[paulh]

Geraniums on the porch - DA18-135 on K10D

[Des]

Portrait of girl in a bicentennial reenactment gig that I covered last weekend.

Nice shot Ray. Portraits with the 18-135 are under-represented in this thread.

Bicentennial of what? Poor Lachlan Macquarie being driven out (and into an early grave a few years later) by the forces of darkness (John Macarthur in particular) in 1821? An early example of the power of fake news: Heroine Elizabeth Macquarie dared to defy fake news 200 years ago

[rayallen]

Nice shot Ray. Portraits with the 18-135 are under-represented in this thread.

Bicentennial of what? Poor Lachlan Macquarie being driven out (and into an early grave a few years later) by the forces of darkness (John Macarthur in particular) in 1821? An early example of the power of fake news: Heroine Elizabeth Macquarie dared to defy fake news 200 years ago

Thank you, Des. The 18-135 is an extremely versatile lens and I see no reason not to take portraits with it. I am very happy with that one. Her mother loves it too.

Re bicentennial: It's a long story so I'll give you a very condensed version. Some of the convicts sent to Australia were women and some also had children with them. It was not considered safe for them to live in the normal community and separate compounds were built for them called female factories. In 2018 there was a bicentennial event for when Gov. Macquarie laid the foundation stone for the new Parramatta Female Factory and we (two mates and I) covered that one as well.
Last Sunday (21 Feb 2021) was the bicentennial for the actual opening of the PFF and this included a reenactment of the walk of the women and children from the old wooden factory to the new Greenway designed beautiful sandstone buildings.

[Des]

Thank you, Des. The 18-135 is an extremely versatile lens and I see no reason not to take portraits with it. I am very happy with that one. Her mother loves it too.

Re bicentennial: It's a long story so I'll give you a very condensed version. Some of the convicts sent to Australia were women and some also had children with them. It was not considered safe for them to live in the normal community and separate compounds were built for them called female factories. In 2018 there was a bicentennial event for when Gov. Macquarie laid the foundation stone for the new Parramatta Female Factory and we (two mates and I) covered that one as well.
Last Sunday (21 Feb 2021) was the bicentennial for the actual opening of the PFF and this included a reenactment of the walk of the women and children from the old wooden factory to the new Greenway designed beautiful sandstone buildings.

Great story Ray. Wonderful that you got to cover it.

People outside Australia probably won't know about Francis Greenway. He was an architect in Bristol, who in 1812 was sentenced to death for forging a financial document. His sentence was commuted to transportation to the colony of New South Wales. While still a convict he was commissioned by Governor Macquarie to design a number of what became Sydney's most iconic buildings. To complete the circle, this forger of a financial instrument ended up immortalised on the $A10 note! Francis Greenway - Wikipedia

[paulh]

It's a long story

People outside Australia

Thanks guys for the bit of Aussie history!

[ehrwien]

K-S2, DA 18-135 @24mm f/8, ISO 100, ND1000, two ways:

30 s, windy, cropped in, cleaned up

Schloss Herten, clean

60 s, calm, uncropped, no manipulation of reality

Schloss Herten, explicit

[Des]

K-S2, DA 18-135 @24mm f/8, ISO 100, ND1000, two ways:

Both fine images. The stronger light on the red roof and in the reflection grabs attention in the first one and the "impressionistic" reflection is a counerpoint to the strong lines and shapes of the building. The second is the more classic "mirror" reflection shot, with more even lighting. Both interesting. I like the "framing" of the branches in the second, although personally I would probably crop/clone out the few stray branches at the bottom left of the frame.

[HoutHans]

K-S2, DA 18-135 @24mm f/8, ISO 100, ND1000, two ways:

30 s, windy, cropped in, cleaned up

Schloss Herten, clean

60 s, calm, uncropped, no manipulation of reality

Schloss Herten, explicit

Both are nice images indeed, and I l really appreciate the experimentation. I'm not sure whether I like one better.

[paulh]

A bit of green on the hillside after a rare bit of rain - DA18-135 on K10D:

[ehrwien]

Thank you for the comment

I like the "framing" of the branches in the second, although personally I would probably crop/clone out the few stray branches at the bottom left of the frame.

Thanks to you as well. Yes, that's exactly what I did in the first one. In fact, if you look closely you can see that my clone/repair job was not that clean in the lower left corner, a slightly darker shadow can be spotted there. I even went a little further by removing two little branches sticking out of the water a little more into the frame in the lower left corner because I felt they were a little distracting from the bigger branch in the foreground. But I guess you're right and I could give the second shot the same workout as I did to the first one.

For comparison, I have attached a shot (ooc) from before the neutral density filter came on, same perspective and already on the tripod, although I could've taken it handheld with the same settings just as well. Looks definitely more snapshot-y and makes it worth the hassle with the filter for a much stronger effect, imho. Though I guess I could have taken a better "perfect" mirror shot without the filter later in the evening when the water was calm?

The 18-135, although I knew that at 24mm and f/8 would be great, surprised me a little with how sharp it was. In the full resolution of the ooc image I attached you can see quite some CA around the branches at the top, but other than that (non-issue when devoloping the RAW) it really made up for my lack of the 21 (which I could have gotten shots for 170€ on the bay, if I wouldn't have been taking those shots at the time... ).

[nicolpa47]

St. Ives, Cornwall - the harbour, Smeaton's Pier, The Island, Museum, Coastwatch Station - image taken from above Porthminster Beach

[wem59]

Gotta ask, these photos look sooooo sharp and clear! Are these pics processed or straight from camera? Does it make that much difference which camera? How about my K-50? Could I get shots like these??

[ehrwien]

Are these pics processed or straight from camera? Does it make that much difference which camera? How about my K-50? Could I get shots like these??

If you're referring to the pictures I added here and here, the two in the first post are taken with a neutral density filter on the lens which extends exposure time by a factor of one thousand. They were taken a few minutes before sunset and were exposed for 30 and 60 seconds respectively. That absolutely makes the use of a (sturdy) tripod necessary. I also used the 18-135 in its supposed sweet spot at 24 mm and at f/8 (perhaps f/5.6 would have been even better? Oh well, who cares... ). But the combination of those circumstances (tripod, 24 mm, f/8, long exposure time, focussed in live view) means that the building and the ground will not move in all that time, and so those will be exposed all the time and be very sharp in the resulting picture: because of the tripod it is not possible to shake the camera while taking the shot, because of the building not moving it can not be blurry in the shot, and because of the long exposure time any "distracting" element like a bird flying by or people walking by will not be pictured at all.

I did post process those images because I underexposed the shots a little to preserve highlights (like I do with most shots), so I lifted the exposure (mostly shadows) a little, pushed contrast and saturation a little, all in DxO PhotoLab 4 Elite, and I cropped in a little and removed a few distracting elements with the copy/repair tool in FastStone Image Viewer for the first of the two pictures.

In the second post I linked you can see a shot that was taken from the same point of view, on the tripod, same focal length, same aperture, but without the neutral density filter, so a much shorter exposure time, so the picture could very well have been taken like that without a tripod, and I did not post process this image in any way, it is the jpg image that came out of the camera like that.

And to answer your last question: yes, you could definitely take shots like these with your K-50. Mine were taken with the K-S2, so a little more recent model, but not that much, with a little more resolution, but not that much. The camera does not make that much of a difference, and tbh even the lens does not make much of a difference for certain pictures. The most important thing imho is having an interesting subject and being able (compositionally and technically) to take intriguing shots of it.

The one thing that could make it more difficult for you to take shots like these with your K-50 and the 18-135 (or any other lens without an aperture ring) is if it suffered the aperture block failure that leads to all (or just a few at first) of your pictures being taken with a completely closed aperture, resulting in dark, blurry and unsharp pictures because the camera stops the aperture down all the way while it thinks it does not. But there are ways to fix or circumvent this problem, if it should ever come to this.

[JimJohnson]

If you're referring to the pictures I added here and here,
I did post process those images because I underexposed the shots a little to preserve highlights (like I do with most shots), so I lifted the exposure (mostly shadows) a little, pushed contrast and saturation a little, all in DxO PhotoLab 4 Elite, and I cropped in a little and removed a few distracting elements with the copy/repair tool in FastStone Image Viewer for the first of the two pictures.

In the second post I linked you can see a shot that was taken from the same point of view, on the tripod, same focal length, same aperture, but without the neutral density filter, so a much shorter exposure time, so the picture could very well have been taken like that without a tripod, and I did not post process this image in any way, it is the jpg image that came out of the camera like that.

And to answer your last question: yes, you could definitely take shots like these with your K-50.

If I may add one other tidbit... Unless you work with RAW images (which pretty much always are meant to be post-processed outside the camera), you are looking at jpeg images. And jpegs are always immediately post-processed - by the camera using one of the algorithms built in by the engineers. I would suggest taking some time to explore the various available settings for a variety of image types. Once you get a feel for what you like and when you like it, you will be happier with your images.

[Des]

In fact, if you look closely you can see that my clone/repair job was not that clean in the lower left corner, a slightly darker shadow can be spotted there.

I have looked at the image on Flickr, magnified and even after you mention it I still can't see it!

I guess you're right and I could give the second shot the same workout as I did to the first one.

It's such a fine shot I think it is worth it.

For comparison, I have attached a shot (ooc) from before the neutral density filter came on, same perspective and already on the tripod, although I could've taken it handheld with the same settings just as well. Looks definitely more snapshot-y and makes it worth the hassle with the filter for a much stronger effect, imho.

For sure.

Though I guess I could have taken a better "perfect" mirror shot without the filter later in the evening when the water was calm?

Maybe, but maybe the light wouldn't have been right, or whatever. Maybe the "perfect" shot would be in the early morning, with the sun on the facade. But perhaps they don't allow visitors in the early morning. Life has an unfortunate habit of impeding photography.

The 18-135, although I knew that at 24mm and f/8 would be great, surprised me a little with how sharp it was. In the full resolution of the ooc image I attached you can see quite some CA around the branches at the top, but other than that (non-issue when devoloping the RAW) it really made up for my lack of the 21 (which I could have gotten shots for 170€ on the bay, if I wouldn't have been taking those shots at the time... ).

It's surprising to me too how sharp the 18-135 can be (away from the corners particularly). If it's any consolation for missing out on the DA 21, I don't think the Limited would have been sharper. (The difference with the Limiteds is more in the microcontrast, transitions and overall rendering: see HD Pentax DA 21 f3.2 Limited | Reviews | The Northcoast Photographer) The point this underlines to me is how much value there is in taking the time and trouble to shoot on a tripod and use a filter where appropriate.

Gotta ask, these photos look sooooo sharp and clear! Are these pics processed or straight from camera? Does it make that much difference which camera? How about my K-50? Could I get shots like these??

I would echo what @ehrwien has said, particularly this:

The most important thing imho is having an interesting subject and being able (compositionally and technically) to take intriguing shots of it.

Amen. The skills matter more than the gear. Develop your eye for composition, shoot on a tripod whenever practical, shoot RAW and work on your post-processing. All of this is within the grasp of the amateur photographer. Photography has never been more affordable.

Just to elaborate on something ehrwien said that might not be obvious. The reason for using a Neutral Density (ND) filter on the lens is to reduce the light. It doesn't change anything else (unlike say a polarising filter). When you are using a long exposure (which can be 1/15th second in really bright conditions), even with the ISO at its lowest you risk your image being overexposed. You can narrow the aperture (ie higher f-number) to compensate but after a certain point the resolution from any lens drops away because of diffraction. With the 18-135 this is particularly noticeable after f11. The sweet spot is generally around f8. Say you want a long exposure of a waterfall with that milky-smooth water. That typically means an exposure time somewhere from 0.5 second to 2 second. At 100 ISO and f8 or f11, the image will be overexposed in all but very gloomy conditions. At f16 or f22, the image won't be as sharp, because of diffraction. So you put on a ND filter to reduce the light. They come in different strengths - 3 or 4 stops is about the minimum you want.