull to look up from his munching.  It was past sunrise when I took the picture, but because this meadow was in a valley surrounded by mountains, the sun had not yet risen high enough to flood the valley with light.

The seagull shot is along the coast of Maine.  It's not the most noble of birds, but I like the exposure here and the piercing yellow eye staring at me.  The salt covered chains bring a little of the environment into the image.



The butterfly was taken in a nearby butterfly house. I don't really like the deep shadows under the wings, but I do like the angle I had of the butterfly resting symmetrically on the single green leaf.



A few fall pictures

I have looked though my fall images and find I really didn't do a lot this year.  The first two were taken while fishing in mid-October.  The other four were taken along the road while traveling to and from work or to visit family or friends. 



My Bald Eagle and Adobe Lightroom 3.0

I wish I could say I traveled to an exotic location, hiked over difficult terrain and scaled a steep cliff to obtain this shot. But actually it was taken at the Roger Williams Zoo in Providence, Rhode Island. This was one of two eagles that I doubt could fly because they were in an open area with a low perimeter fence. In fact, being without a tripod, I rested my right elbow on the top of one of the fence posts while taking the picture.

Below are shots before and after processing the RAW file on my computer.  I use primarily Adobe Lightroom 3.0 for cataloging and processing my photos. As you can tell I was very close, as the original image is shown without cropping. I shot with a zoom set at a 550mm effective field of view (275mm on a 2x crop Olympus body is equivalent to 550mm field of view on a 35mm camera). I used the built-in flash which created a little catch light in the eagle's eye, which I like. (The catch light is perhaps only slightly visible on these small-size images.)

The first step in post processing for me is cropping. Then, in Lightroom I added 1/3 stop of exposure to brighten things up a bit, as I felt overall the shot was a bit underexposed. I then pushed the recovery slider to 30 because the feathers on the back of the head were slightly overexposed. The recovery slider helped to bring back some detail in these back-of-the-head feathers.

The fill-light slider was used to brighten up the face which was underexposed due the fact that the eagle was backlit. Had I been closer, the fill-in flash might have accomplished the same thing, and probably a bit better.

Final touches include adding clarity with a slider that I almost always use at 25 to 50. This adds contrast (and an appearance of sharpness) to the midtones. I also used the vibrance slider to add some saturation to undersaturated colors. This helped bring some of the yellow out in the beak and eye. The difference between the saturation slider and the vibrance slider is that moving the saturation slider effects all colors at once. Moving the vibrance slider effects only the less saturated colors. Though there is a difference, it is worth playing with both, but usually I don't touch the saturation slider.

This image took more post-processing than I am used to doing. But I am very happy with the final result.