The Mini Ice Caverns 3

Decided to come back to the winter photos again. Still have plenty of these left. I did however manage to get out this past weekend to get some photos of a small set of waterfalls. There was so much around the area to photograph that I had to pass up as I was strapped for time. I’m hoping to be able to try to find the time to go back again though. I ended up taking photos with my wide angle lens and macro lens and thought they both quite nice.

For this set of photos though, it was a nice find as I was able to get out of the wind. I ended up spending quite a bit of time laying on the ground to get these photos. I was walking along an ice wall that had formed from the lake pushing the ice up on itself before it froze over. I had seen a hole in the ice and looked down and thought it looked cool but couldn’t really find the right angle to get a good shot. I found myself a way down to see how it looked from the other side and was surprised by what I found. It was almost like a small ice cavern full of icicles.

For those that are interested the full res photos can be found on my flicker site.

The Mini Ice Caverns

/ Justin Avery / 26 Comments

26 thoughts on “The Mini Ice Caverns”

    • Thanks Laura! I wish I would have had the D610 at this time. What was difficult about these shots was that my 10-24mm lens that I was using has back focus problems. I had to set the fine focus on the camera to -18 for this lens. I recently sent it in to get fixed under warranty so hopefully it’ll be fixed when I get it back. The 16-35mm lens I have for the D610 is spot on for the focus.

      Like

      Reply

      • You’re welcome! They are such beautiful shots. You know way more about photography than I do! I don’t know what you mean about setting the fine focus. Yes I’m that naiive. :).

        Like

        Reply

        • Well, let me educate you. Your camera has this feature as I have the version below it. If you ever notice that your photos just don’t look as sharp as they should then it could be that your lens’s auto-focus is off a bit. It could either be a back focus or front focus problem. This problem seems to be more seen as you get into higher megapixels. Nikon has been nice enough to allow us to be able to fine-tune the auto-focus instead of needing to pay to get it fixed. It’s been proven that over time a lens can become slightly off of focus through wear and tear of normal use and some photographers like to fine-tune their lens’s auto-focus on a regular basis. I always check the auto-focus accuracy on my lenses by using the largest aperture setting and closest focusing distance as this has the shallowest DOF. The method I do is choose a high contrast subject that is at an angle and then make sure the lens is out of focus then let the camera auto-focus on the subject and take a picture. I then make sure that where I focused is the sharp area. I always take multiple shots just to make sure as well.

          Now I have found I like to manual focus more though so relying on the auto-focus isn’t as much of an issue anymore. I save the auto-focus for when I’m photographing the kids or photographing without the tripod (which rarely happens anymore).

          Like

          Reply

          • I remember hearing about this now in another forum I belong to. How do you actually fine tune it then. I heard of some way to calibrate it but I can’t remember. When you describe the way you do it, it sounds like you’re just taking a picture. Does that change anything in the lens from that point on? So far I haven’t noticed anything but I wouldn’t mind trying it out. i can always google it.

            Like

          • Taking the picture just tells you if you have a problem or not. Making adjustments is done through the menu system itself and it remembers the settings for each lens you do it for. This article gives the basics on how this feature works.

            https://nikoneurope-en.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/51633/~/how-to-use-the-af-fine-tune-function

            I found out about it because I had so many problems with getting sharp photos using auto-focus with my D7000. After going through this I noticed major improvements but ever since all the troubles I had, I don’t really trust auto-focus too much anymore unless I need to.

            There is a nice tool you can buy to help with adjustments but it is a little pricey imo. (LensAlign MkII Focus Calibration System) I would just fine-tune the auto-focus with a high contrast item at an angle until it was focusing the way I wanted it to. When I got my D610 I checked each lens as I got them for accuracy right away before going out to use them in the field. It doesn’t seem to be a widely known thing among armatures, but professionals tend to care a bit more. I guess you could call me a borderline hobby extremist when it comes to photography as I tend to sway more towards perfection.

            Like

  10. Pingback: The Orples on Ice | orples

What do you think?