Well, 300 miles in the rain later, I'm back home from giving a lecture at the University of Akron. Of course having to drive across the Ohio Turnpike keeps you tantilizingly close to the lake, which translates to irresistably close to lighthouses along the Lake Erie shore.....

Would I take cameras along knowing that I might have time on the way home to shoot? Dumb question that!

I ended up shooting 2 rolls of Provia 100F on the lights at Vermillion and Lorain. I shot Lorain twice actually... going over when I was bored and needed a break and coming home. I ended up shooting almost a full roll as the sunset was dying out behind me in the west. No sunset colors with the light, but, given that it's lighted at night... It's a long shot even from the closest vantage point but I ended up shooting some shots at 300, 600, and 840 mm. The 840 is my 300 mm f4 + 2X +1.4X which gives you 840mm at f11. Not a very "fast" combination, but who cares, I was shooting with the lens stopped down to f32 this evening anyway. At this point, I'm also kicking myself for not taking the 500 mm f4 lens with me.... with just the 2X that gives me 1000mm at f8 and that would have been decidedly better than stacking two teleconverters... Oh well...

Photos coming tomorrow!

Gary


[This message has been edited by lighthouse_photo (edited 02-21-2002).]

Looking forward to seeing them as usual, Gary!

------------------
Terry (Only my mother, brothers & sisters call me Teresa) Forrest

OK, first some shots of the light at Lorain, Ohio.

This first series were taken from the park along the shoreline... Lakeview Park, if I remember correctly. From this vantage point, you get a long shot of the light,which is quite a distance out the pier. In addition, this series of 4 photos gives you an idea of the effect of focal length. The 200 mm shot was taken with an 80-200 mm f2.8 zoom; the 300 mm photo was taken with a 300 mm f4 lens; 600 mm I got by adding a 2X teleconverter to the 300 mm giving me 600 mm f8; the 840 mm focal length I got by staking a 1.4X teleconverter with the 2X. Optically, this isn't the best way to get to these focal lengths, but, when you leave your 500 mm f4 at home because you didn't want to haul it along on a predominantly NONphoto trip, you do what you can with what you've got with you.

At 200 mm...



at 300 mm...



at 600 mm...



finally, at 840 mm...



It's also worth noting that as the focal length goes up, so should your shutter speed to minimize the effects of vibration that tend to soften detail in your photos. Ideally, I would have liked to be shooting at about 1/1000th of a sec for the 840 mm shot rather than the 1.6 sec exposure at f11 that that photo was taken at.

Gary

LONG EXPOSURES

This particular shot was taken at 600 mm and the scene was metered with the lens wide open, which isn't very far at f11. Matrix metering was used, which gave an exposure reading of 5 sec at f11. I wanted this image to flirt with reciprocity failure to enhance the blue so I stopped the lens down by 3 full stops to f32. For a decrease of three stops of light, you double the exposure time three times, giving a final exposure of 40 sec at f32. To brighten the image a little, I increased the exposure time to 50 sec, which is what the image was actually shot at.




OTHER VANTAGE POINTS

The closest view of the Lorain light, short of one obtained from a boat, is to be had from the municipal boat launch ramp. Take Oberlin Ave north toward the lake from Ohio 6. This is right by the power plant so it's easy to find. You'll weave between the power plant and public works building... just follow the signs to the boat ramp. When you get there, the Lorain light is seen from parking lot. The first 600 mm shot was taken on a grey afternoon...



The second 600 mm f8 shot was taken at around sunset the next afternoon, giving the scene the twilight pink light.



Looking out the length of the stone breakwater from one of the side streets off of Ohio 6, you get an interesting view of the Lorain light, along with an idea of just how many seagulls are around! This was shot on a very grey, overcast afternoon hence the rather flat light and dull color. This is no doubt a shot I'd like to take again. This was also taken at 200 mm, handheld, and I'd probably reshoot it with my 300 mm lens to avoid a little of the cropping that I did when I scanned this slide. I'd also like to have more depth of field so I'd probably shoot this at f22 or even f32, preferably off of a tripod so that the entire length of the pier would be in sharp focus. As it was, having to shoot handheld, this was shot with the lens nearly wide open (f3.2, which gave a fairly shallow depth of field - I focused on the lighthouse itself) and at a high shutter speed (1/500th sec) to give as sharp an image as possible.



Gary


[This message has been edited by lighthouse_photo (edited 02-23-2002).]

I must say it's a pleasure to have you aboard, Gary. It's really nice of you to take the time to share your photography knowledge with the rest of the gang at the CF.

Next to collecting Harbour Lights, I would say photography is probably the next most popular hobby amongst the group.

Keep up the excellent work!

Bob

Couldn't have said it any better Bob. Gary is a real asset to the CF and his input is greatly appreciated.

Got a question on reciprocity failure, Gary. Is their an exposure time that this starts to kick in? Does this vary from film to film?

Sometime, perhaps you could shoot a series of demonstration shots showing perhaps 6 exposures taken at different f-stops and exposure times within reciprocity and a final 2 shots taken with at longer exposure times showing the reciprocity failure effect vs. the 'normal'.

Also, when shooting those long telephoto shots above, what did you do to minimize mirror vibration? Lock up the mirror? Use a cable release? Or self-timer?

These are all amazingly sharp images for such long exposures!

Thanks, John and Bob for the kudos... I'm glad to be able to contribute to the CF and share what I've learned about photography over the years. I hope that some of what shows up in this forum will enable people to get better lighthouse photos when the have the opportunity to photograph. Many folks aren't blessed by living as close to so many lights as I do, which makes photographing them for me a pretty much something I can do on a whim if there's a good storm brewing or it looks like there is potential for a good sunset. I'd like to be able to help people who want to photograph the lights to do so in a way that insures them that when they get home they'll have some good photos to remember their time at the lights.

Reciprocity failure (RF) begins to occur in the 30-60 sec exposure time range and varies from one film to the next. I should qualify this before I go any further by saying that my experience in this realm is strictly limited to slide film so I don't know if any of this is at all applicable to print film since I almost never shoot prints. Velvia, Iso 50, is usually considered to be going into RF at around 30 sec. Provia 100F I've not seen anything written on, but my experience has generally been that it's starting to exhibit RF at around 45 sec or so. In general, Velvia tends to fail toward the blue/purple color group, with blacks rendering somewhere in the blue to purple range depending on light conditions and length of exposure. I don't have any hard fast guidelines that I can share here - this is more the realm of experimentation even for me. More often than not though, Velvia will fail more toward the blue than purple. I've seen purple only relatively rarely. In my hands, at least, Provia 100F has always gone blue when I've pushed it very hard. The shot that I put up on the wish list of Sturgeon Bay where the sky and lake were cobalt blue with the red light from the lantern room reflecting on the lake should have been black given the time of day that that shot was taken (about 9:20 PM in late June). That was a 4 min exposure at f22 if I remember correctly and the Provia 100F that I was shooting was in severe reciprocity failure under those conditions, which was what I was looking for.
One of these nights out at the lake I'll run a series of exposures to try to generate the series that you mentioned, John. It may take more than one effort to get a representative series so please stay tuned.

As for the long exposures with the extremely long focal lengths, I generally do everything I can to minimize vibration. I always use a digital cable release. Mechanical cable releases are better than nothing but the digital trips the shutter electronically so there is a tad less vibration introduced. Additionally, the digital is the only choice with my F5 and N90. if you don't have a cable release, learn how to use your camera's self-timer if it has one and that also helps immensely. I also use mirror lock-up quite frequently. For those who don't know what that is, a 35 mm SLR has a mirror that directs the light from the lens up through your viewfinder allowing you to see through the lens. When you trip the shutter, that mirror is flipped up out of the light path so that when the shutter is open, the light from the lens is going to the film and not up through the viewfinder. There is some vibration associated with the mirror's motion. You'll occasionally hear this referred to as mirror bounce as well. The exposure times that mirror vibration is most noticeable are in the range of about 1/4 to 3 sec where the duration of mirror vibration is significant relative to the exposure time. For short or long exposures, 10 sec or longer in the latter case, it doesn't much matter.

Another point worth mention is the use of a tripod with big lenses. My 500 lens mounts directly on the tripod head and it takes a special head to allow the lens to balance at its center of gravity. I'll get a pic of that loaded on here so people can see what that assembly looks like as it's very unlike a conventional tripod head. MOre on this below for anyone thinking of going to a big lens of any kind. Because of the length of that lens with the lens hood on it and its tendency to act as a "sail" when there is some wind, I also use brace that goes from the bottom of the camera body and clamps on a tripod leg.

I use 2 tripods, an older Bogen 3221 that I've used for a number of years. The newer tripod is a Bogen 3021Pro. I use a couple of pan/tilt tripod heads, an older Bogen 3047 and a newer 3039. For the 500 mm lens, I use a specialized Bogen 3421 tripod head that looks more like a telescope yoke that balances the lens at its true center of mass as I mentioned above. There is a long (about 4 inch) plate on the bottom of the lens' integral support that allows the lens to be shifted back and forth on the head to adjust for different camera body weights, the use of telextenders, etc. The entire 20 or so pounds of 500 mm lens/F5 body can be moved to track birds in flight, etc. with one finger if you want, which makes it pretty flexible. Since lighthouses usually don't move very much, when I'm shooting them from the bottom of the camera, I use a Bogen 3252 long lens camera support. That screws into the tripod socket on the camera body and has an adjustable, telescoping rod with a clamp that attaches to the tripod to make the whole assembly more rigid and less prone to vibration. Given that a 500 mm lens is acting like a 10X telescope, any vibration that would be present in a photo taken with a 50 mm lens is magnified 10X as well, making it much more noticeable! Hence all the effort with specialized tripod heads, etc. to minimize this and get you sharp inmages.

This first photo is a digital pic of the Bogen 3421 long lens head on my tripod legs in my office here at home... The other goodies I've mentioned above are labeled accordingly. It's usually a mess with notebooks of stuff for various scientific writing endeavors stacked around!



The photo below is the same camera/lens/tripod head setup out at Kellogg Bird Sanctuary near where I live in Kalamazoo that may give you a better idea of how the lens is supported in the yoke of the tripod head.



Here it's set up without the brace going from the camera body to the tripod to allow me to pan with birds in flight. An example of what you can get with this arrangement...



This is a photo of a trumpeter swan coming in for a landing. It was necessary to pan with the bird on his approach. The shot was taken on Provia 400F slide film at 1/1600th sec at f4.

Hope that some of this helps.

Gary



[This message has been edited by lighthouse_photo (edited 02-23-2002).]

FOCAL LENGTH

The focal length of a lens governs the size of whatever object you're photographing in your final image. There are some examples over the range from 200 to 840 mm above. I didn't shoot any "normal" focal length shots at of the Lorain lighthouse this past week but do have some test shots of a swan that given a very graphic example of the role of focal length.

This first shot was taken at a nearby lake. The white spec in front of the cattails indicated in the picture is a full grown swan at a distance of about 1/4 mile. The photo to the right is the same bird from the same place at 500 mm.



Going the teleconverter route, the photo below was shto at 1000 mm with a 2X teleconverter. New teleconverters give you full autofocus capabilities for f4 and faster lenses, so this was taken with autofocus. The teleconverter also costs you two stops of light (f4 -> f8 with a 2 stop loss).



Finally, pushing this to the limit, the photo below was taken at 1400 mm with a 2X and 1.4X teleconverter coupled to the 500 mm f4 lens, giving a maximum aperature of f11. This was shot at f11. This configuration, however, does not allow for autofocus so the focusing was done maually. I also took this shot in a portrait orientation (as opposed to landscape) to preserve all of the cattails in the image for a sense of scale.



If I have them in my slide collection, or next time I'm out shooting and think to do so, I'll shoot a series of photos to post on here going the other direction from normal to give a comparison of normal (50 mm), wide angle (this is typically considered from about 24 to 35 mm), and ultrawide angle (for me this is 14 and 17-21 mm, the latter on a 17-35 mm f2.8 zoom lens).

All of these lenses have a purpose and can be used very successfully for lighthouse photography. Not everyone should run out and buy them, some of them are hideously expensive (to my wife's chagrin!). If you're going to invest in a decent, all-purpose travel lens, there are a couple of good choices. Tokina makes a 24-200 mm that I've read good reports on. Usefully, it goes from an excellent wide angle (24 mm) to a usable 200 mm telephoto. Tamron offers a comparable 28-200 and a 28-300 mm lens that gives a still longer reach. I own the latter two and, if I'm not intent upon doing serious photography when I travel, will typically take a single camera body with me with one of these lenses mounted on it. Personally, I like to use 24 mm and have several other lenses that give me that focal length when I want it. The 300 mm end of the 28-300 mm Tamron zoom is nice for lighthouses when you can't get up close and personal. The short focal length end of these lenses lets you get in a lot of real estate in the foreground, or alternatively, still lets you get in all of the lighthouse when you can't back up any further without falling off the cliff! Those are the good points. With wide range zoom lenses, however, there are inherent compromises that are design considerations to keep them affordable. ALL have a variable aperature, i.e. they will have a wider aperature at shorter focal lengths than at their longest focal length. Some older designs don't have internal focusing, which means that if you're using a circular polarizing filter that you'll have to reset the filter if you zoom in or out. Also, of necessity from a cost stand point, the 200 or 300 mm focal lengths of these lenses will typically be no faster than f5.6 or perhaps f6.3 (1/2 stop slower than f5.6). In contrast, fixed focus 300 mm lenses can be had with maximum aperatures of f4 or f2.8. To give you a rough comparison in the cost department, the Tamron 28-300 sells for about $350-400 depending on where you look (I buy my photo stuff exclusively from B&H Photo Video in NYC and have NEVER had any problem with anything that I've bought from them!). In comparison, a Nikon 300mm f4 will set you back about $1,000 and a 300 mm f2.8 Nikon goes for about $4,500, which will take a huge chunk out of your wallet, assuming you're still alive after your significant other finds out about that purchase! If anyone is interested, we could discuss this further... if you have questions, post them here.

Again, hope this helps some for anyone thinking of expanding their photography equipment.

Gary



[This message has been edited by lighthouse_photo (edited 02-23-2002).]

VERMILLION, OHIO

While on the way back and forth to Akron, I also got a few shots of the little lighthouse at Vermillion, Ohio on the grounds of the Inland Seas Maritime Museum. Vermillion is only about a 15 min drive west along Ohio 6 from Lorain. You turn north onto Main Street and go about 3 blocks until it ends in a parking lot at the lake in front of the museum.

The day these shots were taken was grey and overcast and I'll no doubt shoot the light again when the weather/light are more conducive to photography, but for the moment, I thought that I'd share these photos anyway.





Gary

[This message has been edited by lighthouse_photo (edited 02-23-2002).]

ATMOSPHERIC AFTERTHOUGHT

One other point is worth mentioning with very long focal length lenses. There can be an amazing amount of "stuff" in the air between you and your subject, because there's usually a lot of air between you and the subject when you're resorting to very long lenses. Unless the air is particularly clear, you're going to see that atmospheric haze or whatever else it is in your image. What I'm talking about it pretty well illustrated by the photo below of the inner and outer lights at Muskegon, Michigan that was shot last October. This was shot at 1000 mm. The distance to the inner light is well over a mile and probably pushing 2 miles to the outer light prompting me to use the very long focal length. Even casual inspection shows that the inner light is much sharper than the outer. This is a direct consequence of the haze in the air that morning, which isn't at all uncommon over Lake Michigan in the summertime.



Gary



[This message has been edited by lighthouse_photo (edited 02-23-2002).]

Lots of good information and lots of good photos, Gary, as usual. I remember your sending me the swan images showing the different focal lengths over AIM when we were chatting one night.

I have a question for you re reciprocity failure, but I'm going to e-mail it to you. You'll see why when you read it.

------------------
Terry (Only my mother, brothers & sisters call me Teresa) Forrest

[This message has been edited by 1of3trees@prodigy.net (edited 02-23-2002).]

[This message has been edited by 1of3trees@prodigy.net (edited 02-23-2002).]

Thanks for the lessons Gary. I just skimmed them, but later I'll study them and maybe print them for future reference. But for now, let me see if I understand.

I have a Nikon N70 with a Tamron 28-200 f3.8-5.6. My brother-in-law recently gave me an autofocus 1.4x converter and a non-AF 2.0x converter. If I understand correctly, I lose one stop with the 1.4x and two stops with the 2.0x? The 1.4x really isn't an issue yet, because for the most part, I leave the camera on auto most of the time. So if I have the 2.0x on and am shooting in daylight (where I do most of my stuff...I'm not so sure if I'm ready to move to darkness), and I set the camera on manual, and set it to f3.8, I'm really shooting at f8, and if I make a "poor man's 580mm" by combining the 1.4x and 2.0x, I'm actually at f11? Should I be fooling with the shutter speed, of should I just let the camera do it? (or will it on manual?...I'll have to check my Magic Lantern book).

Good questions Larry, and your understanding is pretty good as well.

With the 1.4X between your camera/lens pair, you're just a bit "faster" than f5.6; with the 2X just a bit faster than f8 and with both, right again, just a hair faster than f11. With a variable aperature lens, however, it probably isn't a good idea to stack both of them up to get you out to 580 mm.

With the 1.4X, you should have autofocus at the short end of the zoom range on the 28-200 but you won't at probably maybe 50-70 mm or beyond as there won't be enough light for it to work correctly. The cutoff point will be at whatever focal length the lens is at f4. Try it and see, but if the autofocus keeps going back and forth like it doesn't know what it's doing, then it doesn't have enough light to function properly. There's a switch on your N70 somewhere that will let you choosed between M/S/C for manual, single, and continuous focus (usually on the front of a Nikon camera body to bottom right of the lens as you look into the lens). Set that to "M" and focus the lens manually.

Aside from that, you can set the camera's exposure mode M/S/A/P (manual; shutter priority; aperature priority; or program mode) to any one of the settings as you prefer. "P" is the simplest - the camera will set the shutter speed and aperature to what it thinks are reasonable values for you. If you want the lens at the widest aperature, which might be desirable with the teleconverters, use the "A" setting. The camera will leave the aperature where you set it and adjust the shutter speed accordingly. The converse is true with shutter priority, "S," it will use the shutter speed you specify and adjust the aperature accordingly. If you see "LO" in either the viewfinder (my cameras display that there) or on the readout display on the top of the camera body, there isn't enough light at the maximum aperature for the shutter speed that you're trying to use.

What you should keep in mind is that manual focus - from the M/S/C selector switch controls the autofocus and doesn't have anything to do with the exposure mode choices M/A/S/P. Those work separately from the focus.

I hope this answers your questions. If not, maybe I'm just being slow today so try me again.

Gary

[This message has been edited by lighthouse_photo (edited 02-24-2002).]