They say the best times to take photos are the “Golden Hours” - at dawn and dusk. Now, I am not a morning person, so the dawn can be a struggle - even if winter makes the dawn conveniently later than the rest of the year. The dusk is therefore better for me. I took my Nikon D700 and 2 x manual focus lenses (Nikkor 50mm F1.2 AiS and Nikkor 85mm F1.4 AiS) to the nearby Yutenji temple at dusk on a lovely Tokyo winter evening a few weeks ago. I was hoping to get more of my detail shots, and was even happier to discover some of the autumn leaves were still around and made some lovely colours in the evening sunshine. It was a little windy, so manual focus was a bit of fun with the leaves, but I think I nailed a few. I have been working on getting my colours to “pop” a little more in Aperture (am I the only person still using Apple Aperture these days?) and these are the result of some of my own presets. Let me know what you think….
Late autumn leaves in the temple grounds - 85mm F1.4 AiS.
Ring this bell to get the God's attention - 50mm F1.2 AiS.
Golden light - and Japanese graffiti sticker - 85mm F1.4 AiS.
More Japanese maple - 85mm F1.4 AiS.
Taps - if you are English - 50mm F1.2 AiS.
Graveyard sunset - 85mm F1.4 AiS.
Going home. Just behind my apartment - 85mm F1.4 AiS.
This set does go to show that a) the Nikon D700 is still an excellent little camera - in spite of the constant upgrade mania of the manufacturers and b) old manual focus lenses can really sill cut the mustard - assuming you have a good focusing technique.