One A Day – 588 – Impressions

by mike · February 28, 2015

Reflective

Ibiza

Mi Amigo Fer

MVM Trio

Sensitively

Who’s Zoom’n Who?

Jazz Mood

Rapid Fire

MVM Trio: Fernando Mendoza – Drums, David Villanueva – Piano, Omar Marin – Bass
Amati Cafe
Centro, Morelia, Michoacán, México
February 27, 2015

I didn’t set out to make this a portrait set, but with my new Pentax K3 and the new 50mm – I guess there is nothing else that could have happened. In reality, there are photos from each of what I think of as my prime lenses. There are three:

Pentax 50mm f/1.8 – this is what I think of as my portrait lens. On the size sensor in the camera, this is a mild telephoto. It is very sharp, fast and my only fixed focal length. As someone said, you zoom (walking back and forth) instead of the lens.
Sigma 10-20 f/4 – 5.6 – This has been my favorite lens because I love the perspective it gives and the ability to be in tight spaces with a wide field. It may be challenged by the 50mm, it is still too early to tell. The photos “MVM Trio” and “Mi Amigo Fer” in this post were shot with this lens.
Sigma 18-250 f/3.5-6.3 – This is primarily for outdoor work because in low light it becomes too slow for most situations. I haven’t gotten as much time with it as I would like, but it is very sharp and a kick to use because it increases my reach by a large amount. But that said, I used its shortcomings to shoot “Rapid Fire” – the photo of David Villanueva’s fingers flashing on the keyboard.

If you are looking for rock steady, sharp photos in this set – it is the wrong group to judge. The combination of low light, high ISO (all these shots were between 5000 – 6400), and at most a monopod to steady the camera – this is as good as it gets. That said, this is a huge improvement over what I could do with the KR. What you see is a combination of higher resolution, a better light meter (which will help a lot now that I have figured out how to adjust the focal point and link it to the light meter), and in some cases a special lens.

In short, this was a lot of fun to work on and I had to do some serious editing to arrive at this set. There were just too many good choices – which means I need to put up another set from this shoot. 🙂