Tomcat and Her Sidewinder

Of all the expensive pieces of glass I have (lenses), for this shot, I used sort of a toy piece of glass, called a Lensbaby. Now why would I put such a cheap piece of glass on such a professional camera? Well, hopefully this image shows why.

I went with a group of people to the USS Midway museum last Saturday. This is the decommisioned USS Midway aircraft carrier and her flight deck.

For this shot, since there was a lot of clutter in the shot, I thought it would be ideal to use the Lensbaby and focus the attention better on the F-14 Tomcat and her Sidewinder weapon. Now, I could have used a regular lens and chose a very wide aperture, which would have blurred out the background also. But, here, the blur would have been linear. What I mean is, everything would be the same blur. By putting the Lensbaby on, I am able to direct you attention to where I exactly what you to, by drawing you over to that spot, not just blurring everything else out. I hope that makes sense.

The trick with the Lensbaby is not overdoing it. That is so much easier said than done. For scenese like this, you have to be very subtle with it. For this shot, I used the f5.6 aperture disc and the Lensbaby double optic insert.

You can check out the Lensbaby itself at their website, http://www.lensbaby.com and see if this might work well in your arsenal, as well. It can be very frustrating, many times in fact, but can be very rewarding when you get a couple really great shots. It takes plenty of time and practice to master.

I hope you like how this turned out.