Flexing

Sometimes, in order to get better, you have to flex your muscles, or work them out. Using a infrared filter on a lens seems to have that effect on me in photography.

The Hoya R72 filter, when placed on the lens, seems to cancel out pretty much all light visible to our eyes. When you look through the viewfinder, it's a bit of a shock, as you might think your camera is broken - all you see is black.

You pretty much can't trust your light meter, and although the autofocus does seem to work, you might not be sure what you're focusing on, not to mention the exposures being so slow it's almost impossible to use a high f/stop without a tripod (and I hate tripods).

It's kind of light the film days - when you'd have to do the best you can, make a very educated guess, and see what happens when you get the film developed...

It's exciting because it slows me down, makes me think, and humbles me just a little bit. All good stuff for the photographic brain.

The shot above was taken at f/13 and one full second on the shutter. I had placed the camera on the ground and took just two photos at different exposures. This one worked out the best.