This weeks photo is an Eddie I took whilst trying out a fast prime.

It’s hot a whole lot different to any other Eddie photo but I love this one because the lighting somehow seems perfect, and depth is great and it looks somehow soft and pleasant in a way I can’t even explain.

On time this week, woohoo.

This was taken in Minehead, Somerset… I believe.  Anypoop, it was taken through the glass of a shop window, there’s a trick to this, you have to have the lens flush with the glass so that no light gets between the glass and the lens, but you have to be careful not to bang it so that everyone in the shop turns round and go all hey! on yer.   Dunno what this model is mind, it looks like a cross between a zeppelin and a bi-plane.  Who knows.

This week it’s Cliff’s Cabs. Aaah, good ol’ Cllff’s Cabs. If you’re ever stranded down in Watchet, Somerset get on the blower and give Cliff a try, he’ll whisk you off like a princess.  E-300 with Sigma 30mm f/1.4 lens.

Is it thursday already master? Another somerset affair awaits you…

I like to think that this chap playing the.. um clarinet? Is probably jesus himself!

Forgot to post yesterday Sir.

This was one of the first test photo’s I made when I got a fast prime.  It’s of a model mini cooper in the living room.  I was pleased with the composition as it kinda looks like the mini is about to drive off, and the big low depth of field makes the mini pop out of the image quite well.

I’ve gone mad and bought more stuff for my camera.

First I bought a flash, ‘cos the built in one is too harsh and there isn’t much you can do with it.  Also, for some reason you can only push the shutter up to 1/250 when using the built in affair which ain’t no good with my shaky knuckles.  I bought the Olympus FL-36 which is their mid-level one.  Also to go with it I got a Sto-Fen Omni-Bounce.  Which is a peice of frosted plastic you shove over the flash to soften the blow.  Other neat things you can do is rotate it so that it bounces off walls, but I haven’t quite mastered the art.  I’ve no idea what I’m doing really.

When the flash is in the neutral position you can hear it moving some optic around inside its skull as you zoom in and out of things.  No idea what thats all about.

The other piece of nuttiness I’ve gotten is that lens I wanted.  I couldn’t resist it, it was eating me up inside.  It’s a lovely looking object, got a sort of matt look to it, and boy is it heavy.  Thing is at first I was totally dissapointed, I couldn’t even get it to focus on the right things. I even took a photo to demonstrate the problem I was having, and opened a support ticket with the store I bought it from.  The photo is here, and the deal is, I was focusing on where the spoon meets the ruler.

But after using it more I freaking love it, it’s like a game.  I don’t think it’s faulty but that it’s more um, quirky.  I might have sussed it, I shall now talk a load of crap.  I think that there aren’t enough stops around the focusing mechanism for the shallowness of the depth of field.  So I reckon the trick is, take a photo, see if the spoon is in focus, if it isn’t shuffle yer feet forwards or backwards a tiny tiny bit and have another go, hoping the new position will fall into a possible focus position.

Did that make sense?  I haven’t a clue.  Tell you what though I just love the photo’s I can get from it.  As usually Eddie is my subject, with this lens I can make really soft pastelly portraits of him that make him look verging on the sexy!

Some photos taken with it. 

I want a new lens for my camera bitch.

The friend who got married the other day bought a canon 400d to take on honeymoon pro. First thing that struck me about that camera compared to my e-300 is the speed of the menu, it’s really zippy, whereas mines more of a “down - pause - down - pause - select” affair. The big thing though is that along with the standard kit lens he also bought quite an interesting fixed-zoom lens. They are sometimes referred to as a “prime” lens, for reasons which are lost on me. But the advantage is that not having to cater for zoom allows the manufacturer room for other things, including a really big aperture. You’re able to take photo’s indoors with no flash and only ever a minor increase in ISO level. So of cause, I now want one.

Problem is, canon owners have the luxury of a back-catalogue of lenses stretching back to the stone-age, there’s thousands of the damn things. The lens mount my olympus uses, called the “Four-Thirds” standard was developed purely for the digital age and as such there’s only a modest selection to choose from so far.

Olympus don’t seem to care to create the sort of lens I’m after, luckily Sigma make their lenses for all the current crop of mounts including the four-thirds standard, which is what my camera uses. They have just the lens I want! The Sigma 30mm f1.4. But it’s freaking expensive, around 380 USD and goes for around 270 quid over here.

I could by an OM lens pretty cheap, which work on my camera using an adapter. But you lose Auto-Focus which ain’t no good.

I’m guttered actually because I had a winning bid for the Sigma on ebay but some crazy fool out-bidded me right in the last minute, I was just seconds too slow increasing my bid. So now i’m pissed off at myself for not using a bigger maximum bid in the first place.