In honor of President’s Day, I thought I would share this photo from a trip to Washington, D.C, in February 2009. Before the trip, I rented a fish-eye lens from Pictureline in Salt Lake City so I could play with it during my trip to determine if it’s worth adding to my lens repertoire. That lens explains the outer-edge curves of this photo.
It was a very blustery night at the Washington Monument. At one point, I actually dropped a lens cap and the wind kept it rolling across the floor, with me chasing after it, for a good 30 yards. I felt like an idiot chasing after it, but retrieved it and continued shooting.
Thinking back on it, I wonder how a depth of field change would have enhanced the photo. Maybe keep the first flag in focus, and the others ones more blurred the further away they got. I guess this just means I need to take another trip there to shoot a lot more photos.
And, I decided that I wasn’t quite ready to own a fish-eye lens – mainly because of the price and the amount of use I would get out of it. I’m thinking a macro lens may be next on my list.
~signed, Carltonaut
Carltonaut 
I think the fish-eye lens did rather well to accentuate the curvature of the curved walkway. If that was the main focus of attention (circles or semi-circles), then don’t worry so much about focusing the camera on the first flag. But then again, an image is so subjective. I like it just the way you captured it! Great job!
Thanks. I appreciate your comment about the photo. I do like the effect the fish eye lens gave to the photo. I guess I just like to second guess other things I could have done with the shot, had I thought about them when I was there. I am sure many of us find ourselves thinking the same thing.
Love this shot! We rented a fish-eye lens from Pictureline last year when we put our house on the market. Amber took some amazing interior shots with it. I’d love to add it to our collection.
As mentioned, I would love to add one to my “toolkit,” but the price tends to keep it in the store rather than my camera bag! Maybe one day.