The Limbo Connection's photos with the keyword: Canon EF 35-135mm f/4 - 5.6

Avebury, October 2018. Canon EOS 30D and EF 35-135mm f/4-5.6 USM lens; f/11; much processed and changed to B&W. Photographers face a challenge at Avebury stone circle. The site is vast and Alexander Keiller's ambitious project resulted, inter alia, in concrete plinths being positioned where stones once stood in neolithic times. That helps visitors to visualise the layout of the ancients, but making a photograph without a 20th century plinth or two in the composition is not always possible at certain locations. Hence this close focus photograph. The Canon EF 35-135mm f/4-5.6 USM was introduced quite soon after Canon changed to the EOS cameras and EF mount. Thus it was originally designed to go with full frame film rather than early APS-C digital. It was available new from 1990 until 1997. On a cropped sensor Canon it provides a field of view of 55-215mm.

A new edit.

Avebury Stone Circle, early October. Canon EOS 30D and EF 35-135mm f/4 - 5.6 USM lens set at 85mm (field of view equivalent to 135mm on a full frame camera). 200 ISO; f/11; 1/500th. This lens was in production from 1990 - 2000. It's not bad on a crop sensor camera like the 30D and that's allowing for the parlous condition it was in when I bought it from a short-sighted person with very limited powers of description who was a seller on eBay. I had never seen a lens so dirty and neglected; the dirt concealed some scratches on the front element. But as I have remarked before, scratches to the front seldom make a ha'porth of difference, and the dirt didn't prevent a smooth operation of the zoom and auto focus. Not bad for £37.

Shot in Avebury Stone Circle with a Nikkor-O.C 35mm f/2 lens on a Canon EOS 30D.

Avebury. Canon EOS 30D + Canon EF 35-135mm f/4 - 5.6 lens.

Early October; a warm sunny afternoon. A Wednesday, just before a quarter past three. This part of Avebury is not a spot where visitors linger; there's not much to see here. There's something about the stillness, the warmth, the quietness. Something that stirs memories from way back, not vivid, more abstract. Perhaps a melange of recollections. The bus driver has switched his engine off. I don't know how long he stops here before restarting his journey, but it could be a long-ish stop. So it's all quiet and there is a new memory being made which I experience every time I look at this picture. Canon EOS 30D + Canon EF 35-135mm f/4 - 5.6 lens. Lightroom 6.

Canon EOS 30D + Canon EF 35-135mm f/4 - 5.6 lens. Lightroom 6.

Canon EOS 30D + Canon EF 35-135mm f/4 - 5.6 lens. Lightroom 6.

Photographed with a Canon EOS 30D (£59.78 on eBay, February, 2015) and a Canon EF 35-135mm f/4-5.6 Ultrasonic lens (£37 on eBay, July, 2015). The lens was in production for ten years from 1990. It has quite a good reputation for a product aimed at the amateur end of the market. It’s more modern and advanced than the trombone action Canon 35-105mm f/3.5-4.5 EF I had and which I wore out, but it’s not as nice in my opinion. I bought the camera to use with old screw-thread M42 lenses for a bit of a challenge. (You need an M42 - EOS adapter if you fancy doing this. They don’t cost much). Then I saw the 35-135mm lens on eBay going cheap. You could see why from the photograph. It looked as though it had been stored for several years in a shed. It cleaned up OK and the focus motor worked readily. There was a scratch concealed by the dirt on the front of the lens but damage of this sort has to be desperately bad to make much difference in normal use.

Depth of field achieved with a Canon EF 35-135mm f/4-5.6 USM lens on a Canon EOS 30D. The focal length was 135mm; ISO 200; f/5.6; speed 1/800th. This lens was the kit lens for the EOS 10S in 1990.

It is near impossible to do anything with a camera in Avebury that has not been done before, and better. Here I was keen to make a picture without including any people or concrete markers (denoting missing stones). I will admit, however, that it is often the visitors who add much needed interest to the neolithic landscape. Canon EF 35-135mm f/4-5.6 USM on an EOS 30D. F/11, 70mm 1/250th, ISO 200.

Southern Inner Circle at Avebury, Wilts. The cloudless sky and the long shadows provided by the October sunlight prompted me to under-expose the stones in the southern inner circle for dramatic effect. Canon EF35-135/4-5.6 USM lens at 125mm on a Canon EOS 30D in manual mode. ISO 200; f/9; 1/400th.