Greg Molyneux Photography

Category: Blog

Greg Molyneux’s latest photographs and words presented in reverse chronological order.

I, Phragmites
I, Phragmites — 35mm | f/1.4 | ISO 100 | EXP 1/4000
Phragmites are an invasive species robbing valuable real estate from indigenous plant life due to the dense stands that’ll readily form and quickly grow. Efficiently conquering pristine lands like an imperialist in heat. To the uninitiated conquistador like me, they seemingly fit right in to the natural surroundings—adding almost picturesque sight lines that appear to fit right in to any naturally occurring coastal Mid-Atlantic landscape. It was only recently I learned they weren’t supposed to be here. But many of us aren’t supposed to be here, are we?
On just about any day that ends in ‘Y’ I certainly feel like a phragmites. A central Jersey transplant to Manahawkin, New Jersey, in the summer of ’93 I’ve always felt something of an outsider to the region. My insecure sense of being as coastal imposter only magnifies when I venture over to the nearby barrier island that is Long Beach Island. Here I’m twice removed; not just a Mainlander but a suburban sprawl transplant as well. You see no matter how hard I try, I’ll never climb the podium to gain acceptance as a True Local™. Sure I can wear flip-flops year round, pretend I’m clued into the the scene, all while living a few short miles from the beach, but I’ll never be one of The People. If only in my own mind.
But this is all our struggle, isn’t it? Just where to fit in?
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April 15, 2016
Change Your Latitude
Change Your Latitude — 35mm | f/1.4 | ISO 100 | EXP 1/20
I made my way to Surf City Sunset Park last night with modest hopes of capturing a sunset. It’s been a while since I’ve produced some wide angle goodness, and I was eager to get off the schneid. Of course a low level maritime layer brought in a cloud deck to provide just enough blocking of the sun angle. It was a shame too, as the cold air was really firing the pastels on the high level cirrus clouds blocked out by the marine layer. Plans thwarted yet again.
After a few minutes hemming and hawing and with light fading fast, I opted to switch to the 35mm lens to try to make something out of nothing. From there any kind of skill went out the window in favor of unscientifically hoping for the best. Short on light I set my aperture wide open and dangled the camera body about an inch off the shoreline. From there I popped off a few shots hoping to get lucky and find something interesting waiting on my memory card. The result can be seen above. In hindsight I should have stopped down to f/2.8 and bumped my ISO to 400—maybe 640. This would have given me a bit more depth to my area of acceptable focus, and, coupled with the higher ISO, would have given me a bit more sharpness overall. Alas.
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April 11, 2016
The White Wizard Approaches
The White Wizard Approaches — 100mm | f/3.5 | ISO 100 | EXP 1/250
This is the second time I’ve dipped into the well of anthropomorphizing flowers in a high key macro photograph. While two times does not a trend make, I have a pseudo third example if you take the time my mid-bloom maple conjured thoughts of dragons—to be fair it was Game of Thrones time. For me this is when a dearth of landscape photo opportunities start gobbling up weeks at a clip on the calendar. Itching for some lens time I get a bit desperate—I default to selective focus macros of everyday objects floating both in and about my house. From there it’s just pouring over the exposures in Lightroom trying to find the right frame to do something with.
In this case that something brought together a couple comfortable fall backs: black and white photography and Lord of the Rings. Today’s posted photo first caught my eye as I was processing yesterday’s Jane Magnolia pic. The wizard’s cap and flowing petals of this magnolia bud had just enough suggestion to get my attention. Upon closer inspection this morning the Gandalf connection struck immediately, and I could hear the why so serious? voice of Legolas Greenleaf warning his companions of an approaching Saruman. Of course moments later we are all treated to Gandalf’s triumphant return; cloaked in the garb of the White Wizard, bathed in white light having conquered the Balrog. Now back at the turn of the tide.
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April 10, 2016
Such is Life
Such is Life — 100mm | f/3.5 | ISO 100 | EXP 1/250
Unwelcome cold has crashed the Mid-Atlantic early spring party and brought its unsociable below freezing friends with it. After a well above average March, with temperatures readily exceeding the 70s and 80s, winter has stormed back with a vengeance laying waste to my Jane Magnolia bush. It was only a week ago I wrote about how pumped I was to finally have my Magnolia back in full bloom after years in absentia. But after a week of morning lows in the 20s here we are back in the tundra with dead flowers in its wake. So much for getting my hopes up—thinking I’d make bunch of macro photos of its lovely purple blossoms this year. At this point I am just hoping today’s rain, sleet, and snow is it for winter 2016. Let’s get on to spring. Again.
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April 9, 2016
Land Bridge
Land Bridge — 35mm | f/1.4 | ISO 100 | EXP 20 sec
Friday evening I hitched a ride with Jon Carr and we made our way to Great Bay Boulevard. The hope was twofold: 1) outside shot at a well timed break in the clouds for sunset ignition; and 2) with a segment of thunderstorms approaching from the west, lightning captures were on the table. While neither outcome panned out in the ideal the night wasn’t a total wash. Under the gun of days of stiff west by northwest winds, a blowout tide exposed a land bridge and thereby allowed me to shoot from a sand plain that’s far more often than not under the cover of brackish water. Advantage: Greg. This afforded me a rare angle on Great Bay Boulevard’s first bridge, and I did my best to exploit the opportunity.
Surely I wanted some high drama cloud to ground lightning from this vantage point, but considering we were about 20 miles south of the real action that simply wasn’t in the cards. Instead I tried to make the most of the cloud level flashes coupled with the low cloud deck that was bouncing the light pollution in a cool array of orange, pink, and purple hues. One of the reasons I added a 35mm lens to my bag was for some better lightning photography. More often than not the 14mm is just too wide, and unless you have the fortitude to let the lightning get right over your head the bolts are oft too far in the distance. My hope is the 35mm while bring in the right amount of intimacy while remaining wide enough to still capture a good piece of the sky.
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April 3, 2016
Missed
Missed — 100mm | f/3.5 | ISO 100 | EXP 1/200
I’ve been chewing on out of focus photography for a while now—and by a while now I mean well over a year, and by out of focus photography I mean pictures that are deliberately rendered focus out, in absence of sharpness and clarity. Now I am not ready to declare this here photo the start of something new in my developmental photographic arc, but I am ready to state my affection for this kind of shooting. Done well it breaks through much of what we think are required features in a “good” photograph—strong lines, clear forms, and sharpness on our subject. Focus out instead pares down the rules to introduce simplicity, blur, and softness that brings the attention to the simpler beauty of form, contrast, and movement.
Shown here is a Jane Magnolia bud, a mere day or two from opening, presented in its stripped down form. Even in the absence of focus it’s still easy to pick up on everything happening in the photograph. The sun is warmly shining down on a single flower bud that’s part of a larger bush system. Here sharpness, focus, and clarity are not needed to tell that story. Even in its faded state the imagery is clear. This shot struck me immediately upon import into Lightroom. Even in its unaltered straight out of camera state it smacked me right in the face with that oh, I like this one feeling. A feeling that for me doesn’t come around too often.
Speaking of Jane Magnolias and the layered meaning of the titular Missed—this is the first time in about 3 springs my magnolia bush has armed itself with decent buds. I aggressively pruned and moved the bush a few years back and while it has spread its leaves OK in subsequent years, it has nary managed more than a handful of buds. This year it’s back with dozens and dozens of purple flowers ready for the appreciation of my lenses. I’d be surprised it this winds up my only magnolia capture of the year. It has been missed.
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April 2, 2016
Reframe
Reframe — 35mm | f/5.6 | ISO 100 | 7 Bracketed Exposures
This shot? Again? Really? If you’re thinking we’ve been here before you’re certainly right. In an effort to get comfortable shooting landscapes at a 35mm focal length, last night I returned—if not in triumph, then in repetition—to the familiar stomping grounds of Antoinetta’s Restaurant. The logic was twofold: 1) I was short on time leaving Dock Road as one of few sunset options, and 2) if you’re testing out the landscape prowess of a new lens it’s probably best to benchmark from a location and frame you’ve successfully photographed before. Having made some winners from this spot in the past, it made as much good sense as any.
Having made my first set of brackets fixed atop a tripod using manual focus, my initial thoughts of the 35mm wide angle in comparison to its 14mm ultra wide angle focal length counterpart are as follows: (For referenced I’ve included a similarly framed shot of Antoinetta’s photographed at 14mm below.)
- Staring down the 35mm makes you appreciate just how remarkably wide a 14mm focal length is—I’m roughly in the same spot as in the 14mm rendition below, yet you get the sense I’m substantially closer in the photo above. It’s a significantly tighter frame.
- With a tighter focal length, though still technically wide angle, the 35mm creates less distortion in the perspective. You’ll notice the restaurant (pictured top right) has straighter, less angled lines—particularly obvious along the roof. The perspective moving the eye toward the vanishing point is far less extreme than at 14mm.
- For a first pass the color and sharpness seem pretty good. At this point I am fully confident with dialing in manual focus on my 14mm. To such a degree I don’t even check to ensure I’m dialed in. I simply need to look at the position of the focus ring. It’s going to take some time with the 35mm, but through early testing the 35mm is proving plenty sharp.
Roughly three weeks in, and I am satisfied with my latest gear acquisition thus far. Still a work in progress and despite being another prime lens, the 35mm focal length is proving its versatility.
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Subtlety in Familiarity — 14mm | f/8 | ISO 100 | 7 Bracketed Exposures
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March 24, 2016
Putting in Work
Putting in Work — 35mm | f/8 | ISO 100 | EXP 1/100
Test work with the 35mm continues. Yes, obvious work in progress is obvious, but the fact I took this photograph within moments of yesterday’s dreamy grass shot speaks to the versatility in this lens. To go from shallow depth of field work—getting close enough to near macro conditions—out to a serviceable landscape lens without any change in focal length. Simply stop down to ensure maximum sharpness through your acceptable area of focus, and you are golden.
In the photo above I stuck with a handheld, autofocus approach. I’ve yet to get this thing on the tripod where I’ll attempt to manually find the hyperfocal sweet spot for this lens and make multiple bracketed exposures. Once I figure that all out, I’ll be using this lens setup the same as when shooting landscapes on the 14mm. The big difference here will be a tighter image thanks to the extra focal length. For a theater of the mind comparison, look to the shot above—were I going with my 14mm rig the tree line would be pushed far back to the horizon leaving the trees still recognizable, though hardly discernible—they’d maybe be 1/3 as tall. Sure I would have been able to bring more sky and clouds into the frame, it just would have been at the expense of intimacy. With no interesting foreground subject, shooting ultra wide can get a bit boring. Of course not always, but in general.
Back to the subject at had. Considering this was a single shot, handheld, with no mirror lock while using autofocus, I am satisfied with the sharpness over all. Perfect? Hardly. Yet with some more time in the field putting in work with this lens system on my tripod mount, and I am confident the 35mm will become a key piece to my landscape arsenal.
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March 20, 2016
Still Here
Still Here — 35mm | f/1.4 | ISO 100 | EXP 1/640
As I was preparing to onboard a fast 35mm to my lens array there were three primary uses driving my motivation:
1. Tighter option for landscape shooting situations where the 14mm is too wide
2. Sufficient prime lens solution to spend an entire day shooting with a single lens—think of it as a walkabout lens for Disney World
3. Tack sharp rendering even wide open at f/1.4—allowing all sorts of shallow depth of field, selective focus, and bokehlicious opportunities
Yesterday’s shot above speaks to the latter, and if I get down to it, is the primary reason I long coveted this lens. As much as landscapes are my wheelhouse, this kind of dreamy, shallow depth of field shooting engages me the most. It’s back to the basics photography—walking around, camera in hand, single shot work up close and personal with the subject. Frankly shooting landscapes becomes a bit clinical at times; rote behavior stuck behind a tripod, never worrying about focus—thanks, hyperfocal!—and capturing brackets. But it’s not all a crying shame, being detached a bit from the process allows you to sit back and take in the great sunset you’re there to shoot.
Bringing it back around there’s just no substitute for pared-down handheld shooting. Walking about Stafford Forge yesterday I met with a surprised greeting the nascent remnants of a seasonal control burn. It must have taken place about 10ish days ago as green grasses were already breaking through, coloring up the landscape. Every year this happens, taking down human height grasses and brushes that will steadily accumulate over the spring, summer, and fall growing seasons. For yesterday it made for a chance meeting with this bit of grass here—anyone able to ID that thing? Like most plant life in the Pinelands heat from forest fire allows protective casings to open and seeds to drop. Think of pine cones. This makes the control burning a necessary and important task for healthy maintenance of a productive pine forest ecosystem.
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March 19, 2016