Exploring the wonders of creation through a 50mm lens...and other lenses too.

This is the first in a four-part series, which is something I don’t recall ever doing here on Weekly Fifty. Every now and then I’ll post a pair of related images, and maybe once or twice I have done three in a row…but four? I think this could be a first. There’s good reason for it though–this and the next three images were all taken in a familiar location, but in extraordinary circumstances. If you like what you see so far, then I’m confident you’ll enjoy the next three.

I shot this at Holmes Lake in Lincoln, Nebraska, when my family and I were visiting family recently. It’s my old stomping ground, you might say, as both my wife and I grew up in Lincoln and all of my immediate family still lives there. We always enjoy getting back to visit family and, when possible, friends too–though with so many nieces and nephews spread throughout the city the latter isn’t always possible. My youngest brother and his wife enjoy taking their dogs, a pair of incredibly pleasant huskies, for walks along the crushed limestone trail that winds around the perimeter of the lake, and on this particularly foggy afternoon they invited us to join them. Even just driving to the lake felt like pushing through a cloud, and once we got there and started down the path the atmosphere grew ever more surreal as we walked.

I don’t think I can recall ever being surrounded by quite so much fog ever in my entire life. Even thinking back to when I was a kid I can recall situations with near-zero visibility, but this was something else entirely. As we slowly circumnavigated the lake, we could almost feel the fog surrounding us. Not metaphorically, but literally–I could make a sweeping motion with my hand and feel, ever so faintly, droplets coalescing on my palm. It was equal parts eerie and fascinating, and on more than one occasion I bade the group to go on ahead without me while I attempted to capture a photo or two. One of which you can see here.

I shot this with my Nikon D750 and 105mm macro lens, though this certainly is not the setting in which I would normally find myself when using that particular setup. It worked out well though, since the long focal length drew the farther shore a bit closer while the narrow field of view was made even more claustrophobic thanks to the brown stalks on either side. (For one of the best examples of this technique, look no further than the underwater march in the first Pirates of the Caribbean, where the seafloor below and the rocks above create a condensed frame that draws your attention right to the center, while creating a subtle feeling of unease for the viewer.) I shot this at f/4 and focused midway down the path, which created a subtle foreground and background blur that I quite like. Perhaps f/8 or f/11 would have been good, as they would have resulted in wider depth of field, but the barely noticeable blur was just what I was going for and it worked out pretty well.

One of my favorite aspects of this image is how you can barely, just barely, make out some of the elements on the far shore such as trees and their reflections on the water. That’s not an editing trick, mind you. It really was just as you see here, and an incredible experience overall. One that I’m eager to share here and over the next few weeks.

You can probably tell that these are Christmas tree lights. What you might not know, at least not just from looking at the photo alone, is that these are fairly unique as far as Christmas tree lights go. There’s a couple of trees in Columbia, Missouri, that are absolutely jam-packed with lights, wound so tightly around every surface of the tree that in most places you can’t even see the bark underneath. It’s a sight to behold, and one that we have seen a few times when visiting family in Columbia and which I have featured here on Weekly Fifty a time or two. This year, though, I was able to capture an image of one of the trees a bit differently thanks to my macro lens. Normally I don’t bring that lens when we visit the Magic Trees because a 105mm lens on a full-frame camera is kind of the opposite gear combo one would want in order to fit a 30-foot-tall tree in a single photo.

But this time, I decided to go all the way to the other end of the spectrum and, instead of getting far away for a shot of the entire tree, I got as close as possible to get a photo of just a couple bulbs. My thinking, and you’ll have to tell me if I’m right about this or not, was that I could find a way to convey a sense of the sheer quantity of lights on the tree to a viewer just by focusing on a very tiny slice of the whole. I got right up next to the tree, pointed my camera upwards, dialed in an exposure of f/8 with auto-ISO set to use a minimum shutter speed of 1/180 second, which resulted in an actual ISO of 1400. (The grainy effects of which were mitigated somewhat by Adobe Lightroom’s Denoise tool, of which regular readers will know I am most definitely a fan.)

I hope that even without seeing the entire tree, you the viewer might have a sense that there sure a ton of lights on it. It might be tricky to direct your attention to one of the two lights that are actually in focus, but my idea is that those two will draw your gaze and then you would start to take in all the rest that the picture has to offer. I’m not sure that entirely worked though–there’s so much to look at, and so many colors and spots of light vying for your attention, that the composition kind of collapses on itself. Where should you look? What are you looking at? What is going on? Maybe this image works best as some kind of abstract piece of modern art. Maybe it does exactly what I intended, and you have a sense that you’re looking at a tiny slice of thousands of Christmas lights.

In any case, one thing I can say for certain: I enjoyed the challenge of taking this photo, and look forward to returning to the scene, hopefully next Christmas, and giving it another try. And at the very least, this picture makes me think of time well spent with family over the Christmas season, and that by itself makes it a fine photo in my book :)

My family and I recently took a trip out west to Gloss Mountain along with some friends, with the goal of seeing the sunset. It’s a gorgeous sight, especially from the top of the plateau, as you can see the long shadows stretching and yawning as our star settles gently over the horizon…but this time that’s not really what happened at all. Or, rather, the sun definitely set (as it is wont to do and will, in all likelihood, continue for years to come unless it is beset by a plague of astrophage) but we were unable to view it, thanks to a thick blanket of clouds and, as it also happened, some very frigid air that had come sweeping through the plains earlier in the day. Undeterred, we hiked up the plateau despite the adverse conditions and made the most of the event: time with friends and family is time well spent, after all. Even if it’s cold and windy.

As we ascended the rickety path I looked to the east, dug out my Nikon D750 with the good ol’ 50mm lens, and shot the photo you see here. I was hoping to capture a photograph that showcased some semblance of the sheer scale of the landscape, and while I’m not sure I quite accomplished that goal, I do quite like how the final image turned out.

Since daylight was at a bit of a premium I had to use a bit of a larger aperture than I would have normally preferred, and shot this at f/4 in order to get not just a low ISO but a fast shutter speed to minimize movement. (A tripod and/or more light would have been ideal, but photographers aren’t always afforded the luxury of adjusting such parameters when shooting outdoors, and instead have to make the most of the situations with which they are presented.) I focused on the butte far in the distance, and I’m really happy with the result: the image is sharp, detailed, and in my opinion, does a pretty decent job of imparting a sense of scale. A road bisects the frame in the foreground, and the plains, red dirt dotted with sagebrush, recede to the horizon where the sky seems to melt all the colors into a dull gray. It’s pretty cool.

But the happy accident here, as Bob Ross might call it, is the blurry bits of brown grass slicing vertically up from the bottom of the photo. At first I was a bit annoyed since I didn’t even notice them when I took the picture, but in retrospect I quite like them. They add an extra bit of perspective, making it seem like you, the viewer, is peering out at this scene almost as if from a hidden vantage point. The blurriness, which is in no small part due to the large f/4 aperture which I would not have used on a brighter day, gives the image a bit of a dreamlike quality that complements the somber mood of the scene as a whole.

I almost didn’t bring my D750 with me when we went out here, and switching to the 50mm lens was a last-minute afterthought on my way out the door, but I’m so glad I brought both. Who knows. Maybe I’ll start bringing that lens with me a bit more…

If last week’s image could be considered a rough draft of sorts, then this might well be seen as the final iteration (albeit in a very small series of two) that, despite being taken just 33 seconds after the other one, builds on it in almost every way and is, in my opinion, a significantly better image as a result. The same basic idea is present here as well as the original: a dying cluster of four small leaves, backlit, in the center of the frame surrounded by other elements of nature bathed in brilliant overhead light from the afternoon winter sun. But, as my kids might say, this image has leveled up significantly.

First, and most notably, there is simply a lot more color in this shot. Instead of a monochrome color palette we now have rich, deep reds on the periphery and dull greens in the background. While the relatively black-and-white original was find on its own merits, seeing a similar shot replete with color reveals how empty the first one was by comparison.

It’s not just the color that’s improved here, though that’s the most obvious element. The first shot was not just mono-chromatic but mono-planar as well. The leaves in the center felt like they might as well have just been taped to a sheet of flat paper, whereas here the top-right leaf is curled towards the camera like fingers on a hand, closing as if grasping tightly on to an unseen support. It makes the subject feel three-dimensional and, as a result, more interesting and perhaps even compelling. It lends a sense of character, as my wife might say. The rest of the composition feels more fleshed-out as well, with a vertical branch in the foreground which essentially compresses the frame and imparts a sense of intimacy, as if we the viewer are peeking into a hidden world. The stalk on which the leaves are mounted recedes into the background, where more red leaves reside.

Finally, I did a better job on the raw exposure settings–specifically the smaller f/11 aperture which resulted in more of the subject being in focus due to the wider focal plane. The original was shot at f/6.7 and keen-eyed viewers might have looked at the original on Flickr and seen segments of the leaves that were a bit blurry because of the shallow depth of field. That’s not entirely resolved here, but it’s a lot better.

I really like how this turned out, not just from a photography perspective from an educational perspective. In under a minute I learned a lot about what to do, what not to do, and implemented several changes over the original that made the second version a lot better. But the second would not have happened without the first–an important point to remember about the learning process. You can’t get to where you’re going without coming from where you’ve been. And when you do get there, hopefully you will see that there’s still so much left to explore.

I don’t normally do this here on Weekly Fifty, but this week’s image is the first in a two-part series of directly connected images that build on one another in a very linear sense. I’m sharing this photo first because I took it first, and then next week I’ll post the follow-up as an illustration of how even in the span of a few minutes, learning and growth are possible. Maybe even essential. And hopefully this one-two combination will serve as an example and, perhaps, even a bit of inspiration.

I took this photo while I was out walking around the OSU campus one chilly afternoon, Nikon D750 and 105mm macro lens in hand, on a quick break from work. (I really don’t take breaks in the traditional sense, such as the ol’ two 15’s and a Lunch that I was allowed back at the grocery store in college, but I do like to go on a walk every now and then to clear my mind and do a bit of a mental reset. And those walks are best enjoyed with a camera…) I saw this relatively unassuming cluster of four leaves jutting out from the plant from whence it came, and thought about how I might capture an interesting photo of it. After a couple of tries I realized the key that was missing: backlighting. Instead of putting the sun behind me, I repositioned myself with the sun overhead and in front of me and, as a result, behind the leaves. That one little maneuver made all the difference, and entirely transformed not just the subject but the entire composition.

Immediately the leaves went from dull to radiant, and the rest of the composition was transformed from rather dull, normal, and mostly uninteresting to a brilliant collection of light and shadow with a bit of foreground elements to add a sense of perspective and depth and dimension. I used an aperture of f/6.7 which I could have easily stopped down to f/8 to make the subject even sharper but it works well enough as-is. I put the leaves right in the center to immediately draw your eye, which is classic Weekly Fifty also. It’s a formula, but it works, and I like to use it :)

Still, even though a lot of this shot worked, there were some things that just didn’t. Even though from a technical perspective it gets the job done, from an artistic standpoint it’s just kind of…unfulfilling. But that’s where I’ll leave things, and to finish the story you’ll have to come back next week :)