Professional Tip: Always bring a ladder.

The aftermath of a morning golf photograph...

I met with my friend and sometimes client, Dr. Jim Grubbs, for lunch last Monday. He showed me a comp the cover mock up for his third book about golf and psychology. He asked me to photograph it for him. 

Yesterday I pulled out the camera and lens I wanted to use and made sure I had charged batteries, two formatted memory cards and that all the settings were in the ballpark for use on a sunny morning. Since it's been hotter than Hades here for a long time it was just a reflex to grab a 4x4 foot white sheet of nylon fabric and a couple of clothes pins for use in covering up the black camera, lens and dark camera bag ---- there's not a lot of shade on a putting green...the direct sun on gear is contraindicated during the Austin Summers...

I knew I wouldn't have to light anything but as I was going over the shoot, step-by-step, in my head it dawned on me that a bit of elevation was going to make the shot work better. Jim's scouting photo was nice but he's also about 6 foot five inches tall and I'm 5'8"; his perspective is different than mine when it comes to shooting at a down angle. I knew I'd want some space to back up (literally "up") so I could get the perspective right.

That meant bringing along the step ladder. The ladder is six feet tall and the only way it would fit inside the Subaru Forester is if I reclined the passenger seat all the way back. But you know what? I'm over trashing the interior of my cars with dirty ladders and accidental upholstery destruction. But, for the first time in my long career I finally have a car that has a built in roof rack and crossbars. 

I felt like blue collar craftsman using bungee cords to secure the aluminum ladder to the top of the car. But it was great. It didn't fall off on the freeway and snarl traffic or kill someone.  I can't wait to buy a roll of nine foot seamless and attach that to the topside as well. Hell, give me time and I'll have an entire studio full of stuff tied to the racks...

My sleek Forester will eventually look like one of the those overloaded car/trucks from the FSA photos of the Dust Bowl times in the Great Depression. Or, maybe the VSL CFO will step out, take a look and shut down my plan. Calmer minds prevailing and all that. 

Jim arrived early, carefully planned out his shot and got it set up and ready. I arrived punctually at 9 a.m. and walked over empty handed to check out the props and the angles. We made one small adjustment. I went back and grabbed the ladder and the Fuji GFX 50Sii with the 35-70mm lens. Took one more look and then climbed up three steps on the ladder and started shooting. Damn, those 16 bit, uncompressed raw files are big. About 108.5 megabytes apiece. On the other hand they sure are hard to screw up. Get onto the target and you can post process a "bullseye" nearly every time. 

We started shooting at 9:05, did a few variations, shot a few with passing cloud cover and then called this part of our project completed. Time at the finish was 9:12. The ladder went back on the car and, after a nice handshake, and a quick schedule check to get the book's interior shots on our calendars, I was heading back home. Seven minutes for a book cover. A new record for me.

The shoot was a good reminder to always think about bringing a ladder on a shoot. We might not always use it but it sure is handy when you need one. 

This will be my third book cover for Jim's golf books. Relaxed, fun, happy shooting. Almost like being retired. 

 

I had to go scout for a project today. Back in the saddle.

Mitakon 135mm f2.5 on the Fuji 50Sii. Full frame.

100% crop just below. 

My favorite creative director asked me to do a photography assignment for him. It involves photographing fruits and vegetables in bins on shelving. The images are for a regional food bank. They'll be using 6-8 images as wraps for large, refrigerated trailers. Since my creative director friend is smart, and since we'll be shooting at the client's location, he decided that we should scout the project. We should go look at everything we could.

The client H.Q. is on the other side of town. We were scheduled to meet there at 2:30 this afternoon. I left the house early because with Austin traffic you just never know. Add to that the temperatures and tempers on the road and, well, it's better to take it easy and risk arriving early. 

It was a routine, almost stereotypical scouting adventure. The facility is huge. We all met in the lobby. I was joined by the C.D, the art director, the client's marketing director, and one of her associates. We looked at the trailer that would get the wrap. We discussed the proportions of the photos and how they would be applied to the long, horizontal structure. We walked through one of the huge refrigerated food warehouses to get an idea of what kinds of props/products we'd be working with. And we scouted for some location in which to shoot. 

It's really good to do a scouting trip before a shoot. You can prevent a lot of misunderstandings and lost time on the shoot day. For instance, if you are going to shoot a shelving unit that's six feet tall and four feet wide and you don't want to see a lot of perspective distortion between the front legs of the shelves and the back legs you'll need to back up a bit, use a longer than normal lens and also have space behind the shelves to put up a white background and to light that background separately. What a client thinks might work and what actually does work can be vastly different. 

Moving produce (fruit and vegetables) from a very cold storage space into a warm and humid shooting space will cause a bunch of condensation on the products. Might look good or it might not. In shots like this control over the final look is important....

We ruled out one shooting location because the closest electrical outlets were about a hundred feet away. We ruled out another location because, well, it was on a different floor and also on the other side of the facility. By the time we left we had a working agreement on where and when we would do the job and a good idea of how to proceed. That's a time saver. And an anxiety preventer in anyone's book. 

A good scouting adventure tells a photographer: The best location at which to photograph. Where to get ample electrical power for lights. How to schedule the most popular conference room because it's the best shooting location. What to expect in terms of styling the product. Where to load in on the day of the shoot. Who the decision makers on the client side are. And how long the set up and actual photography will take. 

We have a tentative schedule and I feel more comfortable about the details of the job. I think it was worth the time and travel. Even if my car did tell me that the temperature out on the road today was 114°. 

There's another step before the shooting day. The art director and I need to have a phone meeting to discuss technical stuff. Like, how he wants the files and how big he'd like the files to be. The "look and feel" of the lighting. And who will be responsible for styling the shots. We'll get into that tomorrow. 

But for today it seems like were pretty much on target. 

I read a review on DPR of a lens I had just tested. Don't know if it's sample variation or what but......

A former staffer for DPReview posted his assessment of the TTArtisan 90mm f1.25 lens on that site today. He suggested that the lens he shot with was "soft." After I read his piece and looked at his samples I went back to look at the images I made with the lens to see what it was I might be missing. 

In a way we might be comparing apples with oranges since my lens is outfitted with a Fuji GFX mount and his was mounted on a Nikon Z9 --- which leads me to believe that his is outfitted with a Nikon Z lens mount. 

There are lots of things that can contribute to a lens being perceived as "soft." It could, in fact, be the design or manufacturing of the lens. There's a reason some products are less expensive than others. But it could also be a tester's unfamiliarity with a new camera and how best to use its manual focusing aids. Or it could be an issue with the way image stabilization is being used with a lens that doesn't "speak" to the attached camera. It could be that one of the reviewers is just settling into middle age and over-estimates the acuity of his eyesight and his ability to sharply focus on a screen. It could be too much Seattle coffee causing hands to shake. 

Or, I could have been wrong. But I dragged this 100% crop from my recent take and looked at it carefully. It seems sharp to me. Sad that good lenses get trashed because of bad reviews. I remember Roger Ciccala at LensRentals remarking that they test five or more copies of a lens when reviewing it. They want to establish a median parameter that can take into consideration sample variation. And they also test with the camera on a tripod which allows for very careful manual focusing. And, what we may be seeing is a combination of handholding and a very narrow plane of sharp focus. Breathe in and it goes one way. Breathe out and it goes another way.

I'll stick to everything I wrote about the lens here: https://visualsciencelab.blogspot.com/2023/08/i-finally-got-to-spend-some-time.html

 It stands in stark contrast to DPR's assessment of the lens. I'm okay with that but I wish I knew how we got different impressions and, maybe more importantly, different results. We might never know.

100% Pixels. Grabbed from a very small fraction of the full frame. 

It was only 100° today but more importantly the humidity was much lower. It felt....almost refreshing. I went museum hopping to take advantage of the coolness.

 

After visiting two museums over on the UT campus I stopped by the Medici Caffe for a very nice cappuccino. A very nice cappuccino. I'm not sure why but the staff at this coffee shop always treats me with almost comical deference. I think, since it is across the street from the UT campus they rarely see people who are old enough for Medicare coming in off the hot streets for a coffee. Whatever. If people want to be extra nice to me I'll take it... Did I mention that the product was superb? Cuz it was.

I got all my business stuff done early. I scheduled a scouting expedition for after lunch on Thursday. My favorite creative director has a project that entails food, design and high end photography. I can't wait to see the comps (comprehensive layouts). And the lunch should be fun because it's with an old friend and client who is now the executive director of a big theater in Oklahoma. Can't wait to hear what he's up to and what we might be collaborating on.

I had a lunch yesterday with a psychiatrist/writer/golfer who has written two fun and successful books about psychological approaches to success at golf. I did the book covers for the first two and, over lunch yesterday, I found out that he's almost finished with his third book. We met to go over creative concepts for the book cover images and some fun (and funny) images for the inside. We're booked to hit the putting green on Saturday morning this week to shoot the cover photo. More to follow.

The work day got capped off with introductions to three doctors who need to schedule with me in the next week or so for "official" portraits for their new practice. I have a feeling the 135mm f2.5 Mitakon lens is going to get a workout on those three shoots. Glad I snagged one.

So, with all the work done and the taxes paid I had a free afternoon. That coincided with a drop in temperatures. Instead of a high near 108° (that's coming back again on Thursday...) the heat barely nudged 100° and the lower humidity made everything feel so much better. I tossed on my favorite hat and my favorite sunglasses and fired up the VSL squad car. Raced over to the West campus area, parked and made the rounds. First stop was a quick look through of the Bob Bullock Museum of Texas History. Nothing of note to report. Of my three stops they definitely had the coldest air conditioning and the only café. 

I ambled across the street to the Blanton Museum. I'm liking their new plaza more and more. The main gallery was closed in order to prep for the next big show but I had a great time just going through the modern art collection on the second floor. And taking exterior images of their great arches. And I take every opportunity to walk through the Elsworth Kelly "chapel" to see the colored windows. After that it was time to head over to the HRC and take a gander at...the first photo. Ever. And a nice copy of the Gutenberg Bible. And an exhibit about Norman Mailer. And another exhibit of dance materials by Deborah Hay. I even ran into an old friend who is one of the curators of the Helmet Gernsheim Photography Collection. One of the biggest repositories of 19th and 20th century photography in the world. We had a short conversation about the working methodologies of HCB. Counter to current suggestions on the web.....

After my fine coffee I headed home to play with a few files and to send my next door neighbor some images I took on Sunday at his 3 year old's birthday party. Photos of little kids trying to destroy a piñata. Seems three, four and five year olds aren't so good at piñata destruction. They'll learn. 

So, as I ambled about in the cool 99° weather I took some images. Here are some of them...

Sun shades on the plaza in front of the Blanton Museum of Art.

All images are from the Leica Q2. 

that's about the long and short of it. Now settling in with a Lee Child novel. 

I ran out of John Sanford Novels. But I think another one is coming out shortly.

fingers crossed. 

Looks like I'm back at work for now. It's a good thing. I was getting bored.

Still fascinated with the Fuji 50Sii. Fun galore. Just because it's new and different to me.

I finally got to spend some time shooting the TTArtisans 90mm f1.25 lens outside the studio. Pounded out some photos over on Congress Ave. Till the camera and I over-heated...

 

The enduring power of Ms. Pac-Man. 

How many Magnum photographers from the 1950s and 1960s can dance on the head of a pin? Will we ever find out? Is it germane to your enjoyment of photography in 2023? 

I went to swim practice this morning. It was good. I drank coffee twice this morning as the trout snapped at buzzing but slow moving mayflies skitting just above the bubbling and rippling surface of a fresh running stream somewhere else. And it was good. I sat down in front of my computer a little later. I thought I'd crank out a blog about something inane and inconsequential. I knew that was not good. There were bigger fish to fry. 

I pushed my poorly-made office chair away from my dated, glass-topped desk and stood up. I used the forefinger of my left hand to write my name in the dust on the glass top. I thought about cleaning. Someday that might happen. 

I bent over to see the screen through the correct part of my progressive eyeglasses and at the same time fiddled around with the keyboard and mouse apparatus until I was able to find the ever elusive cursor and then, like a bull fighter, deftly clicked the right menu item and put my lumbering beast of a writing machine to sleep. And it was good. I felt the early morning joy of the screen turning to black. I felt empowered by wrenching my time back from the edge of an abyss. Or perhaps skirting a sink hole of sloth. I looked out a dirty window and saw the withered Japanese maple tree sway in the wind.

One needn't check the news feeds every half hour....

I remembered I had wanted to put my relatively new 90mm lens through a more involved audition. Now there was nothing to hold us back. My friend, Nick Adams, called to egg me on. "Bro!" he said with his usual slow, scattered delivery... "When are you going to make that new lens your bitch?" I laughed and hung up the phone in the middle of something else Nick was trying to tell me. Something about taking bacon fat, wrapped carefully in waxed paper, along on our next fishing trip so we could use it to sizzle the trout we were sure to catch. Sizzle it crispy and fine in my old cast iron skillet. Fish dancing and jumping on the hot metal,  over hotter oak coals. On a merry campfire near the edge of the stream that runs through...the woods, up near Henri-Hickory Jones's place; near the marshes. Just past the weathered wood, roadside stand where the Presbyterian boys in their Sunday finery sell their freshly counterfeited Snickers bars to the gentle folks passing by.

That brought back memories of going to college on one edge of this vast country. Can't say as I ever graduated but I did move on out. Fun times. Fun times. I had a roommate named Steve. We lived in the prestige dorm. I was busy most days photographing models for my studio class. Steve, a philosophy major from a wealthy family (whose names you would know) started each late afternoon conversation, after our classes, by asking me if I'd slept with my latest model. I'd indignantly say, "Of course not." He would say, "Tsk. Tsk. And you want to be a professional photographer someday?" He would shake his head in a knowing way.

When I left college I inherited amazing amounts of money from an old family trust. But I pissed it all away. You know. Gambling on the horses. Buying rare but exquisite china for my dining room, along with golden salad utensils, and generally living too well. Apparently living much better than I have been able to afford. But that's a story for another time. Perhaps over strong cranberry juice at old man Robert Adams's bar that's still on Chickadee and North Central streets; just on the other side of the railroad tracks to Denver. Jack would know. He's been there plenty. 

 But back to blog business... 

I bought a used TTArtisan 90mm f1.25 lens, complete with a GFX lens mount, from the folks at B&H a few weeks back. It's a heavy lens. Not too big just heavy. The lens has 11 elements in seven groups. Someone will know what that means. It also has four sets of achromatic element doublets. I don't really know what that means either but the folks at B&H put it in the description so it must be somewhat impressive. 

When I say that the lens is heavy I'm not really exaggerating. Damn thing weighs just under three pounds (actually 2.3 pounds or XXX grams). Put a medium format Fuji camera together with that 90mm and you're looking at something like five pounds and change. Only mighty or insane photographers will want to carry the combo around. Thank goodness I'm on the borderline of both mighty and insane. I might have a fighting chance. 

The lens has ten aperture blades but still has funky aperture artifacts when you use it at apertures like f2.0. I think they call this effect Ninja stars. They are more commonly referred to as edgy bokeh balls. You'd think with nearly three pounds of potential to play with the makers would have been able to make more rounded bokeh balls. I think there is a filter for that in some vague software that someone sells somewhere...

Other deal killers that come packaged with this inexpensive lens are: It can only close focus down to one meter. I'm not sure what a meter is because I live in the USA but I think it's the Euro-version of one yard and change. All I know is I'm pretty pissed no one told me I would not be able to do easy slide copies with this lens. Another negative is the metal lens hood. You have to screw it onto the end of the lens and that takes too much time. Sure, it's well made but what isn't? I like the hoods that just snap on. Who wants a metal lens hood?

In fact, I guess it was just last week when I was at Old Callaghan's bar and photo gallery playing checkers with a guy we call Garry. Mostly because his name is Garry. He wears glasses and has some sort of vision problems. He likes to play checkers with the board at kind of a slant. I called him on it once, early on, before I knew him better. I asked him, "Garry, Why do you always play with the checker board slanted to one side?" He gave me a long and silent look, stuck his thumbs through the front belt loops of his faded denim trousers, spit his wood toothpick onto the floor, cocked his big head to one side and then he said, "What slant???" He sure had me there.

But anyway, Garry and me and the other guys who play checkers at Callaghan's Bar got into a long philosophical discussion about whether plastic lens hoods were better or if metal lens hoods are better. Garry felt that he could never quite take the photographs he was previsualizing in his head if he knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that the hood on his lens was plastic. I maintained that it didn't matter while Henri-Hickory Jones, who had closed down his place a bit early to meet us for checkers, conceded that he had always been partial to metal. In fact, he loved the metal hoods. After he said that he was silent for a spell, just looking out the window. Like he was looking for an answer.

I didn't want to get into a fracas so I peeled the paper off part of the "Snickers" bar I'd bought from the Presbyterian kids a bit earlier and chewed a while on the delicious nougat and crunchy peanuts. So much better to buy your Snickers bars close to where they are made since they are much, must fresher. It's a taste a convenience store Snickers bar will never come close to matching. Now that's something Garry agreed on with me. Henri? He was pretty vocal about his preference for a candy bar we call, "Almond Joy." 

But I digress. I was delighted when the 90mm lens arrived from NYC (actually, from a warehouse in New Jersey). It came well packed and inside the anonymous, brown cardboard box the lens was nestled like a trout in the cool shadows in its own, original box. I disagree with the store's description though. They say it was in 9+ condition. I maintain that before I got my hands on it the darn thing looked brand new.

So. Getting back to today. I put the Fuji camera and the TTA lens into my car. They ride on the front passenger seat. Strapped in like a bouncing baby. And covered by one of my straw hats. You know, the ones made just for street photographers. It was toasty and sweaty outside so I flipped on the air conditioning and made it cold enough in the car to chill beer. That was a mistake as the outside of the windows started to clot and streak with condensation. We found middle ground between comfort and safety after that...

I parked a couple blocks south of where S. Congress Avenue starts to look successful and fun. I walked north on the west side of the street, padded down a wide sidewalk and took photographs of anything and everything I saw that I thought looked cool. I have to confess though that even knowing that I should be busy pre-visualizing stuff I didn't even know exist until I saw it --- I was not. Didn't pre visualize a damn thing. Just answered my inner Gestalt. See it? Like it? Click it!!! We're not getting any younger here. And less so standing around ogling stuff or waiting for the future to effect some sort of special delivery. No sir. 

As my roommate at my college used to say (and always with enthusiasm...) "Are we going to tap this keg or just sit here with our thumbs up our....???" Steve had the same feelings about photography. The old boy was wise beyond his tender years. 

When I found stuff I liked the look of the only decision I made after my initial, almost spontaneous rush to photograph, was whether or not to try a second shot with a bigger, fatter, wider aperture so as to try and impress anyone who might read this and then actually look at the images. Who knows who, 100 years from now, will be diving deep into the Blogger archives for this kind of "gold."??? 

I shot mostly at f2.8 with a few images at f5.6 and fewer still at f1.4. I was ashamed that I paid for f1.25 but never actually used it. What a failure of technique. It's almost "deal-killer."

When the air temperature hit 105°f and the sun blasted down directly on the black body of my camera I started to get a temperature warning signal in the viewfinder. Coincidentally I also started getting a temperature warning on my self. I was as hot as a rattlesnake on a flat rock. We decided to get back to the car, get back in the AC and call it a good day. I put the camera in the studio and went to the backyard in my boxer shorts to play in the sprinkler. It was fun. And cool. B. glanced out the door to the garden. I could see her saying: "Tsk. Tsk. Tsk. What have I gotten myself into?"

Anyway, my automatic typing machine has been rattling on for hours and hours. And then I spent all day yesterday, today and tomorrow revising: word by word. Bird by bird. So let's push "publish" on this train wreck of a lens review and get to the real meat of the matter --- the actual, real, real world, authentic photographs. Mostly just like they come pouring out of the camera. 

As the farm kids who sell the fake Snickers bars say, "Sure mister! It's the real thing. But don't open it until you get home." And then his little sister, the one with the lazy eye, chimes in to say, "And my daddy says NO REFUNDS." Aren't they darling?

So....on to the images. They're only here for a short time. I'll be putting them into a portfolio. I'm applying for the William Eggleston/Stephen Shore grant. I'm calling this collection "Sleeping along S. Congress Ave." It's a perfect entry for "The Intersection of Art and Intentional Banality." And if I'm not successful in getting that grant there is always the Lee Friedlander/Alec Sloth grant. 

Absolutely the worst mural I have ever seen intentionally painted and paid for in a place of business. 

Just the worst. 

The luscious full frame.

the 100% pixel mag. 

Outside the world famous Continental Club.

it was this ancient Kawasaki motorcycle that gave me the idea to sand all the black 

finish off my oldest Leica SL. It's taking longer than I thought it would. But it's looking sweet.

Texas Grass Tanning Itself in the Sun.

Texas Grass Tanning Itself in the Sun. Part deux. 

Just flat out grabbing Bokeh by the scruff of the neck. Right?

Yes. We now cook popcorn by just laying the kernels on any hot sidewalk.

They tend to cook faster after noon. 

A reader asked if the sign's appearance (the phallic design cues) was 

intentional. It's Austin --- you had to ask???

On the side of Jo's Coffee. On South Congress Ave. 

Sunday afternoon live music. At Jo's Coffee. On S. Congress Ave. 

An example showing the full frame (above) and then a 100% sample (below).

Yes. I'd say the 90mm lens, even used near wide open, is remarkably good.

narrow depth of field test. 

reflection artifacts.

couldn't get the software to figure out how to make these lines go straight up and down...

So, what do I think of this lens?

I think it's heavy. I think I got a bargain at $400. 

I think it's monstrously sharp from f2.8 onward. 

I think I'll continue to ignore the idea of shooting it 

wide open. 

It has vignetting and you can cure it in post. But just barely. 

Better to use a slight crop and surrender to physics. 

Would I buy it again? yeah. 

Is it the best lens ever? Not by a long shot.

Is it a "deal killer" lens? Only for the weak of arm or the 

precious of status seeking. 

should I ever try to channel Hemingway again?

People do stuff they know better than to do all the time.

Why would I be any different.?