Hello from NJ

[Damon]

Hi, I have been following for a while now and decided to take part in these discussions as I find this whole UV world pretty fascinating (and you seem like genuine people!). I began UV last year by bothering Dr. Schmidt with questions and taking some of his advice and putting together a basic rig. A couple months ago I saw the D70 sitting on my floor and said "I really need to either do this or not". So I finished cobbling it together using an old El-Nikkor 80mm etc.

I work for The Nature Conservancy, outdoors every day and have been shooting visible for some time now--mostly nature related. I of course have a fair amount of questions that I have not come across the answers yet while following you all. If I become a question hog then just let me know and I will calm down. :)

I have uploaded a pic I took of Trout Lily which is a spring ephemeral here in NJ and it shows a dramatic pattern. I know this isn't proper posting guidelines but I am trying to see if I am doing it right as I never posted to the web before.

Thanks and I look forward to meeting you all.

 

Damon

[Andrea B.]

Hello Damon and welcome to UVP. I hope you enjoy the site and find some answers to your questions. We are always happy to try to help where we can.

 

Your Trout Lily looks great. I hope to see some formal botanical posts from you eventually. The guidelines for that are here: http://www.ultraviol...l-presentation/

 

I appreciate the work done by the Nature Conservancy and have contributed to the organization over the years.

[nfoto]

Welcome to our world, Damon. You're doing great with that Trout lily. Its UV signature reminds me eerily of the European Gagea lutea, by the way.

 

Feel free to ask for help whenever required. None here has forgotten we started ourselves at scratch.

[colinbm]

Welcome Damon

Wow, what a great start, just keep it up.

Cheers

Col

[JCDowdy]

Quick study, Damon.

Welcome!

[Damon]

Thanks for the warm welcome! It was late and I had to work all day so hence the late reply. My D70 El-Nikkor 80mm is working real well. It seems like just the right combination and there is minimal focus shift. I have been sticking with F8 most of the time and I seems like the way to go for me. I have been focusing visible then shooting ~3 more shots moving the focusing helicoid a little each time the same way and one usually is in focus. All my shots have been outdoors which I have found to be an exercise in patience to say the least. My exposures are usually around 1-2-3 seconds if there is direct sun and it can be still as night until I decide to start taking a pic and then a breeze always picks up. I have been toying with the idea of making a shelter of sorts to help me stay sane. I wonder if white nylon taffeta would let UV through? I saw Dave had something like that.

I have attached a copy of my homemade rig I put together under the gear section. I used the flashes all the time the first couple weeks until I realized I don't need them as much. I just got some Vivitar 285's with slaves off ebay and heated up a razor knife and melted through the front plastic instead of taking stuff apart to help with the UV light supposedly exiting the bulb. I can take UV images with no direct light on the subject using them but it still is a couple seconds.

Internet explorer is causing havoc with this forum so I am switching to a different browser and then will finish my gear list and post some more images.

 

Thanks again for the welcome wagon.

 

Damon

[msubees]

Damon,

 

Welcome and a nice photo! Did you say you still need a few seconds of exposure, even with 2-3 flashes? I am considering these same flashes also since during windy conditions it is impossible to do a good exposure without motion blur with longer than 4 second exposures... I　use a converted G5 and the same lens as yours.

 

Zach

[Andrea B.]

...it can be still as night until I decide to start taking a pic and then a breeze always picks up

 

oh yeah !! The wind sprites are always watching and waiting for their chance to thwart us.

[colinbm]

It's like bird photography....they KNOW when you are going to press the shutter

Col

[Damon]

Zach, I have found in my limited experience that if there is NO wind and cloudy I can get away with an acceptable image under 1 second exposure if I raise the ISO to 400 and shoot F8. I am not terribly impressed with the D70 and noise but software largely eliminates noise at that iso. During windy conditions all bets are off and I either raise my fist to the Gods or go do something else. I really need some kind of collapsible tent that allows UV to pass.The flashes really pop though and do seem to throw a lot of light. I wish I had a couple more that I could pop manually as they don't cycle fast enough to hit the flower again during the same exposure.

[Damon]

I recently took a picture of my friend as I had not shot a human in UV and he turned practically black (I think he has italian in him) the only sunscreen he had on is slightly visible on his nose and cheek and is reflecting. Yet when I look online and here at people shot in UV they are not super dark--any ideas? I will post under people for you to see.

[nfoto]

A general comment is that most "UV" pictures you see online actually are IR or at the very least, heavily IR contaminated.

 

The skin darkens naturally seen in UV. IR contamination will brighten it. A sun lotion makes it go black.

[DaveO]

Hi Damon,

 

My white tent helps to slow the wind down, until you go to press the shutter when a gale suddenly appears. I always shoot with flash inside the tent but I don't think you would get much UV sunlight through.

 

Dave

[Damon]

Thanks Dave, I was wondering about that. I still may make one with at least 3 sides. I must have ticked off the wind demons in my past life.