I don't know if there's a genre called mundane photography, but lately that's what I've been engrossed with. This project involves shooting scenes around my house and then seeing what can be made of them. Since the theme is water, I wondered what would happen if I shot tap water flowing into a drinking glass. Here's what came out the other side.

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Nice scene -- wish I could be there.

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I particularly like your image #1. It is split along a diagonal about 1/3 of the way from the top right. This gives me a feeling of two different sectors of the scene doing battle with each other, or at least displaying different moods/gestures. The differing color pallettes contribute to this tension. Hope to see more of your work.

Compositionally, the rainbow accentuates the golden spiral that starts the curve at the base of the tree.

Well done!

Why not get an Olympus OM-D EM10 iv and a 12-200MM F3.5-6.3 lens for less than the cost of a Sony RX10 iv? You'd be giving up the 600mm length, but you'd be getting an equivalent 24-400, which is pretty good capture, plus the larger sensor.

OK, I gave that a try. Now that I've removed the post and the biggest waterdrop, I'm preparing the paperwork to submit this to the Agora Awards “Best Photo of the Year”. That $25K prize is mighty tempting.

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#8

I couldn't agree more. For the record, though, I didn't express a political opinion.

Do you mean Trump? Clinton?

Nice image to work with. Thanks.

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I hear you. I typically only scan the "main" page for topics (which can be frustrating since folks sometimes don't provide very descriptive titles). Since many of these deal with equipment I don't have, not much joy there. PLus there's a discouraging amount of repetition; but that's common with forums of all types.

I do like this group -- FYC. I guess that's because there is the weekly MIYV, plus what used to be the "masters" monthly topic. I suppose this series will take the place of that. But it will only work if people take the time and trouble to participate: by which I mean (1) share images and (2) provide a bit more discussion/evaluation than can be typical of other groups.

This can be difficult, I know. Time is precious, and it takes time to try to say something meaningful, especially if, like me, a person may not be as visually literate as I'd like to be. But I won't get any better at it if I don't try.

OK. I tried it that way. Better?

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In reading your step-by-step, it appears you've done things correctly. However, long experience with Olympus tells me that each and every step must be done perfectly or things don't happen as expected.

I have an EM-5 original and the following works fine for my camera. I can only assume it will work the same for your more up-to-date model.

1. Press the MENU button, scroll down to the Custom Menu (the Cogs) and select Custom Menu A “AF/MF”

2. Scroll down to ‘AEL/AFL’, press ►, select ‘S-AF’ and press ► again

3. Select ‘mode 3’. You will see that this assigns the AEL (auto exposure lock) and Exposure to the shutter release, and assigns S-AF (single auto focus) to the AEL/AFL button.

4. You can also change the C-AF to ‘mode 3’ to activate C-AF and C-AF Tr via the back button.

5. By default the Fn1 button is set to AEL/AFL, and that works fine for me. This puts the focus right under my right thumb for a traditional back-button focus setup. To be sure, check your setting by using the "Custom Menu -- Button/|Dial -- Button Function -- Fn1 button set to AEL/AFL.

6. If you would like to change the AF activation button, simply assign AEL/AFL to any Fn button you like.

FWIW, although this works on my camera, I don't use it often because the Fn1 button is too difficult for me to press. This is the downside of the small form factor, which I generally love -- just not this feature.

I hope this helps.

I generally tend towards the stop action side of the spectrum, although I've seen many beautiful photos with blurred water.

Attached is a photo I took during a recent thunderstorm. I was struck by the contrast between the left and right sides of the image, with the left being much more colorful. This was pretty much how my eye saw the scene and I tried to enhance the effect by shooting at a moderately fast shutter speed (1/800) while focusing on the post, in order to blur the background while still retaining a bit of sharpness in the raindrops. I then did a little pp to enhance this effect.

Although I think I achieved my goal, I'm not sure my goal was worth pursuing.

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By this time, the image has been recomposed a few times so it's hard to know which version people are referring to. But, of the original two images, I like #2 because, as was said earlier, it provides more context, which allows me to let my imagination work a little bit and I come away seeing the subject as the lead vessel in a little convoy.