K-5: Ghost Tree in the Mist at ISO 800

I have been away at site this week, as I am every week. From the motel to work in about a 30 minute drive. Travelling to work on Thursday morning there was heavy mist. On the way to work there is this tree I have been going to take a few shots of but have never actually got around to doing it.

Well, even though I could hardly see it from the road, this time, armed with my new K-5, I made myself stop.

The mist is very heavy. Heavier than it looks in this picture. I am standing at the fence line I have 54mm of focal length dialled in on my 18-135 PENTAX zoom.

I am shooting at ISO 800 with an aperture of f8 and shutter speed of 1/125th.

When I had a close look at this picture using Photoshop Elements I was a bit concerned that it did not appear in focus.

But then I realised that I am basically shooting through water vapour in the air and as the tree is about 30 meters away from me it is no wonder it does not look like it is in sharp focus.

Anyway, as you can see, I decided to have a little play with this ‘Ghost’ tree in Photoshop Elements. The first picture shows the image from the camera with a bit of cropping to tighten up around the tree.

The second picture has been massively de-saturated, but not fully de-saturated. There is still the slightest hint of green in the grass in the foreground.

Then with the third version of the ‘Ghost’ tree I have given it the good old tried-and-true sepia treatment. The sepia version is actually my favourite. If I was getting one these made into a wall picture it would be the sepia version.

Behind this tree there is a paddock and then a line of trees; and behind the line of trees are power lines. However one up side to the heavy fog effect is that you can only just make out the line of trees and you can’t see the power lines at all.

Each time in the past when I have thought about taking a few shots of this tree I have been put off by the power lines in the background. Well using the mist works very well as one way of eliminating annoying power lines without spending hours cloning them out using Photoshop—and then not being happy with the result.

As mentioned these shots were taken using ISO 800 and in the 100 percent views there is some digital noise noticeable, but when reduced down from 3264x to 400x (an 8x reduction) any visible digital noise is all but eliminated.

You have to love digital photography when you can have this kind of fun with the one photograph.

I have had my new K-5 exactly one week today and the frame counter is up to 192. I just hope I keep it up.