Infrared Gallery

[Don Ellis]

Fortunately, when I bought my G2, I kept my G1 and bought a Hoya R72 infrared filter for it.

A few weeks ago I put up my first infrared photos with their native purplish tones, along with grayscale, duotone, tritone and quadtone versions for reference.

Last week I spent two days walking around the footpath on The Peak in Hong Kong and took 331 shots as sort of a travelogue. You'll be pleased to know that I threw 295 of them away, so it's not quite the slog it might have been.

The new photos are all rendered in quadtone, with the original as a reference.

You're welcome to visit Kleptography (http://www.kleptography.com/#peak) where you'll find "the peak" right after "infrared" at the bottom of the page.

[Vitali]

Excellent work, Don.
Dark, sometimes black, sky and white leaves make the magic.
I like “Back to the work”, very dynamic. “Sunset” (1) with its tonal range and composition is gorgeous.
Thank you for the pleasant journey to the Peak.

Best Regards,
Vitali
P.S. Any luck with G2+IR filter?

[Don Ellis]

Hi Vitali,

Thanks for your generous comments. That one picture should probably be renamed... it's actually "Back to the wok," as in Chinese cooking. From a distance, the station looks like a wok -- at least to me.

I took a few reference IR shots with the G2 and will try to post something soon.

[Don Ellis]

Hi Vitaly,

I've done a little experimenting with the G2 for infrared images -- not as much as I should since I'm always seduced by the ease and output of the G1 -- but I have come to a few conclusions.

The G2 is less sensitive, could probably benefit from a longer exposure (which you'll have to set manually because P mode doesn't have much of a clue), is so dark in the viewfinder that you'll have difficulty framing your shot, and is more trouble that I care to go to.

You can drive a nail with a wrench, but it's easier with a hammer. The G1 is a hammer.

One quick experiment is below. Here is the same picture resized and auto-leveled and sharpened. No color adjustment has been made.

G2 left, G1 right (or over/under if the pictures have wrapped)

http://www.kleptography.com/dl/g2.jpg http://www.kleptography.com/dl/g1.jpg


In the next two pictures I've converted both pictures above to grayscale -- no other changes:

G2 left, G1 right (or over/under if the pictures have wrapped)

http://www.kleptography.com/dl/g2-gs.jpg http://www.kleptography.com/dl/g1-gs.jpg


In both cases, the Program mode chose an aperture of 2.0 and a shutter speed of 1 second. Perhaps the G2 would have looked better using Manual, but then you get back to my comment about the extremely dark LCD and framing.

I have other shots that make me glad I kept my G1 when I bought the G2. In the interests of fairness, however, there are at least two sites that prove G2 infrared photos are possible.

http://www.pbase.com/bonton/infrared
and
http://www.pbase.com/pantala/infrared_arboretum

G2 infrared is too much pain for too little gain since I have the G1 option. If I only had a G2, though, I imagine I'd be out there trying.

[Vitali]

Don,
Thank you for posting this comparison.
Obviously hammer is a better (proper) tool for IR photography:)


Have a great holiday season!

Vitali