Photography

Out with the Nikon 24-120 F4 lens

Yesterday I dropped into the PhotoExpert shop in Delta and asked if they’d seen the new Nikon 24-120 F4 lens yet. Dave checked in the back and suggested he had one just for me 😉 Needless to say I bought it.

Despite the forecast of rain all weekend, it turned out pretty nice. A few very storm-like clouds kept threatening, but for the most part, they stayed away. The same thing happened on Sunday, so over the weekend, I had a few hours to try out the new toy.

I flitted between Surrey City Hall for colour, and Serpentine Fen and Delta to see what was going on. I wasn’t out early on Saturday or Sunday, so most of the wildlife was out feeding somewhere, but the colour at City hall was just fine.

I bought the lens to use at events, so I wasn’t trying it out under the circumstances I’ll use it most. Still, I’m pretty happy with what it’s done so far with landscapes. We’ll see next week how it works at a couple of next week’s events at work.

The new toy: a Nikon 28-300 lens

A couple of weeks ago, I tracked down the new Nikon 28-300 3.5-5.6G lens. When I was using my D300 more, I really relied on that range with the 18-200 lens for DX cameras. Since getting my D700 and D3S, I’ve missed it terribly when photographing events. The range is just so useful when you don’t really have time for frequent lens changes.

Anyway, the day after I got the lens, the weather cleared, and I headed out to see just what it could do at Bear Creek Park and Serpentine Fen in Surrey.

I was quite impressed. Sure, I have some work to do with my handling technique, but when it comes together with the 28-300, it seems this lens can shine. The photo of the duck in a pond was taken from a bridge. I was amazed how sharp it was.

This weekend, a colleague and I headed out early to see what we could find in terms of colorful shots. No dice for the first few hours, as fog was everywhere. On the bright side, that gave me a chance to try shooting in the fog, something I haven’t done much of before. The photo here is probably my favourite of the day.

I still have some work to do on my technique with the lens and with shooting in the fog, but I did like the mood of some of the keepers from that shoot. I also learned a bit more about the north side of the Fraser. There are some interesting spots for photos up around Pitt Meadows and Ruskin. I’ll have to go back and explore some more.

More photos from the photowalks on Flickr

Can a beach be boring?

In the summer, Mud Bay Park in Surrey is pretty much a ‘plain Jane’ kind of park.. It’s flat and open, has one man made path, and follows a rocky, muddy shoreline on one side, with a marshy, migratory bird habitat area on the other. The standout feature is probably the old Burlington Northern train trestle at the east end, linking the north side of the bay with the south, near Crescent Beach. A few trains a day keeps things interesting.

I went there to take some photographs anyway. I knew there had to be something that keeps me going back, so I slowed down and spent some time exploring.

When something caught my eye, even for a second or two, I tried to figure out what it was and how I could turn it into an interesting photo (at least interesting to me). In processing, I tried what I learned in Vision and Voice (see my last post) to show what I saw or felt as I took each photograph. It’s harder than it looks, and I’ve got lots to learn, but it was fun.

With this photo of berries and flowers, I was walking along an open path, looking at the vegetation that had overgrown an old fence. At one angle, even under the plant’s canopy, the bright colours stood out against all the dead, brown grass everywhere else. What attracted me was the variety of life out there that’s hidden, unnoticed until someone slows down to take a look.

Actually, when I noticed them, I was just about to put the camera away, while I headed back to the car. If I’d done that, I would have stopped looking and missed the shot. Note to self: you won’t get the shot if your camera is in your bag while you’re rushing off to the next great location 😉

If I continue working on the image, I’ll probably darken the background a bit, brighten up the berries and flowers, and increase their vibrancy a little. That might draw the eye to the colours more. But for now, I’m happy with it.

There are more shots from the day on Flicker.

Summer reading

I finished reading Vision and Voice by David duChemin today. The bottom line? Recommended.

He starts off defining the difference between how you saw/felt the image you took and what it says to the viewer when it's done for display. He does that well.

Once he gets that message across, he proceeds to show you what he means, and that's where the book really shines.

Using tools like focus, light, shadow, color and sharpness, he shows you how he crafts an image in Lightroom that leads the viewer to see what he saw and feel what he felt when he took the image. In the process, he describes, in a non-technical way, what all the sliders and buttons in the Lightroom develop module do. He focuses on the why, rather than the how, and I liked that for a change. There are lots of technical books that describe the how. They're useful; this is just a refreshing difference.

His examples are clear and to the point. He's not dogmatic about how to do it, he's just showing how he did it and why. Nice. He also has copies of the images he uses that you can download and follow along to see what's going on.

All in all, I really enjoyed the book. I was reading in Kindle on the couch with my iPad, but I frequently had to get up and run to Lightroom on my desktop computer to test the various ideas he was describing. I learned lots, and spent a couple of hours later in the afternoon, trying some ideas on my own images.

I've read duChemin's other books, VisionMongers and Within the Frame, and most of the ebooks he has available through his latest endeavour with Craft and Vision. I've not been disappointed, period.

My recommendation? Go get 'em.

Playing with the new toys.

So let’s see how blogging goes from the iPad with a bluetooth keyboard…

I finally got out today and took some personal time with my D3S. I’m pushing 1800 photos with it over the last 2 months, but very few are personal. Most are for events at work. It was nice to get out again.

Walking along the shoreline at Crescent Beach, I came across this carrot mixed in with the seaweed. Seemed like a strange place for a carrot, but perhaps not. About 30 yards away there was another one just like it. By then, I figured I had potential for a salad, of sorts 😉

Anyway, the carrots were probably just remnants from the beach folks the day before, washed up with the tide.

I’ll be interested to see how the photo comes across on typepad. I’m using Blogpress for now, just to see how much I can do. So far the keyboard is working out quite well. I’ve tried to scale the photo down a bit and aligned it left on the page. We’ll see.

More tk

Oops – was I supposed to check the ISO?

I decided to see how the eagles were doing out around Boundary Bay. Close to the airport there’s a turf company that seems to attract seagulls and eagles, so I grabbed my Sigma 120-400 and my D300 and went to see what I could find.

There wasn’t as many eagles as I’d hoped, but there were a few in the treetops and others flying around with the seagulls. I grabbed some shots as I walked around and tried some panning as well, hoping to catch a clear shot of the birds in flight.

The photos looked great on the camera screen. They always do. But when I got home, they had a funny look to them. Soft, almost blurry. Hmmm. What’s up?

I’d loaned my D300 to a colleague, while his was in for sensor cleaning. Could he have changed some settings? Was it the lens?

Delving deeper, I started going through the pictures some more. Noise. Serious noise present in every one. Back to the camera, and sure enough, I’d forgotten to check the ISO setting. I’d checked the shutter and aperture and did some testing for exposure, but you don’t need and ISO of 3200 on a sunny day. Sigh.

Anyway, what to do. I dove into Lightroom to try a few things, and while I was there, I remembered I had Nik’s Define 2.0 plugin. Ran a couple of pictures through that and it cleaned them up to an amazing extent. Added a bit of Nik’s Sharpener 2, popped them back into Lightroom, and I’ve got a few usable pics. Not great, but usable.

Lesson learned: Reset things to a common denominator right after a shoot (or after lending out your camera). That way you’ll get fewer unwanted surprises and most likely, better photos.

Photography

Inspiration is coming back

For the last few months, it’s been a struggle to get out with the camera. Not sure why. I had no problem taking pics at events for work, but other than that…nada.

Anyway, I got out yesterday and had some fun.

After scouting out the eagles near the Boundary Bay Airport in Delta, I headed off to Bear Creek Park in Surrey.

While I was walking through a particularly barren part of the gardens, this flower stood out like a sore thumb. Dead brown all around, with a splash of red in one corner.

Hurray, the world is coming back to life for another year.

Shot the eagle out of the car window with a Sigma 120-400 lens on my D700. For a change of pace, I used a Nikon 60 Micro in Bear Creek Park.

Fishing in the Serpentine Fen

On Sunday, I took a couple of hours for a walk around the Serpentine Fen in Surrey. The Fen is a bird sanctuary in one of the busiest migration routes on the west coast. Depending on the time of year, you’ll find various species of ducks, geese, and other water fowl, along with bald eagles searching for food.

I was out with my Nikon 70-300 lens and caught this little fellow just after he caught a fish. Between him swimming and thrashing the fish about, and my excitement about catching him in the act, the pictures are not as sharp as I’d like. You know, hand-held, full tele, etc.

Anyway, I took a series of photos over the several minutes it took him to devour the fish. It was an interesting process, I must say. The pics are posted on Flickr. They are really cropped from the original. Even with a 300mm lens, I couldn’t get close enough to get a tight shot of this little fella.

Shows ta go ya, you never have just the right equipment, so you need to do what you can with what you’ve got. I mean, I could have just walked by with a sigh, but instead I salvaged a series of (I think) interesting shots.

How did you get started in photography?

Being one of two staff photographers at my day job has re-kindled my love of photography.

No, I haven’t always been interested in photography. I was in my twenties before I picked up a Kodak Instamatic. Taking pictures with that was pretty basic and not very satisfying. After exploring the craft and reading a few photo mags, I quickly moved up to a Pentax Spotmatic and a Seagull Twin Lens Reflex. I loved that Pentax for a couple of years, until my ex dropped it in the salt chuck one day. Photography was never the same.

About the time my camera went swimming, manufacturers were introducing electronic aperture and shutter controls. I tried a Konica and then an Olympus, but to me, they never really lived up to the hype. The Olympus, for instance, ran through batteries faster than I could charge them. I found out (much later) that there was a fault in the circuit board. Of course by that time I’d given up, because you couldn’t find a new camera without all the electronics. Oh my, how things have changed 😉

In the 90’s, I tried a Kodac digital and then a Nikon Coolpix 990. They were fun for a short while, but the resolution was lacking and I needed more control. The cost of a prosumer DSLR was too much for me, and I found film boring, so that was about it for another 10 years.

In 2006, I started working with the local Board of Trade. The gig was supposed to be a few hours a week on contract, but soon grew to a full time affair. Part of the job was to take photographs at over 80 events a year with a little Fuji S-something. Out of frustration a few months later, I bought a spanking new Nikon D80 and a bunch of gear. That led to a D300 and now a D700 and lots more gear (sigh).

So that’s my story. I’m currently focused on event and nature photos, and I’m learning more about vision and light.

What’s your story?

Matching photo equipment with style – 2

A few posts ago, I wrote about yearning for a lens that would let me get closer to small things. When walking around, I tend to look for small things to take pictures of – drops on flowers, bugs, colourful leaves, etc. While ‘landscapes’ are great, often less is more, and looking at the detail around you can open up your eyes to some wondrous things.

Well, on Sunday, I gave into the lust and purchased the new Nikon 60mm AF-S G micro Nikkor lens. It’s a fast lens, rated at f2.8, although that increases an f-stop or so when taking close ups.

And close it gets; it will focus down to 18.5cm or less (according to reports) and provides a 1:1 reproduction of what you’re seeing. I have the 105mm micro as well, but this lens is lighter and wider, giving a completely different look.

I tested it out with a few photos you can see in my Flickr stream.

So far, I’m really impressed. The pictures are all taken handheld on a breezy afternoon. It leaves me wondering what I can do with a tripod on a calm day. Sure, I’m going to have to learn how to deal with the depth of field for closeups, but it will be fun to play with. That’s why I like photography – there is always something new to learn.

It’s also quite good as a close to ‘normal’ lens. Just a little bit longer than the 50mm, which is considered normal on FX digital and film cameras, it gives just a touch of reach that the 50 doesn’t. Of course it also gets much closer than either the 50mm or 85mm, and lets you fill the frame with tiny subjects whenever you want.

Based on first impressions, this lens is a keeper. It’s a bright, sharp, versatile, prime lens and a lot cheaper than some of it’s Nikon cousins. I might have to walk, rather than zoom, but hey, I need the exercise anyway 😉