Cherry Blossoms are popping...

[Momo]

Hello everyone,

This is my first post to what looks to be an awesome forum. Jeeperman turned me on to CiC after chatting with him in person last week. So, I just picked up a new 50mm f/1.8 prime yesterday and thought I would take it for a spin on some unsuspecting cherry blossoms. The wind was howling as I was trying to get off a shot. It was actually quite frustrating with no end in sight. This is one of the 25 photos that I somehow managed to capture. I'm open to criticisms. It's minimally processed in Lightroom... mostly to remove ISO noise and add some contrast.

I'm loving this lens!

View EXIF info here.

[jeeperman]

Darren, for whatever reason the image is not showing. I am not familiar on how to post from flickr but there are many here that can help with what it takes. Have you read the "how do I post images" tutorial? I was able to right click it....nice capture, I am betting you will have some fun with the nifty-fifty.

Oh there it is! lol I was about to post the Tut link. No need now. Glad to see ya made it.

[Donald]

Hello Darren and welcome to CiC. I hope you enjoy being on here.

With something like the nifty-fifty it is all about managing the depth-of-field (as it is, I suppose, with any lens). But what we find out is that the DoF at 1.8 is amazingly shallow. Your image above doesn't have the EXIF data in it, but I'm assuming you were at f1.8 or f2.

And that's the important thing with a new lens. You have to experiment to find out what it can and can't do. Really stretch it to the limits. And you got perfect subject material for doing that.

[Momo]

Donald, so true about DoF. I did a lot of research online between the 35 and 50 and comparisons between the 1.4G and 1.8G. I went with the 1.8G simply because I do not have a need for an extreme DoF. My second reason was cost. I did manage to edit my post above and add a link to my EXIF information.

thank you

[jeeperman]

Darren, while I still think this is a nice capture I think had you used around F5-F8.0 you would have gotall of the first brach in focus and still had the background OOF. From you posted data I think even with the wind you could have sacrificed a bit of shutter speed.

[Momo]

I think you're spot on. I probably could have got the shutter speed down to 1/1000 or less if I had the patience to wait for the wind to subside. It was just nuts though... to the point where I actually reached out and grabbed one of the branches to hold it steady. I'll have plenty of time to take another crack at it soon. I might try and haunt the U of W this weekend, as there are some incredible shots to be taken at red square with all their cherry blossom trees.

[FrankMi]

It was just nuts though... to the point where I actually reached out and grabbed one of the branches to hold it steady.

My wife bought me several inexpensive tripods for $3-4 each at yard sales. These are perfect, along with a simple light clamp, string, or rubber band, to hold just about anything from blowing around in the wind while still being out of sight of the lens.