Dog Vision and 50mm Macro Primes

[BobDavid]

I recently purchased a new macro lens. Somehow, my curiosity took over. I decided to take a picture that represents how the world looks through a dog's eyes. http://goo.gl/wUz9X  The attached photo is a simulation of what my 10.5 year old dog sees through her milky lenses. Yes, she has cataracts.

[Jim Pascoe]

I have to say it's not the most exciting use of a 50mm Macro lens that I've seen.

Jim

[BobDavid]

With all due respect, I think you missed the point of the story. The macro lens is incidental to the narrative. Photographers know how funny things happen when they start testing out new equipment. Ultimately, banging off a few pictures of my dog in non-macro mode with a shiny new lens led me to ponder how dogs see.

Please feel free to post some "interesting" macro photos to keep the thread going.

[Jim Pascoe]

Bob, the link in your post took me through to a page where you had a bit of a blog about your new 50mm Macro lens.  I guess my point was that none of the pictures illustrated the fact it was a macro lens and not just any other ordinary 50mm lens.  I agree the idea of seeing the world through a dogs eyes does have some interest, but not sure where the Macro bit comes in.
My 50mm macro lens is definitely my favourite.

I attach a couple of pictures that were taken with a macro lens - the Cala Lily was in fact taken by my wife Nicky.

Ps - I have to say that you do have some rather good dog pictures on your site!  Not my sort of photography but superbly done.

Jim

[BobDavid]

I like your macro photos. I can see where your expectations were let down when you clicked on my link. I really don't do anything exciting with macro lenses other than copy photographs and documents for restoration and reproduction. Macro lenses are optimized for flat-field imaging and exhibit virtually no linear distortion.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

It is a wonderful lily shot! Pure visual poetry! And such a creamy bokeh... which lens/f-stop was it?

[Rob C]

The hell with the lily - haven't you seen the knees?

Stuff of dreams.

Rob C

[Jim Pascoe]

Nicky shot the lily with the Zeiss 50mm macro lens at f2.5.  Now Slobodan, I thought it was you who thought it was all mumbo-jumbo fanboyism when people started to extol the imaginary virtues of particular brands of lens!

And to Rob C, a couple more from the shoot.  I don't really do product photography but someone we know asked if I would like to photograph some of his oil which is extracted from oats.  His website and technical data sheets looked really boring with no pictures and he wanted to jazz them up a bit.  So I thought running the oil over skin would look interesting and we asked the girl over the road if she would pop over in her bikini.  Personally I thought running the oil over a breast would have looked good but my wife/assistant drew the line at that one because the girl was only 18!

Incidentally - these were shot with the Canon 100mm macro.

Jim

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

Nicky shot the lily with the Zeiss 50mm macro lens at f2.5.  Now Slobodan, I thought it was you who thought it was all mumbo-jumbo fanboyism when people started to extol the imaginary virtues of particular brands of lens!...

Indeed, it was me, and I stick by it. However, I have never doubted that a particular lens can have a better bokeh than another, even within the same brand. After all, who's to say that, say, a Canon 50/2.5 wouldn't produce the same or better bokeh for the same shot? Your other shot illustrates that nicely, although it is hard to notice bokeh with knees like that

[Rob C]

I agree with your original choice of shot, Jim. Nice skin and colour, and shame about the breast, but there you are - some wives/assistants are like that. You could have fired the assistant but a wife is something else -  better take no hasty actions, though you could think about separating the two rôles.

Not that I can talk: my wife was also my assistant/temper-monitor/client-rescuing service/etc./etc., but she didn't mind at all about me shooting breasts - as she always retorted to her girlfriends when they asked her if she wasn't concerned about models hanging around: well, doesn't your husband have a secretary back in the office...? I don't think they liked that too much. That's the thing about an intelligent lady - she knows you can't enchain a person and hope to keep it. However, I never shared that sentiment the other way around; I just wasn't that intelligent.

Worse, there is no girl across the way I'd like to photograph.

Dogs, days etc.

;-(

Rob C

[Jim Pascoe]

Indeed, it was me, and I stick by it. However, I have never doubted that a particular lens can have a better bokeh than another, even within the same brand. After all, who's to say that, say, a Canon 50/2.5 wouldn't produce the same or better bokeh for the same shot? Your other shot illustrates that nicely, although it is hard to notice bokeh with knees like that

It is true though, I have used a number of 50mm lenses and the Zeiss just seems to have a certain something.