***10/20/2018-10/27/2018 Weekly Show, Tell, and Critique***

I understand your devastation over Sarika's death, David. Been through that too many times, but the loss of a family member never gets easier - it may even get harder. I dread that Chase has gotten so old. Having another one (or two) at home helps. Puppy breath helps the most. While nothing will ever replace Sarika, or any of our beloved dogs who have passed, because they are each unique, a puppy keeps you busy and thinking about positive things as he/she worms his/her way into your soul.

Besides, the passing of one allows us to open our hearts and homes to another. For example, if my very special Maggie had not died, I would have never known very special Joy.

Nice you are trying a male. I've had males and females and found that the differences between individual dogs are greater than the differences between gender. Each can make a loving pet and a hard-hitting bird dog. My next pup will likely be a male, as well. Even though my next pup may outlive me, my older daughter is a dog freak and knows I can't live without a couple Brittanys in my life, so she has volunteered to take in any dogs I have when I pass. They won't hunt, but they will be loved and well-cared for house pets. Otherwise, I'd be reluctant to get a new pup at my age.

I look forward to watching Erik grow on these pages.

Greg

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Check out my photos at: https://www.flickr.com/gp/137747053@N07/4M38jj

Good suggestion - it was just a snapshot that Nancy took when I wasn't really paying attention.

We did. Thanks, Courtney!

At working this morning, but we'll all be out chasing birds this afternoon.

From Madagascar




From Madagascar




Rainbow Fluorite from China



--
Bill
"Life's Too Short to Worry about the BS!"
So I Choose my Battles
Click for Wild Man's Photos
Using Rx10 IV at Present

Truly a rainbow of colors! The violet ones are really unusual.

Nick

Aquaroid said:

Truly a rainbow of colors! The violet ones are really unusual.

Nick

Click to expand...

I like the last batch (from China I think). Did you notice I sent full size especially for you, Nick?

Evenstar606 said:

That’s impressive! I like the end result, and there’s still detail to it. Lunchtime for Spidey.

Click to expand...

Actually, looking through some taken pictures recently, I remembered that this was a hectic don't-miss-the-moment-completely shot which

a) explains the lack of focus

b) makes this more like after-lunchtime contemplation for Spidey.

At actual lunchtime, I asked a visitor what kind of thread the objective on her rather bulky DSLR had. 58mm. So I asked whether I could borrow it (as it fit my VCL-M3358). Now mind you, this does not really belong in a Sony forum and I did not manage to get along with the controls of that camera so I produced a lot of junk in a few minutes and spent significant time deleting most of it to cover my tracks. Here is one of the better ones:




Same spider shortly before with a fat DSLR and too narrow DoF

Nice color and detail but it's obvious that I did not manage to coerce the camera to settings where I'd have something approaching reasonable depth of field. Aperture far too open regarding such a large sensor. So much disappearing into the haze, so few parts actually in focus.

As one example of this poor spider photographed without similar timing restraints (while she still could not decide whether to leave the fly for good this time), here is a slightly older one that does not need sharpening in post-production but suffers from a lack of lunch:


All is calm, all is bright

So the Sony closeup lens (making this fit for the Sony subforum) works on other cams as well. I suspect that if I had spent time figuring out the camera of our visitor I could have gotten a better result regarding DoF, color play and saturation. It does show potential, but it also shows that the much more modest DSC-H1 can be pressured into at least reasonable results with that kind of add-on.

Thank you, Bill, I did! It was fun to look closely at all the tiny structures.

Keep the stones coming.

I'd like to see the end result - the display - when it is completed.

Nick

Aquaroid said:

Thank you, Bill, I did! It was fun to look closely at all the tiny structures.

Keep the stones coming.

I'd like to see the end result - the display - when it is completed.

Nick

Click to expand...

Will Do

16 GB USB 3.0



--
Bill
"Life's Too Short to Worry about the BS!"
So I Choose my Battles
Click for Wild Man's Photos
Using Rx10 IV at Present

Bill Borne said:

From Madagascar


From Madagascar


Rainbow Fluorite from China

Click to expand...

I love the purple! The rainbow Flourite is awesome.

--
Courtney

He was sitting still ... waiting. I had to take a pic. ;-)



Nick

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Evenstar606 said:

Jack R. Grouell said:

Click to expand...

That’s incredible handiwork! Is there frost on the webs or is that how they are?

Click to expand...

Blow the images up; you'll see that the white stuff is water beads condensed as dew onto the threads of the web. We see this pretty much any damp cold morning and think of it as a striking effect, but the physics and micro-chemistry of this effect is a glory to even contemplate. The proteins from which web is spun, a silk-like material, and the surface coating that makes the threads very slightly sticky are mildly attractive to water and cause it to stick - in effect the thread is slightly wetted. But, as the dew continues to deposit, and the amount of water grows, a point is reached at which the surface tension of the water defeats the wetting chemistry and the water suddenly forms pierced beads with the web filament in the centre, like pearls drilled through and strung on a silken thread.

To quote the Perishers [a beloved cartoon strip of days gone by, broadly the equivalent of Peanuts]: And they say there's no great eternal plan!

To add another little bit of useful information - spiders are not physically large enough to generate new webs from their own body mass and depend on eating their old web to make up the shortfall. If you take away the old webs the spider will die. This process begins when the spider is newly hatched and can only generate a tiny web, but just sufficient for its very limited nutritional needs. Eating the old web each time, and growing from the intake of food, the spider's daily food needs gradually outstrip its ability to generate a big enough web and the old web protein becomes completely essential to its daily survival.

And finally: an old friend of mine is professor of Ecology at a university in the Caribbean, and his research speciality is spiders, on which he is one of the world's leading experts. He told me of an expedition in central America when he came across a bridge over a 50 feet high ravine with a fast-flowing river in the bottom. The bridge had two support struts attached near the centre and bedded into the rock of the sides of the ravine. The construction effectively generated three triangular apertures, each perhaps 50 by 20 feet and each space was completely filled with a single spider's web. This type of spider is the size of a dinner plate and they catch and eat birds!!!!!!!

--
Ed Form

Dak on cam said:

I recently got a Sony VCL-M3358 (which basically appears to be a +3 dioptre lens but implemented using 2 elements in one group). We have a smallish araneus spider that has happened to build a web before a crack in the living room window pane.

This is basically what the camera (DSC-H1) says on its own from the vantage point I've taken the subsequent photograph from, zoomed in as much as the camera will allow without losing focus:


Without close-up lens

This already uses some not-so-accurate white balance setting since the (reflected) window stoles are actually white. Now with the macro lens attached, I can zoom in a whole lot more since ∞ in the camera lens' perspective maps to 33cm in reality. So (same setting, different scene) I get


Spider with VCL-M3358 lens

The crack in the glass has left the depth of field significantly and makes for some perspective effect. The windows stoles have essentially dissolved, possibly also because of using a flash, reducing their contribution to the overall lighting. The narrow depth of field warrants a smallish aperture.

In postprocessing I realized that it might be fun to turn the crack into some kind of horizon. The framing/orientation does not leave a whole lot of leeway, but one can make do with rotation and cropping just as much as necessary.


Rotated and cropped

I call this "Don't pay the ferryman" since it may be considered sort-of like a water surface.

In summary, the main challenge with the close-up lens so far has been focus: getting the most out of a rather narrow depth of field.

But then that's probably not exactly news to most of you...

Click to expand...

A new member - Welcome Dak and congratulations on such excellent images - and for the lesson in the capabilities of this close-up lens.

--
Ed Form

10 inches.These shots were taken near where I used to live.


Slight motion blur (I was walking when I took this one)


This shot of the village church gives a good idea of just how deep the snow was


I took some snow off this tree and popped it in my mouth for a drink!


Tree on the right is same as #3.

The last time I had seen this much snow was in January 2013 - nearly 5 years earlier!

--
If you want to know what camera was used,check the EXIF.
My YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsn3wEMMaEO9fl7FDlA-V7g

Fresh snow is beautiful. I like shots like that.

Nick

Aquaroid said:

He was sitting still ... waiting. I had to take a pic. ;-)



Nick

Click to expand...

A selfie !!!

Way to sneak it in Nick.

Yes! ;-) Thanks for noticing.

Nick

Thank you so much for sharing that information! It was natural dew on those webs - not from a spray bottle. I also wondered why all the webs had disappeared by the next morning - now I know. I had an ear worm of Glenn Miller's "String of Pearls" after taking the pictures!

Thanks, Courtney. Glad you enjoyed them