Alunfoto

Sima and Ray

2012-02-04T21:20:00.003+01:00

Today I rummaged through my archive looking for something else, and happened upon this picture. It's shot in 2009 at the Kielder Water Birds Of Prey centre in Northumbria, UK.

I made a lot of pictures of this pair because their relationship amazed me. Looking at this image now, I think I may have captured some of it.

Snow crystal

2012-02-01T22:14:00.003+01:00

It's been a while since last time I photographed snow crystals, so today there was a lot of joy in repetition.
The biggest challenge, in my opinion, is to get the lighting right. The crystal itself is completely transparent. It has a lot of angles acting like prisms, so with a combination of lights from different angles it can become interesting. This one here is an experiment with a piece of coloured cellophane and a flash, and a LED flashlight. Challenge for next time; do it more delicately. :-)

Auroras

2012-01-27T20:17:00.005+01:00

Another batch of low-light photos from Runde. Last time I had a full moon. This time I had auroras.

Pentax K-5, DA*16-50/2.8
f/4.5, 15s, ISO 6400

Pentax 645D, FA 35/3.5
f/4.5, 60s, ISO 800

Pentax 645D, FA 35/3.5
f/4.5, 30s, ISO 800

Pentax K-5, DA 14/2.8
f/4.0, 30s, ISO 800

Pentax K-5, DA*16-50/2.8
f/5.0, 15s, ISO 800

Pentax K-5, DA 14/2.8
f/5.0, 15s, ISO 800

Q inspection

2012-01-08T13:28:00.002+01:00

I've had a Pentax Q with 01 Standard Prime lens on loan for a couple of days, and took it for a walk in my local forest. Below are a bundle of snaps with comments. It's barely enough to get a first impression, so don't read this as any serious test.
On balance, my impression with this camera is only so-so. I appreciate the image quality for what it is; pretty good for a compact with a small sensor. I also appreciate its dynamic range and noise characteristics. For a walkabout camera the size is near perfect too. With the Standard Prime lens it fits nicely in a pocket, or if slung around the neck you hardly notice its weight.
But. There are things I don't appreciate with the Q. As "everyone" says on the web forums, the price tag is too high compared to its performance. I know I would need the zoom lens to go with it, and here in Norway I would have to shell out NOK 8000,- for the package. By today's exchange rates that's €1000,- £850,- or $1330,- rounded to the nearest 10 in each currency. For clever shoppers seeing that prices are lower in other countries, Norwegian VAT of 25% is added to the total price of purchases from abroad by the customs authorities; transport cost included. Not much to be gained, in other words, and higher risk regarding warranty issues. But I digress.

It seems to me the Q has an issue with battery capacity. On my two-hour trip I made about 50 exposures. I refrained from chimping and used no flash. Yet the battery was down to 1/3 charge when I got back. I suppose reducing the screen brightness could have helped a bit, but in the snowy and sunny environment its default level seemed to be just about right. Between shots I turned the camera off and kept it inside my jacket. Ambient temperature was about -4°C. Maybe this is on par with what you get from any "serious" compact, I don't know. It seems a bit low, and makes the camera less useful, to me.

As a seasoned system camera user I expect a range of focal lengths for the Q, since it is advertised as a system. The current lineup has five lenses, but only two have variable apertures and autofocus. That's too weak, even with one of the fully functional lenses being a decent normal zoom. I'm really sorry I didn't get to test the camera with the zoom. I guess that would add the optical flexibility I would expect from a compact, even if the size of the zoom lens compromise the convenience of the overall Q tinyness.

And a bit of advice to Q owners in warmer countries: -Don't even try to operate this camera with gloves on... :-)

A big thanks to Fovi A/S for lending me the camera.

Pentax Q with 01 Standard Prime (8.5mm),

Camera in P-mode, no flash.

1/60s, f/1.9, ISO 200

Pentax Q with 01 Standard Prime (8.5mm),

Camera in P-mode, no flash.

1/125s, f/2.8, ISO 250

Pentax Q with 01 Standard Prime (8.5mm),

Camera in P-mode, no flash.

1/400s, f/3.2, ISO 125

Pentax Q with 01 Standard Prime (8.5mm),

Camera in P-mode, no flash.

1/60s, f/2.2, ISO 500

The snow in the corners burned out, as expected. Lots of detail in the shadows.

Pentax Q with 01 Standard Prime (8.5mm),

Camera in P-mode, no flash.

1/400s, f/2.2, ISO 250

Pentax Q with 01 Standard Prime (8.5mm),

Camera in Av-mode, no flash. Auto-bracketing drive mode.

-1/0/+2 EV blended in Photomatix, using Details Enhancer algorithm.

1/250-1/2000s, f/2.2, ISO 250

The camera did not notice it could not complete the -2 EV exposure by only varying the shutter speed. The EXIF data for exposure compensation says -2 EV, despite the shutter speed being only one stop faster than 0 EV.

Pentax Q with 01 Standard Prime (8.5mm),

Camera in Av-mode, no flash. Auto-bracketing drive mode.

-1/0/+2 EV blended in Photomatix, using Details Enhancer algorithm.

1/250-1/2000s, f/2.2, ISO 250

Same thing in metadata as above, but motif more forgiving.

Pentax Q with 01 Standard Prime (8.5mm),

Camera in P-mode, no flash.

1/400s, f/6.3, ISO 250

No HDR here. I think the camera does a pretty good job in retaining detail. In full resolution, however, this shot is a bit soft. It looks like diffraction caused by small aperture to me. Strange to think of f/6.3 as an aperture causing diffrection, but f/8 is the minimum f-stop on this camera.

Winter is here

2011-12-20T16:21:00.000+01:00

Last weekend I went to Nissedal in Telemark. There's a river called Fyresåna there, that has carved out a series of very nice potholes in red granite. I just wanted to see what it looked like in wintertime. All shots with Pentax 645D.

Forest interior from Vålberget

2011-12-01T21:22:00.001+01:00

Vålberget is a small nature reserve near the Swedish border in central Southern Norway. It was protected just a few years ago, to preserve the dying and old trees in the area and the host of fungi, insects and birds that follows. Last weekend I was introduced to the area along with 10 more photographers, and we spent a few hours getting ourselves lost between the trees.

It was great to be out with fellow photographers for a change. In the forest we didn't see much to each other, but the evenings were spent discussing pictures and photography in general. Very inspiring.

The picture below is very much a work in progress. It's a HDR tonemapped rendering from five exposures. I am both fascinated and disappointed by the result, and write it all down to being a complete novice at tonemapping. In this shot I had problems reigning the greens, and as you can see they ended up running wild.

In defence of the greens, I can say that this rendering is closer to my subjective experience than anything I could wring out of a single exposure. The green mosses were iridiscent. The soil and bark was damp, and the contrast range pretty tough. The tonemapping certainly helps bring the shadow details out.

Spurious noise

2011-11-22T22:07:00.001+01:00

8 minute exposure

In the night photos from Runde I noticed something odd. There were tiny streaks in my images, looking almost like luminous dust, in some of the shots. The number of streaks increased with exposure time. Nonexistent at thirty seconds, and all over the place at fifteen minutes exposure. On close inspection, I also found dark streaks of the same size and frequency as the luminous ones.

In a weird moment, it reminded me of a photo I once saw of a fog chamber used to detect cosmic radiation, set up by a Danish physicist who claimed our local neighbourhood in space had a lot more impact on Earth's climate than had been previously thought.

But then worry crept in, and I wondered whether my camera was faulty (oh, angst). Then I noticed the streaks were never in the same spot from one shot to the next. So if it was the camera, it couldn't be the sensor, at least. Besides, groups of faulty pixels would be detected by either the pixel-mapping feature or the long-exposure noise reduction, wouldn't it?

Detail from the above showing the
bright specks

I was at total loss on ideas for what it could be. First I considered dust. Maybe the sensor heated up so much during long exposures that the dust appeared luminous from reflecting heat back onto the photosites? That didn't fit with the occurrence of both black and light streaks, and it was unlikely that so many dust grains would shift position between every exposure.

A friendly soul on Pentaxforums confirmed to have observed the same, at least, and suggested software to deal with the problem. He said the best of the bunch are programs used by astrophotographers, who are dealing with faint light on a regular basis.

So I checked it out. There are lots of programs available, but their interfaces are somewhat incomprehensible to a regular photographer. Scientific terms and names of mathematical algorithms for noise reduction are tossed about, presumably expecting the user to know them apart. I didn't, but decided not to let that stop me. Eventually I homed in on the terminology and realised that my phenomenon had a name, it was categorised as "spurious" noise. To an astrophotographer, this kind of noise could look like a real signal. I can imagine a meteroite could produce a similar streak.

Armed with this keyword, it took me just one more Google search to hit the explanation. Well at least i hope it is the right one; it still sounds a bit like UFO/grain circle/tinfoil-hat theories to me.

Apparently what happens is that the sensor gets hit by cosmic rays. Sort of. For technical details see this article by Don Groom at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, USA (PDF). Image examples are also available in many astrophotographers' blogs, as are suggestions on how to avoid it and how to recognise it from real stars. Or meteorites.

After a few days of thinking about it, I'm more comfortable with the thought, even if I'm still incredulous about highly energetic particles from space ("relativistic muons" and "Compton recoils" apparently) slipping through the atmosphere and hitting the sensor. But the explanation fits like a glove. Some particles hit at a shallow angle, leaving a streak. Others hit head on and make dots. Since the particles are charged and moving very fast, they can trigger a signal in the imaging sensor like a whole bunch of photons.

The dark streaks can be explained by particles hitting the sensor during the long-exposure noise reduction, which essentially is an exposure of the same length as the picture but without adding any light from the outside. The cosmic rays gets through anyway, however, and creates streaks of false noise that the camera then subtracts from the image.

The bottom line, however, is that cosmic rays will remain an obstacle to really long exposures, and that the only real way to avoid it is to do as the astrophotographers recommend, to take multiple exposures of 30 seconds each and combine them.
There's even a plugin for Lightroom to do that.

So perhaps the fact that my weird association to fog chambers turned out to be pretty close is more incredulous than the explanation itself. Spooky, even.

Go figure... :-)

CLS-filter

2011-11-15T10:15:00.001+01:00

A German webshop called Astronomik sell filters for astrophotography. They have developed a rather clever way of placing a small filter within the camera bayonet of Canon EOS cameras, so that one filter can be used with lenses of all diameters. The range of filters they offer is great, everything from ND filters to bandpass filters tailored to specific wavelenghts. Its clip-on design makes changing filters as easy as changing lenses. I have to admit: in this regard, Canon owners are lucky.

The electronic contacts in the Pentax K-bayonet is arranged in a far more cluttered way. Astronomik encourage custromers to contact them with special needs, but I figured a custom job to fit K-mount would be either undoable or too expensive.

Instead, I took a long, hard look at my 645->K adapter. It's a "dumb" piece of metal without any electronic contacts or cluttering mechanic contraptions. Its inner diameter is a few mm larger than the EOS filter. Then I asked Astronomik nicely if they could envision a solution for using the EOS clip-on filters inside this adapter. They suggested fitting a small ring of hard plastic inside the adaptor to make the filter sit tight. It would only cost me a few Euros. I have to add also that the dialogue with Astronomik was very good; corteous and precise. Excellent service.

I took delivery of the ring and a filter yesterday, used a little bit of silicone to secure the ring inside the adapter, and clipped the filter in place. And with typical German precision, it was a snug fit!

A pot shot out the window in broad daylight assured me there was no vignetting. And adding to my enthusiasm, the weather forecast predicted clear skies for the night. Maybe I could test it for real straight away! -But alas. Local fog.

So my Little Gray Cell began churning. What else could I do to test this filter? A CLS-filter is designed to remove "airglow" (wikipedia-link) and glare from urban light pollution. So to push the filter to its limits, I decided to simply photograph one of the most obnoxious sources of light pollution and see what turned out. The result is the image above. As you can see, the streetlights appear white, despite being sodium lamps which normally appear intensely orange. At the same time, the front- and rear lights of the passing cars are relatively unaffected.

This could turn out to be fun.

Technical setup: Pentax K-5, 645->K adapter with CLS filter, FA645 45-85mm f/4.5 and tripod.
Exposure: Manual mode, 30s and f/8 at ISO 200.

Low-light photography

2011-11-14T14:41:00.001+01:00

Some pictures from a trip to Runde, mostly famous for its seabird colonies. Not a lot of birds around in November, however, but the landscape is still there. On this trip I did most of my pictures with the sun below the horizon. Hope you enjoy.
---
Noen bilder fra en tur til Runde. Det er ikke mange hekkende sjøfugl å finne der i november, men landskapet står støtt. Denne gangen ble de fleste bildene til mens sola var under horisonten. Håper de kan falle i smak.

Published in Italy

2011-10-26T10:27:00.000+02:00

In April, Dario Bonazza asked to interview me about travel photography for an Italian photo magazine. The result became a double-spread article on photography in cold climates, published in July. A couple of days ago, I received my writer's copy in the mail.
Humble thanks to Dario for having me. Doing the interview was great fun.
Here's what it looked like:

Pentax Photo Gallery update

2011-10-25T09:21:00.000+02:00

Pentax USA has revamped their gallery site. My photos are still featured. Other than that, it's a great update. :-)
Speed has been increased tremendously, and the site now seem to be prepared for the coming of HTML 5 and deprecation of old multimedia provisions like Adobe Flash. That's well done.
The interface looks nice too, and is even readable on my Android cellphone.
For some reason however, probably to do with shortcomings in the English alphabet and its native speakers' mindset, all non-english characters have been screwed up. :-)
It's not often us foreigners get a chance to be smug about americans not adhering to international standards, so please pardon me for not being able to resist. In its present state, there's some erratic behaviour with regards to sorting and readability. But they fixed the same kind of bugs in the previous version, so fingers crossed they'll rectify this one too.
Overall, it's a very nice upgrade from the old site. Way to go, Pentax USA.

From fame to shame; Terje Hellesø

2011-10-04T15:08:00.005+02:00

It's been a very long time since the previous post. Many times I've considered shutting the whole thing down and be done with it. On the other hand, it's nice to have a little soapbox to stand on once in a while. According to statistics, there's even the occasional reader still dropping by.

What's shaken me out of my hiatus this time is a virtual earthquake in the circles of Scandinavian nature photography. A month ago, highly profiled photographer Terje Hellesø was caught cheating with his animal portraits of lynx in Swedish forests. It turned out he's been forging a substantial number of photographs over the years, and even received awards for his images. Terje has been thorough in removing his online presence, but young Swedish photographer Tilda Larsson have some examples in her blog. She has an article on Terje in Swedish here.

If you don't wish to read Swedish or machine-translated Swedish, she has made links to some really nice animated gifs and illustrated jpegs reproducing some of Terjes fakes here:
imagelink 1
imagelink 2
imagelink 3
imagelink 4
(hyperlinks removed in edit, as they were not Tilda's work. Please go to this blog for a full account on how these frauds were uncovered, or see links in comment below article. Thanks again to the anonymous vigilante who set me straight on the origin of these disclosures.)

Terje's deceit makes me so angry. He has f**ked up for so many more people than himself. In a way, I can count myself lucky not to be completely scathed, but he fooled me too. As you can see from my previous blog post about the guy.

My acquaintance with Terje goes back a decade. In 2001 I attended a photo gathering at Hvasser, 120 km Southwest of Oslo, where Terje would hold a workshop. He came up from Skåne in Southern Sweden by train, and needed transport from Oslo to Hvasser, so I volunteered. We chatted all the way down. And one night Terje and I stayed back, talking, as the nachspiel after a party petered out. I had thoughts about going pro with my photography, but hesitated for many reasons. Terje picked them apart and explained how, when push comes to shove, it's basically a matter of taking the plunge and work hard. I believed him. It seemed like common sense. But I didn't jump. Not then, and not since. Now I'm puzzled. I wonder if he, already then, had bolstered his career by more than honest, hard work.

What I since realised was that succeding as a professional nature photographer requires a good number of other skills in addition to being a photographer. For one, it's important to be a reasonably good business man. I know I would fall through in that respect.

Incidentally, it has surfaced that Terje Hellesø also has unfinished business with Swedish authorities over tax evasions. So in sum, he has been a total cheat, both with his craft and his business.

Hellesø's fall also precipitates unfortunate consequences for many other nature photographers in Scandinavia. Especially those who make a living on spectacular images of rare, endangered or dangerous animals now face more critical questions about their own authenticity.

And what's even more unfortunate is that the distrust rubs off on Good Causes that such images are helping to promote. Such as wildlife conservation. Such as habitat protection. Such as climate change. And even such as promoting the upsides of nature experience itself.

The documentary status of nature photography is built on confidence. A declaration of trust between photographer and audience. All it takes to bring that down for everyone is one big liar, in this case Terje Hellesø.

Shame on him.

Traner - Cranes

2011-05-18T13:45:00.003+02:00

English text below.

Et bilde fra en tur til Hornborgasjön i april. Merkelig sted. En naturopplevelse av sjelden sort, mer i slekt med forholdene på den afrikanske savannen enn den nordiske naturen. For å få de virkelig gode bildene ved Hornborga må man nok leie seg inn i et fotoskjul. Og ha litt mer flaks med været enn jeg hadde. :-)

Pentax K-7, DA* 60-250/4, monopod
1/125s, f/8, ISO 400, at 250mm

A shot from Lake Hornborgasjön in Sweden a month ago. A strange place, more akin to the classic experience you can get on an African savanna than up here in Nordic nature. Fascinating in its own right, though. To get really good photos here, one has to rent a hide. And be a little more lucky with the weather than I was. :-)

Hoggorm - Common adder

2011-05-03T18:56:00.003+02:00

English text below

I dag traff jeg en hoggorm i Lillomarka. Den slanget seg på vissent gras da jeg kom over den, og så egentlig litt fårete ut. Som om den tenkte "ops, der ble jeg ferska", eller noe slikt. Jeg begynte forsiktig med teleobjektiv, gikk deretter over til en 120mm makro, og endte opp med vidvinkel. Da den til slutt fikk nok av all oppmerksomheten freste den. Da takket jeg pent for samarbeidet og trakk meg et par meter unna. Den fulgte meg med øynene et halvt minutt eller så, og så snudde den og krøp stille ned blant noen steiner. Fabelaktig opplevelse.

Pentax 645D, FA 120mm f/4 macro, AF160-FC ring flash

1/90s, f/16, ISO 400

Today I met a Common adder in the local forest. It was basking on a sunlit patch of last year's grass, and looked positively sheepish. As if it was caught doing something it shouldn't. I approached it gradually, starting with a tele lens before changing to a 120mm macro and then a 35mm wide angle. When the snake got fed up with the attention it hissed loudly. I mouthed a thanks for the cooperation and withdrew a couple of meters. It kept its eyes on me while I moved, and for half a minute after my retreat. Then it turned and slid down between some rocks. An amazing encounter.

Humleflue - Bee-fly

2011-04-27T19:54:00.003+02:00

English text below.

Her er et av insektbildene fra forrige dagen. Humleflua er et av de snodigste insektene jeg vet om. Den er liksom bare en pelsdott med fasettøyne og en alt for lang sugesnabel. Men underholdende å fotografere. Relativt uredd, og med evnen til å stå bomstille i lufta slik som andre blomsterfluer. Jeg hadde ikke sjans på å fange den i flukt, så jeg satsa på å sitte musestille ved noen hestehov og håpe at den stakk innom. Det ergrer meg litt med det lyse strået i bakgrunnen. De hører jo med til våren, men dette bildet kunne godt ha vært luket litt uten at det hadde gått utover motivet. Men det gidder jeg ikke gjøre ved data'n. :-)

Pentax K-7, DFA 100mm f/2.8 WR macro, Tamron-F 2X AF teleconverter, AF540-FGZ flash.
1/180s, f/11, ISO 200

Here is one of the insect shots I mentioned the other day. The bee-fly is one of the weirdest looking insects I know. It's just a furball with composite eyes and disproportionately long legs and proboscis. But very entertaining to photograph. It is relatively unafraid, and capable of standing still in mid-air like other hoverflies. I had no chance to ctach it in flight, though, so I sat still at a group of flowers and waited. It took just 10 minutes. The bright straw in the background annoys me a little. Yellow straws are definately integral to spring, but just this shot would not have suffered from removing it. But I ain't doing it in post. :-)

Hvitveis - Wood Anemone

2011-04-25T08:15:00.003+02:00

English text below

Det er fantastisk vårvær i Oslo om dagen. Nesten så man kan høre at det gror. Jeg fikk et par timer i sola på nordsiden av Breisjøen i Lillomarka i går, og det ble mer makro. Denne gangen hadde jeg gravd fram en gammel Tamron 2X telekonverter som jeg putta på makroobjektivet. Kameraet slet litt med autofokusen, spesielt på korte avstander. For dette bildet gikk jeg over til manuell fokus. Den ekstra arbeidsavstanden var praktisk i går, det var mange insekter ute. Det kommer sikkert en liten snutt om det seinere. Den optiske kvaliteten er ikke verst heller synes jeg. Ikke i nærheten av Pentax A* 200mm f/4 macro, naturligvis, men grei nok.

Pentax K-7, DFA 100mm f/2.8 macro and Tamron-F 7MC 2X teleconverter.
1/180s, f/5.6, ISO 200

Oslo is being assaulted by spring these days. One can almost hear the plants sprouting. I had a couple of hours in the sun yesterday to play around some more with macro. This time I dug out an old Tamron 2X tele converter to go with the macro lens. The camera struggled a bit with autofocus in the macro range, so for this shot I switched to manual focus. The converter gave me some extra working distance which I appreciated much yesterday. There were lots of insects about, and I'll probably post one shot of them later on. The optical quality of this combo isn't too bad either. Not up to the standards of Pentax A* 200mm f/4 macro, of course, but decent enough.

Blåveis - Anemone hepatica

2011-04-22T11:10:00.003+02:00

English text below image.

I vinter solgte jeg mitt ærverdige A* 200mm f/4 macro som en del av slagplanen for å finansiere 645D. Jeg er har lurt litt på om jeg kom til å angre, men foreløpig er behovet dekket med DFA 100mm f/2.8 WR macro. Her er et bilde fra Kolås i går, der jeg fikk overraskende besøk av en humleflue mens jeg jobba med blåveisen.

Mine eksperimenter med blits fortsetter, men dessverre har jeg gått surr i notatene for denne sesjonen, så jeg er usikker på hva jeg brukte her.

Jeg har forresten gitt opp å prøve direktepublisering fra Lightroom, for redigeringsmulighetene i plugin'en var for dårlige.

Pentax K-7, DFA 100/2.8 WR macro, tripod and flash
1/180s, f/16, ISO 200

A few months back I sold my venerable A* 200mm f/4 macro to help finance the 645D, and have been wondering whether I would regret it. So far my needs are covered by the DFA 100mm f/2.8 WR macro. Here is one shot from yesterday, where a bee-fly stopped by for lunch at the anemones.

My experiments with macro flash continues, but unfortunately I have messed up my notes from yesterday, and don't know what kind of setup I used for this shot.

I have abandoned my attempts at direct publishing from Lightroom. The editor in the plugin was not up to the task.

Springtime brings change

2011-04-17T21:58:00.004+02:00

English text below.

Inspirert av Benedikt Meier sin blogg Lichtfänger er jeg nå i ferd med å endre arbeidsflyten min for publisering av bloggartikler. Min måte å jobbe på så langt har egentlig vært ganske tungvin. Jeg har begynt med å eksportere bildet fra Lightroom, for så å klargjøre bildet for bloggen i Photoshop. Så har jeg eksportert det derfra igjen til en bestemt mappe i filsystemet slik at jeg kan finne det raskt etterpå. Deretter skriver jeg bloggartikkelen i web-editoren til Blogger og laster opp bildet fra disken.

Men fra og med nå har jeg i hvert fall flyttet all bildeprosesseringen til Lightroom, slik at jeg slipper å forholde meg til Photoshop. Det blir sikkert noen småjusteringer framover, men resultatet nedenfor er sånn cirka. Neste skritt på veien blir et forsøk på å flytte tekstredigeringen til Lightroom også, slik at jeg kan publisere bloggartikkelen direkte. Sjansen for at jeg kåler til dette og hint i denne fasen er relativt stor. Så da er du advart.

Pentax K-7, DFA 100/2.8 macro WR, AF160-FC & AF540-FGZ flashes
f/11, 1/180s, ISO 200
The 540 flash was set to wireless slave mode and pointed to background.

Inspired by Benedikt Meier of the Lichtfänger blog, I'm in the process of changing my workflow for creating these blogposts. So far, my workflow has had many steps. First I would find the image in Lightroom, and then export it to Photoshop. In photoshop I would run an Action rescaling the image and applying mats and frames, and the texts. Then I would save the file to a special folder. Only then would I come here to the Blogger website, add the text in the online editor, and upload the image.

With this post, I have moved all the image editing into Lightroom, so that the image comes out ready for Blogger without the need for Photoshop. I will most likely tweak the mat&frame stuff a bit more, but this is probably pretty close.

For the next installment I will look at doing the entire post in Lightroom, and set up publishing directly in there. That's where I'll probably create the most mess. So now you're warned.

645D: Part 3

2011-04-12T11:45:00.003+02:00

English text below.

Tradisjonelt heter det seg at Pentax har utmerket bakoverkompatibilitet. At et nytt kamerahus kan utnytte den funksjonaliteten som finnes i et objektiv. For småbildekameraene (K-bajonett) er dette en sannhet med en viktig modifikasjon, nemlig blitsfotografering. Fra og med kamerahuset K10D var det nemlig ikke lenger mulig å få TTL-basert blits med eldre objektiver, inkludert "A" serien.

Jeg var derfor spent på om det samme var tilfelle for mellomformat, eller om 645D støttet TTL-blits med optikk fra "645A"-serien. Til å teste dette brukte jeg en 645FA og 645A versjonene av 120mm f/4 makro, og sammenliknet eksponeringer gjort med Pentax AF-160FC ringblits. Resultatet ble to serier med ekspneringer av en bordduk som sammenstilt nedenfor. Som det går fram av både bilde og histogram i de to første kolonnene er eksponeringene er akkurat like for alle blenderåpninger med unntak av blender 5.6.

Arbeidsavstanden var 22 cm. Blitsen er for kraftig til å gi riktig eksponering på blender 4, og helt i grenseland for blender 5.6. Jeg mistenker at dette har en sammenheng med avviket på blender 5.6.

Den tredje kolonnen i bildet viser et annet resultat som også kom fram. Kameraet valgte samme hvitbalanse for alle blendere med 645FA-objektivet (temp=5450, tint=+20), men varierte med 650 K ved ulike blendere for 645A-objektivet. Uten korrigering fører dette til at eksponeringen oppfattes som svært forskjellige. Det er tydelig at kameraet tar hensyn til informasjon om hvilket objektiv som er koblet på. 645A-serien har ikke innebygget elektronikk som tilkjennegir objektivet på samme måte, og kameraet må begynne å gjette. Litt pussig at det gjetter forskjellig etter blenderåpning, men det kan man leve med. Situasjonen kan enkelt løses ved å sette en fast hvitbalanse (f. eks. "daylight" eller "flash") i steden for "auto" før man begynner å fotografere. Klikk bildet for større versjon. Hvis den versjonen også er vanskelig å lese, finnes en enda større versjon her.

Click image for larger version. If the larger version is also difficult to read, there is an even bigger one here.

Traditionally, Pentax has an excellent record for backwards compatibility with lenses. A new camera can extract all automation a previous-generation lens can provide. For K-mount, however, there is an important exception to this rule. Starting with the K10D, support for TTL flash photography with manual focus lenses was dropped from all K-mount cameras.

I was therefore curious to see if the 645D supported TTL flash with the 645A series lenses. I compared exposures made with the 645FA and the 645A versions of 120mm f/4 macro, under the light provided by a Pentax AF-160FC ring flash. As you can see from the first two columns in the image above, the TTL flash exposures are the same for both lenses except f/5.6.

The working distance was 22 cm. The flash is too powerful to provide correct illumination at f/4 at this distance, and even f/5.6 is at the very limit of the specs. I suspect this is connected to the anomaly at f/5.6.

The third column shows another result. The camera selected the same white balance across all apertures with the 645FA lens (temp=5450, tint=+20), but varied the colour temperature by 650 K for the 645A lens. Without correction the exposures look very different from the 645FA series. This demonstrates how the camera use information about the lens attached to set white balance. The 645A-series lenses have no built-in electronics to identify themselves, so the camera has to guess. I think it's a bit odd that this guess varies with aperture, but it's not a big deal. A preset whitebalance (eg. "flash" or "daylight") instead of "auto" will save the day.

645D: Part 2

2011-04-05T18:15:00.005+02:00

English text below.

Det var en sann glede å bruke kameraet på Svalbard i en uke. En av opplevelsene jeg ikke har blogget om ennå var en snøskutersafari til østkysten av Spitsbergen; en 10-timers tur i minus 25°C. Jeg bar kameraet på brystet i en LowePro Toploader, slik at jeg kunne fiske det fram kjapt om et motiv skulle dukke opp. Men dermed ble kameraet også nedkjølt, og jeg var litt spent på hvordan det ville gå etter hvert. De første timene fungerte alt helt ukomplisert, så lenge jeg passet på å fotografere på innpust, slik at søkeren var duggfri. Det var også lurt å holde balaklavaen over nesen. Ved to anledninger frøs nesetippen fast til displayet bakpå kameraet. Det ble litt plundrete, og sårt i flere dager etterpå.

Etterhvert gikk også batteriytelsen ned. Indikatoren for batteristyrke ble stående på 67% som "standardverdi". Ved en anledning tok jeg 8 eksponeringer, og observerte indikatoren droppe til 0% allerede etter at bilde nr. 2 var lagra. Men det holdt ut. Alle bildene ble lagret feilfritt. Jeg tenkte "dett var dett", skrudde kameraet av og stakk det tilbake i veska. Fem minutter etter var indikatoren tilbake til 67%. Jeg tok 15 eksponeringer til på vei tilbake til Longyearbyen.

Det eneste som virkelig fikk trøbbel i kulda var LCD-displayet på toppen av kameraet. Det brukte mer enn 5 sekunder (målt med 1001-1002...) på å skifte fra ett tall til et annet.

Vel tilbake i Longyearbyen lot jeg kameraet ligge i veska i mange timer før jeg våget å åpne det. Det er bare huset som er værtetta, og jeg hadde liten lyst til å få dugg inni objektivene. Etterhvert kommer det vel mere værtetta optikk også tenker jeg.
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Pentax 645D, FA 35/3.5
f/8, 1/350s, ISO 200

It was a pleasure to use the 645D for a week at Svalbard. One experience I haven't blogged about yet was a 10-hour snowmobile trip to the East coast of Spitsbergen in minus 25°C. I carried the camera on my chest in a LowePro Toploader for fast access if a motif appeared unexpectedly. This meant the camera quickly cooled to ambient temperature, and I was a bit anxious to see how it would develop. For the first couple of hours, everything was uncomplicated as long as I drew my breath in as I shot, to keep the viewfinder clear. Keeping the balaclava over my nose was a good idea too. On two occasions the tip of my nose froze stuck to the glass on the rear display. That turned fiddly fast. The skin was sore for days afterwards.

As the day wore on, battery performance dwindled. The power indicator showed 67% as "default". During one series of 8 consecutive exposures, the indicator dropped to 0% just after the second shot was stored on card. The electronics endured, however, and all eight shots were stored without a glitch. I thought that was it for the day, turned the camera off and tucked it back in the pouch. Five minutes later the indicator was back, though, and I went on to shoot another 15 exposures on the way back to Longyearbyen.

The component that really suffered from the cold, was the LCD-display on top of the camera. In the afternoon it took more than 5 seconds to change from one digit to another.

Back in my room, I didn't dare open the camera bag until many hours later. The camera is weatherproofed all right, but the old FA and A-series lenses are not. And what's more, they contain a fair amount of metal. I suppose there will be some weatherproofed lenses for the system with time, but for now I don't take any chances.

Roedeer

2011-03-30T10:11:00.003+02:00

English text below.

Observerte denne karen ca. 150 m fra husveggen i morges. Ser ut som en flott ung bukk, men det ser ut til at den har noe utøy i pelsen.

Pentax K-7, DA* 300/4
1/350s, f/4, ISO 400

Observed this guy this morning, about 150 m from my house. Looks like a becoming young buck, but unfortunately troubled by some skin parasite.

Frokostutgraving - Breakfast Excavation

2011-03-21T10:45:00.005+01:00

English text below.

Om du tror på reinkarnasjon, be til din gud om å slippe gjenfødelse som reinsdyr på Svalbard. Riktignok har de flere fysiologiske tilpasninger til barskt klima enn selv vanlige reinsdyr, men det er ikke lett å skrape ut en eksistens for en planteeter her oppe. Plantedekket strekker seg fra havnivå til bare litt oppi skråningen, og der må den spise alt den hæler i en kort sommer for å overleve vinteren. Da går den stort sett sulten, med mindre den kan grave fram grasset fra i fjor.

Svalbardreinen kan løpe fra en isbjørn hvis den må, men beveger seg lite og sakte for å spare på energien. Det gjør dem ganske tilnærmelige for mennesker, hvis man bare viser dem respekt. Denne fant jeg i Nybyen, hundre meter fra gjestehuset der jeg bor. Bildet er beskåret til ca. en tredjedel.

Pentax 645D, FA 150/2.8
f/5.6, 1/750s, ISO 200
Cropped a fair bit.

If you believe in reincarnation, pray your next life will not be as reindeer on Svalbard. As a distinct subspecies, it has adaptations to living in this extreme environment that other reindeers do not. Yet it's a bitchy life. They eat all they can in summer. Not easy for an herbivore in a mountaineous island where vegetation only cover the lower 100 meters above sea level. Yet, if they put on enough reserves they might make it through winter. In a permanent state of hunger, unless they can find some half-decomposed plant material under the snow.

They can outrun a polar bear if they have to, but prefer to move as little as possible to conserve energy. This also makes them rather tolerant to human approach, if you go about it with respect. The locals in Longyearbyen pretty much ignores them, so they are unafraid even within the city. I found this one about 100 m from my lodge.

Topptur, Sarkofagen

2011-03-19T19:28:00.003+01:00

English text below.

Morgenen i dag fortsatte som kvelden i går, kaldt og nesten vindstille. Jeg tok skia og rusla opp på Sarkofagen, rett over Nybyen. Skikkelig Besseggen-følelse ut mot spissen. Jeg stoppet der bildet er tatt. Ble nervøs bare av å se på ham som klatret opp på piggen ytterst. Det er 300 m ned.

Pentax 645D, FA 45-85/4.5
f/11, 1/250s, ISO 200.

This morning continued the good weather spell from last night. I grabbed my skis and walked up the nearest mountain from where I stay in Nybyen. It's called "Sarkofagen"; "The Sarcophagus". Don't ask me why... From a broad ridge, it tapers into a narrow edge where two valleys merge below, just where the buildings of Longyearbyen begins. I was quite impressed with the young man's lack of vertigo out there, on the outermost point. The drop to the city below is about 300 m.

Gruve 2b

2011-03-18T21:36:00.004+01:00

English text below.

Gruve 2b, eller "nye gruve 2" ligger i Longyeardalen, rett utenfor byen. I vinternatta reflekteres lysene fra byen i skavlen på Gruvefjellet. Det er ikke drift i gruva. Lysene er visst på bare for dekorasjonens skyld.

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Pentax 645D, FA 45-85/4,5, tripod
f/8, 15s, ISO 200.

"Gruve 2b" is a coal mine just outside Longyearbyen, Svalbard. In the winter night, the city lights are reflecting off the snow. The mine is not in production. The lights are left on for decoration

645D: Part 1

2011-03-13T11:05:00.006+01:00

English text below.

For seks uker siden begikk jeg et hårreisende dyrt kamerakjøp, da jeg skaffet meg Pentax 645D med et 645FA 45-85/4.5 zoom-objektiv. Det svir fortsatt litt i lommeboka, men kjennes også som starten på et godt vennskap. Kona har allerede døpt det "digitalkameraten" min.

Bildekvaliteten er langt over mine forventninger. Jeg trodde jeg kjøpte en oppgradering i antall piksler og en mer sofistikert prosessering mellom oppfanget lys og lagring av råfil på minnekortet. Disse forventningene er naturligvis innfridd. Kanskje jeg rett og slett ikke tenkte stort nok, men det skader ikke å bli imponert. Spesielt ikke når det kommer i stadige porsjoner etterhvert som jeg lærer kameraet å kjenne.

Jeg kommer til å bruke noen bloggartikler på å nedfelle mine erfaringer og meninger om 645D så langt. Riktignok har jeg tjuvstarta litt med førsteinntrykk fra før jeg kjøpte kameraet, og bildene i de to foregående artiklene (1, 2) er også tatt med 645D selv om jeg unnlot å spesifisere det. Men den mest naturlige begynnelsen er litt om mitt tidligere forhold til mellomformat, og hva jeg har av utstyr å gjøre erfaringer med.

Tilbake i gelatinens dager brukte jeg et Pentax 645Nii. Jeg husker det som et fantastisk verktøy som aldri kom i veien for fotograferingen. Det er i grunn det beste kompliment jeg kan gi noe kamera; at det er et verktøy som gjør jobben friksjonsfritt. Men i 2006 var film og framkalling blitt dyrt, og bekvemmeligheten utkonkurrert av den øyeblikkelige tilbakemeldingen med digitalkameraer og den enklere arbeidsflyten når skanning ble tatt ut av prosessen. Jeg følte alltid et stikk av dårlig samvittighet når jeg fikk øye på 645Nii der det satt og samlet støv.

Objektivene mine samlet imidlertid mindre støv. Jeg fant ut at den optiske kvaliteten var utsøkt for ekstrem-makro, og brukte dem til å fotografere de virkelig små ting slik som zooplankton og snøkrystaller. På den måten kunne jeg også rettferdiggjøre å beholde dem, selv om det ble stadig mindre sannsynlig at jeg noen sinne kom til å sette film i kamerahuset igjen.

Dermed har jeg fått en bevinget start med det nye systemet, med 5 brukbare objektiver til det nye huset. Fra makro-arbeidet visste jeg jo at optikken var god, i hvert fall på midten. Jeg må innrømme at jeg var nervøs da jeg begynte å teste objektivene med 645D. Det kunne jo godt hende at kvaliteten tapte seg mot hjørnene med den større bildebrikka. Hvordan dette falt ut kommer jeg tilbake til.

Mitt 645D utstyr består nå av:
FA 35mm f/3.5
FA 45-85mm f/4.5
FA 75mm f/2.8
A 120mm f/4 makro
FA 150mm f/2.8
A* 300mm f/4
Et sett mellomringer
AF-160FC ringblits
AF-540FGZ blits (samt en blits fra Metz)
Snorutløser og IR fjernkontroll
Vinkelsøker
2x 16 GB SanDisk Extreme III (30 MB/s) minnekort

Objektivene tilsvarer bildevinkler mellom 19mm og 160mm på Pentax K-bajonett digitale speilreflekser med APS-C brikke.

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Pentax 645D, DFA 55mm f/2.8 (on loan)
1/250s, f/9,5, ISO 100, EV -1/2

Six weeks ago I committed a scandalous amount of money on camera gear, when actually buying the Pentax 645D with a 645FA 45-85/4.5 zoom lens. I'm still a bit apprehensive about that, but now it's beginning to feel like the start of a long friendship.

The image quality exceeds my expectations. I thought it would be another upgrade in pixel count and an added level of sophistication to the in-camera computations effecting a raw file. Those expectations are met, of course, so maybe my expectations were too modest. Anyway it doesn't hurt to be awed. Especially not when it comes in multiple helpings, as I gradually explore what's actually on offer in this camera.

I will spend a few posts relaying my findings and opinions. Well, actually I have already begun, but my first post about this camera was before I actually bought it. The photos in my last two posts (1, 2) were also shot with 645D, although not mentioned. This post is for starters. Some background, and what my 645D kit includes.

Back in the photographic days of gelatine and darkrooms I used a Pentax 645Nii. It was a wonderful tool. It never got in the way of making photos. That's the best compliment I can give any camera. The only way in which digital SLRs scored higher was in the convenience of immediate review. At the time I used the 6 Mpix *istD, and scans from 645 film was orders of magnitude above in terms of image quality. However, the convenience of digital conspired with the wait and cost of film and processing to lure me away.

The last time I used the 645Nii was in June 2006. The 645 lenses, on the other hand, turned out to be perfect for super-macro work like snow crystals, plankton and other stuff requiring magnification beyond 1X. So I justified keeping the gear. This means that I now have 5 lenses to go with the new 645D. From my macro work I knew the image quality to be very good, but the K-mount DSLRs only sample a small area at the centre of the full 645 image circle. I must admit I was a bit nervous about how the lenses would perform with a larger imaging chip. I'll get back to that in later posts.

My 645D kit now consists of:
FA 35mm f/3.5
FA 45-85mm f/4.5
FA 75mm f/2.8
A 120mm f/4 macro
FA 150mm f/2.8
A* 300mm f/4
A set of extension tubes
AF-160FC ring flash
AF-540FGZ flash (and a Metz flash too)
cable and wireless remotes
Angle viewfinder
2x 16 GB SanDisk Extreme III (30 MB/s) memory cards

These lenses spans the Angles Of View (AOV) comparable to 19mm - 160mm on Pentax K-mount DSLRs with their APS-C -sized chips.

Revespor -- Fox tracks

2011-03-05T21:05:00.003+01:00

English text below.

Lillomarka har rikelig med skiløyper, men noen har det med å tråkke egne løyper også. Her er det riktignok reven som har satt sine poter, men jeg mistenker at gropene i snøen er et gammelt nattleie for elg. For min egen del fulgte jeg et spor avsatt av en enslig skiløper før meg, langs en sommersti.

My local forest has an abundance of well-prepped tracks for cross-country skiing. But some like to make their own tracks too. On this picture, a fox has put his paws down recently. The big dents in the snow may be a moose's old night lair. The track that took me to this spot was set by a single skier, along a path marked for summer-only.

Tripod Coffee

2011-03-03T19:21:00.004+01:00

For English, see below.

Etter en vinterferie på Filippinene var det godt å komme hjem. Er ikke så glad i varmen, egentlig. Så i dag tok jeg skia og rusla et par km inn i Lillomarka, og dro i gang et bål. Det var vidunderlig fredelig. Antar at alle andre er på andre siden av byen og ser på VM.

Men kaffe må man ha, så jeg måtte finne en måte å henge kjelen på. :-)

Good to get home after mid-term vacation on the Philippines. My body doesn't cope very well with the heat, really. So today I enjoyed a stroll into my local forest, in temperatures more familiar. It was wonderfully quiet; probably an effect of the skiing world championship contests going on at the other side of town.

With the campfire going, the lust for coffee was overwhelming. So I needed a fast solution for suspending the kettle over the flames. Manfrotto 455 to the rescue. :-)

Going bilingual

2011-01-29T22:12:00.002+01:00

It's about time I begin honouring my native tongue in blogsphere. Instead of running two blogs in parallel, I will make each post bilingual. Norwegian text will appear at the top of each post, English text below. The language used in titles of posts will probably vary, and so will the image titles since I can't fit both language versions into the matting/framing design without going through a lot of hassle with my Photoshop macros. I am too lazy this year to figure out a new design that would accomodate both. I'll try to provide for the omitted language in the text part as necessary.

Whooper swans

2011-01-28T10:21:00.002+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 300/4,
1/2000s, f/8, ISO 400

A Good Stretch

2011-01-24T15:31:00.002+01:00

Pentax K-5, DA* 300/4
1/100s, f/9, ISO 400

Observed in Akerselva, Oslo. Cropped a bit.

Suburbia Winter Night

2011-01-22T09:54:00.004+01:00

Pentax 645D, 645FA 45-85/4.5, tripod
8s, f/5.6, ISO 400
Click image for larger version

I'm having great fun these days. My Pentax dealer has generously let me borrow their Pentax 645D demo-cam for testing, and I'm in the process of going totally bananas with it. So far I have found nothing to dislike about this camera except its price tag. My wallet hurts.

The above shot was obtained last night. Just for the heck of it, I set up the K-7 on another tripod and made a time-lapse of the event. As always, I think of myself as looking ridiculous in front of the camera, but hey. If it gives you a laugh, that's a mission accomplished. This is the first time I try uploading a video to Blogger, so there's a good chance I screw up:

Serously though, the time-lapse thingy is fascinating stuff. It requires some thinking quite different from ordinary stills photography, and yet not quite video shooting either. The technical aspects of it intrigues me. My first attempts has only instilled a very deep respect for those clips you see from BBC, Discovery, NG and their ilk. It's a lot more tricky than I thought, and requires a lot of planning.

Notable mistakes made with this one includes, the "break" in the video where the camera angle changes a little bit, for example. The K-7 can only record 99 frames at a time automatically, so I had to restart the sequence at that point. Guess I must have moved the tripod a little in the process. Normal video has 25 frames per second. This one has only 16,6, so that's where the flicker comes from. You can also see how the camera varies its automatic exposure a little bit from one frame to another. I used Tv exposure mode (shutter priority), but should probably have used M (manual).

Lessons learned, I hope.

Winter Stream

2011-01-19T17:46:00.004+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 16-50/2.8, tripod and long boots.
1/15s, f/11, ISO 100
Click image for larger version

Observed at Mylla today.

Compelled

2010-12-14T23:30:00.001+01:00

When I wrote the previous post I was very emotional. I felt I had to carve an X so deep on the calendar it left marks on the wall. Words that swirled around in my head were "pivotal moment", "paradigma shift", and some of the more juicy swear words my language has to offer. Well, I'm sure you know how it is to have your life take sharp turns.

The actual fallout of my situation is not relevant. Not yet anyway. What I try to ponder is how this kind of situation affects photography. So far, I have noticed that the shutter-finger itch is stronger than it has been for a long while. That's good for volume, if nothing else. But there's something else that bugs me. Or just peaks my curiosity, I'm not even sure which...

Normally when out shooting, I raise my camera to anything that looks interesting, work the angles, consider the light, exercise the shutterfinger and move on. It's not until the pruning process by the computer that I really get the groove for keepers. What happens now is different. There are motifs I shoot with absolute conviction that it is important. Not for anyone by myself, of course, but it just feels so right that reason doesn't even get a foot in the door. Subsequent pruning of these shots just doesn't happen.

It feels really weird to project so much emotional load into an image without letting my "inner critique" have a say. It feels like giving up on creative control. The photography becomes more raw, in a way.

Here's one motif I felt compelled to shoot the other day. Because of the bright area at the top of the slope, that's all. I just had to shoot that.

Pentax K-7, DA 21/3.2
1/30s, f/5.6, ISO 200
(image clickable as usual)

Working on it

2010-12-03T00:00:00.002+01:00

Dear reader,
If you are the typical coincidential visitor, welcome.
If you are the returning reader, I admire your persistence.

And to both of you; thanks for dropping in.

On the 30. November this year, I was confronted with organisational changes at work that implied radical change for my job situation. When I got this message I turned very, very emotional. I took the rest of the day off, took the car and drove for an hour into the countryside. I stopped by one of my favourite photo areas, Mylla. The landscape up there has a soothing effect on me; both for its beauty and its good memories.

After pondering the situation for a couple of hours, I had pretty much realised how to deal with the next couple of days; until the time is ripe for a grander decision. To mark the event, I stepped out of the car and shot the below picture before heading home.

Pentax K-7, DA 14/2.8
f/4, 1/10s, ISO 400

(click image for larger version)

Already that night, when I got it up on my computer screen, I wondered why.

I mean, not that I did what I did, or how management at work arrived at their policies. But why exactly this tree; why exactly this kind of image composition. Because of its strong bond to my emotional state that day, I cannot judge this image objectively. It is just too close. A slice out of time too potent with emotion.

Interesting times, it seems.

Enjoying nature

2010-11-09T18:14:00.004+01:00

Last week-end, I went to a nature photo festival in Sweden; the Vårgårda festival. One of the speakers there was Swedish photographer Stina Deurell. In her talk, she emphasised the importance of the Local Nature. It was kinda zen, but she had a good point; that the good nature experience doesn't always have to involve the spectacular or the exotic.

My Local Nature is the Lillomarka forest. Just in case I haven't told you before. It goes through the season cycles, providing different experiences at different times of year, but it is always there. Never forbidding, never hostile, a bit mystical and ready to shield you from the rest of the world. Or provide a real challenge to the pulse chasers.

Next year is a UN international year of forests. It seems like a good opportunity to bring a camera among the trees.

A bridge to cross

2010-10-30T10:00:00.002+02:00

In the previous article, Times Of Change, I assumed that my blogging frequency would be about one post every second month. As usual in the business of forecasting, I was wrong. In fact, I'm so frequently mistaken in my own predictions that I actually admire meteorologists for their relative accuracy.

But as to blogging, here we go again. Since photography is a hobby, I can take the luxury of letting interest wax and wane. Since I got back from Antarctica, it's been a long period of wane; 2010 has been my least productive year on record. As in numbers of frames collected, that is. The hobby has seen a lot of associated activity, though, and that has been fun in its own right. But not really blogworthy.

These days it seems I've hit a turning point. The desire to pick up the camera is returning. Over the last couple of weeks I've produced a lot of crappy pictures and still enjoyed it. Just last week, for example, we had a good spell of frosty nights, and I goofed around looking for ice to photograph.

While I didn't find what I was looking for, I found this sign that made me giggle. The stream is only an unnamed trickle, the footbridge is proudly labeled the "Upper Kwai, 2002".

Pentax K-7, DA-21 ltd.
f/8, 1/60s, ISO 400
Click image for larger version

On some level of conciousness which I haven't quite reached down to yet, this must be an omen. Think it might be a good one, even.

Times of change

2010-05-17T11:21:00.005+02:00

Today's post is mostly a rumination on what has happened to me photographically this spring. Hope it does not come across as bragging in any way, because the news are of the kind that can lift one's spirit all the way into vanity mode. -Well... my spirit anyway.

First, there's been the relative success of my Antarcica photos. I've compiled them into three "products"; a one-hour photo talk with slide show presentations, a 58 page book combining blog texts and images as suggested here by Paul Stenquist, and some exhibiton prints. One of the photos, first posted here, has been particularly successful. One week ago (7-8. May) it finished 4. place in BioFoto's competition Nature Photo of the Year. At the same time it went on display at an exhibition in Chicago, and sold on the opening night. Special thanks to Mark Roberts for making the print; it was outstanding.

Secondly, a Norwegian group of Pentax enthusiasts is taking form, and it looks like a lot of fun. I would hate to abandon the international virtual villages of Pentax, but when pressed for time I will have to give my natives the priority. Unfortunately I already look set to become pressed for time because of taking on another responsibility.

One week ago (things kinda peaked that week-end) I was elected leader of BioFoto for two years. BioFoto is an organisation for nature photographers. It has around 1400 members from Norway, Sweden and Finland. Most of the activity goes on in local "branches"; resembling ordinary photo clubs. The central organisation issues the quarterly member journal "Naturfotografen", represents BioFoto at larger events, and promotes nature photography on a broader level in the Nordic countries. But before you get the wrong impression, there was no voting contest going on. I was the only persuaded candidate for the job. Doing this service feels like a great opportunity to pay back for some of the inspiration from seeing a lot of fantastic images and meeting so many nice BioFotographers.

So blogging has, unfortunately, been pushed way down on the priority list. Again. And if my crystal ball is worth what I paid for it, the time between the previous post and this one will become the normal update frequency.

A practical look at K-7 autofocus

2010-03-17T19:00:00.004+01:00

When I bought the K-7 last summer, the first thing I did was to compare Autofocus performance to its older sibling K20D. Under relatively controlled and predictable conditions, I found the K-7 to be a significant improvement both in speed and precision (blog article here).

Then I went to the South Atlantic, and to situations demanding more of the AF systems than did my initial testing. My experiences from this trip is a bit more nuanced than the first impression, and so I felt it would be natural to share here on the blog. It has been very long in the coming, however. Too long, maybe. Hope someone will find it interesting nonetheless.

I will take a practical approach, and present you with a few scenarios which made me think about AF performance in particular.

First, there was the case of the ordinary Bird-in-Flight (BiF) shots. In one respect the K-7 performed admirably; it is adequately fast at achieving a focus lock. However, when shooting from a ship, the background will be water in a large number of your shots. Water with a varying degree of froth and wavecrests. I found those white patches of foam to be very deceptive to the AF. If a bright spot appeared in the background, the AF would lock onto that even if the closer subject was many times the area in the viewfinder. Especially if the foreground bird had bland or darkish colours. In this situation, I really wish the AF would have more affinity for proximity and less for brightness. Compared to the other brands present on one occasion (Canon 7D, 1Ds MkIII and 5D, Sony A850 and A900, Nikon D300), the K-7 was definately lagging behind in AF performance/accuracy.

Pentax K-7, DA* 300/4
1/500s, f/8, ISO 400
The Cape Petrel with its checkered pattern was a good target for autofocus.
My AF hit rate was maybe 70-80% with this species.

Pentax K-7, DA* 300/4
1/500s, f/8, ISO 400

The Giant Petrel was a real PITA to keep in focus.
My AF hit rate was an abysmal 15-20%.

Then I would like to mention some not-so-ordinary BiF shots; obtained with fill-flash in low light. Made hand-held with the DA* 300/4. The flash was a Metz AF-58 flash set to -1.5 stops compensation, and a BetterBeamer flash condenser. On one occasion, I was on deck with 3 Canon shooters who all gave up, complaining their cameras wouldn't lock focus on the birds in the twilight. I kept going for nearly an hour afterwards, the K-7 remaining sure-footed as long as the background was not brighter than the bird. In fact, I kept going much longer than I had expected was possible. And for the record, I did not use the focus-assist lamp. So kudos to Pentax for low-light AF performance from me.

Pentax K-7, DA* 300/4, Metz AF-58 flash
1/180s, f/9, ISO 400, -1.5 flash comp.
My hitrate here was pretty low,
but then again I was the only one getting anything at all.

The next challenge for AF was blizzards. Technically speaking, however, this is a variant of the same issue as above; brightness affinity. When snowcrystals cluster together in big flakes, the AF tries to lock on them as they pass the sensor area. The net result is an awful lot of focus-zipping back and forth, and never locking onto the subject beyond the falling snow. A couple of Canon shooters confirmed the same thing, and our Sony guy just sighed and shook his head. Both he and I switched to manual focus only, and worked that way throughout the blizzard. I don't know how the Nikon guys fared under these conditions, and some Canonites seemed to be doing okay. However Pentax was certainly not the only struggler.

Pentax K-7, DA* 60-250/4
1/200s, f/7.1, ISO 200, manual focus

On the whole, I would say that the K-7 stands its ground pretty well. It is certainly the best-performing AF system ever produced by Pentax, it runs circles around eg. the *istD and easily outpaces the K10D and K20D. In comparison with the other brands, however, it's not leading the pack in any way. I found better performance than some Canons in low-light conditions, but I can't recall exactly which models those guys had. A comparison with non-contemporary models would be unfair and misleading.

It's still the Big Two that have the most advanced AF systems, and Pentax will probably forever be at least one camera-generation behind with regards to performance. That's a fact of life.

For myself, I find that I can either enjoy the advances Pentax has made with K-7, or continue to look longingly at other brands and say "Pentax makes too little, too late". I also find the latter attitude to be very counterproductive in terms of what kind of images one attempts, and succeeds, making.

The Lure of the Laptop

2010-03-15T23:24:00.004+01:00

When I got home today and had a look at the previously posted picture from Goksøyr, I realised just how much I had pulled the levers in Lightroom to produce what was posted. On my desktop monitor it looked completely over the top, with unreal saturation and a warm tone that did not exist as far as I can remember the scene.

So what happened? I think I was deceived by the laptop screen. Though calibrated, it renders the colours very differently from the desktop screen. It is also very sensitive to viewing angle, and the shadows will go either black or a blocked-up kind of grey depending on how I hold my head.

To save you the trouble of looking at the previous post, here's the laptop rendering too:

Goksøyr, Runde

2010-03-13T21:58:00.003+01:00

Another pic from our week-end foray.

Pentax K-7, DA* 16-50/2.8
1/250s, f/8, ISO 400

Shielded from the westerly and North-westerly winds by the island of Runde, the houses at Goksøyr are sheltered from most winter storms.

Old Fence

2010-03-12T21:57:00.002+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 16-50/2.8, tripod
20s, f/9.5, ISO 200

Observed at Runde tonight. If the highlights look a bit odd, it's probably because I got it full of sleet and tried to wipe it off with the sleeve of my almost clean fleece jacket.

I think it doesn't look too bad, all things considered. :-)

City lights

2010-02-26T22:13:00.006+01:00

I've passed this motif many times this winter without a tripod with me. Tonight I saddled up and went straight there. :-)

Pentax K-7, DA 21/3.2 ltd, tripod
30s, f/5.6, ISO 100

The place is the Northern end of Lake Alunsjøen where the skiing track comes down to cross over the ice. The city, and my house, is behind the low hill at the far end. When the sky is overcast like tonight, there's more light in the forest than by the light of the full moon.

Slide shows and music

2010-02-12T14:00:00.000+01:00

I find fiddling slide shows to be great fun, except for one task. To select music to go with the slide shows. The clearer the vision of what I want, the harder it is to find. Fortunately, Magnatune exists. They let you listen to music without commiting your money, and let you buy a license to use a piece of music in your own creative projects. All directly from the website; and at a very reasonable price. I think this is important. If we, as photographers, want others to respect the difference between hanging our picture on their wall and using our picture in their own publications/creations, we should honour the same for composers/musicians. Obtaining such rights, however, tend to be either prohibitively expensive or bureaucratically difficult.

One argument against Magnatune is that they are the microstock of music, underselling the true value of the music.

Personally I feel caught in the middle. I think it's great to have the possibility to buy music licenses within my modest budget. On the other hand I think microstock is underselling images.

Anticlimax

2010-02-10T09:48:00.000+01:00

So I had this trip of a lifetime. Coming back to the daily routine didn't feel good at all. I think, in fact, that there are both psychological and purely biological reasons for that. An example of the latter is the abrupt change in daylength. We went from 17-18 to 6-7 hours of daylight, and got 4 hours of timezone difference between Argentina and Europe free in the bargain. It wreaked havoc on my circadian rhythm.

But now I'm sipping my coffee, thinking about how the solstice is behind us and light is returning to the Northern hemisphere. Literally brighter times ahead for me. And the mountain of images to be sorted, tagged, described by keywords, and finally developed, is reduced to a more manageable size. Not through yet, but sort of glimpsing the end of it ahead.

The promised article on K-7 AF performance is still in the pipelines, but will materialise. Eventually.

Meanwhile K-7 is becoming sort of old news, as the rumors of new releases in March are already floating on the forums. And the long anticipated medium format digital, of course, which was foreseen by Pentax to materialise in June this year.

Thoughs on photographic influences

2009-12-15T19:10:00.001+01:00

I said I would have a break from blogging until Christmas. I was wrong. :-)

Thing is, I found a Swedish blogger posting about his 10 most inspiring nature photographers (link). I figured I should do my own list. If not for anything else, it would be a good excercise in recognising my own influences.

The first influence I can remember was the beacons of my first local camera club in Bergen, Bekkalokket fotoklubb. It is a club of very high quality, and it was both humbling and very inspiring to be part of it. Some of the people I remember are still active and still produce great stuff; Rune Fjæreide for his macros, particularly of dragonflies, and Roald Synnevåg and Tor Henning Olsen for their general interpretation of light. It's where I learned my basics; but had I stayed in Bergen I think I would have learned a lot more.

But I moved. Far out into the coastal countryside of Norway. This was in -95, and the web was just beginning to flourish with photographers presenting their images. Through the Pentax Discussion Mailing List (PDML) I found guys like Doug Brewer, Mark Roberts and Mark Cassino. Just as much as Bekkalokket was a warm, including and inspirational club in the physical world, PDML became the cyberspace counterpart for me.

I also joined the nearest photo club in Sandnes, but it was an hour's drive and a ferry ride away. Many good photographers there too, perhaps most notably John Sirevåg. but not the same intensity as in Bekkalokket.

In the same period I discovered Biofoto. When receiving the first issues of the member journal I was awestruck. Firstly, with the quality of the photos and the quality of the publication. Had it been in a larger market like USA, UK or Germany, the magazine would have sustained widespread circulation beyond the society's members. Secondly, I was struck by the close match between my own way of seeing and what I saw in the magazine. It was perhaps the single most inspirational event I have experienced. To discover that many other Norwegian photographers thought about nature in roughtly the same way as myself. It's futile to list names to represent Biofoto. Many of the most profiled Norwegian nature photographers have emerged through Biofoto. Some are still members, others have moved on. New photographers continue to emerge. So it continues to be a major source of inspiration. Check out the website and look at the gallery of images submitted by members.
My promotion of Norwegian photography is perhaps shameless. Writing in English and all. I guess it's a culture thing. Something I've previously alluded to (here) with regards to the Nordic countries, and also in a post about the emergence of the Pentax Photo Gallery and the persistence of the old Pentax Photo Annual -books. By the way, I remember it tickled my inspiration a lot when I realised how different aestethics are across the world. Maybe I'll be able to use that conciously some day.
This became a very long ramble. Thanks for reading it through.

Gentoo jump

2009-12-11T16:00:00.003+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 60-250/4

1/1500s, f/5.6, ISO 400, Processed on laptop

Click image for larger version

I have reached the bottom of the pile. That is, with this image, I have now posted one image from each day of photographing on the trip. It's prepared for blog on a laptop with screen of dubious quality, so I hope I've hit the ballpark in the post processing. At least the histogram looks good.
This string of images is a far cry from being representative for the trip. I have yet to finish the post-processing of all the files. From South Georgia, for example, there are hundreds of pics from every session, and on good days we had up to four of them. And also, I have already improved the rendering of many of the shots posted, so I must admit to have been too hasty. On the other hand, the self-appointed obligation to publish has forced me to work my images more than I otherwise would have. Without it, I wouldn't have begun the post processing until January, most likely.
I will now take a pause from posting to the blog until the week between Christmas and New Year. Hopefully I will then post some thoughts on the AF performance of the K-7, and maybe some other thoughts about the camera as well.

Imperial Shag

2009-12-09T21:03:00.002+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA*300/4

1/500s, f/5.6, ISO 200

Click image for larger version

The day after Deception Island, we made landing on the Antarctic Peninsula itself; at Paradise Bay, by the Argentine research station Almirante Brown. There was a colony of nesting Imperial Shags close by, and our Zodiac drivers didn't let us down. :-)

Departing Chinstraps

2009-12-08T20:23:00.003+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 60-250/4

1/180s, f/5.6, ISO 200

Click image for larger version

The day after negotiating the icebergs around Elephant Island, we turned into the broad Bransfield Strait separating the South Shetland Islands from the Antarctic Peninsula. We made stops at the Aitcho Islands first, and then at Deception Island. The latter is an active volcano, its last eruption was in the ninteen-sixties. In the area affected by this eruption is a large chinstrap penguin colony. It's rarely accessible, though, because it involves landing on an extremely exposed beach. As you can probably guess from the above pic, there wasn't much of a swell at all; we were once again lucky with the weather to allow us the landing, even if the sky was a dull overcast and not fit for the most amazing shots. The experience mattered most. :-)

Chinstraps adrift

2009-12-07T19:18:00.003+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 300/4
1/1000, f/9.5, ISO 400
click image for larger version

Two days out from South Georgia we passed North of Elephant Island. All day we encountered small and medium sized icebergs, some of which had passengers. Gentoo penguins, or as here, chinstrap penguins. The blue tones in the ice were just amazing. Scouts' honour and cross my heart, I have not increased saturation or colour vibrance in this shot. The only adjustments are to increase white balance by about 400K and use the curves tool to pull the shadows down a bit.

Southern Fulmar

2009-12-06T21:13:00.002+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA*60-250/4
1/1500s, f/5.6, ISO 400
Click image for larger version

The DA*60-250/4 zoom was by good margin the most used lens on my trip. Combined with the K-7 it's adequate for many wildlife action situations. Consider this one, for example. The autofocus was set to multi-segment, and as all AF systems it tend to prioritise the brightest elements in the frame. Yet it had the wits to stick to the bird.

That said, I think Pentax still has a way to go with their AF system. I notice the K-7 is a big leap forward compared to any previous AF camera from Pentax when it comes to track-focusing, but there's still a good gap up to Canon and Nikon in this respect. And Sony too. To get a sharp shot in a situation like the above, one has to expect a considerable number of mis-focused shots. There's a lot of variables, though. White birds against dark background gives a good hit rate. Lower the contrast, and Pentax bails out sooner than the others. Try to photograph brown birds against blue sea and you're lost with Pentax. I threw away 90% of my pictures of giant petrels in flight obtained under similar conditions.

But then again... The main key to successful photography is to know the strengths and weaknesses of your gear. The K-7 has a lot of strengths to show for itself. And I think I'm getting better at catching these critters as they fly by, too.

Curious pup

2009-12-05T14:39:00.004+01:00

An experience from Gold Harbour, South Georgia.

Pentax K-7, DA 14/2.8
1/90s, f/6.7, ISO 200
Click image for larger version

The infancy of elephant seals ends abruptly when the mothers wean them by leaving the beach. The pups linger for a while, and as hunger builds, so does their curiosity. They will eventually leave the beach on their own to figure out how to hunt, but in the meanwhile, tourists are apparently good entertainment for them.

We had a strict policy of not approaching the animals to less than 5 metres. Standing still, however, immediately made us targets of close scrutiny.

fur seal at Godthul

2009-12-03T22:28:00.003+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA*16-50/2.8

1/500s, f/5.6, ISO 200

Click image for larger version

Godthul was one whaling station that never got a cookery on land. Just a few sheds, a pier and access to freshwater. Human activity must have been less abrasive on vegetation here, because the Tussock grass has reclaimed all of the area and many male fur seals defend it as theirs.

Sunrise, St. Andrew's Bay

2009-12-02T21:51:00.004+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 16-50/2.8

1/125s, f/6.3, ISO 200

Click image for larger version

Still from South Georgia, one of our early morning landings. Also one of the most productive landings in terms of pictures taken. I still need time to sort this one through.

Prince Olav Harbour

2009-12-01T18:57:00.005+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 16-50/2.8
1/640s, f/8, ISO 200
Click image for larger version

Prince Olav Harbour was an old whaling station estabished by South-African whalers. It changed hands a couple of times, and was eventually abandoned in the thirties. Most usable equipment were relocated to other stations. Now all rust and wreckage, we were not allowed ashore lest the ruins collapsed on us.

South Georgia; Salisbury Plain

2009-11-30T18:59:00.003+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA*16-50/2.8
1/180s, f/7.1, ISO 200
Click image for larger version

Salisbury Plain was our first stop at South Georgia. We had been warned about how the weather could change abruptly, and it certainly did. More than once. We experienced two blizzards in four hours, with blue sky and still air between. I chose this picture to represent the place because I think it captures a bit of both.

Birdwatcher

2009-11-29T16:43:00.003+01:00

Pentax K-7, FA-77/1.9 ltd.

1/200s, f/16, ISO 200

Click image for larger version

It's a fair bit to travel between the Falklands and South Georgia. Those of us signed up for the general photographic interest roamed the deck every now and then, if the light looked good from the lounge. The birdwatchers, on the other hand, spent as much time on deck as they could. Apart from a passionate interest for birds, they must have the patience of saints.

I brought the FA 77 because I wanted to have one fast prime in my bag. This was the only time I used it.

Black-browed Albatross

2009-11-28T20:04:00.003+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 300/4

Metz 58 AF-1, BetterBeamer

1/180s, f/9.0, ISO 400

Click image for larger version

There were always birds around the ship. Cape- and Giant petrels, mostly, but also this handsome albatros. Captured at dusk, just East of the Falklands.

Rockhopper at Saunders Island

2009-11-27T09:40:00.002+01:00

Pentax K-7, DA*300/4
1/250s, f/8, ISO 200
Click image for larger version

Saunders Island is also in the Western Falklands. Our first penguin rendezvous, we got to see Gentoo penguins, and these guys, the punks among penguins. Their rookery was high up on a cliff some 50 meters above the beach, living up to their name as they passed between feeding and nesting.

Carcass Island

2009-11-25T12:36:00.004+01:00

Currently in transit at Terminal 5 on Heathrow with nothing better to do, I figured I might as well start the picture flood. I will present one pic from each of our landings, or from our passage of the seas where I was fit for photography.

On our first landing at Carcass Island (West Falklands) we had bright sunshine and balmy temperatures. Beautiful start to the trip. Spring was bursting all over the place, with the usual compliment of seasonal activities performed by the local wildlife. And they weren't shy about it either!

Pentax K-7, DA* 60-250/4 at 250mm,

1/1000s, f/7.1, ISO 400

Click image for larger version

Buenos Aires again

2009-11-24T04:13:00.003+01:00

Just a quick note.

First of all, many, many thanks to all of you who have read my blog; and all the more to those who bothered to leave a comment! This is the first time I've had the occasion to see them, and it really warms my heart! Even the shake-up from Maritimtim on seasickness! :-)

To my defence, in that department, I can brag about NOT having been seasick at all across the Drake passage! Despite ocean swells comparable to those that knocked me flat to and fro South Georgia. It seems my system is gradually, ever so gradually, getting used to being at sea.

Actually, as we anchored up outside Ushuaia waiting for the pilot to take us to harbour, I was wondering how much "residue" the ocean swells would leave in my organism when back on solid ground. I guess I will find out for sure tonight when my head hits the pillow, but so far I haven't noticed anything. Much to my surprise. ;-)

Ushuaia is a town that puzzled me. It shares the building style of Buenos Aires, which means that it's a pretty strange conglomerate of ramshackle tin-roofed build-as-you-go houses, and fancy modern stuff. And of course yesteryear's modern stuff; in a variety of states of maintenance. The concept of neighbourhoods does not seem to exist, though. Shacks and middle-class houses may stand wall to wall. The approach to choice of coloring on the house walls seemed also rather haphazard. We saw a B&B, for example, with details in oiled oak and green-painted concrete. And we counted at least 3 distinct varieties of green, ranging from the matte colour of avocado meat to the juicy greens of lime rind.

Tonight we were honeypotted (sorry about verbing) to another tourist trap; a beef restaurant with a live show of the history of Tango. Wine was included, and so it was that I, after nearly a whole bottle of Argentinian Red, tried my hand at stage photography. My mind was blurred (a bit clearer now, thank you), and my pictures got blurred. Most of them anyway. I think I managed to isolate a couple of moments; judging from the rear screen of the camera. Might be worth a blog post after all.

Tomorrow is leisurly; at least compared to some of our schedules on the boat, we only need to be ready for going to the airport at 10:00 AM. A fifteen hour flight to London awaits. Then another couple of hours to get to Oslo; which we'll reach around 16:30 wednesday afternoon. Boy, it will be good to get home.

Thanks again to all of you who have bothered to read my ramblings, I promise I will respond to each of the comments in turn when I get back home.

In the meanwhile, here's a pic I meant to post from the Falklands, but which would never upload through the crappy link. Taken from the whale safari off the Valdez peninsula, Argentina:

Pentax K-7, DA*60-250/4
1/250s, f/8, ISO 400
Click image for larger version

Towards conclusion

2009-11-20T18:34:00.000+01:00

Today is our final day in Antarctica. As advertised in the previous
post, we got up at 05:00 and went ashore to yet another Gentoo penguin
colony. I had my doubts about going this time. There are limits to how
many ways one can photograph a penguin. Or more penguins. We got the
full reportoire a long time ago already; fighting Gentoo penguins,
courting Gentoo penguins, mating Gentoo penguins, swimming Gentoo
Penguins... Closeups, group shots, animal-in-environment shots, you name
it. The Gentoos are ubiquitous; we have encountered them at nearly every
landing site on the Falklands, South Georgia and around the Peninsula.

Yet, Neko Harbour turned out to offer some unique possibilities. The
rookery is situated right beside a glacier, on a moraine ridge that has
quite deep snow all the way down to the beach. There are only a few
places where the penguins can actually get in and out of the water, and
at times there is a lot of bird traffic coming past. It was a treat to
just sit down and watch them transit from one element to another. I even
remembered that my camera has video capabilities, and did some
recordings. Not fit for public scrutiny, though. Don't expect to see any
videos posted on this blog.

Breakfast was waiting when we got back to the ship. Then we sailed
through another narrow stretch called Gerlache Strait, to make the final
landing at Cuverville Island. Access to the beach was blocked by ice,
however, so the guides made an ad hoc decision to go for another zodiac
cruise among the intensely blue icebergs. As we cruised along the stony
shore of Cuverville Island, past yet another Gentoo penguin rookery, we
noticed that there were unusually many birds in the water, swimming
together like a swarm. When at the surface they made the water boil. As
if on cue, they would all disappear, and resurface some distance away.
We paused to look at this for a while, and suddenly the cause of their
behaviour emerged. A leopard seal was hunting along the beach. The seal
got curious about the zodiacs and checked us out.

By fortunate accident, my 77mm polafilter is stuck in the thread of my
14mm lens at the moment. I had decided I wanted to use a polariser for
pictures of underwater ice, and so the 14mm was mounted on one camera
instead of the more general-purpose DA* 16-50mm. For the Leopard seal
encounter the 14mm was a better deal. That's how close we got.

Fantastic experience.

At the moment we're leaving Antarctica for the Drake passage. We have
been told to pack away all loose items and apply remedies for
seasickness as needed; it seems we're in for some rough weather towards
Ushuaia.

Indeed, I had to enter the bridge to post this, that's where the
satellite connected computer is, and I don't wish to do that again in a
hurry.

Unless I get some idle time in either Ushuaia or Buenos Aires, this will
probably be my last blogpost until getting back to Norway. It's been
three amazing weeks. So many amazing places, and so many nice people.

Truly a fantastic experience.

Antarctica Proper

2009-11-20T01:34:00.000+01:00

This morning started with passage through the Neumayer Channel. A
stretch of fjord with spectacular mountains and glaciers on both sides.
Some of us even skipped breakfast to see this. For the first time we
also met another tourist ship. A vessel larger than ours, somewhere
between luxury yacht and full-blown cruiseliner. Very sobering
correction to our sense of proportions, making the nature experience all
the more humbling.

Just after this encounter I sneaked into the kitchen and begged some
food. As I was just finishing a bowl of cereals, our guides announced
arrival at Port Lockroy in a few minutes. No rest for the busy tourist.
:-)

Port Lockroy is a small British station where they run only one
scientific experiment. The station is build on a small island that hosts
a Gentoo Penguin colony. Half the island has been fenced off; allowing
the station crew to study the effect of tourism on the penguins.

To lure the tourists into this experiment (ie. a genuine Tourist Trap!),
the British Antarctic Survey has made a museum of the whole station,
restored into a snapshot of what it was like in its heyday in the
nineteen-fifties. It is also possible to have one's passport stamped,
and buy a variety of souvernirs. All major credit cards accepted.

In total, the station attracts around 30.000 tourists every season. And
though nobody explicitly told me so, I got a distinct feeling that this
little business is doing a good job of funding other research activities
for the British Antarctic Survey.

The penguins seemed quite satisfied with the arrangement too. According
to the staff, the breeding success is slightly higher in the tourist
zone. The suspected cause is that skuas are more intimidated by tourists
than are the penguins, and so leave the eggs and chicks in the tourist
zone alone. This sounds quite puzzling to us, because skuas have been
quite ignorant of our presence at other landings.

Our second outing for the day took place in "Paradise Bay". It's a name
I have been unable to locate on any online map, but it refers to the
fjords around the Argentinian Brown base. There are several glaciers
feeding into this bay, leaving the waters full of little icebergs.
Apparently the sea ice had recently broken up too, because there were
also thousands of small and larger flakes of sheet ice floating around.

Into these waters we were taken on a "zodiac-cruise". Zig-zagging
between the icebergs was amazing. There was no wind and only partly
clouded. Excellent weather for shooting ice in water. With a
polarisation filter it was amazing how much submerged detail we could
discern through the crystal-clear water. And what colours. The shades of
blue and green were almost otherworldly.

In fact, a thought about these colours have nagged me ever since this
morning in the Neumayer Channel. It is said that many people who travel
the polar regions are infected with a sort of "polar bug" that makes
them go back time after time. Today's visual impressions has made me
wonder if it isn't the colours themselves that are infectious. Some
imperative quality of the light itself. I already fear I may have caught
that bug.

But I digress. The landing at Brown base was the first touch of the
Antarctic continent itself. The Argentinians were not at home, but a
host of Gentoo penguins played caretakers. By now, I feel more or less
saturated on penguin photography, but I still think they are some of the
funniest animals in the world to watch. How they come swimming like
little torpedoes between the ice flakes, and use their swimming speed to
get out of the water in their stride, running for the first couple of
steps to brake down. And then the clumsy looking walk with
characteristic swing of the head and wings straight out to the sides to
keep their balance. If you sit still, they will ignore you unless you
are in a straight path between the penguin and its destination. If you
are, it will stop at two meters' distance and consider. What exactly
their bird brains do consider is a mystery, but apparently it takes a
long time to figure out the options. In most cases the bird will just
walk around. However in deep snow they make regular paths, or "highways"
as our guide calls them, that they do not lightly abandon. We had to
take care not to trample all over such paths at times. Fortunately they
are easily distinguishable by the pink remnants of digested krill...

Tomorrow we will rise at 05:00 for another landing on the Peninsula, so
I better get this posted and hit the pillow. It's 21:15 ship time, and
I'm just about finished taking backup of the afternoon's 700 images.

Live report from South Hebrides

2009-11-18T17:47:00.000+01:00

This post is made just to get a hands-on description of how we are
doing.

I am standing on the front deck with the laptop resting on some metal
structure. Almost everyone is out, and PolarQuest is handing out beers
or soft drinks. We are cruising along the Southwest side of the South
Hebrides in bright sunlight and nearly flat sea. Temperature is an
amazing five celsius above zero. My hands get a little cold as I write
this, but not really impairing my typing speed. But please allow for
more typos than usual. :-)

This morning we made another successful landing; the Aitcho Island was
another fascinating closeup with Antarctic wildlife. Gentoo and
Chinstrap penguins for most part. What was new this time was that the
animals came ashore just where we landed, so we got all the images we
could wish for, of penguins in water.

One of the guides just interrupted, calling our attention to feeding
gentoos swimming just in front of the ship. I got a few shots before
they vanished.

The landscape gliding past on our right hand side is spectacular.
Glaciers and nunataks, sometimes with icebergs just broken off, or with
visible moraines towards a bit of beach. All the mountains are jagged
and sharp; adding to a feeling of majestic desolation.

Okay; now my fingers _are_ getting cold. :-)

But I couldn't pass the opportunity.

Icebergs and whales

2009-11-18T17:45:00.000+01:00

The following was written yesterday, 17. November:

After completing my previous post, something interesting DID turn up.
Today we got to see the humpback whales. They played around the sides of
the ship; we could see their white bellies down in the water. They
surfaced occasionally to breathe, but no spectacular jumps. Our guides
are puzzled by their presence, because they have a long way to swim from
the breeding grounds in more tropical areas. Normally they do not arrive
in Antarctic waters until the turn of the year. This brings our total
whale sightings list up to four species. We saw the Right Whale in
Argentina, Hourglass Dolphins on the leg between Falklands and South
Georgia, fin whales yesterday, and today the humpbacks. Today we also
encountered the first really big icebergs. Big as in more volume than
our ship above the water line. Man those structures are awesome.

On many of the icebergs there are chinstrap penguins chilling out. They
bring the total penguin species count up to five; Gentoo, Rockhopper,
King, Macaroni and Chinstrap. The Adelie penguins have not shown
themselves yet, but I expect they will turn up further South.

Whenever I have seen pictures of icebergs, I have always thought the
blueishness of the ice was a Photoshop construct. It is therefore doubly
stunning to see the actual blueness of the icebergs. Especially close to
the waterline. Must be something about how the light is reflected from
the ice below the waterline, onto the parts we see. Together with the
sheer dimensions of the icebergs it's awesome. Beyond awesome.

Just before dinner, when going through the captures from this morning, I
had a hard time deleting any of the images at all. Even mediocre images
are kept. The landscapes just so blows me away that I can't find the
heart to delete them. But heck, I have already weeded pretty well in the
collection, so I would have to shoot 10.000 images a day for the rest of
the trip to exceed my storage capacity.

Just after dinner, most of us rushed back on the deck to photograph
icebergs in the sideways light of sunset. It was a beautiful sunset in
its own right, but the floating chunks of ice turned even more blue. It
may well be the most stunning sunset I have ever seen. The captain is
performing some kind of ballet with the icebergs, dodge one, swing
around another, and still keeping between 10 and 12 knots. Fortunately
the sea is nearly flat and with no winds. We are indeed on a lucky
streak weatherwise.

The plan for tomorrow is to land at Aitcho Island in the South Hebrides,
receive a crash course in snowshoe walking, and go for a hike to another
penguin colony. If the weather stays like this it will be just a stroll.

Fingers crossed.

Another day at sea

2009-11-18T03:48:00.000+01:00

Fingers crossed.

Towards Antarctica

2009-11-17T14:23:00.000+01:00

We hit the ocean swells again after leaving South Georgia. And again I
got knocked out flat with seasickness. Scopolamin patch to no avail; I
have had another 36 hours doing nothing but to lie as still as possible.

It's a bit of comfort, though, that many of the other passengers are
going through the same. I may be a chicken, but not the only chicken...
:-)

By the time of posting, we have covered most of the distance between
South Georgia and the Antarctic Peninsula. We are currently heading for
Elephant Island, but with little hope of actually getting ashore
bedcause of the sea ice. We have the huge advantage of having another
ship ahead of us, that can report on ice conditions before we get there.

Even if we don't make a landing on the island, there's a good chance of
seeing whales along the edge of the ice, so we keep our fingers crossed
for another good nature experience.

During a recap and debrief of our days at South Georgia, we learned that
our luck with the weather is almost unprecedented. We made landings at a
total of 9 sites; and one of the guides even got a first-time landing on
one of the more exclusive sites; featuring Macaroni Penguins, among
other things.

As of now, the ocean swells have either dampened down, or alternatively,
my brain has been sufficiently dampened down not to notice. Anyways,
there are many people out on deck photographing icebergs while hoping to
catch a glimpse of a whale or two.

I can't wait to start posting images from this trip. Hopefully I can
convey some of the sense of wonder from being here.

Oh, and someone mentioned in the passing that this is the very ship that
Michael Reichmann from the Luminous Landscape website travelled on a
couple of years ago. I relay this information just to give you a hint of
how used they are to accommodate for the wishes of photographers.
Yesterday we got a good example of their understanding for our desires
when they turned the ship to follow a group of whales for a while, in
hope of getting some good shots. The whales however, were busy and hard
to track, so eventually we gave up. But it was very kind of the captain
to try anyway.

More later, now I wish to join my fellow passengers on deck, in case
something interesting turns up.

South Georgia

2009-11-14T00:20:00.000+01:00

South Georgia has, after its own fashion, given us a warm welcome!
Surely, we have had showers of snow and katabastic wind-attacks, but
every beach landing so far has been smooth, and we've had more sunshine
than clouds. The experiences will be etched on my mind forever. The
wandering albatross and its half-grown offspring at Prion Island. The
king penguins, elephant seals and fur seals at Salisbury plains and St.
Andrew's bay, and the old ruins of the whaling station at Prince Olav
bay. At the latter we were not permitted on shore, however, because the
buildings are in such a condition that they may fold like a card house
over any visitor careless enough to just sneeze.

Not sure I'm able to put down a lot of words to describe these events
yet. They are all grand, both on geographical, emotional and
photographic scale. From the last 36 hours I have obtained about 20000
images. I haven't had time to do anything but to just store them on the
computer and make backups.

Oh, yes, and one more thing; geotagging the images by matching them with
the log from my little GPS unit. The job has just insinuated itself into
my workflow, and it seems like the most natural thing of the world to do
by now. It's just a few clicks to harvest the data from the GPS and
store it. Then another few clicks with GeoSetter to match the log with
the images. Works every time!

I have also experimented a little with the video functionality of K-7.
More on that later, when I begin to make heads and tails of it.

Further, I have also FINALLY got around to use a good-quality sound
recorder I bought 3 years ago. I have made recordings of the somewhat
obscene sounds of elephant seals, and the all together puzzling sounds
of the king penguins and their chicks.

To visit Grytviken was also quite an experience. The place is simple
enough to tour, there are only a few stops. Ernest Shackletons grave,
the whaling museum, the church, the old derelict buildings and stranded
ships from the whale industry, and the recently opened hydropower plant.
And the souvernir shop, of course, where I bought an obligatory "been
there" t-shirt and some christmas presents. The bill was paid by credit
card, which gave a certain feeling of paradox; being so far, far away
from anywhere else and yet pay with plastic money.

We still have one day left here before heading towards the Antarctic
Peninsula. The landing tomorrow will (most likely) be our only chance to
see Macaroni penguins. Fingers crossed it works out.

Days at sea

2009-11-10T23:49:00.000+01:00

North-westerly winds have nudged us in the back all the way from the
Falklands towards South Georgia. The ship has been making roughly 13
knots, and our guides are pleased to remind us, often, that it will mean
more time ashore at South Georgia.

At the time of writing we have had just over 50 hours at sea since we
left the Falklands. A lot of time has been spent weeding the pictures
from the beaches at Falklands, and subsequently assigning keywords and
making backups. The most convenient place for these activites is of
course the ship's lounge, where we also get to glance enviously at each
other's captures and exchange experiences from the various shoots. Some
of us have also spent a few hours on deck, photographing seabirds as
they zoom past in their search for food surfacing in the wake of the
ship. Albatrosses, petrels and so on. Don't ask me to recognise those
species yet, they all look like some kinda fulmar to me. But it's great
practice to have a go. The DA*300/4 lens is seeing a lot of work, as
does the Metz flash and the BetterBeamer. The latter is really doing
wonders for the effective flash range, and enables me to shoot images I
would definately have missed without. It also opens for some creative
flash photograpy. I will pursue this as my stomach allows; my
seasickness has begun stirring again. It feels a bit unfair, because my
roommate is having a great time. Apparently completely unaffected. I
applied another patch of scopolamin a couple of hours ago, but I'm still
not good. Have to lie down frequently to calm the system.

Yesterday our ship was accompanied by a flock of Hourglass dolphins for
nearly 20 minutes. They made beautifully gracious jumps along the side
of the ship, sometimes two or three together, and all of them in
suitably photogenic distance from the ship. However, again I fumbled.
Just like on the whale safari at the Valdez peninsula. Seems like me an
whales don't go well together. All my dolphin shots came out slightly
blurred because my shutter speeds weren't short enough. Grrr...

A few hours ago we passed Shag Rock, a set of jagged peaks protruding
out of the sea in the middle of nowhere. Coloured by guano and inhabited
by thousands, it was indeed a Shag's rock. Our guides were very pleased
to have the opportunity to sail close by, explaining that this point is
normally passed after nightfall. The favourable winds are credited for
this one too.

As of now, our preparations for landing at South Georgia have begun. We
have been instructed to vacuum-clean all outer garments we intend to
bring ashore, as well as all photobags and other equipment that may
become exposed to the island's soil. We will also have to scrub our
boots thoroughly in a disinfecting liquid before setting foot on the
island. Their hope is that these precautions will keep foreign seeds,
micro-organisms and insects from spreading into the ecosystem. It's
tedious work, and with only two vacuum cleaners and over 40 passengers,
it's quite a queue to get it done.

If you have read this far, it might now occur to you that I'm babbling
about trivial and rather insignificant things. You would be right. I'm
bored. :-)

And looking forward to seeing South Georgia tomorrow.

The Falklands

2009-11-08T14:40:00.003+01:00

Since the previous post we have moved a long way. The trip has taken turns, both for the worse and for the better. I will take the better first and last, and mention the worse in the middle.
Our next stop after Buenos Aires was Puerto Madryn. A harbour city of 100.000 people situated by the bay Golfo Nuevo. A dusty place at our time there, and probably most of the time. The Argentinian steppe goes all the way down to the ocean, and doesn't even allow a sliver of greener country towards the beach. There are long, shallow beaches everywhere, and the harbour of Puerto Madryn is just two long piers erected far into the water.

After a very short night in a Madryn hotel, we were stirred at 5:00 AM, stacked into a bus at 6:00 AM and hauled along around the Golfo Nuevo to a place called Puerto Piramides. Like Madryn, it wasn't much of a Puerto, but nonetheless the starting point for all official whale safaris in the area. Unlike Madryn, the Piramides is situated within the nature park of the Valdez peninsula; a UNESCO world heritage area with strict regulations on tourism. Strict as in "No camping outside designated areas" and "No walking outside of marked paths". Yet there are sheep ranches in the area, and most if not all land is private property with fences to restrict the movements of sheep.

The whale safari was no disappointment. We were on the water for a couple of hours, watching the social interplay between a Right Whale mother and her calf. Photographically I fumbled a lot and got back with mostly useless images. The swaying boat, the constant competition for the best spot to photograph from, and the unfamiliar behaviour of the subjects all contributed to confuse the hell out of me. But I think I got a couple that will survive posting on the blog when I get the chance.

After the whale safari and a short visit to a Magellan penguin colony, we boarded the expedition ship, and left Argentina in the afternoon. Some time after dark we got caught up in strong winds and big, rolling waves. I don't remember much of it. Slept my way through the first night and most of the following day, dozed through the second night and spent the second morning finally emptying my stomach. Not much to let go of, but it released the tension for a while each time. The ship's doctor patched me up with a scopolamin plaster, and it seems to work. Much to my surprise.

At the time of writing we have arrived at the Falklands. First stop was Carcass Island, where we were invited to tea by the local residents. I skipped that, in favour of photographing a plethora of bird species that weren't really afraid of humans at all. Got lots of nice bird portraits. Took some landscape shots too, but the light wasn't the best for that.

Second stop at the Falklands was Saunders Island, with penguin colonies aplenty. Rockhoppers, King, and Gentoo penguins. Skuas, cormorants and albatrosses were also present and photogenic.

Right now it's Sunday morning, I'm sitting in the lounge at the Malvina hotel in Port Stanley, accessing Internet through a local wireless hotspot that I had to pay outrageously much to get access to. But it's cheaper than the satellite phone text-only option onboard the ship anyway. I have tried to upload some images, but the outgoing bandwidth of the connection is too small, I don't get them through.

Buenos Aires

2009-11-03T01:57:00.004+01:00

First leg of the trip has gone smoothly.

Well... - As smoothly as a 13 hour flight can go, for a man that barely fit between the seat rows of a British Airways Jumbo jet. It's been a touristy, eventful day. And kinda long. We have traversed 4 timezones since Oslo, and though my watch says 22:00, my body insists that it's about 02:00, and bedtime much overdue. I suspect my grammar will confirm this... :-)

Buenos Aires is a city easy to like for a European. It looks like Portugal. Or Spain. Or Italy. Depends whom you ask. But it looks like no other too. And people are slightly more laid back that I have experienced them in, say, Lisbon, Milano or Palermo (unfortunately I've never been to Spain). This afternoon my room-mate, Per, and I sneaked around and did some street shooting. One motif we both found was this young lady making a phone call. Dunno if she missed her car, but the sign was too well juxtaposed to pass up.

Tomorrow we'll start early and head for a wetland reserve practically inside the city. According to our guide we will spend a couple of hours there shooting wildlife, before heading to the airport for the last airborne leg, to Trelew airport. From there we will go by bus to Puerto Madryn, deliver the luggage to the expedition ship, and go on a whale safari with a smaller boat.

The location challenge

2009-10-18T14:48:00.002+02:00

Antarctica is a place where relatively few geographical features are named. Many of the names are also disputed because explorers from different countries have assigned different names, so what's "official" will depend on who you ask.
So I figured the safest way of keywording landscapes from this trip would be to assign geographic coordinates. Geotagging. Much like the way I've used my Garmin heart rate monitor, I assumed. Just log the positions, upload to computer and match with images based on time. It shouldn't be much harder than to make sure the clocks of the GPS and the camera are synchronised, right?
:-)

Right. Step one: buy a cheap GPS logger with long battery life. This one looked good, a GlobalSat DG-100.

When it arrived at my house, I realised the software did not support 64-bit Vista. Fortunately, after a bit of googling, I found that the obstacle was actually the USB driver, which could be downloaded from the USB component's manufacturer, Prolific. Link here.

Latest version of the GlobalSat software can be downloaded from the GlobalSat product link above. It's pretty amateurish but do the job I want it to. An open-source alternative also exists at SourceForge, if you'd like to try something else. Link to DGmanager .NET.

The only thing I use this software for is to collect the GPS data-log from the unit, and save it as a file on my desktop. Both programs support the Garmin *.gpx format, which is what I prefer at the moment.

Next, I dug around for a program that would match the GPS data with my images. There are lots of tools out there, but not many that support raw files. I chose GeoSetter, which is a very decent piece of freeware. I also found a LightRoom plugin that seem to work, but I get a bit confused about the author's explanations of "shadow data", so I have steered clear of this.

The total workflow seems now to end up something like this:
1. Turn the GPS on before going out for the day, and make sure the clocks of the GPS and camera are in synch.
2. Happy snapping.
3. Upload GPS data to PC and save as *.gpx
4. Upload images to PC. In my case also import to LightRoom.
5. Run GeoSetter on uploaded images
6. Reload metadata from files in LightRoom.
7. Further processing and backup.

The packing challenge

2009-10-11T15:15:00.002+02:00

Photographic equipment is typical carry-on luggage. The callenge is to fit all the gear into a bag or case that meets the maximum size limit for the airline. Here's the list of things that must fit into my bag:

FA* 600mm f/4
DA* 300mm f/4
DA* 60-250mm f/4
DA* 16-50mm f/2.8
DA 14mm f/2.8
one K-7 with vertical grip
one K-7 without grip
Metz 58 AF-1 flash
14" laptop
portable disks for backup
A few chargers and power supplys

The physical dimensions of the 600mm is of course the biggest challenge. The largest diameter is 23 cm, and it's nearly 49 cm long, including lens caps.

I was quite optimistic at first, because there actually are a couple of photobag solutions that will hold a 600mm and, according to the marketing, fit into the overhead lockers in airplanes. The ThinkTank Airport Security v2 is one such example. It's built specifically to meet the limits for domestic flights in USA.

USA limits, however, are far more generous than elsewhere in the world. Check the wording on American Airlines' website for example. ThinkTank also acknowledge this, and recommend their "international" model for flights outside US. But it doesn't hold a 600mm.

My heart sank a bit, but based on previous experience with various European airlines I decided that I'll probably get away with the USA version anyway, and shelled out the money. Since then I've even brought it from Oslo to London and back with two different airlines without trouble, so my confidence grew. But my upcoming trip will also involve domestic flights in Argentina, so I felt I had to check the allowance there too. Just in case.

That's what I should have checked first. Aerolineas Argentinas have even stricter rules for the size of carryons. 55 x 35 x 25 cm. The good news is that a 600mm will, in principle, fit within these limits. The bad news is that no photo bag exists that makes the most of these particular volume restrictions.

My best answer is an ordinary soft-walled carryon bag from Carlton. It's slightly over the limit on paper, but in practice a tight fit. And the 600mm fits neatly inside.

And bless Pentax for supplying pouches with their lenses. In airports and planes, those pouches are sufficient as padding between the items. With all the lenses separated by pouches, I'll wrap some clothes around the cameras and the laptop, dress up the 600mm in its rain cover, and that's it. I test-packed today and it looks really good. I could even sneak in my passport and a couple of dollar bills.

And I will just have to hope that nobody wants to check the weight of the thing...

Where birds don't fly

2009-10-01T20:51:00.002+02:00

Pentax *istD, FA* 400/5.6, tripod

1/150s, f/11, ISO 200

At Cotswold Wildlife Park and Gardens

Figured I might as well go public on where I'm headed on that ship mentioned in the previous post.

I'll be seeing a lot of penguins in November. Not the species above, which is native to Chile and Peru, but lots of others. Starting from Argentina, we'll go by the Falklands, South Georgia and the South Orkney Islands to the Antarctic Peninsula. The travel agent is a Swedish company called PolarQuest, and the ship is a refurbished ice breaker taking 50 passengers.

I have dreamed of a trip like this for years. The booking was made half a year ago, but the reality of it hasn't begun to really dawn on me until now. The practical preparations has begun, the packing list made and revised several times over the last week.

The subtitle of this blog is "an attempt at photography close to home". I am, once again, failing spectacularly in my attempts. But it would be futile to deny that this make me tick, this kind of adventure, this kind of opportunity to see. The penguins may not fly. I feel like I already do.

Words alone (test)

2009-09-28T22:37:00.001+02:00

In November I will be without web-access for most of the month. I will be on a ship with a satellite link that allows text-only emails, once a day. That's what this test is about; to post to the blog via email.

It's a shame I'll be unable to post pictures while on the go, but I promise I'll pester you with them when I get back. :-)

Frosty Morning

2009-09-24T20:56:00.002+02:00

Pentax K-7, DA*60-250/4, tripod

1/400s, f/6.3, ISO 400

Click image for larger version

Still from the canoe trip. Temperature dropped just below zero one night. At sunrise there was a thin layer of frost on everything, and the water steamed because of being slightly warmer than the air.

Along the river

2009-09-23T18:29:00.003+02:00

Pentax K-7, DA* 16-50/2,8

1/160s, f/8, ISO 400

Click image for larger version

Autumn tradition

2009-09-22T20:27:00.005+02:00

It must be called tradition by now. Nearly every year I go to Rendalssølen to photograph autumn colours. That's how it started out, anyway. The first experience made me want to go back. And so did the second experience, when I did go back. This was the fifth time I returned, and it won't be the last if I can help it.
For two years now, I have had my eye on a watershed in a broad valley, right in the heart of the area, and have been wondering whether it would be traversable by canoe.
Long story short, it is.
And quite probably the most beautiful stretch of canoeing I have ever done. Quiet, meandering rivers and streams, wide wetlands with birds and beavers. All the animals were very shy and difficult photographic subjects. I will keep that in mind for later, but for now I'm content with the harvest of landscape shots I got this time. I will post a couple as I get around to process them.
Here's one shot from the first evening's campsite, the title is the name of the lake.

Pentax K-7, DA*16-50/2.8 at 50mm
1/4s, f/16, ISO 200, tripod.
Click image for larger version

Ops...

2009-09-17T22:39:00.002+02:00

It's been a month since the last post.
There's been very little photography lately, except a good gathering with friends in Greenwich last week-end. A whole lot of other stuff has happened, though, and my anticipation is rising before a Big Event in November.
Tomorrow, however, there will be a small event. It's time for the yearly trip to Rendalssølen, my favourite spot in the Norwegian mountains. There should be a good dash of colour up there now, and the weather forecast looks half decent.
Fingers crossed that I'll catch something to show for myself when I return.

Metz flash experiements

2009-08-16T12:00:00.001+02:00

My Pentax AF 540-FGZ may have been broken for some time without my noticing. I realise that now, after a few sessions with my new Metz flash. In a previous post I mentioned how easily flash photography leaves me confused, but maybe it hasn't been all my fault after all.

In a friend's wedding a week ago, the exposures made with the Metz were far less confusing than my previous flash sessions. And so are the results for macro, it seems.

However a reliable flash is not the only factor adding improvement. Combined with a A* 200/4 macro, the K20D tended to underexpose by 1 or 2 stops. The K-7 is much closer to the mark.

So again, as it always ends up, the weakest link my technique. I really don't like the specular highlights in the fly's carpace below. And my skill at approaching the subject is still weak; not to mention that I still jump with suprise every time that snap-in focus triggers the camera. :-)

2469

2009-08-07T22:59:00.005+02:00

Today I am particularly proud of my family. Yesterday we hiked to the summit of Norway's highest mountain, Galdhøpiggen, 2469 meters above sea level. Not a terribly big feat in itself, but considering who's involved, the achievement is quite monumental. I see no reason not to brag for people I love. :-)

The summit is the rightmost peak in the background. Over the last two decades, it has changed from a remote and majestic peak to something reachable by any old flatlander on a one-day hike. Under surveillance of a guide, that is, because the shorter route goes across a glacier with many nasty crevices.

The glacier covers roughly one third of the distance to the peak, and we crossed it single-file, tied together with ropes. I hope the images below convey some of the mood from the glacier, with multiple teams crossing simultaneously.

At the summit it was rather crowded, but I got a clean shot of the guy below. A posture that was far from unique up there, but interesting nonetheless.

All pics with Pentax K-7 and FA 43mm f/1.9 ltd. Post-processing done on a laptop with screen of dubious quality.

Sigma flash woes

2009-08-01T17:21:00.001+02:00

Since my Pentax AF 540-FGZ flash began acting up a couple of weeks ago, I've been considering other flashes to replace it. Both Sigma and Metz have alternatives sporting the same functionality and output power. Today I gave in to the shopping lust and grabbed a Sigma EF-530 DG Super, which was a good 500 NOK (90 USD, 50 Euro/GBP) cheaper than the Metz.

Well at home, I subjected the flash to some tests. Exposure looked nice on both K20D and K-7 and P-TTL seemed to work as it should. But alas.

As you know P-TTL actually requires two blinks for each press of the shutter button. One blink to meter, one to expose the shot. So the flash needs to be sufficiently charged for two blinks before communicating "ready" to the camera. The Sigma reports "ready" when charge is sufficient for one blink. Which means that the camera can be fooled into metering for flash, but receive no output from the flash when the actual exposure takes place.

I discovered this by taking a series of shots with the K-20D. The first two shots were correctly exposed, but then followed three or four completely dark frames, and at last one correctly exposed frame with ambient light only. I waited 30 seconds to let the flash recharge, and repeated the series while watching with the camera away from my face. First there came two exposures with double-blinks. Then came three exposures with one blink, and at last a long exposure without flash. The three single-blink exposures turned out black.

So back at the store, I did a test series right there for demonstration. The salesperson sighed. "Worst thing is," he said, "I don't think your flash is faulty. We've seen this on Sigma flashes in combination with Canon as well".

I was offered to return the flash without any cost, but chose to trade it for a Metz 58 AF; spending the additional 500 NOK. Naturally, I asked to test the Metz before committing the money, and this flash behaved as expected. All P-TTL flash exposures correct.

Lesson learned.

Oh, and the Metz is still a good 1000 NOK cheaper than the original Pentax AF 540-FGZ, in case you wondered... :-)

Autofocus performance of Pentax K-7

2009-07-18T17:15:00.006+02:00

Half a year ago I agonised over the K20D not being fast enough for capturing the action when photographing birds, and I sincerely wished for Pentax to build a faster camera (link to old blogpost). So when I learned about the coming K-7 I had hopes that this was the kind of camera I had wished for.

Over the last couple of days I've tried to compare the AF performance of the my K-7 to its predecessor K20D in some real-life situations. At first I was quite informal about it, just to get a feeling of the new camera. It was an enjoyable experience to track birds through the air with the K-7. When comparing the percentage of in-focus shots I got the impression that this camera was more than three times as precise as is the K20D. But that was just a gut-feeling, my photographic material was not extensive enough to draw any conclusions. For that, I needed some photographic subjects with a more predictable behaviour. So yesterday I got serious. Well... as serious as I'm capable of becoming when this kind of peeping is involved. This kind of testing is very much limited by the skill of the photographer at keeping the subject inside the frame, and within the area reachable by the 11 autofocus sensors. So take the results with a suitable measure of salt-grains. :-)

My subject of choice was trucks, driving 100 km/h on the highway just North of Oslo. I found a nice bridge where I could shoot whole series of them as they approached. Back home I studied the AF precision by inspecting the shots at 1:1 in Adobe Bridge CS4. I took a conservative approach, and judged everything that wasn't pin sharp at the front of the car to be mis-focused. The typical determinators were details in the grille or the number plates, as in the two examples below, shot with the K-7 and FA*600/4.

The camera settings were:
- SR on for shots with DA*300, shot freehand
- SR off for shots with FA*600, shot from tripod
- AF-C, multipoint
- ISO 800
- Av-mode (aperture set to f/8. shutter speed varied between 1/250s and 1/4000s)
- DNG file format

Between each series I allowed the camera to save all files before commencing a new series, to make sure camera speed was not held back by a full buffer.

Results:
1. K20D + DA*300/4:
13% mis-focused, averaged over 9 series

2. K-7 + DA*300/4:
7% mis-focused, averaged over 7 series

3. K20D + FA*600/4:
43% mis-focused, averaged over 7 series

4. K-7 + FA*600/4:
25% mis-focused, averaged over 11 series

Each series held between 10 and 19 shots.

So on the whole, I "lost" 50% less shots to mis-focus with the K-7 than I lost with K20D. That's quite an improvement, in my opinion.

Both lenses are focus-calibrated with the K20D, but not with the K-7. I therefore suspect that the K-7 results could be even further improved. Somewhat.

However, there are many other factors influencing this result. I may have misjudged the focus, and the mis-focus may have been caused by motion blur. For example, if a truck has no cargo, it tends to bounce more after passing dents or bumps in the road. I'm pretty sure my longest shutter speeds were inadequate for freezing this kind of motion, but when comparing mis-focus to shutter speeds, I can't see that the shortest shutter speeds (1/2500 - 1/4000) has fewer mis-focused shots than have the longest shutter speeds (1/250 - 1/640). Yet I can't rule out this effect, particularly for the series with the 600mm.

So back to the mentioned measure of salt, this is not a scientific study. However, I feel for my own part that the K-7 is vastly improving my odds of obtaining sharp pictures of moving subjects.

Ninja alert

2009-07-10T23:40:00.002+02:00

This guy was part of a game that thrilled 130 kids to no end at a karate summer camp. Us parents who stood ringside had a good laugh too, as the children fought down the scary, but for the occasion ever so slightly stupid ninjas.
For the first time in my life I have used a monopod, and was quite surprised how useful it can be. This shot was obtained at 1/40s, at a focal length of 220mm. Had you asked me one day earlier, I would have said I'd need a tripod for that. :-)
Camera: Pentax K20D,
Lens: Pentax DA* 60-250/4

Rust

2009-06-27T20:19:00.003+02:00

Pentax K20D, FA 43mm f/1.9 ltd.

f/10, 1/125s, ISO 200

At Runde, there is a 3m high iron stub left from the previous light, a tall tower built in the thirties and disassembled by the Germans during WW2 for its easy supply of metal. Now it's left to rust in the salt sprays of the ocean, and the corrosion creates many fascinating patterns. I thought this one resembled a jellyfish over kelp.

Armeria maritima

2009-06-22T22:29:00.003+02:00

Pentax K20D, DA 14mm f/2.8, AF540-FTZ flash with LumiQuest Mini-Softbox

f/7.1, 1/100s @ ISO 400

On this particular occasion I was trying out using flash and wide-angle for closeups of flowers. I've never been good at flash shots. That is, I've never been particularly happy with my results from flash-aided photography. I fumble a lot, lose control, and end up mostly confused. One of the things I have hated is all those weird shadows that end up in places where I don't want them. So I've experimented with indirect flash, small softeners, off-camera flash, etc., etc.
However the fumbling factor has got the better of me. Every time. Quite discouraging really.
So it was with considerable suspicion and a slight feeling of recklessness that I bought a LumiQuest mini-softbox a couple of weeks back. When at Runde last week-end I braced myself and tested it. A good many miss-outs and screwed-up shots later, I got this one. The flash is placed off-camera to the left; the soft-box is so close it's just outside the frame.
What still puzzles me a bit is the combination of exposure settings I had to apply to get a decent balance between natural and flash light. I dialled in a +1 stop compensation on the flash, and a -1 compensation for the total exposure. This turned out to be some kind of sweet-spot combination, and I used it successfully for another hour and maybe 50 shots; providing reliably good results with many different motifs. I'm at loss for an explanation for why this worked so well, but I'll surely try it out more. :-)
Th flower is called "Marsh Daisy" in English, according to Wikipedia. A salt-tolerant plant that grace the coastal landscape of nearly all of Norway. The light at Runde fyr in the background.

Puffin

2009-06-20T21:25:00.003+02:00

Pentax K20D, DA* 60-250/4 @ 88mm

f/6.3, 1/1600s, ISO 800

Another puffin. We were particularly keen to get photos of puffins with fish in their beaks this time. Because last year, the entire colony gave up breeding soon after the chicks hatched. There were no fish in the waters. A local ban on trawling for sand eels seems to have made all the difference this year.

Gossipers

2009-06-19T23:51:00.003+02:00

Pentax K20D, DA* 60-250/4 @ 250mm
f/8, 1/500s, ISO 200

From the puffin colony at Runde. Last time I was there, I shot mostly with the DA*300/4 and the FA*600/4. This time, the DA 60-250/4 was the only lens I used.

Tailnapper

2009-06-17T23:43:00.002+02:00

The Great Skua is a pirate. It steals food from other species by harassing them until they drop their catch. Here is one, caught in the act of napping the tail of a Gannet at Runde.

Pentax K20D, FA* 600/4, tripod
f/6.3, 1/1600s, ISO 400

10.000th frame

2009-06-16T20:40:00.000+02:00

Two days ago my K20D took its 10.000th exposure. This is it.

Obtained at Runde Fyr, a lighthouse on the West coast of Norway.

The lens was an FA 43mm f/1.9 ltd.

Lingonberry Flower

2009-06-07T19:17:00.004+02:00

Pentax K20D, A* 200/4 macro

1/250s, f/8, ISO 400

Click image for slightly larger version

The lingonberry is a small, red and bitter berry ripening in September. It is used for jam to go with dinner courses, much like cranberry jelly. In the forest today, its flowers were more abundant than I've ever seen them before. Fingers crossed it will mean a lot of berries too, in a couple of months.

Consolidation complete

2009-06-05T19:14:00.002+02:00

...for now anyway.
I'm talking about the Personal Lens Roadmap, of course. Back in January, Yvon Bourque suggested creating personal lens roadmaps akin to the official one that Pentax publishes bi-annually. That idea had struck me too, already when I saw the first incarnation of the Pentax roadmap. So I published mine as a response to Yvon's post. With the reservation that roadmaps are of no value if not kept alive.
Today I updated mine, after having purchased the 60-250/4, and offloaded the FA 50/1.4 and Sigma EX 70-200/2.8. I have now reached a state of balance, with no more lenses on the wishlist and no more lenses for sale. I still have a redundancy for normal zooms, and will have to think that one over once more. Otherwise it's consolidation complete.
Feels good, actually. :-)

Iridiscent Camouflage

2009-06-01T20:01:00.003+02:00

Pentax K20D, A*200/4 macro, AF-540FTZ and Lumiquest mini-softbox.

Have had a couple of enjoyable days off-work. Nice time for insect macros now, with warm weather and lots of wildflowers out.
No clue what species this is, but probably a relative of the bluewings.

DSLR modularity

2009-05-26T10:27:00.003+02:00

Fellow blogger Miserere has called for a new DSLR paradigma with one key feature to separate it from status quo; modularity.
He points to how different photographers have different needs and how manufacturers could save money by building cameras with discrete modules to be fitted at the photographer's need.
It seems like a good idea at the surface. And indeed, Hasselblad's digital medium format cameras are taking a similar approach. What used to be film cartridges are now digital sensor modules.
My immediate thought was that if this was a good idea for the mainstream DSLR market, we would have seen modular DSLRs a long time ago already. And the more I think about it, the more certain I am that the nemesis of modularity is integration. The components of a camera are finely tuned to each other. By making cameras discrete and integrated units, one assures that the components are truly compatible and scaled to fit each other.
For example, Miserere suggests that mirror/shutter assembly and imaging sensor could be separate modules. The upcoming Pentax K-7 is an excellent case in point. It has the same CMOS imaging chip as its predecessor K20D, but with one important modification. In the new chip they have doubled the processing capacity of the output. To match this, the K-7 has a mirror/shutter assembly that moves to capture 5 frames per second (fps). In the K20D, the two components are matched to do 2.5 fps. In a modular approach, you'd need both modules to get the advantage of high fps. If you don't need high fps, you're unlikely to bother about paying extra for either module, just to make future upgrades easier.
I also notice that one component is spectacularly absent from Miserere's list. It is the one component that has caused me the most headache when building PCs from components. The power supply. When estimating the needed power for a new machine, one needs to know the power consumption of all the components. It's doable for stationary machines, but I'd never dare to choose battery for a portable computer, for examle. By the way, have you noticed how different generations of portable PCs have different batteries? And have you noticed the same trend in digital cameras? Looking at Pentax again, their first generation of DSLRs, the *istD series from Pentax used AA batteries. The K-series, however, switched to a videocam-style lithium, providing a higher and more stable power output. The K-7 will raise the bar another notch, presumably because of its higher processing power. For each upgrade bringing new and more advanced tech to the data processing parts of either PCs or cameras, it brings new power requirements. So upgrading the processing module without upgrading the power source doesn't make much sense either.
In all, I'm glad the camera manufacturers make these choises for me, rather than having to make them myself. I'd rather sell my old camera and buy a new one, just as I do with my laptops and stationary PCs. And my other advanced machines, such as cellphones and toasters. :-)

Buttercup Basking

2009-05-24T12:31:00.003+02:00

My back garden has a small patch of wild flowers. I tend to forget about it all together. It seems too small and insignificant to provide any good motifs. But perspectives change once a macro lens is employed. This shot was made with an A* 200/4 lens on a Pentax K20D.

Congrats, Peter Lee!

2009-05-23T00:00:00.006+02:00

Kudos to fellow Pentax photographer Peter Lee, who has also turned 100 photos in the Pentax Photo Gallery. He has even pushed me down to second place in numbers. :-)

Here's one photo taken almost exactly nine years ago in Hardanger, using the Pentax 645 and a 645A-75mm f/2.8 and a pola filter, on Kodak E100VS film. Really seems like a millenium ago, but I thought it would make a nice greeting to a very skilful fellow photographer.

Click on image for slightly larger version.

As if Pentax listens

2009-05-20T16:04:00.000+02:00

Click image for slightly larger version

After my little eagle adventure in January, I bitched about some missing or low-spec'ed features in Pentax DSLRs. I made a wish-list here.

Today the Pentax K-7 was presented. It boasts 5 frames per second and "improved autofocus". Fingers crossed that this is a kind of camera that will improve my success rate with wildlife. DPreview has made a relatively sober comparison to K20D here.

The above shot was made with Pentax K20D and FA* 60-250/4. It's a bit cropped at the top and left hand side. Full resolution JPEG can be found here (warning: file size 7.4 MB). EXIF data should be intact, but just in case:

Focal length: 250mm

Aperture: f/4.5

Shutter: 1/2000 s

ISO: 400

SR on.

The full res image was processed with Adobe Camera Raw v4.6 (CS3), all adjustments at default values.

Detail rendering is impeccable. I can only conclude that this lens is worth every penny.

Bird cherry

2009-05-15T23:30:00.003+02:00

Still testing the new DA* 60-250/4. I like the way this lens renders the transition from in-focus to bokeh. Shot with the K20D, at 1/2500s, f/4 and ISO 400. Focal lenght was 250mm. It was as close as the lens would focus. The close focus limit, by the way, is constant throughout the zoom range for this lens. Not bad for a trombone-style designed lens.

Plum Twig

2009-05-13T20:44:00.002+02:00

Our garden plum tree is forever optimistic. It blooms in splendour every year and doesn't seem to mind us cropping it down quite drastically every winter. Here's one shot from this afternoon, in the last rays of a sun that hasn't quite begun warming us properly yet. But spring is definately here. :-)

The photographer is quite optimistic too, by the way. This photo is obtained using the long awaited Pentax DA* 60-250/4 zoom lens. To try out a new piece of promising equipment is always a bit intoxicating, but this one seems indeed to have been worth the wait. The first few raw files I have examined look beautifully sharp, without vignettting, and without much colour fringing in high-contrast areas.

Digital archiving: ThumbsPlus

2009-05-10T11:30:00.000+02:00

Version explored: 8 beta 3

I have used version 7 of ThumbsPlus (T+) for five years, and was reasonably happy with my choice until halfway through my previous attempt at keywording my images. However it would be unfair to say my discontent was caused by the program itself. It was just that I found the job so boring that my mind frequently began to wander, wondering how T+ could be improved.

As it turns out, Cerious.com has implemented a lot of nice new features in the coming version 8, and some parts of my wishlist has been granted.

1. Magic words
Drag & drop for keywording works both ways with T+. Drop a keyword onto files, or drop files onto a keyword. I like that. In addition, there is a comprehensive tool for managing keywords. It has also picked up on XMP, so potentially the keywords could be compatible with other imaging software. Further, it simplifies keywording on the raw files directly.

Support for hierarchical keywords will be added to version 8. Here's a quote from the Release Notes:

Lengthened keyword size to 255 characters, with the ability to define categorical keywords, such as "Animal\Dog". The keyword list will be available in tree format easier handling during assignment.

Unfortunately, this doesn't work in the beta 3 version, so I can't make any assessment of it.

2. Version handling and bundling
T+ does not support any of this.

3. Backup, restore, and migration
T+ comes with support for many different database engines. The simplest one is actually a royalty-free Microsoft Access database, which can be backed up by ordinary file copying as long as T+ is not running when you make the backup. For more advanced database engines, you'll need a dedicated tool to make backups. I use MySQL, and rely on making database dumps to file which then gets backed up with the rest of the backup-worthy files on my system, but this assumes a geek factor that's probably too high for many.

And this is one area where T+ falls short because it does not provide any integrated backup. You have to set it all up using other software. Not a big deal if you know what you're doing and remember to do it frequently, but it's a hassle.

Restore is, of course, dictated by the routines you have set up for your backup. The upside of this, however, is that T+ is quite flexible when it comes to migration to new hardware. You have to retain the filesystem folder structure of your old disk, but that's just about all. Nice and simple. The only additional thing it requires is that you assign the same label to the disk as you had before the migration. Ie., if the hard drive of your old system was labeled "System" before the drive letter in Windows Explorer, it should be named the same way on your new system. The drive letter itself doesn't matter, just the label. Saved my ass once, this feature... :-)

4. Support for offline archives
The only features T+ provides to this end is an "import" and an "export" function that can assimilate or dump a text file containing selected fields from the database. Selecting the full range, you can have all the metadata stored in the database except the Galleries.

Galleries (equal to albums in Adobe nomenclature) are very convenient for visual grouping of related images. The manual warns against using Galleries for anything but temporary assemblages, but in practice it's terribly easy to let such structures become at least semi-permanent. However, T+ is neither better or worse than the other programs for overlooking the Galleries in export/import routines. And it's not a terribly big deal. Keywords and categories are much better for organising than Galleries anyway.

T+ can not branch out a portion of its archive for use on a laptop, and it can not add a branch to its main archive. What it can do, however, is to automatically import IPTC metadata from newly found files (see below). I assume this will apply to XMP too, when this becomes fully supported in the production release of version 8.

5. other stuff
T+ is a vigilant little piece of software. It looks out for changes in the folders you tell it to monitor, and updates its own database automatically. It will add new images and update thumbnails and metadata after edits. This is one of the things I really like with T+. It saves me from being mindful about telling the program to update such things.
I also like the interface in T+. Granted, it's old fashioned enough to look like something designed for Windows 95 or thereabouts, but it's clean and efficient.

T+ is usually also very quick to release support for new raw files. The only exception to the rule is K20D. Basically, I was told in the support forum that they didn't care since the camera supports DNG raw format.

Exit

2009-05-07T21:05:00.003+02:00

Observed at Heathrow, Terminal 5. Shot with Pentax Optio W60.