How I Do: Ring Shots while Testing Nikon's 105mm f/2.8 Micro Lens!

Over the weekend I rented a Nikon 105mm f/2.8G ED-IF AF-S VR Micro-Nikkor Lens from LensRentals.com.  Their review about it explicitly warns that once you try it you will want to keep it.  It was so hard for me to ship it back yesterday because I did want to keep it.  I currently use the 60mm f/2.8 from Nikon for my macro shots and while that is great, the compression on the 105mm just is so awesome.  I definitely can see the benefit of having 45 extra mm hehehe!  You are also less likely to be in the way of your own light and such.  I feel like it's a lot easier to get a super big shot of a ring if you'd like it to fill the frame as well... or at least you don't have to do as much cropping in post compared to the 60mm. :)  

It's currently around $900 bucks and if it weren't for the fact that I'm saving up for the D4, I'd totally snatch it up.  But for now, at least I can rent it when I do weddings :)  I always suggest renting a lens first before buying it so you can really see if you have a need for it! 

Here's some shots of my own wedding ring taken with the 105mm - if you get a chance, rent it and try it out too!!
 

All of these were taken using items in my kitchen LOL.  

Window light was coming in directly to the left of the kitchen table.

Here's what I had at my disposal:
- banana tree

- big fake diamond paperweight

- water bottles

- laptop cooler (the black thingy) 

Note:  I started out with auto focus, but quickly switched to manual.  Auto is good in some respects, for the 105mm it's very fast, but sometimes it couldn't pick up what I wanted to be in focus since my ring is a bit ... elaborate and sometimes I wanted to the bigger diamond in focus but other times I wanted the side diamonds to be focused.

So.. when I started, I felt the shots were decent but.. nothing was like wow to me:

The bokeh in this first one is the water bottles, although it almost looks like.. the background could be a window with storefronts showing through or something.. at least in my mind lol.


ISO 1600, f/9, 1/60 sec

Then I tried getting some leading line action in... 

 ISO 1600, f/9, 1/125 sec

Eh, it's okay, it's a start hehe! 

I took a minute to rethink things and do some rearranging.

 This one is the banana tree hook with bokeh from its own wooden stand and I think there's a little brown candle box behind the stand as well.  

ISO 800, f/5.6, 1/160 sec

This is my ring on my laptop's fan cooler.. with the big fake diamond paperweight serving as a reflective surface. 


ISO 1600, f/7.1, 1/100 sec

 This is the banana tree's hook with the big fake diamond paperweight serving as bokeh.  I had to move the diamond around to make sure it caught the window light correctly to produce the different colors.


ISO 1600, f/7.1, 1/125 sec

 

As you can see, although the kitchen had a decent amount of light flowing in, the backgrounds seem to be rather black in the latter images.  It has to do with light falloff.  I'm not going to botch an explanation but basically, I placed my background items further back from the light source, and as a result, the light captured in the background by the camera tapers off dramatically.  Also I was shooting at f/7.1 or higher for most of the pics.

So I'm happy with getting from where I started to where I ended up.  I think that you can definitely find ways to turn something ordinary into something extraordinary.  Not that I'm winning awards or anything but I am happy with what I was able to do with things I found in my kitchen hehehe!

I love the 105mm 2.8 for ring shots.  I definitely see myself renting this for my upcoming weddings.  

Hope my thought process didn't bore you too much hehe!

How I Do: Ring Shots

I want to do more "How To" stuff, so let me talk about my favorite sing shots so far.  For all of these shots I have used my 60mm micro f/2.8 lens from Nikon.  I usually get in pretty close and manually focus... but sometimes you have to be careful not to get in the way of your own light hehe!

When I get a ring, I first look for a surface that has texture.  I love texture.  That's what happened in this frst image.  I was at a bookstore and saw this table..

ISO 3600, f/9, 1/50 sec

And this bookshelf..

ISO 1600, f/4.5, 1/50 sec

My shutter speed here is pretty slow for handheld.  I wouldn't suggest going this slow unless you really have a steady hand, and in the future, I probably would not do this either, instead I'd raise the ISO a bit so my shutter speed could be faster.  Since I was indoor, my ISO was pretty high to begin with.  I decided to go with black and white to focus more on the textures than the colors.

For my next shot I started with this shot of a treasure chest that contained an engagement ring.  This was outdoors on a table in front of a cafe.

I was pretty happy but now I wanted a compelling ring shot.   I placed the ring near the edge of the table, several inches in front of the treasure chest, and composed my image so that the ring was in sharp focus. That caused the treasure chest to make some interesting bokeh in the background.  

ISO 200, f/5.6, 1/500 sec, 60mm

Make sure your aperture is small enough that the whole diamond is in sharp focus. For me, f/5.6 was able to do the trick.  It gets more tricky when you have smaller diamonds surrounding a larger one, you might have to go to f/7.1 or smaller if you want them in focus as well...

Lastly, I found a shiny surface that was actually the hotel's brochure/book thingy.  It was like a spiral notebook with a shiny textured surface as seen below.  I placed it by the window for natural light and this was my initial image...

But.. what can I do to make it more interesting?

I started looking for something to use as bokeh and found the garter:

So... I did the same thing as the previous example - I placed the ring a few inches in front of the garter and was able to come up with some interesting bokeh.. especially because the garter was reflected by the surface of the hotel book.  I decided I liked the smaller diamonds being out of focus in this case so I just kept the aperture at f/4.2. 

ISO 400, f/4.2, 1/400, 60mm

So yeah, just wanted to share :)

Flowers Flowers Everywhere! Philadelphia Flower Show 2011

My best friend Grace and I went to the Philadelphia Flower Show last night.  It was BEAUTIFUL!!!  I really had a field day taking pics here, just great practice and a change of pace from photo shoots hehehe :)  There was so much to look at, and people are soooo creative with flowers!  It's AMAZING!  Here's some highlights/favorite shots.  I had a bit of fun getting close and personal with the flowers using my macro lens.  Other times I used the zoom to blur the background more.  I think I will definitely want to go again next year.  And I also have a year pass to Longwood Gardens so I can't wait to utilize that as well!

Well, time to get back to editing and album design :)  Take care everyone!

Click to enlarge!

Lips, Rings, & Dreaming Big

I decided to practice a few things today by giving myself an assignment.  I want to find textures in every day environments and capture them.  So I brought out my macro lens and just kept shooting.

Here's my two favorite from today. With this first one, I'm trying to see light in new ways... and at the same time I'm loving the texture in my friend's lips hehehe.

 

This one was taken at Barnes & Noble.  I walked around and found this texture in a bookshelf.  Beauty is all around us, and I'm going to work harder to find it.

Today I read Jasmine Star's very first blog posts from when she just started out as a wedding photographer 4 years ago.  It was so inspiring.  She basically made something from nothing and now is one of the top wedding photographers in the world.  I think I really admire how she laid out her goals for both herself and everyone to know.  Her blog is raw, personal, HONEST.  She knew she wanted to pursue this dream, and told the world how she wished to hang with the big guns, so to speak.  I followed her words as she talked of experiences that she never thought would happen to her, meeting big shot photographers, and then second shooting with photographers she only dreamed of meeting!  But she called it.  From the very beginning, she said what she wanted and she made it happen.

My dreams may not be quite as big as hers, or even as clear cut, but I wanna put them out here too.  I want to be honest.  I want to be a successful wedding and family photographer.  I want to capture people's happiness and joy in the photographs that I take.  I want to be creative, innovative, and distinct.  I want to find my own style.  I know with God's help, I can achieve this.  I've gotten this far, having started my business this past February.. and I'm committed.  I'm ready to go all or nothing.  I have so much to learn, but I'm gonna do my best.  After all, that's all you CAN do.  You don't know unless you try.