I'm currently decorating the kitchen and that has included painting. For many years, I've been using the same metal paint rods to stir paint. They are now much thicker than they were, due to many, many stratified layers of paint - a bit like sedimentary layers in geology. Some layers were partially wiped off before drying, some are thin in places and thicker in others, some let darker colours from below appear, and so on.

This evening it struck me that the surfaces looked quite interesting when viewed close up. So I put one in front of the K3 + Sigma 70mm at approx 1:1 magnification, side-lit to bring out texture, and produced a stack just to see what it would look like. And here it is. To my eyes, it seems similar to images taken from multi-billion dollar NASA space craft as they orbit a distant planet or moon. Or at least that's where NASA say the pictures have come from ... .

Thoughts, comments welcome as usual (about the picture, please, not about my and Mrs L's tastes in paint!).




There may be more to come ...

Steve

Have you tried the O-ME53 magnifying eyecap? It's not magic, but it helps when using the viewfinder for manual focus.

Steve

Nicely lit, nicely composed, nicely photographed. I like it. Had to look up what it is, though! ('sporangium', not 'moss' :wink

A stack? Or enough DoF without stacking? What is the size of the sporangium? (Had to use that word now I know what it is )

Steve

Well... Back in the days of film, I bought my first wide-angle prime for a trip to Iceland. It was a 24mm. It took shots that I doubt would have been possible with a 28mm. But that was Iceland with huge and spectacular scenery, some of which you couldn't fit in a 28mm by stepping backwards (or you'd fall down a chasm or into a puslating pool of boiling, evil-smalling water). Perhaps it's that experience of having a 24mm rather than a 28mm, but when APS-C digital came along I've always preferred zooms that start at 16mm (equivalent FOV to 24mm for a K1) rather than 18mm (equivalant FOV to about 28mm for a K1). That difference does matter for me. So if I were in your shoes, looking for primes for a K1, it would be a 24mm first then ask whether there would be any benefit in getting a 28mm.

But that's just me. Only you can decide whether a 24mm would be worthwile for you. If you sometimes feel constrained by 28mm and wish you could go a bit wider, get the 24mm. Or just get a 24mm anyway and see whether it will give you something you didn't know you were missing. And you can always crop a 24mm picture to 28mm, but you can't crop a 28mm to 24mm .

Steve

Yes, but does the lens work OK???

Steve

You're missing that K3III and SR are in black, too. Since all text seems to be in black, presumably the menus are black text on black background .

Steve

The key question is what there is about the K5ii that makes you want an upgrade? If you can answer that, then it becomes a matter of which of the three K3 variants will give you what you want for the lowest cost. For what it's worth, I've got a K3 (first version) and can't convince myself that there's any need to get a ii or iii for the sort of thing I do. But that's mainly taking photos of things that don't move (or at least not very much). If I needed to photograph things that move around quickly and had to rely on autofocus tracking, then I might be tempted to look at whether the K3iii really is the big improvement that people seem to claim.

Of course, if an upgrade is simply because you feel the urge to get a new toy once in a while (and who doesn't :wink, then it's easy - just decide on a budget and get the fanciest camera you can get without going too far over the limit .

Steve

Steve

100mm macros can also be used to take portraits - of dogs . And that can be followed by getting 1:1 with those gorgeous eyes... .

Steve

I am. Put six painters behind six portable easels at any of the positions from which you took a photo and ask them to paint what they see. They'll produce six different pictures of the same scene. (I've known a few artists over the years ... :wink And that's without even the filtering/rationalising/idealising effects of memory kicking in.

1000% agree!

Steve

Interesting. As far as I can see by flipping between the original and last version, the main difference is that the most distant ground and a narrow band of cloud above it has been darkened, making the horizon more pronounced. The only significant change to the foreground that I can see is a slight reduction in contrast in the vegetation at the bottom left, but it's far from obvious. I'm using my tablet for this, not the big calibrated monitor so perhaps something is getting lost in the limitations of the tablet screen. Or perhaps it's my ageing eyesight!

This does, however, raise a philosophical (or should that be a practical?) question: what is the purpose of a particula photograph? To record the scene as it actually was? Or to record the scene that you think you saw? Or to be a good image in accordance with some aesthetic criteria? Or to be an image that will please someone else? They might be quite different versions of the same scene !

Steve