Tag Archives: lensbaby

Lensbaby Now Has Mounts for Mirrorless Camera Systems

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_DSF2159ARecently, Lensbaby released a lineup of their creative tilt lenses with mounts for mirrorless camera systems. This means that Fuji shooters can now get in on the fun!

Lensbaby currently has mounts for Fujifilm X Series cameras, Sony A, Sony E, Olympus and Panasonic M 4/3, Pentax K and Samsung NX, in addition to their original Nikon and Canon mounts.

I’ve used a few of the Lensbabies and they’re lots of fun. They offer some great creative options, and while you wouldn’t want to use them all the time, they can be really cool tools to have in your kit. I absolutely LOVE this merged Lensbaby panorama shot by pro travel photographer Nevada Wier. She’s long been one of my favorites; I’ve been following her work for a long time, ever since I started shooting back in the early 90s.

Keep in mind, all Lensbaby optics are manual focus and they do not have electronic contacts so they don’t communicate with your camera. With use on Fuji cameras, you must go into the menu and select the “Shoot Without Lens” option. Other cameras may function differently, so you’ll need to check the manual when you get the Lensbaby in hand.

Also, if you already have Lensbaby optics from another system, say you bought them for Nikon and switched to Fuji, you can special order an “empty” Composer Pro in your new mount that you can use with your optics. Any Lensbaby optic can be used with any camera, no matter if they’re DSLR or mirrorless. Contact contact Lensbaby directly at 877-536-7222 or email them at customerhappiness@lensbaby.com.

Here are the Lensbaby models that are currently available for Fuji and other camera systems:

Composer Pro with Sweet 35 Optic

The Composer Pro is the main mount that allows you to swap out different optics. The Sweet 35 Optics is the widest of of the Lensbaby optics, and it allows you to get a very dreamy look a “sweet spot” of focus that’s surrounded by a creamy wash of blur. By adjusting the tilt of the lens, you can control the amount of blur and the location of your in-focus sweet spot. Here’s an example of what you can do with the Sweet 35 optic.

Composer Pro with Sweet 50 Optic

Same design as the above model, but a slightly more narrow angle of view. It also has an aperture range from f/2.5 to f/22, so you have a wide variety of creative options.

Composer Pro with Edge 50 Optic

The Lensbaby Edge Optic system is quite different from the “Sweet” optic system. Essentially a short telephoto lens, the Edge 50 allows you to achieve a totally flat field of focus, just like a standard lens. However, by tilting the lens, you can create a slice of focus that can be manipulated with regards to the amount of focus and blur, and the position of your in-focus subject matter within the frame.

The Edge Optics are my favorite Lensbaby lenses and I’ve used them for a variety of compositions. Here are a few examples. They also have the Edge 80 Optic, which is designed for DSLR cameras.

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Lensbaby Velvet 56 f/1.6

Built like a classic portrait lens, the Velvet 56 is a unique design that offers a short telephoto viewpoint, a very fast aperture and 1:12 macro capabilities.

With a manual focus ring, it delivers a rich, sharp imagery with subtle undertones when you stop down, and a soft, glowing, ethereal effect when you open up the aperture. This gives you some very organic and original creative options to your imagery.

The Lensbaby Velvet 56 is a pretty versatile lens, and it goes from dreamy to crisp with a simple twist of the aperture ring.

5.8mm Circular Fisheye Lens

With a 185 degree angle of view, the Lensbaby Circular Fisheye offers an extreme perspective and the ability to focus at one quarter of an inch in front of the lens. It also has a polished interior barrel that produces a unique flare effect when pointed directly at a light source.

Breaking Down The Shot: Mountain Biking Self Portrait

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Last week, while hanging around Facebook, I saw this photo by a young Australian photographer who I follow named Tim Arch. I was immediately wowed by the shot and therefore inspired to step away from the computer and go outside to make some photographs of my own. The biking shot above was the result. It’s one of my favorite photos of late, and since it garnered a great deal of positive response, so as promised, here’s the how-to.

Step 1: Decide What Kind of Photo to Make

Having been motivated by Tim’s photo, I decided to make a biking shot of my own, and since it was short notice, I figured I’d just go shoot a self portrait. Since I’m not exactly “model material,” I did what I usually do in these situations and shoot close up and focus on the bike.

Grabbing my Nikon D700, a couple of lenses, a Nikon SB-900 Speedlight and a pair of Pocket Wizards, I shoved all the gear into my Lowepro Flipside Sport AW camera pack, strapped my Gorillapod to the outside and jumped on my bike.

Step 2: Finding a Location

This didn’t take long, as there are numerous trails within a couple miles from my house here in Anchorage. I simply pedaled around for a few minutes until I found a suitable looking section that had good greenery, relatively few roots and a gentle curve.

I didn’t want too many roots, because since I’d be riding slowly and triggering the camera with a Pocket Wizard in one hand, I needed as few obstacles as possible, lest I wipeout and ruin the photo opportunity, or possibly hurt myself.

Step 3: The Setup

I wanted a shot from the front, so I fixed the camera on the Gorillapod and placed it right on the trail looking towards the curve. For a lens, I chose the Lensbaby Composer Pro with Edge 80 Optic. Once I had the framing set the way I liked it, I cabled up one Pocket Wizard and slid it onto the hot shoe.

For the flash, I set my Lowepro pack on the ground just off trail at camera right and stuck the SB-900 into the Tripod strap. It took quite a bit of fiddling to get the pack/flash combo balanced so that it wouldn’t fall over. I also needed to make sure that the optical eye on the flash was in line with the camera, since I’d be using the pop-up flash on the D700 to trigger.

Step 4: Framing and Exposure

Since the Lensbaby is manual focus, I needed to set an identifiable focus point that I’d be able to hit while I rode towards the camera. I chose the small root that lay across the trail and framed accordingly.

Then I set manual exposure on the camera with a shutter of 1/250 and set the flash to straight TTL mode. Coming in from the side, I was just looking for a mix of fill and key, or accent light. Although you often have one light for each, sometimes you can do both with a single flash.

Step 5: Start Shooting

Pedaling down the rooty trail right towards the camera while trying to steer and hit the button on the Pocket Wizard requires more coordination that I usually have on any given day. I rarely got the timing right, and I almost wiped out more than once. I needed to catch the bike wheel right in line with that root, but it didn’t always work out and many of my shots were out of focus. I kept at it for a few minutes, though, hoping that I’d get something good before the mosquitos drove me away. At least I never actually ran into the camera.

Step 6: Happy Accident. Or Divine Intervention, if you prefer. 

While the light was ok, it wasn’t anything to write home about. However, I had a little help. More than once, my Lowepro pack ILS (Improvised Light Stand) fell over and I had to keep setting it back up. It was far from precise, and one time, I inadvertently placed it so that the flash head was angling down and pointing slightly towards the camera. The result was a really cool looking God-beam style flare.

This happy little accident added an unbelievable dimension to the shot, and I instantly knew that I had something special. However, in order to make it really shine, or as Frank Zappa used to say, to “put the eyebrows on it,” I slapped the CTO warming gel onto the flash head and went for gold.

Of course, every time I touched the flash, I moved it slightly and it took a couple of tries to get that cool looking beam back. Eventually, I dialed it all in and managed to nail one pass where the tire was in perfect focus an alignment in the shot.

By then, the mosquitos were really bearing down on me, and since I had neglected to douse myself in Deet, I could only take so much before being driven completely mad. As soon as I knew I had the shot, I threw all the gear back into my pack, and pedaled off at full speed so as to outrun the incessant little buggers.

Total elapsed time for this shoot from setup to fleeing from bugs: Under 30 minutes. This is a perfect example of what I call Going Fast With Light, which is the subject of my off camera flash eBook of the same name about using flash in outdoor photography.

Thanks again for the inspiration, Tim!

Trying Out The Lensbaby Edge 80 Optic

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Mountain biking, Alaska Style. Shot with the Lensbaby Edge 80 Optic

Tilt shift photography for me is like candy. It tastes good, but way too much of it and you get a little sick to your stomach, which is why I just can’t seem to justify spending $1,700-ish on a real tilt shift lens. Since I’d rather put that kind of money towards a new mountain bike, which is something that I’ll use way more often, like many photographers, I use a Lensbaby whenever I get the urge to tilt.

Lensbaby just released a brand new gizmo called the Edge 80 Optic. It’s an 80mm f/2.8 optic with a 12 bladed adjustable aperture that you can pop into any of the Lensbaby lenses. When aligned straight, the Edge 80 gives a flat field of focus, but when tilted, it creates a slice of sharp focus in a soft field of magical sugar filled blur.

Since I’ve already got a Lensbaby Composer Pro, and since I’m a big fan of the 80s, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on the Edge 80 Optic. Nice Mr. UPS man dropped one off at my door the other day and so I slapped it on my D700 and took it on mountain biking yesterday afternoon to give it a review.

Bear with me. Being my first time using the Edge 80, I probably over-tilted a little bit, but hey, I might as well get it out of my system, right? Despite being limited to your own artistic whimsy, you can actually over tilt the Edge 80 with some subjects. Yes, you’ll get a nice wide blur, but you might lose needed subject matter that helps tell the story. That’s all I’ll say on the matter.

As for quality, I was impressed by the heft, weight and overall build quality of the Edge 80 Optic as soon as I pulled it out of the box. (Lensbaby does really nice packaging!) It’s built with 5 multi coated glass elements in 4 groups and it feels quite solid in your hands. It’s also solid enough to hold up to when you accidentally bang the front of the lens against your metal bike stem. Believe me. I hit it pretty hard while riding with the camera around my neck with no damage done.

Being 80mm, it falls right in that sweet spot of a great fast short telephoto lens, which makes it an extremely versatile tool for all types of photography, and gives your imagery a more professional look. I love my 85mm f/1.8 for portraits and as a lightweight outdoor lens, so the Lensbaby Edge 80 Optic was an easy visual transition for me. Even without tilting, it’s got a shallow depth of field and produces wonderful background blur.

In use, the glass is good. They’re sharp, especially when you stop them down. Outside, though I tend to shoot fairly wide open, mostly so that I can see better. Since the Lensbaby has a manual aperture control, the blades stay stopped down when you turn the dial. Add to the fact that they’re all manual focus and manual exposure, Lensbabies can be pretty challenging to use outside. If you like to make things a little harder, though, you can definitely get some cool results.

I find the key to using a Lensbaby on fast breaking scenes like sports and adventure, where you’ve got constantly changing subject distances, is to put the camera on high speed continuous mode and just go crazy with the shutter. Shoot tons of frames. Shoot more than you normally would in the hopes that as you keep focusing on your moving subject, you’ll nail at least one sharp image. So far, this technique has worked for me.

Also, with such a variable amount of shifting, you can tilt your way into a corner with a very narrow slice of focus. Depending on your subject matter, your slice might be overly visible, or else you can have such a tiny delineation between what’s sharp and what’s blurred on your subject. Again, that’s where shooting lots of frames helps.

Overall, the Lensbaby Edge 80 Optic is a cool lens. I might even prefer this over the Sweet 35 Optic, but only because, as I said, I love the short telephoto look. It also might be sharper at the edges, simply because it has more narrow field of view, however, I’ll have to test further to confirm this. One nice difference is that even if you tilt the Edge 80 all the way, you don’t get vignetting like you do on the wider angle Sweet 35 Optic.

It’s a versatile lens for a wide variety of outdoor photography subjects, and if you already have one of the Lensbaby bodies, such as the Composer Pro, the $299 price tag is pretty easy to handle for a well made piece of gear that will give you tons of creative options. This is especially true when you consider that by using it flat field, you effectively get a nice sharp and fast 80mm f/2.8 lens thrown into the deal. Check out this video tutorial for a full explanation of the Edge 80 capabilities.

I’ll post more Edge 80 Optic shots as I take them, and I promise, I won’t tilt quite so much next time.

Mountain biking on the beach, Anchorage AlaskaMountain biking on the beach, Anchorage AlaskaMountain biking on the beach, Anchorage Alaska

Full Review: Lensbaby Composer Pro with Sweet 35 Optic

Dan Bailey's Adventure Photography Blog Posted on by

Having been a long time fan of selective focus techniques in my photography, it would only make sense that I have a tilt shift lens. Only I don’t. Mostly because they’re quite expensive. As much as I’d love to get … Continue reading →

Trying Out the Lensbaby in Alaska Conditions

Dan Bailey's Adventure Photography Blog Posted on by

It’s always great to challenge yourself and push your own creative boundaries. Sometimes you do this with different techniques, sometimes you do by photographing new subject matter, and sometimes you do it by using different gear. I recently got my … Continue reading →