Yesterday I was at a Max Muscle store doing my weekly ritual of visiting my meathead buddy Scott (we pound the weights after) when I noticed a couple dragonflies buzzing about on the interior side of the front windows. Remarkably, they kept relatively still as I believe they were stupid and trying to fly outward, perhaps not understanding that the window glass is their invisible barrier.
Lo and behold, I actually had my Olympus E-PL5 camera on me. I always try to have this camera with me when I'm out and about because it's so small, and it also has basically the same sensor photo quality as all of the current top micro 4/3rds cameras. Even more luckily, I had the Olympus 60mm/2.8 macro lens attached to it--a lens I don't normally carry around, but every now and then I like to practice with a different focal length to train my eyes.
Even lit by nice window light, the interior side is fairly dark in contrast. So I had to bump the ISO up to 800 on these shots. Worse yet, my E-PL5's built-in image stabilization is broken (flashing red, a result of me dropping it in Knoxville earlier this year), and I had to hand-hold all shots (the lens does not have I.S. built in). Which means higher shutter speed in hopes of getting sharp shots.
I was forced to shoot wide open at f/2.8 in order to keep my shutter speed at around 1/200 second, and prevent raising my ISO any higher. As it happens, I had to boost exposure a bit anyway in Adobe Camera Raw. Fuck my life.
Surprisingly, I got a few keepers. Here are some more (you may have to click to see bigger):
1/200 second, f/2.8, ISO 800
1/200 second, f/2.8, ISO 800
1/200 second, f/2.8, ISO 800
1/200 second, f/2.8, ISO 800
1/200 second, f/2.8, ISO 800
1/200 second, f/2.8, ISO 800
Obviously, being so close and shooting wide open gave me a very thin depth-of-field. I would have loved to close the aperture down a bit, but didn't want to sacrifice any further shots/picture quality as is. Thankfully, the Oly 60mm macro is unbelievably sharp from the get-go, wide open. So whatever is in focus (obviously I like the eyes) will definitely stand out.
The Oly 60mm/2.8 lens is one of my favorites lenses; I call it my "most-fun-for-your-buck" lens because of its versatility. Hey, it's even a good glamour/portrait/short-tele lens in a pinch:
Tee hee :D
MODEL: Mai
Assistant: Vo
Location: New Orleans, LA
The end (see what I did there?).
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