MorseBlog

I am catching up on some work these past couple of days now that my initial digital intensity has subsided. A result of my earlier project around Houghton meadows was that there were some printable images that I wanted to lith print. One did not turn out well, but a couple of others did.  One obvious candidate was the Heron viewed through the reeds in the water. I printed this conventionally to include in my photo books. The negative does not have much contrast despite being pushed because of the mist and early morning light. The conventional print was done entirely on the #5 filter, and I was not able to get completely black shadows without losing the highlights in the water. I compromised somewhere in the middle. It makes for a good print despite this as the print reflects the conditions on a foggy morning. I made some lith prints on Oriental Seagull paper as well as Fohar Raster which I have to think of as having more soul especially when toned. Since the Rater paper is 5x7" (...

There is this idea in photography that gets a lot of discussion at times depending it seems on if it is trending in some social media channel like YouTube. It is also a descriptive term some photographers use for images that might be taken in 'soft' light, perhaps with some light fog or mist or with a lens that is not stopped down very hard. The term that often comes up is 'painterly' which usually means 'like a painting'. I won't get into the obvious ironies here only recognize this is an idea or an objective in some people's photography.  I mention this because I have run across this before and have even made a few images I described this way. More recently I watched a YouTube video of a Venezuelan photographer Samantha Cavet who has made this part of her style. The video is here...    My examples are here... No doubt debatable but the idea is there. These were not intended but the light and the film colluded for a unique look.  This first one has a s...

As I mentioned in a previous post I had found some inspiration for a photography project that morphed into a small photobook. To recap the book will be hardcover in A5 (210mm x148mm) in landscape orientation. I am publishing this at Mixam my favorite photo-book publisher .  I received my softcover proof copies the other day and they came out nicely. I substituted one photo that I decided didn't look so nice. Since they were black and white images, I opted to print a monochrome book. The images came out nicely. I updated my minor changes and reformatted it for hardcover. This involves changing the number of pages and reshuffling a little to make sure the pages I wanted to land across from each still do. I use softcover to save a little money on the proofs before committing to the more expensive hardcover run. I have found with these softcover books with 32 sides (internal pages) 8 copies cost as much as one. So I order a batch of proof as they usually turn out well enough to give to...

As I discussed before I picked up a couple of cheap K&S adapters for Nikon F and Olympus OM lenses. I have a few of each in each lens family and I wanted to evaluate them on the GFX 50s ii for vignetting. The sensor is only 44mm across, so larger than 36mm full frame but not so big as 56mm fil medium format film. There are some discussions on forums that mention some lenses that perform well with the GFX series cameras. Sadly, my lenses do not seem to be amongst them.  I have the following lenses. OM Series Zuiko 28mm f2.8 This is a nice wide lens. Generally regarded as a very good lens.  Zuiko 135mm f2.8 This lens get consistently great reviews. It can be quite costly to buy second hand. Mine I bought in almost mint condition. Tamron 70-210mm f4-5.6 Again a well-liked lens surprising for a non-Zuiko lens.  Nikon F Series Nikkor 50mm f1.4 This is a classic lens and well-made and a joy to use. It was optimized for black and white and as such has a slightly yellow coati...