Posts from the ‘Nikon 105 AFS VR Micro’ Category
A bit of departure a from the norm here at LightAsMagic.com, however I thought someone out there might benefit from it. Over the weekend, I noticed our bleeding hearts were in bloom and I wanted to make a ‘thank you’ print for the friend who gave them to us. I grabbed my 105mm Micro VR and snapped a quick image, then another, and another, and another. As I have mentioned in a previous post, I began to ‘work the composition’. Just short of the kitchen sink, I threw everything at it. Why not, film is cheap these days! I selected these 3 images as an example of my approaches.
The first image was the metered exposure, the one the camera told me was the right one. It is the one I will probably print and give to my friend. I think she will like it. After the light began to shift, and a slight shadow was cast on the bleeding hearts, I noticed that the most pronounced heart was highlighted by a single ray of sun. I quickly changed my camera’s light meter to ’spot meter mode’ and dropped the exposure compensation by a full stop. My intent was to exaggerate the light’s idea. It worked, and I made an image my wife really likes. Finally, my vision became less focused on details and more on colors and shapes. I grabbed the focus ring, manually focused in front of the flowers, and achieved the final image. You can probably guess, it is my favorite, which is usually the case. I rarely like the first image I make.
The Metered 'Thank You' Print Exposure.
The Spot Metered (-.7 EV) Exposure. My wife's favorite.
Colors and Shapes Exposure. My favorite.
A warm day today, in a rather long and disheartening winter. It might be too early to get excited, but I can’t help it. This winter has been tough on the people who love long days and flip flops. Apparently we set a record.
This image is one from last spring. It is a single exposure HDR. Normally I have great results, however because I was shooting at 800 ISO the processing introduced some noise. You can see it if you look close. Hopefully soon I will have the chance to make another image like this one. Bulb season isn’t too far off!
Recently, I published the toolset within my darkroom. I also published a list of tunes I listen to while I am clicking, sliding, dragging and dropping my way to victory. I had so much fun making that playlist, I have decided to publish one every month. So, without further ado (sp?)……here is the myTunes playlist for the month of March! Just click the link below.
(Note: You will need iTunes installed on your machine to access it.)
March 2010 LightAsMagic.com myTunes Dark Room Victory Songs
Capture Notes:
Nikon D300
Nikkor 105 2.8 AFS VR Micro
Exposure: 0.001 sec (1/1000)
Aperture: f/3.5
Focal Length: 105 mm
ISO Speed: 800
Processing Notes:
Capture (1 Image)
Photomatix (pseudo hdr)
PS (color corrected)
NIk ColorFX Pro (selective tonal contrast on main flower)
Nik Define 2.0 (brushed noise reduction on fence)
LightAsMagic.com
Spring, originally uploaded by LightAsMagic.
Here in Colorado I am looking out my door at the 2ft of snow that has accumulated over the last 24 hours.
Is it too early to be thinking about spring?
Camera: D300
Lens: Nikon 105 VR
Tip: When shooting macro images it is best to use a tripod. Because you are getting so close the depth of field becomes very shallow. To compensate for this you will really want to stop down your lens (i.e. larger aperture number ex f22) so that you will be able to get more of the image in focus. When you stop the lens down, you reduce the amount of light entering the camera, which in turn requires you to use a lower shutter speed to get the appropriate exposure. With a slow shutter speed and being really close to your subject it is a good idea to stabilize your camera. I’m not saying you can’t do it without a tripod, but it does help. Good luck with your close encounters of the macro kind!
Lady Buy Portrait Studio, originally uploaded by LightAsMagic.
This summer we had an aphid problem. Our aspen trees were covered with the little buggers. As a rule, my wife and I despise the use of chemicals or pesticides so we began to look for natural solutions. I’m not sure where we learned it, but we were told ladybugs are aphid’s natural predator. In addition to that, we discovered you could buy ladybugs at the local flower shop. We ended up buying 4000 ladybugs and declaring war on the aphid population. It was actually a success. A trick to this technique is to refrigerate the ladybugs for about 15min prior to their deployment. This lowers their metabolic rate and decreases their ambition making it less likely they will flee your garden. Anyways, with 4000 ladybugs a photographer has quite a few subjects to pose in the garden portrait studio.
This image was shot with the amazing Nikon AFS 105vr Macro.
