The return of color to the midwest

Greens, purples, yellows, oranges... spring is here in all of its colorful glory.  It's been a mild winter, but I couldn't be happier to see spring arrive.  All of the fields have a lush carpet of green, the flower beds are sprouting, and the trees are waking up.  Here's a lovely wide angle of the field behind our house.

Just before sunset last night, I combined my new favorite toy (the Canon 250d screw-on close up lens) with my old favorite lens (the Canon 50mm 1.8) to get some fabulous shallow DOF for the first arrivals of spring.  I'm so glad to be breathing in that fragrant 80* air.  

 

New Lens

Last weekend I took a trip with my husband up to Calumet Photographic in Boston to buy some flash accessories. While we were there, I decided to buy Canon's 50mm 1.8 lens. It is a really fun, lightweight lens -- very different than the lenses I already owned. I had previously read some reviews on this lens and photographers seem to be very happy about it. Now that I have shot with it for about a week, I can definitely see why everyone is so impressed.

This lens is all plastic, so its not the most durable, but I don't know too many photographers who aren't careful with their gear. Also, the auto focus is slow and loud, but for anyone who's willing to manually focus, the results are tack sharp. This is my first fixed focal length lens, and I've had a lot of fun playing around with it. Here are some of the shots I got with it this week:

"Cappuccino" -- this well foamed beverage was served to my husband at

Wicked Fire Kissed Pizza (one of our favorite restaurants in Cape Cod).

"Children Playing"

"Sake" -- a set of these mugs was a wedding gift from a friend

"Admiral" -- a page from one of my grandmother's old House Beautiful magazines...

I would recommend this lens to anyone who's been thinking about picking it up. Its fairly inexpensive (less than $100), and it offers high quality results.

Check back next week for images from some Family Portrait Sessions!