Some years, like this one, photography can slow down after the drama of all that autumnal show. While in a couple of months these temperatures will be welcomed as warm, when the temperature first starts to cool then we experience it as cold. Add to that overcast, blank, skies, »
After the success of my Cornwall 2012 calendar, I have put together a new calendar for 2013. All the photographs were taken in 2012 in Michigan, indeed most of them in Ann Arbor.
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Last weekend we were in Cleveland. Actually left Thursday and had lunch at the wonderful Toledo Museum of Art and a casual stroll at the Ottowa National Wildlife Area, before settling in for the evening just west of Cleveland.
The first image is from the west side of Cleveland the »
Whenever I get together with my friend Paul, and even when we talk on the phone, although not so much nowadays, he likes to ask me, who are your influences. My answer has always been, I don’t have any photographic influences (other than the million images I see a day of course); I would instead look to painters, especially the Impressionists, and more recently also Constable, as well as Vermeer. When I got home from this latest visit, I looked once again at the postcard above our fireplace, and thought, yes, that would qualify. It’s “Chez Mondrian” by André Kertész. »
I wanted to see how much detail my Voigtlander 20mm lens could pick up when focused at infinity. I went into the field next to our house and pointed up the road, thinking the “neighbor’s” garden would be far enough away for such a wide lens. I tried focusing first on the large tree, middle left. Then I exposed again, this time simply turning the lens to infinity. To my surprise, the focused shot is much sharper, all the way through the scene. It may be that the distance still wasn’t great enough, or just a peculiarity of (my copy of) this lens, but it certainly says to always focus the lens, and never assume. Of course, it is probably also reminding me that DOF goes in front and beyond the plane of focus, and I might need to give thought to exactly what might be found beyond infinity!
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