A short walk with the Meritar...

[Timber]

Today at lunchbreak I took the Meritar out with my Nissin flash to Finsbury Park... unfortunately weather was not too nice, very cloudy so could not shoot anything without the aid of the flash... It was probably funny looking as I had the Sony NEX6 in my right hand... trying to focus by moving back and forth (focus was set to the closest possible) in f2.8 then closing to f8.0 with my right hand while I was holding the flash :) Gosh, felt like a juggler from the circus :) In the end I've got a few shots I like (not love them... but I think they are okay :P) and happy to share. C&C is always welcome ;)

 

All photos were taken with:

Sony NEX-6 Spectrosil 2000 edition, E. Ludwig Meritar 50mm f2.9, 1/50, f8.0, ISO 1600

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Andrea B.]

Cool work, Timber !!!

Hope to see you take lots more walks with a UV-capable lens. :D

[enricosavazzi]

Looks definitely good IMHO.

 

I did the same kind of handholding a few times, walked away with very few keepers, then I resigned myself to accept the fact that a tripod is a necessity. I have occasionally been seen at the local botanical gardens with a strange, two armed and three legged robot-like contraption. At close examination it was actually a rather conventional aluminium tripod with two Manfrotto friction arms attached each to one leg, to carry flash and a reflector, and a sliding combination of Arca-compatible parts to change the camera distance to the subject. This way, I still get two hands available to frame and focus.

 

A compromise with better portability is hand-held camera with flash attached to the camera via an articulated arm. The advantage is that no hand is used to hold the flash, leaving both hands to focus the lens/helicoid and move the camera back and forth.

[nfoto]

My hand-held approach is slightly different. I normally use either a Panasonic GH-2 (broad band) with Coastal Optics 60 APO lens and the Baader U2 inside the lens adapter, or Nikon D3200 (with internal Baader U2) plus the UV-Nikkor 105. some times even a D600 (broad band) and the UV-Nikkor running in LV mode and with a Zacoto finder attached. The flash usually is the SB-14 held in my left hand. That allows me to position the flash head optimally with regard to the subject.

 

I quickly decide on a desired magnification of detail (focusing the lens), then just sway back and forth until perfect focus is achieved then push the release. A preview peek to ascertain acceptable focus and exposure are attained, then move on to take the comparison visible image (often with a D300 and a modified Medical-Nikkor 120 mm f/4 having a built-in ring flash and a CPU).

 

This setup allows for a very rapid pace of work enabling me literally to flitter around which say in Botanical Gardens nearly always is required to avoid drawing unwanted attention by staff or security. There are such Gardens that regard 'professional photography' to entail paying stiff licensing fees, even though the Garden itself is public property and paid for over the national budget. If you fumble around with setting up a tripod, they're on to you in the blink of an eye. Just bow down and grab the shot and you're gone before they have decided what you are, if they ever notice you.

[enricosavazzi]

I am aware that UK museums, for quite a few years, have been desperately hunting every perceived source of profit, no matter how unlikely or small, by claiming exclusive copyright on any pictures of the material in their care taken by anybody for any reason. Over ten years ago I had to sign lengthy documents stating - basically - that any pictures I was going to take at the collections of the Natural History Museum in London (during the course of a fellowship paid by UK public money) were not mine but theirs. They were generously letting me use my pictures for any non-profit purposes, though.

 

Apparently public institutions in Norway are doing the same or worse now. As far as I know, Swedish ones are not there yet, but who knows what will happen when I show up with a camera at the botanical gardens next year? I have also read of many amateur photographers armed with cameras being stopped in name of UK anti-terror laws. UK police is definitely convinced that terrorist use large, heavy and expensive cameras, and consequently, are stopping for investigation people who use one of these in a public place. Time to learn Bjørn's "touch and go" no-tripod technique. Has anybody learned how to convert Google Glass to UV imaging? I might get one of these implanted intra-ocularly some day. Do they trigger a metal detector?

[Timber]

oh then let's not talk about the laws in Hungary, where photographing people in public is illegal :D

[nfoto]

You could snap them in UV and claim they were invisible at the time :D

[enricosavazzi]

oh then let's not talk about the laws in Hungary, where photographing people in public is illegal :D

Funny, in Sweden it is about the only thing that it is legal to photograph. Should I be caught photographing flowers in a park I might claim I thought they were little people.