The third new lens I purchased at the beginning of the year was a Sigma 105mm f/2.8 DG DN Macro Art Lens. I had a 50mm macro lens, but I needed a longer macro lens.
Here are the first pictures I took with it:
I might go into some technical details about the lens at some point in the future, we’ll see.
At the moment of the publishing of this journal entry, my Covid vaccine will be fully marinated. It will have been two weeks since my second shot. While life won’t return to normal exactly, I look forward to at least, maybe eating in a restaurant, or maybe having a movie night without masks, when the rest of my Movie Night friends have their vaccines fully marinated. It feels pretty great!
After I purchased the Velvet 85 for my Christmas present to myself, I also decided to purchase a wide angle zoom lens in January. I ended up purchasing two more lenses actually, but the wide angle zoom lens was the first.
I purchased the Tamron 17-28 f/2.8 Di III RXD Lens. I’m not going to get into any technical details of the lens, I’m just going to share the first set of pictures I took with it.
I might into the technical aspects of this lens at some point. Just not quite yet.
I should point out that I messed up the coding in yesterday’s post. You should go to that post again to see the corrections in the code that allow you to see Kim’s and Shannon’s submissions.
My Christmas present to my self was a Lensbaby Velvet 85mm f/1.8 lens. I was going to do a whole thing on it, but I have owned if for going on 5 months now and I think it is just time to share the first few pictures I took with it.
Rather than going into any of those technical details, here is a description from the Lensbaby website:
A manual focus portrait lens from Lensbaby that’s dreamy and delicate — or tack sharp and subtly vintage at 85mm.
Create soulful portraits with our Velvet 85 art lens. Compose impressionistic masterpieces with a velvety glow at bright apertures, straight out of camera. Use darker apertures to bypass glow and make images with a crisp, film-like aesthetic.
Building on the strengths of our bestselling Velvet 56 lens, Velvet 85 combines lustrous skin tones with the added compression and buttery smooth bokeh found in the best 85mm portrait lenses. Use its macro capabilities to capture significant details with new life.
The Velvet 85 design features a solid heft and smooth, dampened manual focus.
Here are the first few pictures I took with it:
I actually have two other lenses I purchased around the same time. Those lenses are more practical, but I’ll discuss them at some point in the future.
There was a decent amount of submissions for TRAVEL. It looks like several people left their house this weekend and had TRAVEL adventures.
But you didn’t come here to listen to me talk all tommyrot about participation rates. You came to see the submissions:
Elizabeth Nordeen
Jodie Cue
Jodie Cue
Christopher D. Bennett
Jodie Cue
Kim Barker
Shannon Bardole-Foley
Kio Dettman
Kio Dettman
Mike Vest
Carla Stensland
Carla Stensland
Carla Stensland
But enough dwelling on the past. Time to look to the future. We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future! This week’s theme:
FACE! Another great theme for Year 8 of THE WEEKLY PHOTO CHALLENGE.
A FACE image is pretty simple. It is merely a picture where a FACE is a major compositional element. Everybody has access to a FACE. Almost everybody either has a FACE or knows somebody that has a FACE. But not just humans have a FACE. Animals have a FACE. Clocks have a FACE. Even cliffs have a FACE.
Think about the following quote when you are contemplating your FACE image:
Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the human face.
-Victor Hugo
Meditate on this quote and I have no doubt your submission will be one that is ready to FACE the world.
The picture has to be taken between 12:01 PM today and 11 AM next Monday. This isn’t a curate your photos project. This is a get your butt off the couch (unless you are taking your picture from the couch) and take pictures challenge.
You can send your images to either bennett@photography139.com OR you may text them to my Pixel 5.
That is all I got, so if the good Lord’s willin’ and the creek don’t rise, we will all be sharing our idea of FACE in this place that sometimes doesn’t know which way to FACE next Monday.
The pictures in the folder are from when the Creek formerly known as Squaw flooded Duff Avenue in the August of 2010. I’m not being sarcastic, I just know that they recently changed the name of Squaw Creek, I just have no clue what they changed it to. Ioway maybe?
By adding these pictures to the Photography 139 Gallery, I was able to restore the following historic “An Artist’s Notebook” entry to their original glory:
Next week’s walk down memory lane will involve flowers and Jesse, but not necessarily together.
