*** This Week Through Your Eyes 2024.06.22 ***

The foreground flowers make this 😃

What an elegant bridge. It's not always easy to find just the right angle for these subjects, but you've cracked this one.
The church interiors are quite an eyefull!

Great shadow pattern with its regular zig-zags leading though the composition.

Not too busy.

Dream shot.

It's all about contrast. Excellent.

This shot makes me smile.

Wonderful.

Great B&W rendition. My fave.

The bean flowers are indeed lovely. I occasionaly grow some dwarf beans amongst the shrubs.
I always get jasmine and honeysuckle muddled up.

I used to enjoy the B&W filters on my Oly Pens, it did encourage me to take shots that I otherwise might not have 'seen'. The shots with buildings / structures work best here, I feel.

This is a very pretty scene. I loved your shot of the road last week.

I think these bridge shots are your best for a while. Stunning. 1, 2 and 5 in particular.
I just love that bridge.
Having to rely on grab shots on the odd occasion when I ventured into a church etc. in Italy made me appreciate the precision you achieve with your work.

And now for something completely different
Last week I posted fire shots, which was last performance of dance studio's spring show. I happened to be there almost by accident, thanks to one singer of local pagan rock band, she posted info of this show in facebook and it seemed interesting enough to photograph, so I contacted her to ask permission for photographing and she forwarded request to organizers, who were ok with it. But it felt like jump to water in unknown place, as I'm not eager to shoot people, they are much more demanding in outcome than birds... Fortunately I managed ok and organizer seemed to be pleased with some shots. Phew...

forest fairies

main organizer performing

spanish style

cover your ears, sirens singing!

Polynesian style

Dancing with sword

Dance like egyptian

The sun dancing

The sun and the moon rotating around each other

The sun and the moon in opposition

rotating sun

I think it all depends on the lens.

Here it is with the Sigma 18-50 f/2.8 on alongside the E-M1 MKII with the Lumix 12-35 f/2.8 which are broadly equivalent in terms of effective focal length (28-75 vs 24-70 in FF terms) and they're both reasonably bright lenses, although I'd rate the Lumix as the better lens in terms of IQ...

E-M1 MKII wins on ergonomics and weather sealing, but the Fuji is pretty close on ergos and wins hands down on IQ (well, the camera body does, this lens probably undermines that a little and might be beaten by the new Fuji 16-50 which is a similar size, but not something I personally own).

Going the other way, here it is against the smallest M43 camera I own (one of the smallest in the system I think), the Lumix GM5 with the same 12-35 f/2.8 lens on the Lumix...

Here, the Fuji ergonomics are much better than the GM5, which is still pretty usable, but getting into compact camera territory, it's also as slippery as a bar of soap. The sensor in the Fuji really pulls ahead against the 16MP one in the GM5 both in terms of resolution and dynamic range. It's also got decent IBIS too which the GM5 lacks, although in that category the E-M1 MKII is still the king amongst all of the cameras past and present that I've owned.

All three of them side by side, with the E-M1 MKII wearing its legendary 12-100 f/4.0 lens. Still my favourite lens in that system, although it's something of a brute.

If you're into primes, Fuji do have a number of pancake lenses including an 18mm and 27mm (the latter is on my must acquire list). Here I've got the GM5 with the also legendary (but I never got on with it) Lumix 20mm alongside the X-T50 with the 18mm, which is not a fair comparison as the effective focal lengths are different, but it gives you some idea of what's possible.

With decent primes, this camera is capable of excellent images (and generally superb video too - although it's not great in terms of rolling shutter when you use the highest quality modes, the lower ones, which can read the sensor faster are much better in that regard), although this comes at the cost of swapping lenses. I'm not entirely convinced by the Sigma 18-50 f/2.8. I got it after watching a number of comparison reviews which claimed it stood up well to the Fuji 16-55 f/2.8 which is even bigger and heavier than the Oly 12-100. Having used it extensively in good conditions on Thursday night, I'm not convinced, but then, I'm comparing it to the best primes I own (23mm and 56mm) so it's not likely that it's going to match up to those (I'll post photos from that walk shortly).

I couple of full res examples taken with the Fuji 23mm f/1.4 which give more of an idea of what the body is capable of than my usual 2K wide images...

Focus point here is on the fencepost in the centre of the frame...

Focus point here is just below the centre of the frame...

Weight wise, you're talking 538g with the 18mm pancake and 768g with the Sigma 18-50, so it's pretty light. I've been carrying it around in one hand during my walks with a wrist strap for added security.

The 2nd is a cool capture but I think maybe some more proceesing to emphasise the lines on the road would help to lead the eye to that lone figure.

Good comp Chris, maybe better in mono?