Heated to caramel. Mine condensed more without darkening. Next time I'll use pressure. That will get it hotter then shut it right down, open it up, and see what that does.
The caramel is a mistake. It's nearly all sugar and that double whammy is too much. It ruined the effort.
By itself the blond caramel tastes very good and not overly saccharine. Much better than I expected. It has a welcoming warmth and depth to it that regular caramel doesn't have. But in combination it is too much. I wish this had worked better. Maybe it's just me at this moment. I'll keep it awhile and see but the whole time I was thinking I really don't want to ingest this much less digest it.
Technical:
I'm using a 50mm fixed length lens. It's the smallest and lightest I've got. There is a plastic version that is rated very highly but this one is glass, one stop faster and twice as expensive. It is made for a larger camera than mine so my camera uses only the center and that's such a bummer. Three of my four lenses are like that. So this is the smallest, the most practical, the most all-purpose. But I hardly ever use it. This is rare. I'm trying to appreciate it more.
Today I stepped backward to have this thing in focus lost my balance with camera in hand and fell but caught the fall halfway down by bashing the camera into a cabinet and chipping the thin black plastic rim a sort of lip around the edge of the lens. Just a tiny chip. I still have the chip and can maybe repair it. It doesn't seem to make a difference. The lens cap still snaps on. Closed up there is a tiny air gap to the lens. It saved my fall. And that fall would have really hurt too. That's right where I took a faceplant seven years ago and paralyzed the whole left side of my face. I'm only now recovering from Bell's palsy from that earlier fall. So, small price to pay then innit. Score!
In Photoshop with raw files it's best to adjust lens distortion. I usually do that to eliminate any fish-eye type effect. This time I reversed it and cranked up distortion to maximum instead of minimum. I like the faint bulging effect. Everything comes at you just slightly.
In Photoshop with raw files it's best to adjust lens distortion. I usually do that to eliminate any fish-eye type effect. This time I reversed it and cranked up distortion to maximum instead of minimum. I like the faint bulging effect. Everything comes at you just slightly.
As a boy brownies were my favorite thing. Right up there with tinned ravioli and chicken broth from a cube. I might have outgrown it.
Status, Brownies with cherry, pecans, and caramel: Fail
I don't believe there's any sort of gas between the lenses (though I could be wrong about that). If so, the only problem with a small air gap in the casing might be condensation, which is just something you'd have to keep an eye out for when starting a shoot.
ReplyDeleteThe final picture is awfully nice, and highlights the shallow depth of field that fast lenses like yours do so well. Over time I've used shallow depth of focus less--though I still use it when I want to isolate the subject from the background--and often in macro shots I've been using stack focus so I can have everything from the front to the back of the subject sharp. But your pic is a winner just as it is.
Thank you Rob.
ReplyDeleteThe lens barrel is fine. This is the outermost thin rim that the cap snaps onto. That extends beyond the lens that was not affected or scratched. The air gap is between the outer lens and its black plastic cap. The worst is sand could get in. I suppose.
This lens is better than I've been giving it credit. If I were to step back then the depth of field would increase with each step. Since this is not a macro I can only get so close. It's frustrating. I'm shooting close as I can and fairly wide open and those two things decrease depth of field. I could back up and crop the photo but I prefer not to.
Well, the other thing you could do is stand in the same place and take two or three images, focusing on the front of the subject in one, the back in another. Then use PS to auto-align the images and auto-blend them (choosing stack focus in the auto-blend step). But for purposes of illustrating your food blog, that may be overkill.
ReplyDelete