More Christmas Tree Bokeh & Some Rad Flare

...because I'm just certain you haven't seen enough of it, have you?! ;)

I was playing with my 50mm lens the other day and decided to share some different sized bokeh shots: small, medium, and large. I always find it interesting to see how a shot can take on a whole new look with the slightest of changes.

I think I like the small best. 

What about you?

I also hopped on board the Karli-Wagon and tried the tree-through-a-lens-shot.

(side note: I just visited Karli's blog to grab the link to her cool tutorial and saw she had bokeh in various sizes, too!  Karli - you beat me this time! ;) )

Anywho, I thought I'd share a little trick for us Nikon users who also want to get a shot like hers. 

(Thanks must go to Sarah Halstead for tipping me off that Nikon lenses are a little different.)

When Nikon lenses are off the camera, the aperture closes. Or pretty close to it.

That tiny hole will not do.

So I decided to come up with a little ingenuity and find a fix for that problem.

Are you ready for my very technical solution?!

Masking tape.

There's a little slider (for lack of a more proper term) on the back of the lens that will allow you to manually open the aperture. I found that by pushing that slider all the way open and sticking some masking tape right against it, my aperture would stay open sans hands.

Not pretty, but it is effective.

This is our little tree in the kitchen.




And this is our big tree in the living room.

(hmmm...perhaps I should clean my lens.)

While I was taking the above shot, I noticed the sun in my lens.
I played around a little with it and ended up with the following fun sun flare and starburst shots.

I think they turned out pretty rad!