Time to Grab the Macro

So while adventuring to Deep Dale Gorge, we pulled over at a tranquil pool down Deep Dale Gorge. Armed with my smartphone and my bare feet I ran (well, what passes for running in bare feet over rocks) to the waters edge to throw some stone, see some fish jumping and take in the colours of the red wall, green foliage and crystal clear water.

The smart phone started snapping away. The reeds in front of me were attracting all manner of dragonflies. I carefully stepped forward, step by step, until I was standing in the reeds, surrounded by dragonflies and with only my smartphone in tow. Sure, I snapped a few dragonflies with my smartphone, but when I realised they would sit comfortably beneath my smartphone lens not 30cm away, it dawned on me it might be time to grab the macro lens I spent a lot of money on and was sitting on the back seat of my car.

Running again in bare feet back to the car, I grabbed my camera, swapped my lenses and dashed cautiously back to the reeds. Thus started the shutterbug, snapping, checking exposure and experimenting with exposure. Still getting used to using my fixed macro, I had to experiment with different exposure settings. I learned that in that particular situation, a fast shutter speed was key given the propensity for camera shake and wind.

It was almost as good as the butterflies at Iguazu Falls.

Canon EOS 50D f/5, ISO 100, 100mm (Macro)

Canon EOS 50D, f/5 1/320 ISO 100, 10mm (Macro)

Canon EOS 50D f/3.2 1/500, ISO 100, 100mm (macro)

Guess who loves the macro??

Needless to say, I had a lot of fun. I could fill this post with numerous happy emoticons.

I do still need to master editing and reducing the grainy noise that cropping causes. But I think I can safely say that at the moment, my macro is my favourite.

The beach approaching mid day

One of the great things about living in the Pilbara is the lifestyle. This Easter weekend, my husband and I went kayaking again, once more to Conzinc Bay. Now, reaching your destination at 10:30 in the morning may not seem like such a big deal. But once you have a swim, a bit of a fish and a chill out on the beach, the next thing you know it's nearly midday and you haven't taken any photos!

I did however manage to test out the wide angle with the polarisor this time, so that was pretty nifty. Except  I discovered two things - one, that because of the extreme wide angle of 10mm and the high sun, it produced many flares in my lens. This was corrected in photoshop with a little bit of cloning, but still it's rather a pain. The second thing I noticed is that I have dust on my mirror, which I will need to fix somehow.

Any way, below are some of the photos taken that celebrate the glorious day and being alive!

I love the first image below because of the fish. One of the marvelous things about a polarisor is the reduction of glare in the water, so you can see things like these guys! They were fantastic though, every now and then they would be spooked and leap from the water in unison. Fantastic.

Canon EOS 50D f/10, 1/250, ISO 200 11mm

Of course, all of these photos have been edited in Adobe RAW in Photoshop. The white balance has been warmed, vibrance and saturation increased and some of the horizons corrected.

Canon EOS 50D f/6.3, 1/320 ISO 100 10mm

 The fish make an appearance below once more! This photo has actually been copped to remove a large clump of weed and its shadow that got in the way...

Canon EOS 50D f/10 1/250 11mm

 My conclusion? The wide angle is fantastic at the beach, even at midday. I always long for the day we can camp on the beach so as to utilize the sunrise and sunset. It would be magical.

Canon EOS 50D f/6.3 1/320 ISO 100 10mm

Roses are...Pink (aren't they?)

Again, another experiment with the black and white. First though, a little introduction (and a touch of photographer envy).

Cameras, good cameras, are a dime a dozen at the moment, especially in the Pilbara. Everyone is taking photographs with fancy cameras. I sometimes worry that I am just another hick, jumping on the bandwagon, thinking I'm fancy because I've got myself a DSLR, can twiddle a few dials and tweak a few things here and there in Photoshop.

Then I see friends post amazing photographs on Facebook, or seem them on their blogs, or in their Photobooks and I groan. "I know how to do that," I'll say, but internally knowing the truth that knowing how and actually doing are two completely different things.

So, twice in the past month I have set myself the challenge of not actually saying "I know how" but actually doing. Much easier thought than done, as it turns out.

One photo that regularly makes the portfolio of the budding (excuse the pun...you will get it in a minute) photographer is the black and white flower. Enter challenge number one - a black and white rose. (Roses were the flowers that week).

I set up my tripod, precariously on the table, and got my remote out and made sure my subject was well lit. Let the dance begin. The Macro was on, the tripod was moved forward, backward, up, down, tilted and adjusted. As were the flowers, the vase, the leaves, the flowers, the petals. Pretty much everything was touched or tampered with in some way.

I took dozens of photos. Some came out. Some didn't.

Best of a bunch - Canon EOS 50D f/32, 15 seconds, ISO-1000, 100mm (Macro). Still getting funny exposures - ISO 1000??? What's with that? What was I thinking? This one was also edited in RAW to correct the white balance for our orange lights in our dining place, increased contrast, and vibrance.

 That was the easy part. Well, actually no I lied. It was hard.

A month later I messed with the colours to try and make them go black and white, to which I succeeded. It's not that hard to make a black and white photo. What is hard is when your subject is one colour and you want as much contrast as possible. In this situation I increased the saturation and contrast to make the shadows as dark as possible. See the step by step results below.

First I increased saturation to as much as I could bear.

I then converted to black and white.

At this point I tried a few things that didn't quite work, so I decided to crop it to just the centre of the Rose.

And then increased the contrast once more for good measure...

It's not as clear as I would like. It probably won't be causing any others out there any photographer envy. But it's a start.

...My Bubbles (you have to imagine the fish voice)

I have been contemplating joining the Red Dirt Camera Club for a while now. Finally, last week, I was not indisposed for their monthly meeting, so I toddled along. It was great to get together with fellow enthusiasts and learn from others in the same position as I am - experimenting and having fun.

Each month there is a topic, to which you submit your best photo taken during that month and you vote on your favourite at the next meeting. This month the topic is black and white. I have never done much in the area, except one or two conversions just to see how they look. At the meeting we were given a few tips which was fab, so I decided when I got home at 9:30pm to make a cup of tea and experiment. I converted a couple of my images to black and white, just to see what they looked like. Then I started to play. I changed the contrast and the saturation, constantly flicking between colour and black and white to see the effects in both.

I must say I was blown away by the difference in technique. It finally clicked with me (to whom the obvious is not always so) that, well, there is no colour in a black and white photo! You are relying on contrast and tone, composition and subject. For someone as passionate about colour as me, this was quite a challenge!

My favourite black and white photo was this one below. I may or may not enter it, it depends what happens next weekend. Believe it or not, this is a tiny corner of a photo taken of a wave hitting a bit of coral at Conzinc Bay, on the Burrup. I was testing my Macro lens on the coral, and it turned out there were bubbles in the picture! Woo! I increased the contrast to pretty much the max, and cropped it to size.

Canon EOS 50D f/2.8 1/4000, ISO 100, 100mm(Macro)

I'm not completely sold on the composition. Due to the depth of field, not all the bubbles were in focus, but I didn't want to make the picture too thin. Maybe bubbles are something to try again one day.

Native Flowers

So, I have been experimenting with my Macro lens, still getting to know it. I have also been purchasing more and more flowers, just to keep the place fresh.

I have noticed though, flowers don't last long in the Pilbara. The head wilts them, they soak up their water like a sponge, and well, they die. Quickly. (Unfortunately, so do my pot plants...).

So my solution was to buy some native flowers, in the hopes that they would withstand the conditions.

It turns out that these intricate flowers were also very fun to photograph with my macro.

Canon EOS 50D f/3.5 1/60 ISO 400 100mm (Macro)

I like this image for the swirl and the seeds and the pods. It may have been a little over edited, and I will need to find a way to deaden the flash I think, and also not to over saturate the colour in editing.

All in all though, I think it works. It is over saturated because I was playing with the contrast. More on that later...