Varanga - 16mm

Varanga is a small sleepy village located in the Udupi district of Karnataka at a distance of 25 Kms from Karkala and 43 Kms from Moodabidri on the way from Karkala to Agumbe. I reached Varanga just before sunset to capture the nice evening light. I had visited Varanga many a times and each time the experience is unique and exhilarating. The Kere Basadi of Varanga is unique Jain temple situated in the midst of a gentle green lake. Serene lake contrasts well with the sharp quadrilateral architecture of the temple and gentle swaying hills at the distance.

I used Canon EOS 5D mark II fitted with Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8 L USM Lens and Hoya circular polarizing filter to get these pictures. I used various focal lengths from 16mm to 35 mm take these photos. What you can notice is use of hyperfocal distance to get both foreground as well as background in sharp focus. I had mentioned in the earlier blog about use of hyperfocal distance to catch flying kite as well as moon in sharp focus. Unfortunately hyperfocal distance will not work effectively for a 600mm focal length I was planning. It really is effective in normal to wide angle lenses.

Varanga - 16mm

So what is the definition of this term Hyper focal distance? The hyperfocal distance is the closest distance at which a lens can be focused while keeping objects at infinity acceptably sharp; that is, the focus distance with the maximum depth of field. Digital cameras with tiny sensors have almost eliminated need to get the calculator to get this hyperfocal distance. Tiny sensors which you find on most point and shoot cameras will give you a universal focus right from close up to infinity. Many manufacturers have eliminated the scale displaying a zone of focus on their digital lenses all together in recent years. So is it just meant for film cameras and not relevant to digital? No. As more people start venturing into larger sensors (35mm or larger) they will come to face with the hyperfocal distance.

Varanga - 23mm

When you focus your lens there will be a zone that is in focus and areas that are out of focus. The area that is in focus is called the focal plane of acceptable sharpness. The interesting thing about this focal plane is that, when you focus on a subject, one third of the distance closest between subject and camera is in focus; secondly, two thirds of the zone that stretches out from and behind the subject is also in focus.

In a landscape photography you want maximum area in focus (foreground to background), so if you keep your lens focus to infinity your focal plane stretches 1/3 in front of infinity and 2/3 beyond infinity. What is is the use of the focus infinity? it is a waste as it is supposed to be focus anyway. So trick is to focus little in front of the infinity mark so as to stretch the focal plane just into infinity. That will give you a sharply focus foreground and sharply focused background too.

Varanga - 35mm

There are 3 rules to get best out of this trick.

• Use wide angle lens which inherently has greater depth of field.
• Use smaller aperture like f/8-f/16 which give you a great depth of field.
• If you don’t have depth of field calculator handy, focus on a point about a third the distance between you and the subject and use depth of field preview button to check the focal plane.

If you want to be accurate and mathematically inclined there is a formula to calculate this hyperfocal distance. It is dependednt on several factors. The focal length of the lens, aperture, sensor size etc. I don’t want to confuse you with all that jargon. If you are interested to know the calculation check links below.

Learn more about hyperfocal distance at these links.

• Digital Photography school has a nice article Hyperfocal Distance – Photographer’s Friend
• Cambridge In Color also has a calculator and shows an excellent example of it in use http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/hyperfocal-distance.htm
• You can calculate exact hyperfocal charts with http://www.dofmaster.com/charts.html.
• Martin Bailey has the following podcast on hyperfocal distance – Understanding Hyperfocal distance , DOF Explainedand the pdf-file to the DOF Explained
• Apple iTouch/iPhone/iPad has a free hyperfocal distance calculator called Field Tools
• Android phones have a similar app called Photo Tools

If you need more info on Varanga check this nice article on Deccan Herald – Basadis are testimony to rich Jain culture.

Pheasant-tailed Jacana

I found this Pheasant-tailed Jacana (Hydrophasianus chirurgus) in non-breeding form at Mallyadi Bird Sanctuary near Kundapura last February. I was using my Canon EOS 5D mark II with Canon EF 300mm f/4.0 L IS USM attached with Canon EF 1.4x II Extender to photograph this beautiful bird.

Pheasant-tailed Jacana (Hydrophasianus chirurgus) is the only member of the Jacana family to have different plumages for the breeding and non-breeding seasons. Distributed on the Indian subcontinent and from Central China through South East Asia, Afghanistan and as far as Java and the Philippines. Resident on lakes, marshes and ponds where it feeds on invertebrates, frogs and fish. Jacanas are a group of waders in the family Jacanidae that are identifiable by their huge feet and claws which enable them to walk on floating vegetation in shallow lakes, their preferred habitat. The Pheasant-tailed Jacana is capable of swimming, although it usually walks on the vegetation.

It is conspicuous in the breeding season because of the long pheasant-like tail of the male. The plumage is blackish-brown with white head and neck. On the nape of the neck there is a yellow mark. Its wings are dazzlingly white in flight. Females are slightly larger than males with similar but brighter colours. Non-breeding adults lack the long tail. The underparts are white except for a brown breast band and neck stripe. The side of the neck is golden.

Pheasant-tailed Jacana

In the breeding season, the male grows the 15cm (6″) arching tail, to which the bird owes its name. A female may mate with up to ten males, each of which incubates a clutch and raises his own brood. The female is able to present her males with a full clutch of 4 eggs at intervals of 9-12 days. Each male is visited twice in succession giving a total of 6-8 clutches or 24-36 eggs in a year.

The cocks were seen to approach the clutch with great care and carefully to preen, especially the breast feathers, so that they are quite dry and airy for the brood. Then he spreads his pale-green legs and lowers his breast slowly while supporting himself on his wings. He pushes the eggs together under his belly with the wings and, swaying from side to side, scoops the eggs up from the wet ground with his white wings so that they lie warm and protected between his breast and underside of the wings.

After torrents of rain and rising water levels, this jacana moves its nesting site. If disturbed, the eggs are moved to previously built nests at new sites. Moves have been observed in July and August. The distance moved is 1-15m. It is a common but not regular and on occasion seen to occur 3-4 times with the same clutch.

After the first chick is hatched, it is not easy for the cock to remain sitting firmly on the clutch; his changed position, higher and looser tells the experienced observer that some hatching has taken place.

Pheasant-tailed Jacana

If one approached the nest, the chicks, when only a few hours old, will leave the nest slowly and hide under leaf or among water plants where they remain motionless with only their beaks above the water surface.

About 2-3 times an hour, the father gathers the chicks together at a suitable place such as a lotus leaf on the water or on somewhat firmer ground – there he broods them under his abdomen or his wings. First, with legs spread out and bending his legs, he slowly lowers his body. Then he raises his wings slightly and with them protects the chicks as they snuggle up to him. Such a comforting rest period of 5-10 minutes breaks up the strenuous foraging for food. The cock can hold the brood between body and wing in such a way that they are practically carried with their legs dangling freely.

Their call is a mewing me-onp and a nasal teeun

Exposure Fusion

Pre-Monsoon clouds were gathering as I shot this photo at Seethanadi Nature Camp inside Someshwara Wild Life Sanctuary, Hebri Karkala. I used Canon EOS 5D mark II with Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8 L USM Lens on a tripod to get 3 bracketed images at 2 stop difference. I used Photomatix Pro to fuse exposure of these three bracketed shots to produce this photo. In Expo­sure Fusion a series of brack­eted images are processed to produce a dynamic range image. It takes the best tonal­i­ties from each image in the sequence and com­bines them to cre­ate a sin­gle image. Best part of each image gets recorded and fused together to com­bine all of the best ele­ments in final image. You have quite a lot of control to adjust which tonality of the exposures are used in the final image.

You might ask how is Expo­sure fusion is different from HDR? The only resem­blance the two have are that they com­bine a sequence of brack­eted images together. In Expo­sure Fusion the final prod­uct looks more real­is­tic to how the scene really would like. This means that the shad­ows main­tain a cer­tain amount of shad­ows and the high­lights remain brighter in higher tonal­i­ties then a high con­trast scene.

HDR takes the sequence of images and blends the images seam­lessly but does its best to even the tonal­i­ties in the extreme tonal­i­ties of shad­ows and high­lights. That is why HDR the appear­s arti­fi­cial­ and unnat­u­ral­.

Expo­sure Fusion after fus­ing the images together keeps the tonal­i­ties how they would appear if one was to be look­ing at the actual scene being pho­tographed. HDR image most of the time shows the uneven tran­si­tion between the lumi­nance and can there­fore lose the appeal of real­ism. Expo­sure Fusion pro­duces results that are truer to the scene that the pho­tog­ra­pher is try­ing to capture.

Photomatix Pro produces both fantastic HDR as well as Exposure Fusion. Try it and you will love the results. Trial mode is also available for Photomatix Pro.