SiMuMe wrote:
Butterfly-at-rest is what I settled on for now. They take the fly part of their name seriously. And they zig and zag as if I'm pointing a gun at them.
A Blue pansy butterfly, showing both sides of the wing. Z50 + AI NIKKOR 135mm f/2.8S for reach.
Great pics of a lovely creature!
I've never seen a butterfly that didn't zig and zag.
pbraymond wrote:
Been awhile since I've had an Nikon MF lens attached to the Z. From this morning, it did not look hopeful at all when I left the house but there was a brief opening that made it worthwhile photographically. 20mm f3.5 AI.
I'm very partial to pictures that artfully show the environs, like this one here. Well done.
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SiMuMe wrote:
Butterfly-at-rest is what I settled on for now. They take the fly part of their name seriously. And they zig and zag as if I'm pointing a gun at them.
A Blue pansy butterfly, showing both sides of the wing. Z50 + AI NIKKOR 135mm f/2.8S for reach.
Beautiful butterfly Siphiwe. Great focus plane on that second shot.
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mjgphotoz wrote:
Ray, these are awesome! Welcome back!
Mary
Thanks Mary. I just need to (1) get outside more even when it does not look hopeful and (2) be less lazy and take out the MFNG instead using the AF zooms. Actually, I need more inspiration to find new subjects and topics.
Couple more that same morning with the 20mm f3.5 AI. Serge, I only wish I had a Z8! That would be great to use, but the added bulk (and to some added extent weight) would mean that I would likely not hike as far or as often fly with it, and it would stay home on most fly-to destinations (we are usually carry-on only travelers). That has saved me a lot of $$$ for now, so far, I've resisted the GAS!
I removed the Nikon D7200 from my microscope without checking the settings. So no raw files, and I had left it in crop mode. So all my framing went kabluey. On the bright side there are lots of keepers anyway, and it at an effective focal length I've never done before - 1872mm
600mm x 1.5x sensor crop x 1.6X modified TC-16A X 1.3X in camera crop = 1872mm
Thanks for the likes and comments, really validated the choice of framing !
During the trip I visited Slope Point which is pretty muc the bottom of the South Island. There is a sign there on the cliffs, it points north and south indicating it is 5140kms to The Equator and 4803kms to The South Pole !
The winds down there are pretty extreme due to a lack of landmass to slow them down on their journey eastwards and have bent the trees over time and are known as The Roaring 40s due to their Latitude. Not to be confused with the Furious Fifties or the Shreiking or Screaming Sixties which are at more southern latitudes.
There are a couple of stands of trees in a field, both obviously planted to shield the farmer's wooden houses, both still there but now abandoned and collapsed. As the gate was open I had a wander round until the farmer and his two sheep dogs approached on his quad bike / 4 wheeler.
We had a chat after I initialled asked if it was ok me wandering around his land and he informed me that no it wasn't but he relented and said it was ok, not to let any tourists see me and to shut the gate when I left. I even let slip that I would return later for an astro shot or two.
This is a 2 shot stitch with the 55/1.2 wide open (for some reason )
cadman342001 wrote:
Thanks for the likes and comments, really validated the choice of framing !
During the trip I visited Slope Point which is pretty muc the bottom of the South Island. There is a sign there on the cliffs, it points north and south indicating it is 5140kms to The Equator and 4803kms to The South Pole !
The winds down there are pretty extreme due to a lack of landmass to slow them down on their journey eastwards and have bent the trees over time and are known as The Roaring 40s due to their Latitude. Not to be confused with the Furious Fifties or the Shreiking or Screaming Sixties which are at more southern latitudes.
There are a couple of stands of trees in a field, both obviously planted to shield the farmer's wooden houses, both still there but now abandoned and collapsed. As the gate was open I had a wander round until the farmer and his two sheep dogs approached on his quad bike / 4 wheeler.
We had a chat after I initialled asked if it was ok me wandering around his land and he informed me that no it wasn't but he relented and said it was ok, not to let any tourists see me and to shut the gate when I left. I even let slip that I would return later for an astro shot or two.
This is a 2 shot stitch with the 55/1.2 wide open (for some reason )
I took a bike out for a spin this morning along the Waltham section of the Mass Central Rail Trail (MCRT). A few historical highlights, all taken with the 55mm f/3.5 AI Micro:
One of the buildings backing onto the MCRT has a nice mural on the corrugated metal wall. Bicycle history and some old Waltham stuff. Too wide to get in any single pic. EarlierBikes
by James Muller, on Flickr
cadman342001 wrote:
Thanks for the likes and comments, really validated the choice of framing !
During the trip I visited Slope Point which is pretty muc the bottom of the South Island. There is a sign there on the cliffs, it points north and south indicating it is 5140kms to The Equator and 4803kms to The South Pole !
The winds down there are pretty extreme due to a lack of landmass to slow them down on their journey eastwards and have bent the trees over time and are known as The Roaring 40s due to their Latitude. Not to be confused with the Furious Fifties or the Shreiking or Screaming Sixties which are at more southern latitudes.
There are a couple of stands of trees in a field, both obviously planted to shield the farmer's wooden houses, both still there but now abandoned and collapsed. As the gate was open I had a wander round until the farmer and his two sheep dogs approached on his quad bike / 4 wheeler.
We had a chat after I initialled asked if it was ok me wandering around his land and he informed me that no it wasn't but he relented and said it was ok, not to let any tourists see me and to shut the gate when I left. I even let slip that I would return later for an astro shot or two.
This is a 2 shot stitch with the 55/1.2 wide open (for some reason )
Both are stunning images Andy. The trees look like the Bristlecone pines of Yosemite that are in wind shadow. On exposed areas like half-dome they grow like ground cover less than a 12 inches high. I'm curious about which version of the 28mm f2.0 you got, because I'm not seeing much coma distortion - in fact, a 25 second exposure can have streaking from star movement - tracking gear?
Some more mistakenly taken 1872mm shots using the Nikkor 600mm f5.6 ais (back to a more manageable 1440mm efl). Last year Barb started feeding the Crows raw Cashews. (I know ) Which of course they love and told all their friends. One time there were about 8 crows wolfing them down at the same time. Since that time Crows fly over the house frequently - they look for me at my desk from many angles and perches. They also loudly call even if just flying by. So we got a crow bird call to answer back. This year Barb switched them up to raw in the shell peanuts. Apparently, this is a massive hit in the Corvid community. Every variation of Corvid snatches them up, Blue Jays etc (there is over 120 species) So, Barb dedicated a 5 foot round glass picnic table to giving the Crows a chance to get some before the other Corvids and Squirrels. It lasted one day, because I just saw a Squirrel take a running leap - land on the table, slide off while knocking peanuts onto the ground. This is the sequence of a single Crow who noticed the new feeding locale. He called out from the garage roof to let me know he was here. I watched him swallow 3 or 4 peanuts whole, then scooped up another 3 or 4 in his beak.
Seeking input/advice. I don't know if this is the right place to ask, but since I'm shooting all MFNG anyway it's as good a place as any.
Sometimes my SOOC pics aren't as crisp as I would hope. Other times they are great. (Post-shot sharpening helps but I feel like it should be better.) Sometimes it looks like I just didn't focus well. I've been using the magnifier, which helps a lot. I've tried shooting with several apertures, but reducing the aperture to f/8 or smaller to increase DOF doesn't necessarily get me in the ballpark I expect.. With shorter lenses (like 35mm or the 2.8cm) I can't even see focus error, but the picture sure does.
So I'm wondering what the causes are and how to remedy them. One guess is that the vintage lenses just aren't all that crisp. For example, today's 55mm pics weren't quite what I hoped for, but that lens has been superb on previous occasions in different conditions. Or maybe there's too much glare in the lens, that with the existing light conditions I'm getting the best I should expect. Or maybe it's the camera's processing to produce jpg's. Which means I need different camera settings.
So if it's the camera's product I'm fussing over, maybe I should be shooting raw in addition to (or instead of) Fine* jpg's. Which leads me to the next conundrum. I've tried raw before to get better color but was never able to improve on the camera's jpg. If I started with raw I have no idea what a workflow should be. Like, golly gee whiz, now what do I do?
Maybe I just need more patience when setting up a shot. Unfortunately the world doesn't stand still for but so long.
but he relented and said it was ok, not to let any tourists see me and to shut the gate when I left. I even let slip that I would return later for an astro shot or two.
) Which of course they love and told all their friends. One time there were about 8 crows wolfing them down at the same time. Since that time Crows fly over the house frequently - they look for me at my desk from many angles and perches. They also loudly call even if just flying by. So we got a crow bird call to answer back. This year Barb switched them up to raw in the shell peanuts. Apparently, this is a massive hit in the Corvid community. Every variation of Corvid snatches them up, Blue Jays etc (there is over 120 species) So, Barb dedicated a 5 foot round glass picnic table to giving the Crows a chance to get some before the other Corvids and Squirrels. It lasted one day, because I just saw a Squirrel take a running leap - land on the table, slide off while knocking peanuts onto the ground. 
