A Tale of Two Sunsets

I have an entire gallery on Zenfolio dedicated to sunset photos made from the same spot on the shore of the Hudson River near my home. There's a link on the menu bar to the right under TrulandPhoto Resources.

This is one of the times of year where I tend to get down to the water's edge more often than not, mostly due to the timing of sunset. As I sit in my kitchen in the early evening I can clearly see whether the sunset has possibilities.

The past two evenings have been such occasions, seeing me grab one of my 5D Mark III bodies and the 17-40mm f/4L USM lens and heading down the street to the river. Photo captions will indicate date, time and focal length.

4/9/2019 - 7:19PM EDST - 22mm

4/9/2019 - 7:20PM EDST - 21mm

4/9/2019 - 7:21PM EDST - 17mm

4/10/2019 - 7:19PM EDST - 40mm

4/10/2019 - 7:25PM EDST - 40mm

4/10/2019 - 7:30PM EDST - 29mm

No Substitute for a Tripod

The older I get the more I want to just hand hold everything. With image stabilization, you generally can hand hold scenics, even with exposure bracketing for HDR processing. With closeups, though, there really is no substitute for a stable tripod.

Image stabilization will not compensate for camera movement affecting the plane of focus, which is pretty thin close up. I've been trying to sell my crop sensor 60mm macro lens without any success so I decided to try it out this morning with the 7D Mark II (the only camera I have it will fit) on the first blooms of the season, Blue-eyed Grass.

At f/8 and 1/750th of a second, the image should be fairly sharp. It is, but the thin line of focus is missed as I hand hold the camera. This is cropped and if you click on the image twice you will see it at 100%.

About 20 minutes later I decided to do it right and grabbed my travel tripod and remote release. It's a much better result. Here is an only slightly cropped full image along with a couple of 100% crops showing the detail.

5D Mark III and 50mm STM

Now that I have sold my Tamron 45mm lens, I have a choice of two "normal" prime lenses for use with a full frame body, the 40mm pancake and 50mm STM lenses. Prior to selling the Tamron lens, I had picked up the inexpensive Canon 50mm STM to use on the 7D Mark II in partnership with the 24mm pancake lens. Those two lenses have field of view equivalents of 38mm and 80mm on the 7DII.

Yesterday, I went out midday with a 5DIII and the 50mm lens. Without the image stabilization of the Tamron lens, I have to remember to keep shutter speeds up a bit when hand holding bracketed sequences for HDR processing. Here are some results.

Cohoes Falls

Cohoes Falls Apartments

Cohoes Falls Apartments

Vischer Ferry Nature and Historic Preserve

Vischer Ferry Nature and Historic Preserve

Vischer Ferry Nature and Historic Preserve