365.58: the Outtakes

Outtakes from yesterday’s 365 shoot…

Many are multiple-exposures, some are accidents, and most show strong evidence of the 75-150mm E Series and its notorious zoom creep. I’m not sure what I expected from having the camera in such a strange orientation, but the 75-150 will be forever (if lovingly) known as ‘The Creeper.’

I fired off about 80 shots, trying to hold the zoom ring in place, but not shake it in any way (fail) before I realized that I could just move everything around and shoot horizontally. :facepalm:

Check out my early brilliance:

365.58: the Outtakes
Anyway.

I used a couple of LED light saber lamp things to focus at higher apertures, and for the majority of the light in one or two of the shots.

All in all, this was good times. I hope to have similar amounts of fun during today’s shooting session.

All of these were shot yesterday, and are not part of today’s 365 project (which will be #59). Nikon D7000, 75-150mm f/3.5 E Series, ISO100. Many were shot with the lens on 49mm of extension tubes and/or reversed. Most had some involvement from the SB700. One was shot with the iPhone 4. One had a 30 second exposure (chosen by the camera, as I was doing a test shot in Aperture Priority-don’t ask me why). And I think many are sortof interesting.

Enjoy.

365.58 Abstraktes Bild

Well, I could write a novel about today’s shoot, or I could just post the shot and its general setup notes…

There are about 15 interesting shots from today, some purposeful (like this one), some entirely accidental, and I started with a rather insane setup, so I may make an outtakes post later tonight or tomorrow (probably the latter…). If I go into more detail, I’ll just go on and on and on, so:

D7000, Nikon 75-150mm E Series, reversed, on 49mm of extension tubes, ISO100, two exposures, both 1/250th, both at f/3.5, with the SB700 at 1/2 power, with it’s diffusion panel down, hard camera left (maybe 80 degrees off axis (or is that 270?)).

Oh, and btw, this is straight out of the camera (with whatever RAW – jpeg conversion trickery Aperture performed, and with a conversion from Adobe RBG to sRGB). Good times.

365.57 Ohne Titel (and a friend…)

I made 150-odd photos today, trying (in vain) to capture a macro version of yesterday’s optical illusion with the crayons.

I got some interesting-enough shots, so groovy.

All were shot with the D7000, Nikon 75-150mm E Series, Reversed, on 49mm of extension tubes, and at ISO100.

The runner up (see below) was taken from about a foot away, 1/10th, f/3.5 with the SB700 at 1/2 power near camera right.

The 365 was more complex in that it was a multifun shot in addition to being macro. The end of the lens was about 3 feet away. Shots 1 and 2 were at f/11 and 1/10th, with the SB700 at 1/4 power at camera left. Shot 3 was at f/3.5 without the flash.

This was perhaps the most fun I’ve had with a 365 shoot: no cussing or grumbling or checking the clock and the shot count. And I’m reasonably pleased with the results. All in all, pretty much win, methinks.

365.57 Ohne Titel (and a friend…)

365.56 Optical Illusion

The idea for this came quickly, but took many tries to execute (poorly). It looks better as a thumbnail, fyi.

D7000, 75-150mm f/3.5 E Series at 150mm (225mm equivalent), ISO100, 1/10th, f/16, SB700 at 1/4 power, zoomed out to 28mm set to it’s wide beam setting, about 3 feet from the subject maybe 10 inches to the left (about 2 feet from camera-left).

I tried a bunch of multiple exposure trickery, and I’ll be trying that again tomorrow, but maybe with the lens reversed, get my macro-multiple-exposure-strobism on…

365.55 Wino (3rd Attempt): Take it Easy…

I’ve been sober for almost 2 years.

But some days, I really feel like tying one on…

Maybe tomorrow. For now, though, it’s clean up the mess I made making this mediocre (at best) picture, then it’ll be dinnertime (it’s already way past…), and then time to relax so I can have a good night’s sleep and start all over again tomorrow. Hooray.

D7000, Sigma 30mm f/1.4, ISO100, 1/100th, f/1.4. SB700, at full power and zoomed to 70mm, on its wide angle setting and firing through CerealBoxStripBox(tm) on a tripod outside the window at camera left (fyi, probably the most complex I’ve gotten with the whole strobing thing…).

Well, I probably won’t shoot this again, and I probably won’t submit one to Alex Koloskov and Dave Nitsche’s Studio Photography Insights Hangout, as I’m in no way satisfied with any of the three attempts I’ve made thus far. Oh well: I’ve learned some things, I think, and that’s what counts!

365.54 Wino (Second Attempt): One Too Many

Once again, not happy, but oh well. I’m not happy with much of anything today: nothing in the way of sleep last night… Oh well.

I did mess around with this a bit: cloning, cropping, etc.

D7000, 50mm 1.8, ISO100, 1/80th, F/1.8, snooted SB700 high camera right, aimed at the label, at ~1/64th power, iirc.

365.53 Wino (first attempt)

Even though I’m always already asleep by the time their Studio Photography Insights hangout starts, I’m still going to try my hand at Alex Koloskov and Dave Nitsche‘s weekly project.

This is my first attempt (but not my last: the next will have to wait) at shooting this week’s assignment, an unopened bottle of red wine.

Seeing as I don’t drink, this bottle is on loan from a neighbor. I thought I’d try for a sort of disco (as in 1976) vibe. This is shot number 217 out of 227 attempts… Needless to say, there was some cursing and gnashing of teeth involved, and my apartment is a wreck.

I’m not happy with this much at all, but it’s got a few interesting things going on methinks:

  1. the backlight, uneven though it is, is quite striking.
  2. the tungsten glow from underneath is fairly rocking.
  3. the slightly soft focus, thanks to my sneaky multiple-exposure process (see below) gives a hazy sort of vibe to the whole image that sorta works for the subject, imo.

So I need to get some better light going on the front, while somehow avoiding all the reflections I got earlier.

And I need to get the camera and subject lined up better.

And I need to get the flash involved to a greater (and more obvious degree).

And I’d like to get some light shining through the bottle, but given the green glass + red liquid, I don’t think that’s going to happen…

I may make some more attempts tonight, but I doubt it. I’ve already been at it for 6 hours, and I need to try to get the place straightened up, have some dinner, and relax before my early-honking bedtime so I can get back to my day job tomorrow. Whoo!

So.

D7000, Nikon 75-150mm E Series, at about 140mm (~210mm equivalent), ISO100, 1/20th (chosen by the camera as I was in Aperture priority by accident), f/3.5,  three shot multiple exposure, processed in camera.

Shot 1: no flash, just the styrofoam-cooler-as-softbox-ish-type-thing and two LED light bar things I picked up at the home improvement center earlier today.

Shot 2: SB700 at 1/128th power, with it’s diffusion dome in place, about 4 inches in front of the subject and about 16 inches below, and with a handheld flashlight aimed down onto the top of the bottle to give it some definition.

Shot 3: same flash setup, sans flashlight, deliberately defocused.