Cosmos

[John Seaman]

Taken with a very old near circular aperture Rokkor 135mm f/4. Mounted on my Sony A900 via a Minolta MD to AF adaptor. Comments will be appreciated thank you.

[jc1305us]

I really like this composition. Super sharp, in focus flowers with great colors. Well done. 

[John Seaman]

1 hour ago, jc1305us said:

Super sharp,

Thanks for the comment. I should explain that the picture is a combination of two shots of the same scene in my garden, one with the old Rokkor 135, one with a modern macro lens. Hence the sharpness of the flowers vs the painterly quality of the background. The vignette is a result of the MF/AF adaptor used, and was not added by me. I cropped in slightly to reduce the strength of the vignette, as the first uncropped version was criticised by a judge because of the strong vignette. Also she didn't like the buds or dead heads - this was my first version:

[JDMvW]

Still nice.

[mikemorrellNL]

Lovely photo, John!  Personally, I'm not so much interested in your specific equipment or technique. Just in the wonderful result that - through your artistic eye and craftmanship - you've achieved!

Congrats,,

Mike

[John Seaman]

2 hours ago, mikemorrellNL said:

I'm not so much interested in your specific equipment or technique.

Thanks for your kind words Mike. I guess I'm a bit of a gear head and sometimes let the nuts and bolts of making the image override the actual content.

[hjoseph7]

There is a lot of depth in this picture that gives it a 3D look. The composition, focusing, colors are all good. There is a slight amount of vigneting in the lower part of the picture, also the brown branch? or whatever that is in the background, is a little distracting. Otherwise good job ! 

Edited March 10 by hjoseph7

[John Seaman]

11 hours ago, hjoseph7 said:

There is a slight amount of vigneting

Thanks for the comment. The vignette was in the original image due to the equipment used. I find it an attractive feature, when not over-used.

Thanks again

[mikemorrellNL]

On 3/9/2024 at 7:23 PM, John Seaman said:

Thanks for your kind words Mike. I guess I'm a bit of a gear head and sometimes let the nuts and bolts of making the image override the actual content.

Hi John, I really enjoyed (quickly) browsing through your PN 'portfolio'. You have widely varied and wonderful photos! IHMO, many (future?) members could learn a lot from your photos. I notice that for each photo you include the Exif info (Gearhead 😉) but whatever the gear, you also have a great 'photographic eye'. In other words - whatever gear you're using - you're always going to capture great photos.

IMHO, (new?) members could learn a lot from your photos. Yes, from the Exif data but also from your 'photographic eye'. I would therefore encourage you to add some info about 'where the photo was taken, when and why'. All the Exif info is there. FWIW, your title reminds me of the second line in a poem by William Blake entitled Auguries of Innocence. 

[John Seaman]

Mike, wow! Thanks. I include the exif data for the simple reason that I don't know how to remove it. I've hardly looked at my portfolio since the PN "upgrade", to be honest I found it rather hard to actually find. Hopefully the thing has settled down now and people seem to be quite active in the Gallery area.

Anyway I was prompted by your post to revisit it and eventually worked out how to set up a new album with my name, and add some newer pictures to it. I'm confused though by the process of adding captions, tags and notes whereby it does not seem to be possible to add these to older images. Or indeed, to new ones - unless within the 15 minute editing limit?

[mikemorrellNL]

On 3/13/2024 at 3:40 PM, John Seaman said:

Mike, wow! Thanks. I include the exif data for the simple reason that I don't know how to remove it. I've hardly looked at my portfolio since the PN "upgrade", to be honest I found it rather hard to actually find. Hopefully the thing has settled down now and people seem to be quite active in the Gallery area.

Anyway I was prompted by your post to revisit it and eventually worked out how to set up a new album with my name, and add some newer pictures to it. I'm confused though by the process of adding captions, tags and notes whereby it does not seem to be possible to add these to older images. Or indeed, to new ones - unless within the 15 minute editing limit?

Hi John,

I'm long retired but I'm still quite curious to find out why some websites don't work as you'd expect them to. My only involvement in a couple of local 'not-for-for-profit' websites in entirely voluntary.

So as a PN member, I read your post with curiosity!  Following a couple of 'experiments',  I think (suspect) that I've figured things out. I'll post my 'findings' to the PN 'Help' forum too.

Experiments

I've just upload 3 'test images' to my personal Album and I think (suspect) I've figured things out.

I uploaded my 1st 'test' photo to my album, faffed about a bit and it didn't seem to matter whether I uploaded a new photo to an existing Album or tried to edit an existing photo.  The only 2 options I saw under 'Manage Image' were a) Report Image and b) Delete image. As far as I knew then, you could just upload images with any remaining Exif data. You can usually 'strip' some or all Exif data when exporting from a post-processing program. Though again, I personally believe that including Exif data really helps other members in figuring out 'how did she/he take this shot?'

On the upload of my 2nd photo, I was a bit quicker off the mark. Suddenly the 'Manage Image' options also included a 3rd option: 'Edit Details'' (including adding a custom title and description). I added a 3rdphoto and the 'Edit details' option was still available for my 2nd an 3rd photos. I can only guess that the 15 minutes 'time-out' on editing posts also applies to editing 'photo details'.

When you upload a photo, you also have the option of adding 'tags' (which I assume will be used in searching for photos).

Summary

I realize that this doesn't t help help you with your existing photos on PN but hopefully for future photos. You of course always have the option of deleting your best photos and uploading them again and editing 'the details' within 15 minutes.

Hope the helps,

Mike

Edited March 14 by mikemorrellNL

[marceppy]

I really like this image.  Beautiful flowers and think I have a shot some of the same.  I enjoy the explanation of equipment used but still not sure how it all came together (I once had a Minolta film camera).  Anyway, there is a little white spot to the right of the 2nd flower I would have cloned out.  Maybe crop out the darker parts of the vignette, especially at top, maybe balance top and bottom somehow.  The buds are fine.  Perhaps clone out the one that’s center on far right edge.  Only suggestions, great job.

Marc

[John Seaman]

7 hours ago, marceppy said:

Perhaps clone out the one that’s center on far right edge.

Thanks for this Marc. Actually I did crop out the bud near the edge, also cropped out some of the vignette, if you look at the first picture in the thread. The second picture was the original uncropped version. I like to include buds in flower shots, even dead heads, as they help to tell a story.

The lens is a Rokkor-TC 135mm F/4, which has a multi blade near circular aperture. Here's a picture, showing it with the Minolta MD to Minolta AF adaptor. You may recall that when Minolta introduced their AF system, they used a completely different lens mount - much to the disgust of owners of MD mount lenses. An adaptor was available but it had to include a glass element to maintain infinity focus, to the detriment of image quality. My adaptor is third party rather than Minolta's own.

Thanks again ... the lens:

Edited March 19 by John Seaman

[marceppy]

ah, yes.  I didn’t scroll up enough when commenting.  Wonderful image.