Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Backlit Trees

Woodbury, Connecticut

I used to love to do pictures in Spring, on Kodachrome, with my F-series Nikons and 180/2.8 lens. Otherwise I'm a short lens person, but there's this particular look I like as the once a year event of Spring comes around on the guitar.

The Lumix long varifocal 45-200 lens is interesting. It lets me also explore the look I got with a 300mm f/2.8 that I bought for a specific project, did personal work with while I had it, and then sold. But our standards have improved. The lens has IS, but when I look at 100% views of the results, it seems to be making plaid of my detail instead of resolving it. I've tested this several times, and keep finding the same result. So last evening, I went out to a nearby favorite spot thinking the clouds and sun effects looked promising, and set it up on a massive Gitzo level 4 tripod, IS turned off, of course, then set the 2 second self-timer for better than cable release actuation. This is Blogger, you can't see the actual file, so you'll just have to take my word for it, but the bark on the trees is resolved wonderfully at 100% view in ACR, which means that a print on 17x22 with one inch borders will be completely convincing. Cool. Why don't my hand-held shots with the same lens live up to this standard? Neither I, nor any IS system, is a match for a fifteen pound tripod.


2 comments:

lyle said...

out of the darkroom for a couple of hours? Question: your quote: "self-timer for better than cable release actuation". Is this true? using a self timer is better than a cable release?

Carl Weese said...

Lyle, a two second delay self timer on a really sturdy tripod is at least as reliable as a cable release, though of course it doesn't work if you want split second timing for the moment of exposure.