Farmer's Market, Mt Pleasant, SC Tuesdays
This is the first week I went this season. It just opened a couple of weeks ago. I submitted pictures for the challenge from this event last summer/early fall. I went yesterday for pictures of food for the challenge. In the course of doing that, I did what I like to do, I took pictures of children, people and dogs. I could describe it to you, but instead I will share my experience through photos. There was a guitarist playing whose photo I did not take.
This picture is so typical of the market, so many children, people, mostly well dressed, etc.......... the only thing I missed here were the dogs of which there were many.
g
This picture is so typical of the market, so many children, people, mostly well dressed, etc.......... the only thing I missed here were the dogs of which there were many.
g
After all is said and done, it is the sweet tea.
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Comments
Eric
It's better to be hated for who you are than to be loved for who you're not.
http://photosbyeric.smugmug.com
This is especially cute. I think her parents would buy prints. If she were mine, I'd want them.
This one looks like you used shadow/highlight and either overdid it or didn't follow up with curves to restore contrast.
Were you using your 70-200? This looks like just the place for it.
ginger (How are the babies, more photos?)
It took me a while to figure out how my D70 was selecting what to focus on. Closest object, etc... Now I just manually select which focus area I want the camera to use, and my pictures have been much sharper.
mitch
http://clearwaterphotography.smugmug.com/
In the market I was using the 70-200 lens on the kids and the dog and people.
That lens tends to shoot soft, or it is because it has no IS or whatever. I really don't like it, but it seemed the lens to use for the kids yesterday.
The osprey has changed where he is. The egrets are no longer where they were, I am shooting further.
I would get rid of the 70-200 lens if I knew what to replace it with in my price range. I can't even think of two lenses to replace it with.
Most of the shots here were shot with that lens. The ones in the nature which was a disaster, but I am trying to figure out if it is the distance I am from the birds, or if it is me, and I am not getting much info. They were shot with the 300L with the 1.4 extender as are all of my bird shots. Egrets, etc.
The egrets used to be all around me, now I go to a rookery where they are separated. I am still fortunate they are there, but they are further than they were. Anyway that is the 300 which was extremely sharp when I got it.
Then there is the 17-40L lens which I also shot with yesterday. Those shots are in the Challenge thread.
I can guarantee you that I am not shooting one more thing until I know if all those shots are soft, or these and the birds, or what. I am going to a seminar on Saturday, if I still don't know, I will shoot, I paid 150.00 to go and bought a CF card, but I will not shoot with happiness or confidence.
Thanks for looking and commenting, Mitchell, now would you please elaborate.
ginger
I have also manually focused since I got that camera. I have been shooting alot of birds. I lost the bird places I had, found new ones and have been trying things to adapt. Guess it didn't work.
g
That second one is my fav as well
Cincinnati Smug Leader
These look soft/OOF to my eye.
I've taken many pictures where my D70 focused on something that I didn't want it too. I wonder if your D20 is doing the same. Some of these issues may also be exaggerated by a shallow DOF. What do you think?
mitch
http://clearwaterphotography.smugmug.com/
hoping this message finds you well -Ian
I went through these shots on this thread, picked out the soft ones, was going to list them, but I had already posted alot on the subject and let it drop. I could go through each one and say why I posted it anyway, but it is more of a general thing. I think everyone knows by now how I feel about that lens. So I don't use it much. I was there for the vegetables, but I love the kids, the music and the atmosphere. So I grabbed shots, I mean that very literally, I sat down on the ground near the music, worried about my dogs but soaked in the wonderful atmosphere of the carefree children, and I grabbed shots without thinking.
Then late at night, after working up the vegetables, doing a few osprey shots: I hate that bird, but I worked those up carefully. I then started on my grab shots at the market. I wanted to post them and I thought "how little work can I do and still post these". I decided, for one, I didn't need to sharpen them. I worked up the dancing boy knowing it was soft just because he was so cute, well not literally, but his concentration on his dancing and his total with it look, it just showed something that got to me. I also tried to save the little girl with the tennis hat. I just loved all those shots. I worked most of them up that night, practically posting them RAW, but doing a bit, no sharpening, though. I only posted one and that was of that excited teen couple. I could have done better with a different lens, but that was the lens on there and I used it, and I really liked it. Anyway, I posted it and someone wanted to know the context, so I put it where it belonged, with the farmer's market, but not til yesterday. I also worked up some more kids, with my theory of less is "OK" here, it is the atmosphere and the kids.
I knew about these soft ones, I knew how I worked them up, but I was not sure, or was very confused about your post. These shots, and the corn, I already knew were soft, made a chancy decision and posted them anyway. Except the corn that didn't seem to matter that much in the grand scheme of things. But the thought that shots I had worked very hard on since early Feb when I bought the camera and the lenses, were, in general, soft, that was what I was upset enough. I often post shots I know are soft for whatever reason. Sometimes I post that this shot is a bit soft, but ....... and I still get the response of an OOF shot, a group of letters I don't like.
So I swore, a few weeks ago, not to post anymore shots unless they were crystal clear. I forgot that with the farmer's market. I intentionally was not as discerning as I could have been re whether a shot was soft. I just wanted to get the set up and share. I forgot, I guess since I was not posting a bird on the nature thread, my resolve.
I don't know now.... some of those shots I would not post over again without more work, like the girl with the tennis hat. The little boy I could not make less soft, maybe sharper, but it is a soft shot. The thing is that these kids are moving, so I take the first shot and maybe a second one without alot of thought, and I wait, hoping to get more. Well, that kid's mother came after him, and he quit dancing. So I posted the ones of his reaction to that. They may be a bit soft, too. The reason the photos of mine are soft have different reasons, but most of those center around my attitude not the camera. That lens tends to shoot soft in my shooting circumstances, but we are stuck with each other for awhile.
I shot at least 250 shots in 4 hours, most of those 4 hrs at the osprey nest, and I went to Barnes and Noble in that 4 hrs, read that vegetables made a good pattern shot, so figured I had to hit that once a week market and hoped my dogs were OK. Then, with only a 512 mb card left, me literally running through the market to get the vegetable shots, I did that, even kind of ran by an old friend and told her I couldn't chat. What stopped me was this.
It was the first shot I didn't take on the run. I stopped and took that photo that captured me, in all the happy chaos that is a farmer's market was this little girl, she was in deep thought. I did not get it as soon as I wanted, but afterwards, I just went to the music, on the way took the photo of the glass jars, but then I sat down on the ground, changed lenses, swayed with the music and the kids, and I snapped away what was left on the 512 mb card. Most of it showed up here.
Now I question this, and maybe I should post this on the "wide" thread, my problem with not having much of a problem with the technicals when the subject is very good. I often want to share the shot, I could have, in retrospect should have, shared the knowledge that I knew certain shots were soft before I posted. But I didn't think.
There are different reasons for taking photographs, I did most of them that day. My question is posting a technically bad shot in a set that is basically action. It is the only shot, shows the mood, well, I don't understand why this thread is so technical. Now the challenge thread, after all this, I "had" to suggest to someone that her proposed entry might be soft and could be reshot. That is important in that thread. One would not want to enter a soft photo in the challenge, a single photo. But in these peripheral threads I have determined not to point out technical deficiencies unless asked. There are people who are good at that. One problem I have run into with it is the follow up. I don't want to write a tutorial for anyone. So I let the photos go "unchallenged" so to speak. A color shift: fine with me, etc. Blown highlights, cool photo.....
I appreciate your taking the time to respond as now I know what happened. I know it is not the camera, it was my attitude at the time of shooting and at the time of posting. (You birders, I do still need feedback, technically, from you all........ it is just the people I did not understand)
Thanks Mitchell, I have learned alot about myself from this set and the ensuing worry, and I have learned, well, just say I have learned alot.....
I think I would do all of this over again, just like I did it. Sometimes I just gotta post, and I can only concentrate carefully on so much and sleep, too.
Yes, we are all shaky, we all shoot before our camera has focused, we all don't pay attention to what our camera is focused on. My attention to the DOF was nil by the time I was taking the kid's photos, so I am sure there was not much. I use the AV setting, right now it is on 5.6, it probably was then, too. I did not even plan to take kid photos, then I did not plan to post them, etc. I question why it was on 5.6 when I had needed DOF for the vegetables. That is more worrisome. So I need to pay more attention to that, and that is a learning curve.
Mostly I learned that I have to make time to go to the Farmer's Market every week. It was the most fun I have had this week. 15 min with the kids, on the ground, people eating and talking, with the guitar playing music....
ginger
I love your attitude! I'm only sorry that I seemed to touch a nerve with my comment. This whole site and photography in general is a learning experience. If we can't view it that way, then we have big problems.
Please don't feel like you shouldn't post pictures that are less than perfect or have not been tweaked in PS for 10 hours. I enjoyed seeing your series at the market and look forward to more.
I for one am a rank beginner when it comes to photography. The concepts of altering my DOF and the frustrations I have with lighting still take me a lot of energy to interpret. Glad to see others also still thinking about these things too.
mitch
http://clearwaterphotography.smugmug.com/