Category: Up Close

A closer look at lunch and lens rendition

Some photographers, upon receiving a new (or in this case old) lens, photograph brick walls, test charts and/or newspapers to test a lens. I’ve never done this nor understood the reason for that approach. I prefer to test a lens within the context of a photograph I’ll actually enjoy looking at — to discover the lens’ rendering qualities. Yesterday afternoon a Novoflex-Noflexar f:3.5/105 R arrived.  I rounded up the necessary ring and tube to hang it on my Visoflex III. Today I photographed my lunch with the lens. With only one frame exposed it appears that I will enjoy working with this 40 year old, $50 gem. It focuses continuously from infinity down to filling the M8 frame with a 25mm subject (on the long dimension — at a working distance of 18cm). Both sharpness and bokeh appear quite tasteful.

(click photograph for larger view)

Leica M8, 105 mm R f:3.5 Novoflex-Noflexar on Visoflex

Friday: flower — still life?

The flowering plants have fallen over, wilted, dried, gone to seed. Very little green remains “outside” — only the pines and some grasses. The days have become short and the light, more often than not, overcast, dull and gray. If I continue to produce a flower photograph each Friday it will require more planning; no longer simply a stroll within so-called nature. From now until spring I’ll need to travel to a shop and make both economic and aesthetic choices.

This morning it was 32 degrees F outside so I decided to shift into this new way of thinking about Friday flowers by bringing one of the last blooms from a porch plant inside for visual exploration. As soon as I dropped the bloom into water the photograph appeared.

(click photograph for larger view)

Leica R8/DMR, 100 mm Apo-Macro Elmarit