continuing with the lensbaby effort... i'm starting to realize a number of reasons why i am struggling so badly with this... a big one is that it strikes me that the lensbaby is best suited to a brightly lit chaotic environment... however, for my set up shots, i tend to aim for dark and minimalistic... for this shot i'd have preferred to make the background completely black, but i think that would have defeated the purpose of using the lensbaby so i've left some of it visible... sort of... maybe...
for the dogwood challenge as this was shot full-on manual...
i was using the LB sweet35 set to f/2.5 (I think... it's always possible i shifted it by accident)... these lenses require manual focus... i am hoping the little "offshoot" is in focus...
ISO 400 was more by accident than by design... i hadn't reset it back to 100 after yesterday's shoot (the chair kept swinging on the thread so i needed a fast shutter speed)... that said, i tend to like 400 ISO to allow for a softer focus / light effect which seemed appropriate in this instance...
i experimented with various shutter speeds and picked 1/160 as it seemed to provide the best balance between the dark of the background and the light of the garlic...
this was processed in LR, a couple splotchy bits were fixed in PS, and then converted to b&w in silver fx...
What I like about this is thinking it was a swan and then seeing it was a garlic bulb. So something is happening with soft focus and blur. I find LB tough for the reasons you stated, and also that I tend to prefer structure in all that I do, along with clarity unless I'm fiddling with textures, and even then, I need something clear for my eye to land on. With a LB, it's hard even to get that one focal point to be sharp. It's been interesting to push myself to use it and I'm enjoying the learning, but suspect it will never become a preferred lens for me.
I've just been made aware that we have previously had a garlic challenge. So could I please ask you to change your tag to
mundane-garlic2 so that I don't get mixed up when selecting the finalists.
I enjoyed reading your explanation of the shot, and found the thought process and rationale somewhat reassuring. Thank you. Also reading about the reasons why lensbaby and you aren't getting on well is interesting. Whatever you do, to create your own style, keep on doing it - I always love to see what you have come up with.
January 19th, 2018
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I've just been made aware that we have previously had a garlic challenge. So could I please ask you to change your tag to
mundane-garlic2 so that I don't get mixed up when selecting the finalists.