I can see them in Flickr easily enough. Stunning photos, very nice indeed. K.

Looks like the right type of animal! Thanks Tim. The light balance does need sorting out. The rocks to the left are very bright and the critter was in the shade. It was a quickly grabbed shot so I was quite pleased with it.

K.

If anyone knows what sort of rodent this is, please let me know!

K.

Overtly offended and covertly pleased. It is a photo with many possibilities and variations, many of which would be great. Personally, I would be tempted to tone down the saturation of the blue which makes it a little too surreal for my taste. All in all, rather nice, however. Well done.

K.

I took a number of minor variations on the image below and cannot make up my mind which one I prefer. I think I prefer number 1, but perhaps number 3... Or do you prefer some other crop? Or should I bin them?! All taken with my Jupiter-9 85mm.

1.



2.



3. (with bug)



4. (without bug)



I used to be indecisive but now I am not sure...

K.

Well done Mike, always nice to see one's work in print.

A little tip for anyone who cares... when scanning thin paper (like newspaper) put some black card/paper behind the page you are scanning. That way, the text on the other side of the page doesn't show through. Works when photocopying and making copy photos too.

Best wishes, Kris.

I'm not even getting wee blue squares...

I clicked, I viewed, I liked...

Personally, I think numbers 3, 5 and 17 are the strongest.

Best wishes, Kris

Four more from my recent US visit. All with the K20D.

1. Tamron 70-300mm.



2. Tamron 70-300mm



3. SMC Pentax-M 100mm f/2.8



4. SMC Pentax-DA* 50-135mm



Best wishes, Kris.

FYI. If you do go down the photoshop route, the best way (IMHO) to convert is using a BW adjustment layer avilable in CS3 onwards. Lightroom also uses a similar system (although not presented as a layer).

I like Matt's idea of shooting in jpeg+RAW simply because "seeing" in BW is something that comes with experience and being able to preview your image that way would be a good learning tool. Did I understand beakynet correctly that the K-7 allows you to digitally add filters too, e.g., a high contrast red filter or a YG filter? That would also be awesome for learning how these filters impact on a monochrome image.

As much as I love using film, for teaching/learning digital is so much more effective.

Best wishes, Kris.