Forest in a Raindrop

For all the fog pictures I took this morning — 3 miles worth — I wind up with a forest in a raindrop. 

Just because I suspect a group of people might be reading this…(IOW, the rest of you can stop reading now.)

I've had a version of this lens (this is my second) for nearly a decade now.  It was a present.  I would have never bought it.  Now I can't imagine living without it.  I had no idea it would focus this closely.  I'm about 6 inches away from this raindrop.  This lens is not the best at anything it does.  There are sharper, faster, quicker and better lenses out there.  But if I can only carry one lens (and that's where I am in life) I'm carrying this one.  It will do 90% of what I need.  

About the exposure below:  I shoot on manual 90% of the time.  I'd rather live with my mistakes than the programmer's.  My mistakes teach and motivate me.   Their mistakes just make me mad (at somebody beside myself).  Your personality may vary.

F11 is probably the sharpest f-stop on the lens.  A rule of thumb — the sharpest F-stops are in the middle range of the lens.  If you use a computer to sharpen your pictures, you'll probably never care. Higher shutter speeds yield sharper images if your subject is moving — even slightly.  There was just enough wind to make the branch wiggle so I cranked the ISO up to 1,600 to get the faster shutter.

I shoot at F8 and ISO 400 unless I have a reason to use something different.  I bracket my exposures using different shutter speeds because I'm old, stuck in my ways and don't like playing around with pictures on a computer.  (I think most people just slide adjustments around on their computer until they're happy now.  Good for them.)  I'm told serious photographers don't shoot JPEGs anymore. It's no skin off my nose. Shoot what makes you happy.

I keep the White Balance on Flash a lot because of when I shoot.  I use to leave it on "Daylight" and never change it.  I still shoot dawn and sunrise on "Daylight".  I spend a lot of time in the shade of the forest (or the mountain) and "Daylight" on this sensor is a little cool for my taste. "Shade" or "Cloudy" (both White Balance choices on my camera) are too warm for me.  "Flash" seems to be just about right.

I cropped the image just because.  Do what feels right to you. They're your pictures. 

Nikon D7500 — Nikon 18-300mm F6.3 ED VR

300m

F11@1/200th

ISO 1,600

White Balance on Flash

Cropped

DSB_9706.JPG

©Don Brown 2025