Fungi

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Fungi
Fungi
CameraSony DSC-F828
Exposure Modeauto
Focal Length7.1mm
Aperturef/2.0
Exposure1/8 sec.
ISO Speed100
Flashoff
Sometimes I wish I could afford a full blown DSLR and a range of decent lenses. Not that my main camera isn't brilliant but the extra versatility of interchangeable lenses would allow me the ability to take a larger range of photos. There are, however, some photos for which my camera is ideally suited and which would be awkward or impossible to take with a DSLR.

The Sony DSC-F828 I own has a weird feature in that the lens will tilt up and down by about 30 degrees. Whilst this may, at first sight, seem a bit strange (I honestly thought I'd broken something the first time it tilted) it turns out to be exceptionally useful. You can take photos over a crowd of people by tilting the lens down and holding the camera up high whilst still being able to see the screen. You can also title the lens up and the hold it level to look down on the screen. This turns out to be great for taking photos of plants and especially fungi where you want to get low down to the ground. You couldn't get as low with a DSLR as the body of the camera would stop the lens laying quite so close to the ground.

Fungi Here is one of the first photos I ever took with the DSC-F828 (it's photo number 49) and again shows just how close to the ground I can get whilst still using the viewfinder properly. I've no idea what type of fungi this is especially given the rather tatty nature of the specimen.

The main photo for this week shows velvet shank growing on a dead tree stump in the garden of the previous house we lived in. At least I think it is velvet shank -- I've been through every page of Roger Philips' excellent Mushrooms book and it is the only thing that looks right. Apparently it's edible but given that I don't really fancy a horrible lingering death I didn't actually find out.

Just to round off the post here are three more unidentified fungi all photographed with the lens on the floor. These were all taken by the Coral Beach on Skye during out holiday last year if that is of any interest to anyone who could identify them!

Fungi on Skye
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    • 2 comments:

    April 12, 2010 at 9:39 AM
    GB said...

    Interesting lens you have. My Sony has a screen which tilts through 180 degrees to achieve the same result.

    April 12, 2010 at 11:03 AM
    Mark said...

    Yeah I've seen those tilt screens on other Sony cameras. While that helps with the looking over crowds etc. it doesn't get the body of the camera fully out of the way to enable you to lay the lens flat on the floor, or does it?

    I must admit it makes the camera look really odd but I find it so useful I'm not sure what I'm going to do if the camera ever gives up the ghost!

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