The Farm Life

"Cows are my passion. What I have ever sighed for has been to retreat to a Swiss farm, and live entirely surrounded by cows - and china."

Charles Dickens 

I've never lived on a farm, but often wonder what life would be like on one...cows ARE cute.

  

 

Auto Graveyard

Where once shiny, beautiful metal beasts go to sleep forever...rest in peace.

 

  

  

  

  

  

  

Sunflower

"It is a kind of painting that rather changes in character, and takes on a richness the longer you look at it. Besides, you know, Gauguin likes them extraordinarily. He said to me among other things - 'That...it's...the flower.' You know that the peony is Jeannin's, the hollyhock belongs to Quost, but the sunflower is somewhat my own."

Vincent Van Gogh

 

The sunflower is a magnificent flower, probably the happiest and brightest of them all.  One can't help but to smile and cheer up in its presence.  It's no wonder that this is my GF's favorite flower.

 

  

  

  

  

Follow this link to learn more about about Van Gogh and his sunflowers:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunflowers_%28series_of_paintings%29 

Carl Zeiss Jena Flektogon 50mm f/4 with Hartblei

Here's the Carl Zeiss Jena Flektogon 50mm f/4 with the Hartblei tilt adapter for my Nikon D90.  Please refer to the lens and/or adapter posts for more information.

Monster on the D90

  

What a profile!

  

Tilted down @ 8 degrees

 

Tilted up @ 8 degrees

  

Tilted left @ 8 degrees

 

That's not a hood!

Arsat 80mm f/2.8 with Hartblei

Here's the Arsat 80mm f/2.8 with the Hartblei tilt adapter for my Nikon D90.  Please refer to the lens and/or adapter posts for more info.

  

Side by side

Feeling connected

  

Tilted @ 8 degrees

  

Mounted on the D90

  

Tilted down @ 8 degrees

  

  

Tilted up @ 8 degrees

Tilted left @ 8 degrees

Carl Zeiss Jena Flektogon 50mm f/4

Purchased this wonderful Carl Zeiss lens from eBay, along with an Arsat 80mm f/2.8, a few weeks ago to experiment with tilt photography on my D90.  This is a medium format lens with a Pentacon Six mount.  Haven't had the chance yet to take this baby out for a real test drive, but it sure is gorgeous to look at :)

 

The lens is well-constructed, heavy and solid.  Focus is smooth and the aperture ring, snappy.  Cliche, maybe, but true.  Oh, and that front lens element...it's HUGE!  and BEAUTIFUL!

  

  

  

  

For more information about this lens and test results, please see the following sites:

http://www.pentaconsix.com/wideangle1.htm

http://www.rickdenney.com/mother_lens_test.htm

Arsat 80mm f/2.8

This is an Arsat 80mm f/2.8 medium format lens with a Pentacon Six mount.  It's relatively inexpensive and can be found on eBay on most days.  Got mine as a pair, along with a Carl Zeiss Flektogon 50mm f/4 from a seller on eBay.

 

• Lens elements: 6
• Focal length: 80mm
• Focusing scale: 0.6m to infinity
• Minimum focusing distance: 0.6m
• Aperture scale: f2.8/4/5.6/8/11/16/22

In actual use on the tilt adapter, it is a little soft at maximum aperture as expected, but gets sharper at f/4 and beyond.  I don't mind a little softness wide open as I like the look and fits my visual style.  I believe the version I have is single-coated (as denoted by the C next to the name ARSAT); the newer version has MC written on the ring (multi-coating) from the pictures I've seen on various sites.

Obviously, I can't compare this lens to the Nikon or Canon tilt/shift offerings (as those are beyond what I can afford to experiment with), but I can't complain about the lens build or image quality considering what I paid for the lens.

 

For more information about this lens and test results, check out the following sites:

http://www.pentaconsix.com/StandardLenses.htm

http://www.rickdenney.com/mother_lens_test.htm

Hartblei Tilt Adapter

This is the Hartblei tilt adapter that I picked up on eBay.

The following description is from the seller:

This Tilt adapter is designed by Hartblei to use with all Pentacon Six, Kiev 60, Kiev 88mm lenses on your Nikon DSLR or SLR camera.  Using this new design, the adapter interfaces between the camera and lens, maintaining all F stop and focusing functions, and allowing control of perspective and depth of field using tilt movements similar to a view camera.  Creative applications include increasing depth of field or decreasing depth of field, as seen in many fashion and product advertisements, where unusual focus effects are desired.  Ideal for architectural photography for controlling perspective and depth of field.  A perfect solution for product table top photography including digital.

• Tilt: 0 to 8 degrees
• Direction: 360 rotation
• Will focus to infinity

The seller is http://stores.ebay.com/opticaland

To be clear, this adapter is tilt only and does not provide shift functionality.  The adapter is a little spendy in my opinion, but still is an economical way to experiment with tilt photography when paired with a relatively inexpensive medium format lens, like the Arsat 80mm f/2.8.

Build quality seems solid and simple.  Just mount the lens and turn the upper ring to tighten the lens to the adapter, then mount the adapter (with the lens) to the camera (in my case, the D90).  The lower ring controls the degree of tilt, rotate anywhere from 0 to 8.  The two metal tabs on the sides are there for you to grab to rotate the adapter (hence, the lens) in either direction, in increments of 30 degress (rotation feature).

I was inspired by a certain Flickr member:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rawhead/
so please visit his photostream for more info and photos.  He has an extensive collection of cameras and lenses, and some very informative information :)

  

Tilted 8 degrees

  

Zero tilt

  

 

Tilt with Arsat 80mm f/2.8

Some photos taken with an Arsat 80mm f/2.8 Pentacon Six lens on an Hartblei tilt adapter for my Nikon D90. The lens and adapter were purchased on eBay a few weeks ago; also got a Carl Zeiss Flektogon 50mm f/4, but haven't really tried it out yet.

Figured this was an economical way to begin experimenting with tilt photography. Can't justify spending a grand on a Nikon 85mm f/2.8 PC-E just yet.

All photos below captured with Nikon D90, hand-held, manual mode, RAW files post-processed in Lightroom, exported as JPEGs. f-stops are my best estimation at the time of capture.

Tilted down 8 degrees @ f/4

Tilted down 8 degrees @ f/5.6

Tilted down 8 degrees @ f/4

Tilted up 8 degrees @ f/4

Tilted left 8 degrees @ f/5.6

Tilted down 8 degrees @ f/4

Tilted down 8 degrees @ f/5.6

Tilted right 8 degrees @ f/4

Still a lot of experimenting to do, trying to understand the relationships and effects of the variables: tilt degrees, direction, focus plane, DOF, hand steadiness, etc.

I'll be posting some shots of the gear soon, so stay tuned...