Say Goodbye Sun

There isn't much to say about this picture really. I don't get the chance to visit the coast very often so sunset shots over the sea from me are always going to be very rare. This is another shot though from my recent New Forest trip, more specifically, Barton-on-sea on the south coast of the New Forest. This was the place I had in mind when I planned the trip to the New Forest that day and though the sunset wasn't spectacular that evening in terms of colour, I did manage to capture the briefest appearance of the sun through the clouds with this shot. This was honestly the best it got, it's appearance lasted about 10 seconds.

The Sigma 10-20mm lens has gone

Yes it is with some sadness that say I chose to return the Sigma 10-20mm lens I bought recently. In an ideal world I would have swapped it for another copy but that option was not available, so I settled for a refund. My decision was based on the fact that the images I got back were just not what I thought, they were very soft throughout the picture and left me with a lot of work to do in post-processing. As all photographers know, lenses are not cheap and you have to ask yourself, does the lens I bought for £380 really make £380 difference? I'm sorry but I just couldn't agree with that. £380 will get you a nice few days in Venice and that does make a difference. Is it really that different to the 18-105mm lens I already have? Well it is different (the CA is virtually nil) but again not £380 different. And of course the kit lens is very versatile. I do accept that maybe I just got a bad version and as I said, if I could have replaced it I would have, but I couldn't. I still might buy another copy in future to see if there is a difference with another copy, though if not, I will put the money towards some further photographic investment in the future.

The Edge of England

Well part of the edge anyway. England with the rest of the British Isles is entirely surrounded by coastline, and this is one of the most southern parts of it. This is another picture from Barton-on-sea, which is at the south side of the New Forest. It was my first day shooting with my new sigma 10-20mm lens and though I find it quite hard post-processing pictures taken with this lens, it definitely has it's advantages. The HDR's come out really well and the chromatic aberration is almost non-existent. I still find a little soft though, which means I have to do a lot of noise reduction and sharpening. Does anyone else with this lens have that problem?

This was shot towards the end of the day, and by this time I was mainly going for long exposure of the sea. I fortunately managed to combine a long exposure shot with HDR in this picture and even I'm surprised how well it turned out. The final picture is taken from just 2 shots, processed (after photomatix) in Lightroom, Photoshop CS5 (warming filter) and Nik Color Efex Pro 4 (very slight touch to lighten up the rocks and clouds). The noise reduction was done in Topaz Denoise and the sharpening achieved using Unsharp Mask (in Photoshop).

Footpath Closed

I've mentioned quite a bit recently that I now have a new lens (Sigma 10-20mm) and tripod for my photographic gear, and this weekend gave me my first opportunity to try them out. I really did feel like a pro landscape photographer wandering around The New Forest with a huge tripod and wide angle lens, it was great fun. I'm a bit comme ci comme ca about some of the images. I thought they would be sharper than they were, some of them are really quite soft but I will work at sharpening them and learning more about the lens in future.

This picture was taken at one of the most southern parts of The New Forest - Barton-on-sea. The daylight was shrinking quite fast at this point and I'd looked for ages to find a path down to the sea, which I eventually did. My aim was to get a picture of the sea, with the foreground being one of those wooden stump fences going out to sea. However, my path to that was blocked by this unsubtle hint not to go any further. I did obey and did not go any further but that was really because the rocks beyond this point (and next to the sea) would have made it extremely difficult to take a shot with the new tripod I was lugging round. A flash of inspiration came to my head when I decided to make this obstruction part of my foreground instead, though I accept it has become the dominant part of the picture. Nevertheless, this is the first of what I'm sure will be many, many pictures to come from my new wide angle lens.