We took a drive down to the Frosty Drew observatory to catch a glimpse of the comet and do some stargazing. Couldn’t get a pic of the comet, but ended up with some keepers anyhow. These were shot with my Canon SL3 which I brought along since I’ve got a better suited lens for that camera. However, the high-ISO noise still drives me a bit batty on that body. Though, truth be told, I do like the ergonomics of the Canon much more than the Fuji (flippy screen, touch screen, menus, etc.)
On Sunday before Memorial Day, Emily and Violet and I tromped around the trails near our home. Izzy had left hours before to do more adventurous hiking in CT, but we opted for a 10-minute-drive sort of hike. On the trail, we spied an Osprey, a Heron, a Japanese shore crab, and a curious Robin. Not bad for a Sunday morning!
p.s. I had unwittingly left both of my new fancy camera bodies at the workshop, so I grabbed my Canon T3 & the long zoom for this walk. Other than the vignetting on the zoom, it’s still a pretty fantastic combo.
On Valentine’s Day, Emily and I took a stroll down to the “beach” (waterline by the house) and took some pics. The wind was pretty fierce and the temperature below freezing, so we didn’t hang around too long, but managed to grab a couple of good shots with my Canon SL3.
Snuck in an 30-minute photo walk in Bristol this past Sunday around 4:30pm. The day was overcast, but found a couple of nice shots at the water’s edge.
And, a couple shots from an early morning walk a week ago. I didn’t have my Canon SL3 with me, so I snapped these with my iPhone 11 instead. The colors were spectacular.
Avoiding the task of working on the company budget for 2020, last Saturday I walked around the town and captured some images. The day was overcast, and Warren is threadbare, so it all looks a bit sad. There’s a auto shop of sorts next to our workshop that has a Sanford and Sons vibe.
I really like this shot of the lonely mailbox, not exactly sure why.
A rig truck parked by the grave marker lot has loads of texture.
This utilitarian building never had good looks to spare, but time hasn’t improved the aesthetic.
A couple more worn out bits left to decay.
Around 2am, some fog had descended back home. Before falling asleep, I took a long exposure shot out in the road. The result was pretty good.
Tonight was a great night for stargazing without a hint of moon. Around 10pm, I bundled up and trundled down to the river.
Got a couple of nice shots of Orion and The Pleiades.
Orion
Orion and The Pleiades
And, the Big Dipper…
Big Dipper
And a tree in silhouette with stars overhead.
All the above were shot at f2.8 with 8 to 10-sec exposures for minimal trailing, and ISO 800 or 1600 (higher than 1600 just turns into fuzzy noise). To help pop the stars out, I pulled down the dark tones significantly in Lightroom. Without it, there’s just too much city glow in the sky. Still aiming to get out into the country soon.
While I was down at the river, I swung the lens around at the horizon and took some 30-second exposures at ISO 200. Stopping down to limit the light, or open wide for different looks.
Snapping photos is becoming a fun little hobby. I never know how long I will be inspired by an urge, so for the past week I’ve been trying to capitalize on my reinvigorated interest in cameras and photography to get out and take pictures. Watching too many YouTube camera reviews, I got interested in trying some long-exposure photos. On Wednesday night I bundled up and walked half a mile to the bridge near my house to try the technique. A few nights prior I tried an initial experiment, but both the lack of a tripod and my inability to focus through the optical viewfinder resulted in blurred images. I brought my recently purchased inexpensive tripod from Amazon to steady the camera and studied how to focus in manual mode with the rear display in 10x zoom (auto-focus is useless on my camera in the dark). Even better equipped, I only managed to salvage a few shots, but I’m pleased with the first effort. These were all shot with the EF 24mm/2.8, though I’d like to try again with the 50mm/2.0.
During the holiday break (more on that later), I spent an afternoon browsing through old Christmas photos. As I dug through the digital pile, three distinct eras emerged, marked by the quality of the shots.
Good shots with point-and-shoot cameras (either Olympus or Canon depending on the year)
Great shots with my first, and only, DSLR: a Canon Rebel T3.
Smartphone pics ranging from poor to middling quality. My current iPhone 11 takes darned nice pics, but not comparable to the ones snapped with the big sensor & big glass in my entry-level, ancient DSLR.
This inspired me to dust off my Rebel T3 and use it. After annoying my family with loads of shutter clicking around the house, today I took a short trip into Providence to wander around a bit and practice using the camera. I brought two prime lenses with me:
24mm/f2.8 pancake lens
50mm/f1.8 lens
Since they are being screwed onto a cropped sensor you have to multiply the focal length by 1.6x (I hear that’s the Canon-specific multiplier) to get the full-frame equivalent (38mm & 80mm respectively). I love the pancake lens and find it easer to compose the shot using its wider field of view. To get better with the 50mm will take me more practice and perhaps a little more thought before I press the shutter.
In my effort to learn more about this neglected camera, I re-read the manual over the holidays and was experimenting mostly just with the aperture and shutter speed. However, a couple days ago I was also adjusting the white balance on the camera because I noticed the AWB wasn’t always giving great results with my low-light indoor shots. Foolishly, I forgot to reset the white balance before I started on today’s journey. When I stopped for lunch with the family, I downloaded all the shots I’d taken onto my iPad (thank you, USB-C) and saw that I had goofed. All the shots had a severe blue hue, so the ones before lunch had to be adjusted. Lesson learned that I should check all my setting before shooting, and I figured out how to adjust the white balance in Apple Photos. Win, win.
