Mesquite

[jblaschke]

This is a field of mesquites I shot back during winter. A bunch of shots had hotspots in them, so I didn't mess with them any further. The other day I was cleaning out files and found a few without hotspots. This one's my favorite--and also one of my few B&W efforts in IR I've been satisfied with.



Larger versions here.

[bburton]

Jayme, good to see you posting IR photos again. Looking forward to more.

[groovyone]

Any pointers for working with hotspots? I have some IR shots I love but got bad hotspots.

[jblaschke]

Bruce, I've been crazy busy with work and other such time sinks. The few chances I've had to go out and shoot, filtered IR shooting such as I'm limited to wasn't practical. But I hope to get more opportunities in the future.

Groovyone, I'm not sure if I have anything useful to contribute regarding hotspots. Certain lenses are IR-friendly, and some are notoriously unfriendly. If you shoot Canon, there are easily Googled lists on the subject, and I assume Nikon and others would have the same. I shot these with Canon's EF 28-135 which is listed as an IR-suitable lens, although some people have reported hotspots. I'd shot IR with it multiple times and not had hotspot problems, but for this particular shoot--about 8 a.m. with the sun behind me--probably two thirds of the shots were useless because of strong hotspots. Later on I went out and tried to re-create the situation so I could identify the cause of the problem, and shot a wide range of tests throughout the focal length, working through several apertures, ISO and shutter speed settings for each distance. And I got nothing. Not a single hotspot. There must be something that triggers them, but I can't figure out what.

For the record, my Canon EF-S 10-22 and EF 50mm 1.8 mk I lens produce very clean, hotspot-free images.

[groovyone]

Sounds like my 24-70Z. Most of the time it works flawlessly, but for some reason I had a bad round or two of shooting with hotspots.

Love that shot, btw.

[doctahjones]

i like the shot as well.

[tc95]

Very nice shot....!!!

[jblaschke]

Thanks for the kind words, folks. My B&W IR conversions usually stink--murky and dull--but this one I saw as B&W from the get-go and am tickled I finally managed to have one turn out halfways decent.

I'm thinking I might try a follow-up shot before the mesquites lose their leaves this fall. Probably won't have as powerful impact as the stark, winter barren look in this one has, but you never know.