While on my recent little photo walk around the Cockman House building I recently posted about Here, I took the time near the end of my walk to switch from my Voigtlander 35mm f1.4 to my Minolta 21mm f2.8 on my Nex5n. Here is a nice little HDR I took of the nearby lake to the buildings. I want to return to this spot.
(as per usual please click on images to see as intended)
This is four images shot freehand taken about 1ev stop apart then merged into a hdr image later using NIK hdr efex.
Sunday a week ago I was left to my own devices as my girl was off doing her own things. This left me with the opportunity to get out for a shoot. I had been meaning for a while to get back out to the Cockman house outbuildings since the fences surrounding them had been torn down. I always enjoy the walk around the surrounding parklands, so it was sorted, I packed my Leica elmar 90mm f4 on my trusty old Nex5 and my Voigtlander 35mm f1.4 on my newer Nex5n. The shots here are a few HDR’s I took on my stroll with the Nex5n and my Voigtlander 35mm f1.4 lens. I have tried to pull these back as tastefully as possible as I know NIK HDR Effex can have a tendancy to oversaturate as it merges your shots. I know my greens were a little nuclear green there for a while, however I feel these now came out quite well. Please do share your thoughts.
(as per usual click on images to view larger and sharper)
This is four exposures shot freehand with about 1ev stop of difference between each exposure. This is probably the most known Cockman House out-building as it is the most readily viewable from the nearby passing main road.
Just acquired this lens recently.
Took it out for a quick test the day it arrived. It is interesting manual focusing without any focus aids, however these preliminary tests still came out alright I feel.
(as per usual please click on images to view larger and sharper.)
These were taken in the imediate visinity around my house. I am impressed by the initial sharpness of the lens on the KX. My reasonable focus accuracy and the overal rendering of the lens.
It seems to render colours quite naturally which is always a plus.
Some of you who read my blog may already have read my last couple of posts sharing some of my landscape snaps and stitches of the Perth cityscape from Easter Sunday down on the Swan River foreshore southside, if not, for those that are interested you can find the previous 2 related articles here:
I still very much enjoy shooting my roll once a month for our 1 day in 1 roll Facebook group. Here is an earlier post from more about he beginning of the group: 1 Day in 1 Roll : Event #1 ….and #2
I find myself so busy these days that the group deciding to have a monthly day that is agreed upon that we will all go out and shoot a roll kind of makes it something that I just regularly put aside each month. I must admit that I was rather happy that last months March shoot was decided for Easter Sunday. I was fortunate enough that the family had decided to go down to the river foreshore for a little easter brunch. I was very happy about this as I had been wanting to get back down to the Swan River foreshore southside for some time to shoot some more film stitches of the city. I had very much enjoyed it last time but had only had 400iso film on me, thus it was grainier than I’d like. This time I was going prepared, with my Contax 137md equiped with my Carl zeiss Plannar 50mm 1.7, Yashica 28mm f2.8 ML and my Yashica 135mm 2.8 all excellent lenses and best of all I had decided to load up some of my absolute favorite film Kodak Ektar 100. I had a bit of a happy snap as I walked around the area we had camped out for our family breakfast. Here are a few of those snaps:
(Please remember to click on images to see at larger size)
One of my favorite places in Perth is the South Perth river foreshore. As soon as you exit your car in the carpark and look over at the grass that meets the beautiful swan river which is just the foreground to our magnificent city here in Perth, you have to be overwhelmed by the view, it is simply breathtaking. Ever since Lisa and I went for a photo walk there last year I had been eager to go back, Easter Sunday presented just such an occasion. I had been eager to shoot the scene on better film than last year, and am keen to get my roll of Kodak Ektar back which I shot at the same time. However I also took my Nex5n and a few lenses so here are a couple of stitches I took from the day too that I would like to share with you.
So my coveted Minolta 16mm f2.8 Fisheye arrived a few weeks back. I had been wanting something nice and wide and with a little curvature for my Nex5n for landscapes for a while so was eager to get out and test this beautiful lens. This Minolta lens was rumored to be so good that it is one of the lenses Leica had Minolta produce for them under the Leica/Leitz badge. In fact I have found documentation which suggests that they bought so many of these re-badged Minolta’s and they are so rarely ordered that if you are a Leica shooter and order one for your kit, you will get one of these exact Minolta lenses re-branded to Leitz sent out to you. haha
I acquired this lens as I had been wanting a fast 50mm equivalent on a APS-C crop sensor namely my Nex5n for a while. While I have 50mm 1.4′s these turn out to be 75mm f1.4′s on APS-C, great for portraits, but not always the best suited for a lot of general shooting applications. When I first found out about the Voigtlander Classic 35mm f1.4 it sounded perfect. This would give me a 52.5mm equivalent lens with a nice fast speed of f1.4, the only downfalls being it would only have the Depth of Field and Bokeh of a 35mm lens, but this is all due to the crop factor making it be a 52.5mm and the lens really only being a 35mm. My copy is in M-Mount for Leica cameras, I us an adapter to shoot it on my Nex5n , which is great because it means I can also shoot it on a Leica M if I can ever afford one. hahaha
(source and image from Sony Alpha Rumors)
There has been speculation since at least august of last year that Sony was working on the creme de la creme of the Nex system, what is rumored to be the all new Nex9 full-frame mirror-less Sony Nex, and now this rumor has heated up with the recent announcement that Sony has indeed signed on for Zeiss to make 3 new E-mount lenses for full frame scheduled for release in early 2014. Couple this with the rumors that full frame Nex prototypes are already about and being tested this makes me very excited. It is rumored that Sony is in the final stage of development and that there are 2 prototypes making their rounds being tested, one with the already established fantastic 24.3 mp Sony full frame sensor found in the all new RX1 and A99, and another prototype with an all new 30-32mp sensor. The people in the know suggest that Sony is leaning towards the established 24.3mp sensor with upgraded dynamic range and faster phase detect AF.
Almost every year, there are exceptions however, my company usually breaks for 2 weeks over Christmas as the whole stone industry over here in Perth grinds to a halt. For myself it is always a welcomed forced holiday. As usual for myself I had acquired a few new goodies for my camera bag in the lead up to Christmas and was eager to get out and give them a whirl. One of which was my new TOU Five Star 24mm f2.8 manual focus lens. From initial tests I was very impressed by this relatively no-name lens as it was macro focusing, down to 0.25 of a meter, and it’s contrast and sharpness were acceptable. I had also acquired a remote for my Nex5n so I could achieve long exposures without having to carefully push the shutter myself trying my hardest not to move the camera at the same time. So when the opportunity came up and I was asked to go meet some fellow photographers from the ‘Photographers In Perth’ photography group on Facebook, to shoot some sunsets down at the beautiful Iluka beach, I jumped at the chance.