Post your PHOTOS! - January and February 2023

Sekob wrote:

Dr Hal wrote:

Very nicely done. I especially like the third one.

Hal

Thanks

Larry Rexley wrote:

Thanks for posting those. I particularly like the third one as well.

Nice that you posted the full resolution shots, they show off how sharp this lens is. Especially being an ultra-wide, it does extremely well. Objects at this focal length can be so small that the sharpness really matters.

Most consumer-grade lenses are very slightly decentered if you pixel peep extremely close. My copy of the Laowa has a softer right side than left. Your copy is quite good, it's hard to tell but the extreme left side might be slightly less sharp than the right.

I found with this lens that the center is not always the same focus as the corners, that is to say it has some slight field curvature. Sometimes I'll shoot the same scene and alter the focus slightly, or I will examine the focus at 10x magnification and move the focus box around the frame to get the optimal focus point.

Over time, I've gotten to know where to set the focus on the manual scale for the aperture and type of shot I'm doing. This is one of the advantages of a manual focus wide lens for landscapes --- once you get to know the lens, you can pre-set the focus very quickly and not worry about the focus any more!

I noticed that my copy has a slightly softer left side. But in general, this is not critical and does not prevent us from achieving acceptable images. I watched reviews on YouTube on this lens, this problem often occurs.

I also use at 10x magnification. The electronic horizon also helps a lot, so as not to correct the perspective. But a lot of course depends on the plot and composition.

I've seen your pictures of trains. Impressive work!

Thanks.

I've also noticed, as mentioned in the reviews for this lens, as with many lenses, the resolution is lower in the corners. Since I process using DxO PL6, there is an unsharp masking option called 'Edge Offset' that lets you progressively increase sharpness towards the corners - it works great with images from this lens, producing images of apparent uniform sharpness from the center to the corners. Usually a setting of about 100 - 200, depending on the aperture and image, works well, on top of whatever normal unsharp masking I use for the lens.

My lens is a lot worse on the right side --- when it's noticeable, I also create a control line or gradient mask just for the less sharp area --- and one of the mask settings you can use to to increase the sharpness, which helps a lot.

Digirame wrote:

I was in downtown Portland, Oregon last night. I was having fun taking pictures in these dark conditions. Here's one of them.

Nice shot. I once was in Oregon almost 30 years ago, when DSLMs and the M were still very far away........

EOS M6

With dear 15-45. Its magnification ratio is near 1:5. This was 40% cropped. Not too bad when there is no other choices. There is several cheap ways to do macro and this one is the cheapest

Another cheap way for experiencing macro is playing with tubes. This was shot with stacked tubes (50mm) and an M42 37/2.8 lens (Mir 1B). Min Focusing Distance was 6.5cm and Max FD 6.6cm! Smallest subject that could fill the frame was 16mm and M6 sensor's width is 22.2mm. So magnification ratio is 22.2/16 or 1.4:1 (higher than life size). This is the highest ratio achievable with my toys.
Was shot to show concavity of the dangerous button. Very bad perspective and DoF, and not suitable for almost any application.

For this one, I replaced the 37mm lens with a 135mm one (Jupiter 37a). With this lens, Min FD was 63cm and Max FD 70cm and the magnification ratio 22.2/41 or 1:1.8.
The woodie is 40mm tall to the roof. Compressed perspective and decent DoF are beautiful and natural.
Great way for experiencing an expensive long macro lens. Maybe even it can do the job of great 100L/2.8 (only for these types of subjects)? MR is half but with better clearance (63cm vs 30cm), a little cheaper (900$ vs 'next to nothing'). I think sharpness doesn't matter so much in such applications, even trash lenses are sharp enough in the center and at very closed apertures. However this 135mm is a respectable piece of glass and thick metal, it is better in the corners wide open than my 55-200. Rendering and color? Dunno, I cannot recognize such things.

It is this ridiculous thing. I didn't put it on tripod. Heavy weight of the tank Russian lens and long length of this train have a high torque on lens and tripod mounts. It was mounted where my empty head is mounted, pillow, rather adjustable.
Shot with Nikon A900 at 77mm eq., 0.1s (handheld and not sharp).

(ps. A superzoom camera has been in my wish list for some years. I bought a mint Fuji X-S1 last month (100$). But the bulk and 1kg weight were terrible. First photo is its back and was shot for listing it for sale. Was sold a couple of weeks ago and I bought a mint Nikon A900 (100$). Both from local sellers in our city. I like it sooo much. If you don't peep pixels and your goal is small screens (especially phone screens of ordinary people out of DPR forums ) and of course use it only at days, it is really anamazing tool. A whole beautiful camera smaller than a phone with a 24-800 macro lens.)

There a saying “just because you can doesn’t mean you should”, but in your lens experiments I say you should go for it, why stick to expensive canon glass when some combinations do work

good luck with your new toys

Got a neat shot of a 45-year-old, rare EMD MP-15AC switcher engine at Yeoman Yard in Tampa with the EF-S 55-250 IS STM.

M6ii, EF-S 55-250 IS STM, 250mm

Also got clean 4k video of the MP-15 and many other trains with the M6ii and a Zhiyun Crane M3 gimbal & Sennheiser MKE-200 microphone.

Day shots were with the EF-M 18-55mm IS STM (sharp enough for great 4k video) and night shots with the superb EF-M 32mm f1.4:

https://youtu.be/noQ2oHciFwA

nelsona wrote:

Spend a couple hours at the local rail fanning spot. Nothing special composition wise but it was a nice day to spend some time outside.

Nice shots, quite a lot of train activity!

That EF-M 18-150mm lens is a great all-in-one daytime railfanning lens, I use mine a lot. Generally I use mine at f5 or higher aperture, corners are a little soft at the wide end wide open for my copy.

Stunning! Bookmarked them for when I am in need of watching something beautiful. Thank you for posting them Larry.

jim mij wrote:

There a saying “just because you can doesn’t mean you should”, but in your lens experiments I say you should go for it,

Certainly! Photography is just my hobby. And its goal is to enjoy. With this thing I can shoot backyard foliage and house furniture! Currently I don't know how to justify spending 1K$ for these use cases. I like exploring and playing with these and doing that for free doubles the enjoyment.

why stick to expensive canon glass when some combinations do work

good luck with your new toys

Thanks jim. I want fun with them not luck with them.

Some studio work with Irina, who has a very unique look. Theme was blade runner \ cyberpunk with some Matrix thrown in there for good measure! All taken on my much-beloved M50.

Nice bird, nice photo