[Leica] [IMG] [OT] Takanabe Lantern Festival

[geordiepete211 at yahoo.co.uk (Peter Cheyne)]

Thanks for the comments, guys.

Phillipe, I don't really know much about B&W conversions, but I gave  
it a go.  I used the Lightroom B&W preset, then adjusted colour  
saturation sliders a bit, and tweaked contrast.  To my eye, however,  
it doesn't have the depth that the colour version has.  I also made a  
version in Lightroom where I just desaturated the blue.  It's not a  
fishing pole, although it looks like it, it's a pole to hold a  
portable outdoor light.

In a word, I find the 5Dii utilitarian.  It has many useful points,  
but I prefer the Leica for not getting in the way, simple enjoyment  
factor, and, of course, the lenses.  The Canon 28-105 is also  
utilitarian.  I'd have preferred a 2.8 wider zoom, but the 28-105 was  
all they had in the store and it was an impulse buy, so I didn't want  
to wait for a lens.  I mainly wanted a 5Dii for my bird and animal  
photography, to pair with my  400/2.8 (and sometimes the 400/5.6).

Richard, the highlights were held on the spotlight photos mainly  
because of the decent compound metering (or whatever it's called!).   
Some details seemed to be almost lost, but a 40% highlight recovery in  
Lightroom brought that back, so the detail wasn't lost after all.  I  
set the camera to RAW only.

Luis, showing the movement without too much blur of the faces was my  
goal with the performance photos.  Thanks for commenting on that!   
However, I think I overestimated the magic of higher ISOs and image  
stabilization on some of the 'still' shots, such as the colourful  
garden, and the lanterns in the tree garden.  Despite the 5Dii  
'magic', those shots would have benefited with the tripod I didn't  
want to bring to a festival.  In future, I might use the old trick of  
usng the Leitz table-top tripod to brace against my chest and shoulders.

Peter Cheyne