Exploring the wonders of creation through a 50mm lens...and other lenses too.

As far back as I can remember, I have enjoyed shooting photos on rainy days. Something about the overcast lighting, the rain falling, and the subdued feeling of just being outside in those conditions elevates the art of photography for me, and I find that I enjoy the act of taking photos in the rain even if the end result doesn’t even work out. But when I do come back from taking photos on a dreary day with something that looks good enough to put up on Weekly Fifty…well, that’s a good day in my book.

This picture kind of reminds me of one that I took years ago with my 50mm lens and close-up filters, and it was these early shots that taught me so much about doing close-up photography–enough that I feel like I’m not entirely starting from scratch with my new 105mm macro lens. It’s not just about finding an interesting subject (in this case, a drop of water on a leaf) but looking at the light, the foreground, the background, the colors, the depth of field, and everything else that goes into making an interesting photograph. On this picture I intentionally composed things so that the droplet would be somewhat backlit, as I wanted to get a glistening shine on the top edge. I also wanted a bit of foreground blur and tried to get the subject as sharp as possible, though that is almost always more difficult than it seems since water droplets don’t play nicely with a camera’s autofocus system.

To get this image I knelt low to the ground, got close to the leaf, adjusted the aperture, and fired off a few shots. I wasn’t happy with the results, so I adjusted the aperture some more, repeated the process…and nothing. The pictures just weren’t that great, and I couldn’t figure out why. Turns out that what I thought was a small aperture (f/8, f/13) was way too large when photographing tiny water droplets up close. I ended up shooting this at f/19, 1/90 second (thanks to the Vibration Reduction on this lens), ISO 100, and even at f/19 the depth of field is still razor thin. It’s like I’m having to re-learn everything I know about taking pictures as I use this Macro lens, and it’s awesome. I’m super happy with how this shot turned out and can’t wait to keep shooting it to find out what else it can do.

One thing I have found myself doing with my new Macro lens is returning to shots I took years ago, and reimagining them now that I have better gear for the job. Or, in this case, maybe just copying and pasting :) Way back in August of 2013 I posted this shot of a moth sitting on a flower that I took in the OSU Formal Gardens with my 50mm lens. It was, and still is, a good picture (IMHO) and I am pleased with the colors, the light, and the clarity with which my humble little Nikon D200 was able to capture the subject. It was also a good learning experience for me, and that one image taught me a lot about capturing insects in the form of digital images. So when I got this 105mm Macro lens I wanted to take it out for a spin, photographically speaking, and see if how it would handle that same type of composition.

Spoiler alert: It was amazing.

One of my favorite things about this lens is how there’s no limit to what you can focus on–at least not in a practical sense. It works on things that are super close, super far, and everything in between. When using close-up filters you are generally limited only to subjects that are…well, close-up. You can’t screw on a +4 filter and shoot a picture of something that’s far away. But with a macro lens, you have all the focusing freedom you need. The 105mm focal length lets me get close to insects like this one while remaining a little farther away so as not to scare them. So when I saw this moth drinking nectar from the same patch of flowers as the original image way back in 2013, I was eager to see what kind of a picture I could get.

I followed this moth for a minute or two, adjusting my vantage point and snapping photos as it went from flower to flower while holding my finger down on the back button AE-L/AF-L button and adjusting the aperture from f/8 to f/13 and back just to see how it would work. This picture was my favorite of the bunch and required very little editing, and even at f/8 you can see how incredibly shallow the depth of field is. I like the bit of flower on the left which is obscuring the wings, as it adds a bit of three-dimensionality to the image and makes it seem like I am peeking in on a hidden world.

Anyone who has spent time up north is surely familiar with the call of the loon: the sound that signifies summer sunsets, evening campfires, and time spent with friends and family by the lake. I grew up in Minnesota and also lived there for five years as an adult, and all it takes is one high-pitched warble to immediately transport me a thousand miles to the north woods at dusk. I took this sound for granted most of the time I lived up in that part of the country but now, having spent more than a decade living in the sweeping prairie of Oklahoma, I miss it a great deal. And that’s why pictures like the one you see here are so special to me :)

While this might appear to be a loon swimming on a lake, that’s not actually the case at all. This is a small painted-wood replica of a loon, about 1.5 inches from beak to tail, sitting on top of an overturned glass bowl in front of a crumpled piece of aluminum foil.

This is a technique I have used before but never with an actual macro lens, and the results are kind of stunning. At least to me, anyway. I shot this at f/11 but it looks more like f/2.8 because the background is so blurry and the depth of field is razor-thin. That’s the benefit of using a macro lens though, especially a telephone one like the Nikon 105 f/2.8 FL-ED. It lets you get super close to subjects, even tiny things like this little loon, and get amazing photos without the need to zoom in or crop in post. Originally I had not planned on using an overturned bowl but I kind of like the effect, almost like this is a real loon making ripples on the surface of a calm lake.

Incidentally, I got this loon from my mom years ago and I love having it sit on our shelf in the living room–If you’re reading this entry, thank you Mom!

If you have been following Weekly Fifty for a while, you know how much I enjoy doing close-up shots of…well, pretty much anything. I got a set of close-up filters way back in…2015? 2016? I can’t remember anymore but my goodness I have used those things a lot over the years. It’s so fun to discover the beauty in everything around us that is often overlooked simply because aren’t looking close enough. Ordinary objects like pencils and toys and flowers become works of art when viewed up close, and a cheapo set of screw-on filters can help you unlock this magical world just waiting to be discovered.

But you know what’s even better? An actual macro lens :)

In October I finally got a lens I have been looking at for a long, long time: The Nikon 105mm f/2.8G IF-ED. I know there are newer F-mount macro lenses with similar focal lengths from third parties like Sigma and Tamron, but I have had my heart set on this particular lens and was glad to finally pick it up when Nikon had a sale recently. And my goodness, this thing is incredible. What you’re seeing here is the first of many close-up shots you are likely to see over the coming weeks and months, all thanks to this lens. This was actually one of the first pictures I took with it, and it showed me how incredible this lens is but also how much I have to learn. And when it comes to photography, I sure do enjoy learning.

A couple of things to note here: First, this was shot at f/19. Seriously. That just goes to show just how insane things like depth of field are when working at close distances. This piece of candy is less than an inch from front to back and yet, only about half of it is in focus. Maybe a third. And that’s at f/19! I used a tripod, ISO 100, and a 3-second exposure to get this shot and it hopefully gives you an idea of how little the margin of error is when working at such close distances. This is just an ordinary piece of candy, but it could almost be a work of art just because we are seeing it so close.

Yeah…I’m looking forward to learning more about this lens :)

I just love shooting pictures in the fog. It’s one of the most challenging conditions in which to take photos, but the results are singular. There’s just no other way to get shots like this unless conditions are just right. You can’t fake this, and most of the time you can’t even plan for it. You just have to keep your eyes open, recognize these opportunities when you see them, and have your gear ready (along with a knowledge of how to use it) to get a shot. When my kids and I went outside on this particular morning in mid-October during the fall of 2021 I didn’t even have any specific intention to take this picture, but as soon as we left the house and started playing in the street we all realized just how incredibly thick the fog was. We could barely see across the street, much less down the street to our neighbor’s house. Right away I knew I could get an interesting photo but it would require some quick thinking before the fog evaporated.

I told my oldest son to get my bike, ride to the corner, and then cycle back slowly so I could take a few pictures. While he was on the way down I grabbed my d500 and 70-200 f/2.8 lens, and after a little while I honestly couldn’t even see him through the thick cloud that had descended on our neighborhood. He soon turned around and started the return trip, and I basically just fired off dozens of shots at f/2.8 hoping I would get one where he was right in the middle of the street like you see here. I didn’t want to bark orders to him about where to go and how to look, since the entire scene had a strange, calm stillness to it that was almost palpable. The result is something that looks like a shot out of a scary movie, and one that I don’t think I’ll be able to repeat any time soon…if ever.

Three notes about the image: Yes it has been edited to remove my son’s face. I don’t post pictures of my kids online publicly, but I really wanted to share this particular image, so the result is the compromise you see here. I used Photoshop to essentially copy/paste some fog over his head so you can’t see his face, and if that’s too much editing…well, it’s a creative choice I can easily live with. The other note concerns the car in the background, which you might not even notice at first. It’s actually much farther away than it might seem, and I can assure you my son was not in danger at all. A few seconds after this I did let him know that a car was coming up the street, and he had plenty of time to pull over and let it pass. I think it adds kind of an interesting layer to the image though, almost like he is being stalked by a nameless monster–one that you might not even see at first but is definitely there once you look a bit closer. Finally, even though this looks like it was edited to be black-and-white, I can promise you that what you see here is what we saw on this morning: a world shrouded in fog, devoid of color. It was really cool.