Hole on the Tape

 

In the age of PS and CG, now the people doesn’t necessary believe the image

they saw in a photograph.    It could be cunningly Photoshoped or Filtered.

— In deed, Photographer is an expert of manipulating the image and its context.   

In fact, it is an inherent limitation of any “Expressive” business =

Speak Truth, Draw Truth, anything is not perfect, especially when people got an

illusion, that the photo is a first-hand real reflection of  the situation or the thing.

The more believe the more fooled, hence better detached.

Since when I revealed the reality what “The Created Lens” looks like,

before I get a praise how pretty the resulting image was, I received the 

questions asking me how I could make a hole on the sticky tape so perfect ?

Well, — to a person “It’s a Photoshop” and to the other “It was cut by the best

Henkel scissors, like a magic.  Good German scissors would work by itself,

like a broom in the music ” Sorcerer’s Apprentice ”  by Richard Strauss.

Have look the Top Photo here.  The work of scissors was captured in action.” 

You see, this is an evidence.  You got to believe.   It’s not Photoshop !  

—– So, you got to see, — a photo with a pinch of salt.

Try to cut a small hole on a sticky tape is a futile attempt whether

it was a Henkel or not.   Paper Punch could make perfect round hole,

 but only  1/4″ (6.35 mm) size unless you got an industrial machine.

—– Still, we might able to simulate the work of Hole Punch. = So, I did

put a metal washer under a tape and press its edge with round object.

(in here, it was a bottom of  a table knife.)

We can find a different size of washer, but if you can’t find the exact diameter,

drill a hole by yourself.   (Size of drill bit may not be what you want though.)

Anyhow, in the case like this, it wouldn’t be so critical.

(If you need very precise work, ask a shop doing laser cutting.  But it’s not cheap.)

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Meadow Flower taken by Homemade Lens

This flower meadow was suddenly created in the past 2 weeks.  

It was a green patch between the buildings of the council housing estate.

Two weeks ago, somebody made a bald patch on the grass, — then after few

rains, it became a flower meadow. = Packaged Instant Meadow !

From this meadow, my regular diet of fuzzy photo was made — but this time,

I used a Home made lens which is a Retro-focus type,  2 element lens.

Sound a bit ostentatious though, in short, as the main convex lens had a little 

short focal length,  I put another concave lens to extend its back-focus, hence

it became a Retro-focus type. —– (Main convex lens came from a toy and the

Front concave lens was my broken short-eye-sighted glass.)

 This photo was a comparison.  = taken by the same

Wide-angle Double-density Pinhole lens, I’ve been using.

Note : Regardless the distance, Pinhole never posses a core of sharp image.

And rather blueish color cast, because not much glass lens there to block 

the UV.  —– (It’s a Pinhole ! )

 For this Double-element lens,  I improvised an “inter-changeable F-aperture” to

reduce a halation by stopping down.    (Sound heavy “F-aperture” though, it was

just a hole on a black tape to stick on the back of the lens.   🙂  ) 

——– (Photo above : The clear samples of Iris (F-aperture) Effect =

——– Left = Fully open / 10 mm.  Center Photo = 6 mm.  Right Photo = 3 mm.

Despite the utter humble origin, amazingly this lens has certain image quality.

And those pink flower having rain drops on it —– just able to see !

So, the image was Soft and Fuzzy, because of too much Coma- aberration

still, they are retaining certain sharp image in the center.   😀

This is a part enlargement of the photo above —– Not too bad.  I like it.

(Can you see the water droplets on the petals ! )

And able to give enough fun !

I have no idea, what those flowers called.

Still, I like this glowing color ! — not the Sun, but like a kindling fire in the ash.

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PS :  May be much of your annoyance,  this is it !   = THE home made Lens.

Photo Right shows “F-aperture” ! = Hole in a Black sticky tape.  😀

= To clack a nut of creativity, it doesn’t need to be ostentatiously heavy 

Lens, even though the Camera happen to be expensive.

= Typical case was, just smear the Lens with sliver to soften the image.

Heavy pretense blocks the flow of the idea. = Anything can be done.

Matter is Just Do and discover a FUN.

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Tilting Macro Bellows — Field Test

Following the test like previous post of homemade bellows, I took it to the park.

Setup was either Micro Nikkor 55 mm or Tamron 90 mm Macro on the bellows

which was mounted on Canon 5D  Mk-III.   And the most of the shots were taken

while the lens was tilted up to 30 degree. (Nikkor 55 mm = up to 20 degree,

Tamron 90 mm = up to 30 degree —– before the corner cut-off starts.)  

And as no F-aperture control, all the photos were taken with

fully open F-aperture.  (And hand held.)

Photo above, Right photo, you may see something strange = why the back petal

was out of focus. —– Because the lens was tilted.

Those photos were the too conspicuous demonstration of the tilting effect.  😀

But those were a bit more subtle.

And above left photo was made with Pan-focus effect and

the right was with Shallow-focus effect.

Shallow focus with rather exaggerated out of focus Bokhe. 

With the Bellows extension, the lense can give even larger close-up.

There were a lots of Bees and Bumble Bees though, they were too busy.

This small black fly seemed to taking a rest.

This Hovering Fly — right 2 photos, she was in the air hovering.

(I needed at least F5.6, not fully open 2.5)

Looks quite  inconspicuous,  still this photo was benefited by the tilting effect.

—– Tilting the lens works well though, to have full benefit of it need to have it

from infinity, not just on the close-up = But to do it,

I need to make yet another Tilting SLR using DSLR body.   🙂

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Tilting Macro Bellows Test

These are the photos of the test shot of the Tilting Macro Bellows

which I’ve shown in this blog two posts ago.

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In photography,  Focused Plain is parallel to the Image Plain. = It’s mean if you 

want a photo of the wall painting, you have to aim a camera parallel to the wall.

(Ideally, the camera should be held at a half height of the wall and in the center,

provided the lens can cover wide enough for the whole wall.)   But when you want 

a photo of the carpet, you may not able to hold the camera right under the ceiling.

= Then you have to take a photo from one end of the room.  As the carpet stretching

end to end, to have the whole area in focus is not easy. = You have to use small

F-aperture and very slow shutter speed.—– Otherwise, use a camera which can tilt a

lens or use a lens called Tilt-shift Lens which may carry a price of £1500 or more.

——- Photo above Left is a modified camera “Conica-Tilt 2” and here with

——- Nikon PC-Nikkor 35 mm F2.8  

——- and the Right, this massive lens is Canon TS-E 24 mm F3.5   

When the lens was tilted 10 degree,  it can focus the object 20 degree out of parallel, in

other words, even if the camera was held parallel to the wall (90 degree to the  floor),

if the lens  was tilted 45 degree down, it gives a sharp focus of the floor, end to end.

( But very few lens can work while tilted 45 degree =due to limit of the image circle.)

Photo above, are the demonstration of  Tilting lens effects.  

Photo Left, the lens was dropped hence, Pan-focus effect was created.

But in the photo right, the same degree tilted lens was aimed to the same subject

“Upside down” (Lens was tilted upward) hence giving very shallow depth of focus.

The relation of the Subject – Lens – Camera was like this.  

Left for Pan-focus and the Right for Shallow-Focus effect. 

When the lens was tilted, focused plain is no longer parallel to the camera,

= like on this photo, as the lens was tilted left  20 degree, the focused plain

runs almost corner to corner.   So that, this kind of technique gives more 

choice of the focus control = which subject to be captured sharp.

(The photos here, Micro Nikkor 55 mm F3.5 was used on Canon 5D Mk-3

with F-aperture was set to fully open F3.5)

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Tilting Macro Bellows

This is a photo of a hand made close-up accessory = Tilting Bellows, I made when

I was first year in my Uni’  and it was featured in a Japanese photo-magazine.  

On that time, I didn’t have proper Macro lens — I had Nikon F Photomic,  

24 mm F2.8  and 50 mm F2  that’s all.    And for the special close-up photo 

of the plant, I was using modified Mamiya Press (6×9 format).  

I made this mini bellows for use with 50 mm f2 lens and this combination

gave  1/5  to life size close-up.  —– Without doubt,  this must be the most 

rudimental, and cheap bellows ever designed !  

(You may see the extreme minimal way of the thinking in this design !) 

 = Lens rear cap was mounted on a L-shaped small aluminium panel and

 it was connected to a body cap with a kind of bellows made out of a plastic

sheet (it was a dark curtain).   Lens panel and the camera body were both

 mounted on a straight  camera bracket by means of  1/4″ screws  which 

allow the lens to be held up to 50 mm away from the body, and the front

panel (hence the lens) could be held in angle to the body, therefore 

tilting effect could be easily used as a focus control as well !

I’m certain I got the original somewhere though,  to use it with Canon EOS 5D,

the height of the lens is not the same and to use it with Nikon D810 would be

too awkward ( because of their setting of Non-CPU lens. )  —>  I decided to

make the same for  5D, but use with Nikon lens —– Nikon lens has manual

F-aperture ring and the flange-back is 1.5 mm longer than Canon. )  

Photos above shows the making process.  (I used the lens rear-cap again. )

Then, to make a bellows, this time I found a black leather in a flea-market.

—– Still, bag-bellows has to be designed and stitched in rather awkward way

though, it can be done anyway = only needs stitch, — by stitch.  😀

So, this is the finished product. (Though, I’m going to change the

body mount ring to black aluminium one.)  

Still, what all those works for,  was remained to be seen with the resulting photo.

This is the sample of the tilting effects. (55 mm Micro Nikkor,  20 degree tilt)

(Top photo shows Pan-focus effect.   Bottom photo is its reverse effect.)

If the junk material was available, the cost to make like this would be

as little as £5 if not nil.  🙂

———-

PS:   Good additional reading = [Shallow Focus — Pan-focus]

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Green Karenisque Photo

If the camera was shaken while the shutter was open = image get blurred.

Still, if the shutter duration was very short (fast shutter speed) and made

the length of blurr short and negligible,  we can accept it is sharp enough.

(So, when you shoot moving subject, use higher shutter speed = image was

not still though, our eyes may not able to see such detail and think it sharp.)

But when the image showed a lots of blurr, we see it different.  Intellectually it

wouldn’t make any sense as the subject though, we see it a kind of sign,

unknown symbol or illegible message. 

—– We just open our mind while abandoning to think what it IS. 

When you see a blurred photo like this, you might thought that the camera was

vigorously shaken or twisted.  Though, in reality, it was made by a small wobble

of the wrist when shutter button was pressed, that all.  If you put two rulers or

something straight from right hand side center of rotation to one streak of  light,

you may measure the radial angle of the movement. = It’s only about 3 degree !

(Still, it is a combination of the movement, the shutter speed and the lens

focal length. = if the shutter speed was longer and the lens (Zoom position) was 

longer, the brurr would be much more.)  

When I was in my Uni’  I had  free access to our Photo dark-room and able to do

all sorts of Photographic experiments.  And on top of this, I had access to the

engineering workshop of the Technology Dept’ not mention their skip was filled 

with discarded materials and the broken machines = I could make all sorts of

things, while using even big engineering machine.  

So, when I wanted to try blurring effect, I made a Camera Rotating Bracket  

which can rotates the camera at the center of the image and corners —–

then I realized that to make rotating blurr does not need to rotates the camera 

but just radially wobble the direction of the lens.  (It’s the same, to draw a circle,

you don’t need to rotates a pencil with caliper but just move a pencil circular.)

But shake the camera straight is a bit different from rotates.

How fast is depend on the shutter speed and the pattern of subject.

Just try and see the effect.   (And try again and again. )  

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Karenisque Flower Photo

Here again, those are the photos created, while the camera was shaken. 

Anyhow, as it was not for scientific, critical needs, photo or the visual image

doesn’t need to be sharp and clear. Hence, the Impressionist’s paintings

has been appreciated on the wall.

Photo above top was made by a bit of off focus,  

and the bottom photo was made by a shake.   🙂

You may not know that the photography can be a good exercise too !  😀

So on.  It’s a good twist Sir !

If you can’t attach Pinhole on your camera, still want to take other than

an ordinary sharp, well focused photo, why not try shake your camera.

They are THE Photographs too !  (Why not.    😀 )

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Photografica-Karenisque

Among the WordPress photo-bloggers, Karen of Draw and Shoot is a photographer

I’m following more than 3 years as she is the Photographer who can capture

the air beyond the image can tell. 

So, I want to learn from her a lot though, art is not a kind of faculty we can copy

but we have to born with, still, some of her technique such as intentionally blurr

the image or make it out of focus, could be  somewhat superficially mimicked.

—– anyhow, those are the first attempt to learn.  🙂

(Shaking thousand times, there could be a moment to discover a secret.  🙂 )

Of cause, even making identical image doesn’t mean able to create the same art.

(anyway, I don’t have the same woods or the river, not mention the same snow ! )

—– buying the same camera, in order to take same good photo like a famous

photographer — is a well repeated joke.    And using the same technique doesn’t

make same photo is “strangely” true !

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Many years ago, I set-up the lighting and a model to teach portrait photo to the

students of  St. Martin’s.

While shooting, I found a tick on the model’s expression, so, I asked a student

“Hey give me the camera, let me click” and took a photo using her camera.  

I did twice of this during a session.  — When the film was developed and a contact

print was made, the other graphic student of  St. Martin pointed out those two

photos which I took, saying that they are looks different. (but not know why.)

The same lighting, the same model sitting on the same chair.  Camera and the

lens was the same and on the same film, still the differences were clearly visible.

= If the photographer couldn’t make such difference, better go to another 

profession.   And the art student who couldn’t distinguish the difference

among the shots, better change the school.  

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Azalea and Rhododendron

Even among the same family of  Ericaceae,  Azalea and Rhododendron is

very close.  Often their flowers are indistinguishable. (I don’t care.  🙂 )

A bit fragile branched tree is Azalea and having stiffer branches, thick leaves is

Rhododendron —– in general.

In fact, in the mountain, both Azalea and Rhododendron are quite common.

—– well,  Azalea in the grassy meadow and Rhododendron grows much higher,

even rocky ridged area of the mountain.

Even in the wild, both of them got variety of colors though, in most of

the case, one area got the same kind and the same colored flower.

So, in Japan, we climbers are proudly boasting,  has seen the special

variety of the Rhododendron in the particular mountain.

It seems, the Rhododendron has an alkaloid (poison or medicinal constituency)

 which rise a blood pressure, hence some are believing it has an Aphrodisiac effect.

In the mountain Shelter,  I observed a group of the people experimenting it and

showed the effects = feel hot and itchy on the skin and having a feeling that their

 earlobe are swollen.  (but not their part of the anatomy —– how shame)  😀  😀 

So, when I read a description in the book  “Third eyes” —— Tibetan family eat

honey pickled Rhododendron flowers. = I was very suspicious about the

authenticity of the book = then, later I discovered that the author was in fact

an English Milkman.  Whole book was just a fiction.

So, don’t make a Rhododendron Salad.

They are pretty as they looks !  (nothing more,  nothing less)

(Whole picture were taken by  Canon Fish-eye Zoom 8~15 mm F4

—– it’s a pretty useful lens ! )

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Pippin’s Art

As I described in the other post,  South London Deptford is a peculiar town.

And an artist Steven Pippin must be the most well known (to the certain

people) peculiar resident there.   On the Deptford High Street,  his studio

or work-shop having a sign as an Optician.   (I haven’t ask him why though,

I guess, may be because he is dealing with “Optical things”  🙂 )

So, in his “shop front” there are numerous “Kind of Camera” or “Used to be a

Camera” which are heavily modified or some might say “almost destroyed.” 

Whether his art lies in the resulting images created by those cameras or the

Camera itself is the Sculpture —– or the action to make those Cameras are

the conceptual art ? —– is a question but I couldn’t find an answer yet.

Like a typical artist, he seemed to care little and just doing what he want to do.

(Right = Pippin.  Center = Julian,  and James —– we three were from the

Wireless Workshop in Greenwich)

Often, his creation was more of the destruction — such as to make a camera

explode or shot with a gun.

But his recent project  [ Ω = 1 ]  is a kind of autonomous  machine to keep a

pencil standing upright. = It’s a X-Y optical feed-back system, and he want to put

this machine installed on top of the tall tower. —– (on the end, he seemed to 

persuade the people of the [Sky-tree (634 m tall)] in Tokyo to install this on top.)

(I guess, this optical feed-back system would  work only on the solid ground.  

If the machine itself, with optical detector altogether moves (not just wobbling

pencil), its movement may go beyond the feed-back range, as the Sky-tree’s top  

sways more than 5 meters, wen hit by an earthquake or strong wind ! )

—– incidentally, the link for the anti-shake structure of the Sky-tree Tower 

[Shin-bashira] and  [Mitsubishi Counter-weight system].

By the way, the reason why Sky-tree was 634 m tall was because it’s in Tokyo where

used to be called the county of Musashi. (to pronounce  6=Mu, 3= San, 4=Shi) 😀

Photo Left = Carl Zeiss’ folding camera “Zeiss Ikonta” was burnt to produce

the image of the  “End of the Camera”.   In his “Aladdin’s cave” it’s hard to

guess what there and what for or what would it become to.    🙂

He got fully equipped work shop and all those tools are pretty familiar to me.

Though, to the local folks, the world see through his window must be

the remotest world, let alone to understand the significance of the

[Half-cut Camera] !

So, whether his studio is transparent or invisible to the people or not,

a gap on the street itself shows the mysterious zone in the human mind.

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