We went to Hanging Rock, Mt. Macedon, and Rupertswood Mansion on the weekend, per my suggestion, to try and get some decent shots. No luck - landscapes are amazingly hard to capture. The day wasn’t too bad, but the photos were very definitely disappointing:
- Having a large aperture doesn’t mean you have to use it. Quite a few of the shots I took with the 50mm would probably have benefited from a wider depth of field. They still turned out OK, but I think I would have preferred them a bit more if the focus area had been larger.
- When the subject matter is boring, focus on composition. It’s very possibly my eye, but the vast majority of what we saw was extremely boring. Very nice in person (and very peaceful), but highly monochromatic, too large for the frame, too regular, and no variation in texture. So, like a fool, I kept shooting and trying to fix the framing. Not a hope - what I should have done was start thinking in black and white and focused on deliberately blowing highlights, given up on the 18-135mm and stuck with the 50mm alone, or basically attempted anything to vary my composition.
- Never forget the gremlins are out to screw you up. I actually shot two panoramas, but the first one screwed up because I forgot I had auto-ISO enabled. So, even though the camera was on manual when I shot them (I’m not entirely dumb), the colour still varied between shots because the ISO jumped from 100 to 125 between them. So, only one panorama was usable. Which was a pity, really - I enjoyed how the one I took turned out, so I’ll have to try doing some more.
I got a few decent shots, but nowhere near my zoo visit. I’m trying to recover some of the more average ones by playing around with black and white filters, but it’s like trying to polish a turd. OK, maybe not that bad, but it’s close.
I figure I’ll hit the city this weekend and try to get some late afternoon / early evening shots. Might take the tripod, too.
Other stuff I did over the weekend:
- Finally bottled my beer - it’s been sitting in the vats for about a month. I did another Cerveza and an Indian Pale Ale - will be very interesting to see how the second turns out. They’d been sitting so long, every bottle but the first came out crystal clear.
- Cleaned the yard, picked up dog poo, the usual.
- Played some Lord of the Rings Online.
Stuff I need to do:
- Finish off my second thoughts on Japan piece.
- Populate my events calendar, my attempt to track what’s of interest photographically in Melbourne. I need a dumping ground where I can put everything I come across that has interesting subject matter.