Wow, San Francisco actually gets rain. The water droplets pictured above are from some rain last night.
And then bam, it rained some more later this afternoon and evening.
Crunch Time
(Pictured above, Rudy working late at the office and experimenting with new features)
It’s crunch time. All hands on deck. The holidays are right around the corner… and so is our “silent” launch. We’re going to learn as much as possible, as fast as we can, and we’re going to have fun along the way.
I look back on the year, and I can definitely say I’ve learned a lot. There’s still a ton to do. Overall, I’m very happy with this team and our effort. Sure, the product could be more refined and polished, but at some point, we’ve just got to get it out to there to see if there’s a product market fit. The best is yet to come.
Thank you to all our beta testers, Expa team, family members and friends for all the support. And thanks to the Flare team for pushing me to step up my game. We’re going to finish 2015 strong.
Street Bokeh
On my way home, I snapped a photo of some christmas lights. Testing out my 35mm 1.4g at night. Gotta love that bokeh.
35mm 1.4g with Jia Jia
While I was at cars and coffee, Jia Jia asked me to take a photo of her next to the SF skyline. I snapped a couple pics really quickly to see what the 35mm 1.4g could do at a couple different ranges.
Just a quick disclaimer, I probably could have done a better job with the composition. I realize now that the dock in the background was a bad choice—it’s distracting… and the rocks are a little too tall. They’re visually aligned with her shoulder line, which is doesn’t look awesome. Anyway, I learned a lot from this experiment.
I was about 8′ away from Jia Jia when I shot this. At f1.6, this is pretty good. The was a ton of green fringing around high contrast areas, but I think with the strong color grading, I was able to hide some of the flaws.
I was about 4.5′ when I shot this. While the blurred background looks good, I think I could have shot it at F2.8 to help give the photo more context. I also think that I should have shot this at a different angle because the perspective is so flat. It’s like 3 planes glued together. When shooting at this range, I think I’m going to have to really pay attention to not just the foreground, but what’s happening in the background. The lens is wide enough to give a lot of context.
And lastly, this one was shot at around 3′. Nice separation from the foreground and background. Again, I really need to pay attention to what’s not in focus.
It’s amazing what the 35mm can do. With all those choices, you have to be thoughtful. I’m just amazed at what professional photographers and cinematographers can do.
More Lens Comparisons: Sunrise of the Bay Bridge
I’ve been getting really lucky with sunrises recently. I took a second to swap out a couple lenses this morning to capture the sunrise.
6 images stitched from the 24mm f1.4 shot at F8.
24mm f1.4g shot at F8.
35mm f1.4g shot at F8.
Micro 50mm f3.5 shot at F8.
85mm f1.8 shot at F8.
I think with landscapes, it seems that my 24mm is the best. You can always crop an image, and in the event you need something wider, you can always stitch a panoramic together.
What would be really interesting is if I had a really long telephoto lens. Heh.
Comparison of the 24mm 1.4g and 35mm 1.4g on Cars
I went to Cars and Coffee today on Treasure Island and snapped a bunch of photos. I wanted to show a quick comparison between the 24mm and 35mm.
Obviously there are several differences between these two focal lengths like bokeh, background compression, etc, but I wanted to see exactly how these focal lengths affect how exotic cars… and ultimately, I want to see which focal length suits me the most.
(35mm 1.4g pictured above) I immediately noticed immediately that the lines on the car weren’t as extreme when I shot with the 35mm. In some ways, it the car looked plain. I’m sure there are more flattering angles, but from a corner, it just seemed flat. Sure, the car looks nice, but the photo and focal length wasn’t arousing.
(24mm 1.4g pictured above) As you can see, the 24mm just stretches the perspective and exaggerates the length of the car. The nose feels like it’s so close you can taste it, while everything else is pushed back—this creates a dramatic perspective… and I actually really like the look of the lines.
(35mm 1.4g pictured above) The 35mm looks more natural… but for some reason, it just feels a little boring. Now obviously, we can take photos with compositions that compliment the focal length… but at this particular angle, the car looks pretty normal.
(24mm 1.4g pictured above) On the other hand, the 24mm stretches out the rear and makes it feel much wider. The car obviously doesn’t have these proportions, but the 24mm creates much more depth. Depending on your shooting style, that could be a desirable effect.
Between these two lenses, I personally prefer the 24mm. It just provides something much more interesting. Everything just feels a little more extreme. Lines are sharper and angles are harsher. I like that… a lot!
In the future, I’ll probably just take my 24mm and my 50mm macro to cars and coffee. That gives me an interesting range to capture the extremes of all these exotic cars.