Vapertureburning
Posted on December 12, 2013
The brilliant red orange sunset contrasted with the muted soft grays and blues of the late evening sky really set this photo off for me. If you allow your eyes to look through the bridge, which is where the spot focus of the camera is, it almost looks like the horizon is on fire, which in a way it is since the sun is what is creating that intense glow.
The Zeiss 28mm f2 lens that I shot this with draw warmth like this so well, especially on the Canon 1DX with its incredible metering capabilities. Wonderful combination for late evening photography, especially with long exposures on a tripod.
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sentry
Posted on December 11, 2013
I don’t know why, but this photo makes me feel as though there is something either dangerous or precious being guarded behind this scene. It’s a very interesting photo with the intense detail and contrast within the branches of the tree, and the subdued turquoise of the old street lamp.
I shot this in the evening light on a very cloudy day with a Carl Zeiss 135mm f2 APO Sonnar lens, and I don’t think any other lens could have pulled this much color and quality out an ordinary scene that was terribly washed out by the cloudy grey light of the day. This is straight out of the camera with no processing of any kind.
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watercolor
Posted on December 10, 2013
I’m amazed almost every day with the colors the sun throws into the sky on its way up in the morning, and I’m equally amazed at how many different sunrises there are! Some are aggressive and bold like unfiltered. Some are calm and expansive like creation. And some of are like a watercolor painting, like this one.
I took this with an 85mm Carl Zeiss lens with the aperture set to f/5.6.
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window pane
Posted on December 9, 2013
Sharply focused rain drops on a glass window taken in the very early morning during a storm. Beautiful out of focus background with the silhouette of the Queensborough Bridge acting like a photograph within a photograph. Captured with a Zeiss 50mm Makro-Planar lens mounted on a Canon 1DX, f/5.6. Zoom in and check out the amazing detail on the rain drops.
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harsh reality
Posted on December 8, 2013
This is the exit of the 59th Street Bridge coming into Manhattan on a Monday morning early in the fall when it was just starting to get cold outside.
The irony of this photo is twofold: 1) the dark clouds and harsh colors of the lighting are so ominous and spot on with the daunting feeling that entering the city for a new work week can produce, 2) this photo was taken with a lens that I purchased, tried for one day, and returned the very next day because I didn’t like it at all (but I love this photo!).
The photo was taken with a Canon 24-70mm f2.8 II zoom lens which has rave reviews consistently across the board. I decided to give it a try because of all the hype, and I ended up returning it within 24 hours. The optics were exceptionally good for a zoom lens, but it could not compare in any way to my standby wide angle street lenses, the Zeiss 25mm f2 and the Zeiss 35mm f1.4. The Canon focus ring was short and stiff, and it felt like an overpriced piece of plastic in my hand. The 70mm focal length is awkward and particularly unaesthetic, and the optics start to suffer at the most useful end of the zoom, 24mm.
Great photo. Not-so-great lens.
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serene
Posted on December 8, 2013
I love the magic that evening light creates. This is an ordinary statue with worn surfaces and washed out colors that suddenly came alive with feeling when I took this close up shot in the late evening while the sun was setting. The colors popped, the shadow divided the composition nicely, and the feeling of serenity that I’m sure the artist intended for this piece suddenly came shining through. This would make an AMAZING large canvas piece! Taken with the most artistic lens I know of… the Zeiss 100mm Makro Planar.
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Canon 1DX vs 5D Mark III
Posted on December 7, 2013
I used a Canon 5D Mark II for years for medical photography in my office, but when the Mark II started spending more time at home than it did in the office, I knew it was time to buy another camera. That’s when I started the exhausting process of researching the differences between the Canon 5D Mark III and the Canon 1DX. I knew I wanted an upgrade from the Mark II, and long story short, I wound up owning both of them.
The Mark III and the 1IX are both very impressive machines, but they serve very different purposes, and, at least in my opinion, they are not interchangeable. Here is how I came to the decision to get both, and my recommendations about which one to get if you only want or need one of them.
chained
Posted on December 6, 2013
I adore shallow depths of field and a soft out of focus backgrounds that pull the subject out of the photo towards you, and that’s exactly what’s happening in this photo.
My focus point was on the center of this chain, and if you zoom in and look closely, you’ll see an incredible amount of detail on the chain itself. I like the composition too… I think it’s an interesting photo that really demonstrates the strengths of the lens that I happened to be using at the time, the Zeiss 50mm Makro Planar. The aperture was wide open at f/2 for this photo, which is why the bokeh is so beautiful, and why the photo has the effect that it does.
What do you think?
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parallel
Posted on December 6, 2013
This photo was taken at a marina in San Diego, CA on an average Saturday morning… and by average, I mean gorgeous, which is how it is every day in San Diego!
The water was so clear that everything had a mirror image reflection that was almost as clear as the real structure itself. It look liked a mini parallel universe through my lens, and even though the Zeiss 50mm f2 Makro probably wasn’t the best tool for the job, it’s what I had on the camera at the time and it captured the scene beautifully.
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lonely
Posted on December 6, 2013
I saw this man rubbing his feet and watching everyone go by in Central Park early one Sunday morning, and it made me think about how lonely you can be in this city even when there are 10 million other people around.
I love the way the photo draws you into this guy even though he is such a small part of the overall image. The shallow depth of field and the blurred background help create this effect and guide your eye to the true subject of the photo. This image wouldn’t be as interesting if the entire thing was in sharp focus unless the composition was completely different which would have taken away from the ‘lonely’ story that I observed when I walked past this man.
Carl Zeiss 35mm f1.4 lens set an an aperture of 1.6 (I wish I had shot it stopped down a bit… f/2 or f/2.5 would have been perfect). Lens mounted on a Canon 5D Mark III camera. Killer combo for New York street photography, as long as your well-practiced with your manual focusing skills.
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north
Posted on December 5, 2013
A 30-second exposure of the northern half of Manhattan and the Upper East Side taken at nighttime with a 35mm lens on a tripod with an aperture of f/11. A crisp, classic, view of New York, and the sister image to the Vaperture homepage photo.
Nighttime photography is incredibly challenging, but also incredibly rewarding when you get the shot you’re after. I am developing a love affair with long exposures at night because they combine an ultra sharp, ultra technical look with a fluid, artistic impression that you can’t get without using a long exposure time. Long exposures capture movement… even the subtle movement of water and the sky. The building obviously don’t move, but the East River, the clouds, and the traffic running along the FDR Drive were moving for the entire 30 seconds that the shutter was open.
And from a technical perspective, I don’t think there is a sharper 35mm lens out there. The Zeiss 35mm 1.4 is phenomenal. I’m still trying to grasp that focal length outside of nighttime landscapes, but it is an incredible piece of glass.
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graffiti
Posted on December 4, 2013
This isn’t graffiti by any stretch of the imagination, but the title felt better to me than what this really is… street art. Gorgeous colors. And I love the composition with the front end of the classic car sitting off the right… got lucky on that one!
I shot this with what many people believe to be the classic “street” photography focal length, 35mm. I have to say that even though I think the Zeiss 35mm f1.4 lens that I used for this photo is an amazing piece of equipment, I’m struggling to feel comfortable with the perspective of 35mm. I’m not sure why, but 99% of the photos I take at 35 just don’t feel right to me. I always feel like the 35 is just a little too wide, or not quite wide enough. I love 50mm, and I love 25/28, but I just can’t get in the groove with 35.
Does anyone else have any experience with a 35mm prime? Love it? Hate it? Rather use a 50mm?
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united
Posted on December 3, 2013
Perfectly aligned international flags at Rockerfeller Center with not a wisp of wind. I love the subdued quality of the light, and the soft background contrasting with crisp focus on the flags themselves. If you look closely, you can read the labels on the flag poles (talk about sharp focus!).
Zeiss 35mm f1.4 Distagon lens mounted on a Canon 5D Mark III camera.
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decorations
Posted on December 2, 2013
This is my favorite photo from my black and white teaching experiment I conducted for myself this weekend. There was a very intense ray of sunlight coming through a window to the side of these bulbs which created all the contrast and detail I needed.
I shot this photo in color, RAW, and JPEG monochrome, and I spent hours (literally) converting, adjusting color channels, adding a removing different professional effects, and making minute, but common, post-processing adjustments. And after all that, I went back to the very first photo I shot as a monochrome JPEG straight out of the camera for my favorite. I used a Zeiss 50mm f2 Makro-Planar lens mounted on a Canon 1DX camera. The aperture was set at 2.5 for a beautiful shallow depth of field, and the shutter speed was 1/2500 with EV -1.3.
If you’re interested in reading about my black and white experiment, click here. Otherwise, enjoy the photo and the holiday season!
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Better Black & White
Posted on December 2, 2013
The more time i spend with my camera, the more I realize how much I love black and white photography. There is something striking and timeless about monochrome images that just does it for me in a way that color hasn’t been able to do yet. I feel like color can often distract from the overall feeling and energy of a photo, and I never noticed that before I started experimenting with black and white.
The photos you see here are certainly NOT interesting or ‘good’ by any stretch of the imagination (they’re all pretty bad actually), and I’m definitely not showing them off as good black and white photography… they are just sample shots from my teaching experiment this past weekend. My favorite shot from that experiment is here, but please read on if you’re interested in what I learned about shooting in black and white.
first sign
Posted on November 26, 2013
This is the very first Fall photo I took on a brisk evening in September. I didn’t think I had anything to be impressed with when I took this, but I found myself using this as my wallpaper on my iPhone and iPad for the entire season 🙂
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last sign
Posted on November 26, 2013
The last sign of fall transitioning into winter… colors fading… leaves clinging to their branches but on their way down.
I really like how this photo turned out with such a monochromatic look to it, but also with the incredibly detail in the leaves. The dead leaves have such an incredible lattice pattern to them, which is what made me notice them.
I took this on a trial walk with the Canon 35mm f1.4 lens that I eventually returned because it wasn’t up to par with the Zeiss 35mm 1.4, but this shot turned out great and was worth the trouble of buying and returning it.
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trust
Posted on November 25, 2013
Shooting from the hip is such a tough thing to do, and this was one of those very, very lucky photos that I discovered on the camera after the fact.
It’s almost impossible to take pictures of people in New York without them making a little uneasy about having a camera pointed at them, so you either have to be far enough away that they don’t notice, or ‘shoot from the hip’ without actually bringing the camera up to your face. As you can imagine, the keeper rate for hip shots is pretty low, but when they turn out great, they really turn out great.
I love this photo because the only person who knew that he was having his picture taken was the little boy. He was clinging to his father and looking straight into the camera lens. I have no idea how he knew since the camera was on my hip and I wasn’t even looking at him, but clearly he sensed it and trusted that his father would make it all OK.
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love
Posted on November 25, 2013
Seen in Central Park on a beautiful summer Sunday. Kindness. Happiness. Love. That’s what it’s all about.
I love the colors, the soft out of focus background, the off-center composition, and the general pleasant feeling this photo gives off. It was taken with a Canon 135mm f2 lens with a wide open aperture to pull the subjects out of the photo and melt away the background. This is my favorite lens for taking candid portraits. It’s light. It focuses extremely fast. And it’s not huge, white, or conspicuous like the Canon 70-200mm f2.8 II, which is a fantastic lens, but just stands out too far in a crowd.
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never sleeps
Posted on November 24, 2013
The city that never sleeps truly never sleeps…
This is an ultra wide angle photo of the east side Manhattan skyline that has come to redefine how I see the city since this vantage point isn’t something that many New Yorkers get to see. I love the reflections the city throws off in all directions, especially the light it throws into the clouds and that the bridge throws into the water.
This was taken in the very late evening so my exposure time was a full 30 seconds, which makes this almost like a mini-time-lapse photo, and if you look closely you can see the motion of the clouds and the traffic along the FDR Drive that occurred during that long exposure time. It’s not a typical photograph that captures a few hundredths of a second in time… this captured a full 30 seconds of all the motion in the city, and surrounding the city, and as you can see it’s certainly not sleeping.
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