On The Rocks, a photo from California, West

Photographer's Note

We trekkies had driven up, after having broken camp on our final day, from our TE meeting in Lee Vining, and had just arrived at Tenaya Lake. I was looking around for good images and things began looking up (literally) when I saw these climbers on the rock face on the North side of the Tioga Pass road. I had just, prior to this trip, purchased a Tamron 1.4X SP AF TELECONVERTER(5E) and I was looking for an excuse to use it, so these climbers made my day. The 270mm focal length was modified by the 1.4 factor of the teleconverter. I did shoot a number of images at the full 500mm but the diagonal line of the climbers across this image won over my "artistic vision", so this one got posted.

I was a bit disappointed with the sharpness of the image. I grabbed the lighter of the tripods I had with me and the weight of the equipment was too much for it. The wind was blowing and probably caused some movement so I probably should have used a 125 shutter speed and opened up the f-stop accordingly. Given the fact that the teleconverter reduces the depth of field even more than the long lense I had been trying to keep the aperature as small as possible.

All in all, I felt it was worth a post as the trial run of unfamiliar equipment. The fact that it was the only image of it's kind from the TE meeting made it of some value

plimrn, pboehringer, alainh, xuaxo, darrasin, kmarscher, bakes888 has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

plimrn (21344) 2007-06-16 19:47

Hi Larry,
I like the symmetry of the three climbers on a rope, the little triangle of blue sky reall helps in orienting me. I like the way your experiment worked out. HLJ, Pat

pboehringer (770) 2007-06-16 21:47

Larry ... stirred, not shaken! You forgot to give the right recipe and that made you grab the wrong tripod and the wrong combination of shutter and speed. Anyhow, I remember all your fascination of this theme. Unfortunately I couldn't participate in this contest. My 18-55mm is to weak for such a challenge. The composition is great and the diagonal through the shot is perfect.

alainh (33209) 2007-06-17 0:16

hello Larry
a very pleasant shot with the good timing and a very nice diagonale. very graphic !
i like a lot
have a nice day
alain

xuaxo (6854) 2007-06-17 16:27

Hi Larry,
Apart from technical details, I like your composition. Maybe I'd like to see a bit more of sky included.
Cheers,
F

darrasin (2860) 2007-06-23 21:27

Hi Larry! These guys are crazy, we're the sane ones comfortably taking pictures of them. Very nice composition, I like how the rope and climbers are on the diagonal of the frame.

TFS
Doug

kmarscher (2887) 2007-06-25 7:24

Excellent trial of the new lens toys! I've seen rock climbers and always wished I could close in like this. What a challenge technically and this is demonstrates the learning curve. Very engaging!

bakes888 (18499) 2007-06-28 4:14

Hi Larry. Nice photo. I’m looking for a long lens myself, how do you rate the 200-500 Tamrom? I like the diagonal composition myself and you have the climbers well “posed”. Thanks for sharing.
Cheers, Paul.