Extrema…

Well, the matters had officially went into a disaster zone. It official now that I do have a sleeping crisis, which makes my "whole" life is idle. Well, in case I can call it a "life" anyway. Not only I've skipped my eye appointment on 13^th, but I had to stop writing my Arabic blog for some time and I'm seriously considering making it on a monthly basis, for the lack of topics so far and the hardship in organizing my thoughts. Needless to say how that affected my other projects as well concerning Languages and Conlangs. All what comes to my mind right now is sleep, sleep, and more sleep.

Extreme

They say we had a "supermoon" this week, specifically on July 12^th. It did sound like a good idea to try out my Rokinon mirror lens of 800mm, with two 2x teleconverters (for a total of 3200mm). However, and pardon me, just thinking about working in this weather and heat (even at night) with my cumbersome schedule now, did sound more like a fantasy! And with "fantasy" I mean something to be found in children's book or Hollywood movies.

Rokinon 800mm mirror lens.
Source: B&H

Instead of doing this astro-adventure, I thought for a moment about the possibility of doing an extreme macro experiment with this mirror lens like I used to do with other telephoto lenses before. If we combine 800mm with 2 teleconverters (2x each) then we are assuming that total focal length is 800x2x2 = 3200mm. Now, if we combine a 50mm lens in reverse to this combination, we are supposed to get 64x magnification (3200/50=64). Logically, this is supposed to mean that 1mm dot in reality, should be projected as 64mm on the sensor (or 6.4cm, 2.5in). Despite my trials, the situation was hard to achieve mainly because of the design of the Rokninon mirror lens. This lens resembles the catadioptric telescope in its design and the large difference in the diameter of the objective (the front of the lens) made it hard to combine another lens in reverse. Even though I tried to place the 50mm lens in front of it to some distance and covering the gab with black cloth to block the light. Here, I was working in horizontal manner instead of hanging the camera high up as before and dangling it over the specimen. Anyway, It was hard to work that way and technically nothing was to be gained from such setting. I had to go around it in some way. The answer to the problem then knocked into my brain with Tamron 70-300mm, which is damaged and lying around, and another (useless) lens in my pack; the old Canon EF-S 18-55mm.

The final setting. Teleconverters and not shown here.
Click to Enlarge.

I didn't want to use my Sigma 70-300mm here. It's relatively new and I didn't use it often. It has a better glass quality compared to the cheap Tamron, but I don't want to risk it in such setting. According to calculations, Tamron at 300mm plus two x2 teleconverters should yield a total of 1200mm. When combined with 18-55mm at 18mm in reverse, then the magnification should be (supposedly): 1200/18=66.66x, or approximately 67x. Meaning, 1mm dot would be projected on the sensor as 67mm (6.7cm, 2.6in), which is slightly more than what has been calculated in the previous proposed setting (of 800mm mirror lens and 50mm lens in reverse). This case was easier to be done as you can see from the image above. I had to spend some considerable time trying to improvise a way to hold the sample in this experiment and to provide a strong light source at its back (I tried to cast the light from the front but to no avail). Focusing is pretty delicate so I used the macro rail to move the sample in some way, and I ended up using the Bulb mode and managing the time empirically without doing any calculations. Just trial and error. Maybe with some considerable time, I can enhance this setting.

Manfrotto telephoto support
Source: B&H

The good thing about the horizontal position is that the weight and the pulling force on the camera's body (the lenses consequently) is significantly small, while the whole system was carried by Manfrotto's telephoto lens support. Usually it is a problem because in many occasions this support would make moving the focusing ring (or even zooming) cumbersome, but it's not a problem here because everything is set and the lenses are not supposed to be touched. The only thing to change here is the macro rail distance to move the specimen. I had some problems with the rail itself too, since the screw to move the rail was knocking on the lens' front - but the focusing required kept this screw away from the front for some considerable distance. Anyway, that doesn't mean it might not be a problem in the future!

Results

The results were not much of artistic nature nor a clear variety. But it's a beginning. Probably if the lenses' qualities were better the images would have been better? Who knows!

Sun Side

Shade Side

Shooting in RAW is absolutely a must here. Using a remote and a portable monitor is also a must. In using Bulb mode in the camera, the LiveView (which is transmitted to the portable monitor) mimics the light conditions a bit to see through what to focus on, but this is of course in no way the final result to be expected - Bulb mode is about arbitrary timing. This is one of the benefits for working in Bulb mode in such a situation because using other modes like Av would make it hard to mimic the light. ISO-wise, I think it's hard to expect something below ISO400. Long exposure can be done but it's not advisable I'd say - we need to do shots fast relatively to avoid any sudden shake.
It is a common practice in (regular) macro to use a stop around f/8 and more to gain some acceptable depth of field. Here, however, I don't think this rule of thumb holds - in fact I'm not even sure if a higher stop would do any good, but anyway I used the highest f-stop possible. It is recorded as f/72 but this is a false reading because Vivitar's teleconverter doesn't communicate information with the camera's body. Thus, by re-calculating the f-number under the new focal length (1200mm), the value should be around f/128. You can see from the images above that even such depth is not really strong enough which makes me suspicious about the usefulness of raising the f-stop here. If using a low f-stop would yield almost same results, then it might be fit for this experiment to allow more light in and make my life easier!!!

φ

Been some time trying to polish some simple mathematics in my brain. I didn't use my brain in a while! It had been a while now as I was trying to find some relation between the rule of thirds (ROT) and the rule of golden spiral (RGS) in terms of the difference between the two "power point" in both systems.
One of the major difficult points here is that the two systems are adapted for different ratios of frame. Previously, I've worked with a frame of 3:2 ratio, as it is the ratio usually adapted for most cameras nowadays. However, it was a bit cumbersome in terms of some mathematical identities, thus I've decided to work with φ:1 ratio and adapt the results I could get as an approximation. Numerically, the (3:2) ratio is equivalent to 1.5, while (φ:1) ratio is equivalent to 1.618, meaning a difference of around 0.1 unit; I guess something that can be neglected.

In the beginning I had to use an approximation for the power point in RGS, which I've found in this page. As can be seen in the page, the power point or the center of the spiral can approximated by two diagonals: one for the whole frame, and one for the smaller rectangle after rectangle rabatment (marked with the blue line). The ROT is marked with red lines. The segment I'm seeking here is SG and the angle θ. One of the good points about having such ratio for the frame is that the ratios AB:AG, and AG:AB is equal to the golden ratio: φ. This postulate makes it easier to do some mathematics here. Well, not going to list everything done here, but it turns out that:

• The angle (θ) is equal to -31.72^o. The negative sign is to mark it as going under the x-axis. This angle would of course change by changing the location and perspective (in relation to the x-axis); it would be positive if the power point under inspection is the top right one, and it would be 180±31.72^o for the left side.
• The segment under question, SG, is approximately equal to [(φ-1)√(1+φ²)], or it can be marked as [φ^-1√(1+φ²)]. This is because (φ) as a numerical value is equal to (1.618), and consequently: (φ-1) and φ^-1 are both equal to approximately (0.618). Going further with more decimals seems unnecessary in this occasion.
• Numerically now, the segment SG is approximately equal to (1.176), or expanded little bit it would be (1.1755).

What I'm hoping for is to use this simple information item in various settings, like in the camera's LiveView for example, or in Photoshop itself, even though I heard that newer versions have several systems implemented for cropping. I'm not sure how I'm going to do this, specially in Photoshop, but it surely needs a lot of experimenting with various photos. Another interesting method would be the diagonal method, which was developed (or discovered) by the Dutch artist Edwin Westhoff. The Diagonal Method specifically is well suited for 3:2 frame. Would be interesting to see this kind of grid available for work in the coming generations of digital cameras.

Finale

Here I am, just waiting for the month of Ramadhan to pass. It's not something weird to happen in fact; I do suffer from insomnia and sleeping problems all year long and it doubles every Ramadhan almost, but the thing is different now with extra annoyances at work, and a tiresome body. I think this is what they mean by "getting older".
When this is all over, there is so much to do as well. Schedule a new appointment if possible, and prepare for my travel. Though I need such a travel to rest my mind a bit and enjoy my photography, I do wish if I was accompanied by someone. Someone special...

Macromatic...

Here we are, another week passed, with a special twist of Christmas, of which we don't celebrate in fact. In this week, I was somehow busy with paperwork and going back and fro to finish some business related to my car, and by the evening I'm left exhausted (and mostly with a headache). Thus, I couldn't do much either with my photography projects or with my Geltani project.
I've finally got my new car; a Pajero. I'm used to drive salon cars and this is my first time to drive a somewhat elevated car; I mean like owning one and drive it daily. In the meantime, I don't think I'm getting rid of my old car, because apparently Mom's flexibility and movement won't give her much when riding a big car like a pajero. The plan for now is to drive her to the dialysis with my old Seat while in other days and doing other chores with my new pajero.
I do have my plans for this new car of course, other than just driving! But I need time to think things through and to get myself more used to its dimensions. I really wanted to shoot the car in a cloudy day to have some long exposure but the sky had been clear for days now. Hopefully, the opportunity will come soon.

The Lava Bloom

Source: B&H

Source: B&H

In a simple experiment just to test my Manfrotto macro rail, I've tried to shoot some flowers in the flower bed in the yard that have been planted few weeks back. Initially, I thought that this is an opportunity as well to try out the RoundFlash for macro shooting. Later on, however, this proved difficult, and to really use it for such a purpose you'd need to elevate the tripod higher from the ground and make sure there are no barriers between the camera and RoundFlash set, and the subject. However, I've tried to use the RoundFlash with 580EX II connected but in wireless mode but it wasn't practical because receiving the signals from the camera body can be cumbersome. A cable is better fitted for this task while moving the RoundFlash. After trying several shots, I've discarded the RoundFlash and worked with the speedlite alone. After sorting out the images I've came out with 3 shots only that I "somehow" like - not completely though.

Lava Bloom I

Lava Bloom II

Lava Bloom III

The settings for these shots were almost not changed using Canon EF 50mm lens with addition of 68mm of extension tubes. The speedlite direction and distance were changed between shots (in a manner that I don't quite remember right now). As you can see the 3 sorted out shots are cropped as the leftmost parts of the images were somehow (almost always) blown out a bit and to reduce the dramatic edit in the RAW stage, I've decided to crop it and to serve the composition in a better way (despite the random folds). I've just realized after all this cropping and editing that one particular feature seems to be at the center of image, not abiding to the rule of thirds. I'm not sure yet how to feel about this; is this a weak point in the image (regardless of the overall aesthetics), or it is an unconscious break from the rules?
By experience, I've realized that the most interesting lighting for macro shots, specially floral ones, it is when the light strikes from the side to give some dramatic sense of the scene and accentuate the features of the bloom further. Anyway, in this particular incidence, it seems other direct or close to the top directions were fit as well - and probably the color of the bloom helped me a lot with the vision I had later about this bloom being as a lava! In any case, at such level of macro, experimenting is always a key feature, specially if not using a ring flash.
Trials to render one of these shots into Black and White wasn't successful as the tones appeared somehow "monotonous" and didn't provide that striking contrast that I was seeking. This is understandable, since the tones are closely related (Reds to Yellows), and separating them by black and white rendering is hard if the original hue gap isn't wide enough.

The hue spectrum. Notice the blue circle and the distance between the yellows and the reds (connected through orange).

After these trials I've tried my luck with extreme macro (reversing lenses) and using teleconverters, along with the RoundFlash again, but to no avail.

Forgotten

Source: B&H

Two weeks ago, when it was somehow raining a bit now and then, I've decided to do some outdoor activity and this is mainly just to test my new LensCoat. I've simply forgot to post about this experience last week. I got the chance during a weekend morning, when I've decided to head to a place I'm quite used to since I've done lot of shots there before. The challenge, however, was to drag my stuff to that spot and settle and mount my camera while the rain is hammering (though it wasn't a heavy rain after all). I've found it plausible to just fit the camera and cover it with the coat and then change the lens (if not already mounted on camera) from under the cover; which might need a bit of practice if your movement is clumsy as mine!

Denkmal für Freiheit
Rokinon 8mm, f/8 (?), 0.8sec, ISO100.

Ironically, I was the one without a cover under the rain! The situation was awkward as I was trying to use the calculator as well under this rain to estimate the needed exposure. Not only that, but I've even disconnected the Rokinon lens and tried to fix gel filters on its back with my old method of attaching the gels to the back of the lens. I think I've added 8 stops. I had to move fast (and cover the camera mount fast too). It is not something I do not advise anyone to do, but it gave me a lesson on how to really prepare if you have a real goal in mind!. Anyway, the preparation here is out of question was it was just to "use" my new LensCoat.
Anyway, I've tried long exposure here but, despite the nice clouds formation, didn't produce much nice results, and this is natural in fact because the clouds shouldn't be so massive if you want to create and observe concrete lines in your image after a long exposure. After all, I've picked a single shot image and worked through it with some processing. The noise level wasn't cozy, thus I resort to the old trick of blurring a bit and isolated the background from the foreground by lens blur, beside cropping.
This image in particular, beside others taken with Rokinon 8mm fisheye lens, revived in me the dream of having some sort of a profile for this lens to be used in DxO to correct (or de-fish) the image. I've been checking for some methods to create such profiles, and some of them involve some really large prints, which is something out of my hand for the time being. I'm still looking for alternatives though.

Eigen

It has been a trend in the past few weeks, and because of the dormant activity with my camera lately, to visit some of the older images (and specially old panoramas) to do some kind of a perspective change by editing the images in a different way; mainly by doing a selective discoloration, or what some call it color splash.
Probably the color splash is a phenomenon that occurred and is a product of the younger generations and the modern photo-sharing websites. As they say, the cool imagery. However, nevertheless, it is something worth a stand from the artistic point of view I believe. I didn't study arts myself but at the end I have a mind, and I have emotions. I think I can relate to some aspects of such effects to the images.

Coelus Ignes

The concept of selective coloring or color splash is not new to me in fact since I've done it before for some panoramas, but this time the perspective is different. I'm looking at it as a possible venting. Meaning, the colors of one image might not be flexible with your vision, or maybe the composition is not quite what you have desired for the image, then a color splash might be an option to enhance the visual impact of the image. I've excluded here the black and white option because the black and white, even though it is an option indeed, but it would depend heavily on the composition and the visual arrangement in your image. There are no colors, so the only way to attract the viewer in a black and white image is the composition in the first place, then comes the tonalities.

Planeta Victoria Verde

Orbis Fidei (II)

When it comes to choices as to which color or range of colors to pick for such task, I find the matter is a bit philosophical in nature. Just a bit, not much! As I went through many images from my past, I've found it plausible in more than one image to select more than one color to show while leaving the rest black and white. I've asked myself, what rules here? Probably I can put it down in points:

• The color can be the most important color in the scene. The most expressive color in the scene. As an example, in Coelus Ignes above, despite all the "nice" features in the image, like the lights and shadows and the wooden beams and the distortion, I've found myself compelled to show and accentuate the reddish sky (and here I've tinted the black and white with little blue). The same goes for Planeta Victoria Verde.
• The color can be important to show a certain feature in the scene because that feature is in that specific color. For example, in Orbis Fidei (II), the main feature of the ringed strips on the ground was the popping part of the image. However, because the rings were yellow and the image has a wide range of yellows originally, I've decided to show this feature specifically by showing the blue instead. 
• Even though a color splash scene can be composed of more than one color, yet I do think that showing one color ONLY is more powerful than two ore more.
• The question is, how firm is the relation between the composition, and the color splash? Would I really give an image with somewhat bad composition a push by sorting to color splash? The initial answer in my mind says "no". Composition is of utmost importance even in a color splash - but who knows!

From the thoughts pinned above, it seems that panoramas (specially those with symmetrical attitude somewhat) are a good target for color splashes.

Irish Home VII (II)

Finale

Right. Still there are books on the queue line waiting for me, and there is a Geltani project that I didn't touch for some time now, with me being busy with my life. How much I do wish if I just can change everything in my life in one night and a morning. Now with a new car at hand, I have to bear in mind the future expenses as I have to pay the installments for this car which renders me with a lesser amount of money every month, after deduction.
Meanwhile, all the mental work with the macro photography and even fisheye lenses, made my brain somehow active with mathematics again as I try to calculate and find some solutions or imagine some solutions for future usage of these lenses. In fact, I'm thinking of an experiment already as I'm typing these words. Also, let's hope for more night time photography as my last week's outing was not so promising and I really felt it not appealing to write about in here this week. Probably I'll give it a mention at some other time.
I find the real question deep inside me is, all this busy mind work, is it enough to really make me forget my worries and my personal problems? I'd say the answer is 50-50. Yet, it's really hard for me now to give even more than this activity already. My life pace and my physical conditions are giving me a real push downwards.

Now with the new year coming, I'm having plans to go to Failaka, and this time with my new car if possible. The schedule of the ferry for the days left of December aren't good at all, so I hope by 2014 the conditions are better. Just to do this simple trip I do have to arrange stuff with Mom concerning her medicine.
We don't celebrate Christmas here, nor New Year's, but some people do ask me now and then, what's your resolution for the new year. I'd like to say, simply, not to be lonely anymore, but I know this will be a failure already - regardless of how optimistic, or pessimistic person I am.

For those who celebrate it, I say Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year

Grace...

Mom is finally back home right now, but that doesn't mean the end of the story. In fact, I think the struggle had just began now to elevate her spirit and make her cope what life throws at her, specially with boring hours of dialysis.
We are hoping now that the dialysis process is a temporary procedure until Creatinine is reduced to some level. All we can do for now is to pray for her and, of course, be on her side as much as possible. The other challenge from our side is to cope with life's schedules and rush with an added responsibility like this. We've been managing for the past 3 weeks by having leaving from work and changing shifts among family members, but at a certain point, I believe Mom has to be alone at home, probably with the maid only to help her out.

One of the greatest challenges for me right now is to try and work on with my camera after being mostly idle in the past weeks. Not completely idle, but I was aiming at various things without thinking just to try out my camera and not stop using it. Mainly I was aiming at geometrical shapes in flowers, specially those sent to Mom in the hospital. I won't bother you with the technical details here, but most of the images here were taken with 50mm lens plus some extension tube(s) beside using one or two speedlites (580EXII and 430EXII).

Blooming Alone

Sanfte Aufbau

Zentrum Aufbau

The Dark Side of Beauty

Introvert Petals

Lumini

Vortex

Floral Fractal

Mother's Heart

Die Sanfte Ringe

New Toys:

With the rush of the events lately I've ordered some new toys for my camera that I've barely touched or experienced something with. I hope in the coming days I will do this accordingly.

Source: B&H

One of the simplest "toys" here is a step down ring which is aimed at fitting filters on lenses with different diameters. My ring here is a step down from 62mm to 58mm (62-58mm) which I got specifically for my Tamron lens (70-300mm). Most of the lenses that I'm using have a diameter of 58mm and hence most of my filters (polarizer and IR for example) are ordered accordingly to this diameter. In order to make these filters somehow complete and fit all, this step down ring can do the job. The only problem here is that it sometimes gets stuck in between or stuck into the filter read itself. Typical problem (and I'm planning to get special wrenches to detach filters from lenses).

Source: B&H

The other toy is an eyepiece from Polaroid which acts as an extension at a right angle. It is supposed to be quite useful for shooting at waist level but I didn't test it for long. One of the hardships in this piece is how to fit it into my camera. It comes with plenty of adapters for various cameras (specially EOS cameras) but unfortunately, there is no direct adapter for EOS 7D camera and I had to make several tests. I could hardly fit one of the adapters into my 7D and I'm not sure it is quite useful for shooting at waist level but probably more useful to shoot on sides (i.e. to be on the side of the camera and look into the eyepiece). I will leave this for time to sort out its benefits.

Source: B&H

Maybe the most important toy for me right now (and didn't try it yet!) is the Ubertronix Strike Finder trigger. Some years back I got a cumbersome circuit to trigger the flashes by sound (and needed the PC cable to connect it to the flash but never got this cable). This trigger now is all-in-one type: sound, motion, laser and lightning. The difference here though is the fact that it is a camera trigger (and it comes with N3 cable to be connected in the place of the cable remote into the camera). Without trying it all seems good, but with one thing: the short cables and sensors. I want to try this as soon as possible but yet I didn't formulate any ideas on how to do so. The trigger box contains a jack port saying "flash/camera" thus I do believe I can connect it to flashes (speedlites) by special cables too and it's not limited to cameras only. Among other models, this brand was the only one probably to support Canon EOS 7D. In a twist of options, it has the Laser gate, i.e. triggering the camera with the change in Laser reception as I understand it while other brands depend on infrared gate which triggers the camera only when an object crosses in between a transmitter and a receptor. I'm not sure though how I'm going to use the trigger for Laser but according to the instructions it works as well for infrared just that way, as well as for lightning photography. Too bad the lightning season is over right now!

Thoughts:

In the passing weeks, with Mom's sickness and up till this moment, I had some weird urge in geometrical wisdom and started to read whatever comes my way from Wikipedia; specially the schläfli symbol. There were many stuff that were complicated of course and my mind couldn't digest but reading about simple stuff could spark some imagination. Reading about mathematics and geometry can never be in vain - it is up to you of course!
I'm trying in the meantime to look at the problem with Mom's health as a test for something; probably to change my attitude toward the world, probably to test my capabilities of challenging the world with increasing responsibilities and yet keeping up with my own projects and photography. Mom cared for us as a mother would do, and her memories still race in my mind at the moment; memories of some time when I was 10 years old or less and how she used to dress me for school. Despite the health problem is upon her, but it is our test, her children. Probably God wants to see how we do care for her and I'm lying my hope in succeeding in this test. After all, I arrived to the realization of the fact that at some time, at some moment in time, there should be that point of departure between her and me as it is the case always with every living thing. My only prayers go to make this point in time just far away; far enough in time to make me stronger to bear it. I've realized as well the fact that just wishing to depart life before her so I wouldn't have to see her leave me alone in this world is a mere selfish thought. Mothers can't bear the departure of their kids from her sight - it is me who has to bear it all instead...