In praise of tripods

I wanted to take a picture of a test fixture at work (I have use for the picture), so I brought in my G10, with kit lens, and my Manfrotto 190XPROB tripod - which can have the center column horizontal, so the camera can shoot straight down.  Shot raw, and got this:

CBB - without SMP terminators

I hope it is possible to view this image larger than I see it above, I think the clarity is excellent and could not have been achieved hand held, even with OIS. This was shot at f/9 to try and get depth of field without getting to too small an f stop, required 0.5 seconds at ISO 100.  You can read all the little white silk screened lettering.  The closely spaced pairs of traces are clear.  The pins inside the SMP connectors are even clear.

I held an 8.5x11" sheet of white paper up to reflect some light from a window toward the board, it makes the highlight on the left of the connectors.

I  even like the 3d effect - it's obvious the green cables are coming up off the board.

Interesting: I notice in "Product tags" that I can tag a camera, but there are no tags for tripods!   Some of my best shots happen when I use a tripod.  Sometimes it's just because it really makes me slow down and think about the shot.

I'll stop here.

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