Whimsical Fun with a Fisheye Lens

Fisheye lenses aren't for every occasion, but they are certainly a good idea  in certain instances like this one where I wanted to get everything (house, deck and pool) in the photo.  You can even see my shadow in the pool since I got up on top of the slide to take the picture (:g).

I like the way that the fisheye bends the trees in a whimsical fashion.  Hey, if you are looking for an arbor of trees without any luck you can always take along a fisheye and create one!

Fisheyes are great for panorama photos.  Here I wanted to get the old historical building, the beautiful palm trees and a hint of the modern building next door.

In this case I think that the fisheye effect gave the photo of this Mexican restaurant a more tropical feel as the deck and its tiki like umbrellas wrap around the building.

In this fisheye photo of my kitchen I added a white vignette to enhance the effect. My fisheye lens is an 8mm Rokinon (all manual...no auto settings).  I keep the lens set at Infinity and f5.6.  This is a Nikon mount lens.  I used it for these photos on my Nikon D300 camera.  The Rokinon lens is really built strong. It looks great, and the optics are terrific but it costs a pittance of what it's Nikon competitor sells for. Rokinon offers fisheye lenses for other camera bodies as well.  I added one to my wishlist for my Olympus EM-5 too.

 A fisheye is a great lens when you want to give your photography a creative charge.  I like to put mine on the camera,then I leave all of my other lenses in the bag at home and just spend a few hours seeing what I can create with the fisheye. What do you think?

New Mousepad from a favorite photo.

I just had a mousepad made up by Shutterfly from a photograph that I took of the interior of my convertible. I am thrilled with it and thought that I would share it. The photo was taken with my compact Panasonic DMC LF-1. I mounted the camera on an X-Shot Extender pole and used a 10 second delay to take the photo. 

First Look - New Olympus 60mm f3.8 Macro Lens

 My new 60mm (120mm) f2.8 Olympus Macro lens just arrived.  I am sharing a few handheld photos that I took around the house with the lens on my EM-5...all at f2.8.  I have not touched these photos except for cropping.  I was particularly interested in the bokeh that I would get.  Pretty good I think 

I can't wait to get this baby on a tripod and get some photos of flowers.  What do you think?

Photo Book

Click here to view this photo book larger

Shutterfly allows you to customize your photo book just the way you want.

Sedona Arizona Favorite Photos

Moon rise at Cathedral Rock

Lynn and I just returned from a great week in the Sedona-Cottonwood-Clarkdale, Arizona area.  This is a great spot for beautiful scenery, color and iconic southwest photo ops.  The photo of the moon rise at Cathedral Rock is an HDR.  The moon rise over the mountain makes it special.  I am thankful to an Arizona photographer that was shooting beside me for this rare opportunity.  I was ready to pack up my gear when the fellow next to me suggested that I might want to wait another minute or two...and voila...this is the scene that I was able to get.  My mystery friend said that he consults the iPhone app The Photographer's Ephemeris for the position of the full moon rising.  He drives from Flagstaff to Sedona upon every full moon to get the photo that I was lucky enough to stumble upon!

Sunset over Hangover Mountain

We took a 4 wheel drive trip up Schebley Hill Road in one of the Sedona iconic Pink Jeeps.  This might sound like an easy trip, but as soon as you leave the pavement you are on a non-maintained road that is about as bumpy as you will ever see.  Don't attempt this in anything but a 4 wheel drive vehicle with plenty of clearance.  There was still some mild smoke from the recent forest fires hanging over the mountains, but I was thrilled to get this sunset photo from the 6,000 foot summit.

The train station at Clarkdale is just a 30 minute drive from Sedona.  This is where the Verde Valley Railroad begins its 4 hour round trip journey along the Verde River to Perkinsville.  I love this 1940s era railroad.  You can buy an Economy Class ticket and shoot your heart out from the open, but covered cars that are next to every enclosed car.  The high desert scenery is magnificent and you just might see a bald eagle in flight.  

Sedona-Cottonwood-Clarkdale - It is paradise for the photographer.

Home Town Photos.

Safety Harbor Gazebo

I have found that some of the best photo opportunities are right here in my own backyard.  I try to pass through the historic Main Street in Safety Harbor near my home at least once a day to get ideas for photo projects.  I have been photographing the Safety Harbor Gazebo in John Wilson Park for many years. The city does a beautiful job of  rotating the flowers in front of the Gazebo seasonally.

Yesterday, during my visit to town I spotted this beautiful new planting and just felt the necessity to photograph this scene with my Panasonic Lumix DMC-LF1, my tiny go-everywhere camera.  This camera also is my constant companion on my daily walks.  It is amazing the different things that I have photographed right in my own backyard...wildlife, landscapes, architecture, people and flowers.

 Butterfly on Red Flowers

The photo above was taken at a new park in town, Mullet Creek Nature Park. The local garden club is doing a great job in keeping the flowering plants blooming.

Neighborhood Sunrise

This sunrise photo was taken literally outside of my front door.  I was out just before sunrise to pick up the newspaper when I spotted this incredible sunrise.  I knew that I only had seconds before this scene would be gone.  I ran in the house and grabbed the Panasonic DMC-LF1 and took this picture just an instant before this beautiful scene disappeared. 

Learn your neighborhood...Walk around...Get some great photographs.

Africa in Monochrome

Recently I began a project that involved creating many of my nature images that I took while on several Africa safaris into monochrome images.

It is fun and sometimes it is rewarding to go back to your earlier photos and try to do something unique with them.  I think that the monochrome treatment offers that opportunity.

I use both Nik Silver Efex Pro 2 as well as One On Software's Perfect Black & White program in conjunction with Lightroom and Photoshop to get the best creative images from the color rendition.

Vervet Monkey 

Bat Eared Fox

All of these images were taken in Kenya, but these are just a few of my conversions.  I have many thousands of wildlife images from all over southern Africa.  I know that this endeavor should keep me busy for quite a while.