The Camera's Iris

In optics, a diaphragm is a thin opaque structure with an opening (aperture) at its center. The role of the diaphragm is to stop the passage of light, except for the light passing through the aperture.
Thus it is also called a stop (an aperture stop, if it limits the brightness of light reaching the focal plane, or a field stop or flare stop for other uses of diaphragms in lenses). The diaphragm is placed in the light path of a lens or objective, and the size of the aperture regulates the amount of light that passes through the lens.

The center of the diaphragm's aperture coincides with the optical axis of the lens system.

Most modern cameras use a type of adjustable diaphragm known as an iris diaphragm, and often referred to simply as an iris.


The Camera Iris Function (video)

The Camera's Iris

In optics, a diaphragm is a thin opaque structure with an opening (aperture) at its center. The role of the diaphragm is to stop the passage of light, except for the light passing through the aperture.

Thus it is also called a stop (an aperture stop, if it limits the brightness of light reaching the focal plane, or a field stop or flare stop for other uses of diaphragms in lenses). The diaphragm is placed in the light path of a lens or objective, and the size of the aperture regulates the amount of light that passes through the lens.

The center of the diaphragm's aperture coincides with the optical axis of the lens system.

Most modern cameras use a type of adjustable diaphragm known as an iris diaphragm, and often referred to simply as an iris.


How a Camera Iris Functions (video)

Maya

Here is a photo I took of my baby Maya - she is a husky-whippet mix that we adopted from the local Animal Welfare Association (http://www.awanj.org/). My last dog Pepper, was also from the AWA and I had her for 18 years and 2 months before she passed. She left us on November 20, 2006 and Maya was born seven days after that on November 27, 2006. We adopted Maya in January of 2007.

Maya is a sweet, gentle, people-loving dog - my sweet baby!!

Past Presence Book Project

I started working on a book project in the fall of 2008 and I work on it when I have time, which unfortunately, is not often with my current work and school schedule. The book is tentatively called "Past Presence" and it is a photo/art book project that I intend to self publish. It is truly a project for the fun of it more than anything else and it allows me to indulge in two of my favorite hobbies: photography and digital manipulation.

The concept of the book is to take figures and creatures of myth and legend form a variety of cultures (merfolk, satyrs, fauns, vampires, deities and the like) and to put them into a modern day setting. For example, if the Greek god Pan were alive and on the Earth today - where might he be?

In one idea I had, I placed him as an urban minstrel in a subway tunnel - clothed in jeans but with his horns and cloven feet intact...


The photo of the model was taken against a chroma green screen in my photo studio and then I placed it on a stock image of a urban subway tunnel covered with graffiti. A bit of light and shadow magic in photoshop, the addition of hooved feet and my "Urban Pan" image was finished.

Here are some other images that I have created for the book:

A vampire in an alley...



Isis, a goddess of Egypt as well as the Greco-Roman world...



My idea of the phoenix...derived from a tattoo the model had of a phoenix on his back, actually.



The 'Yuki-Onna' or Snow Woman of Japanese mythology...



...and of course - a merman...




I still have a number of concepts to explore and develop for the book and so far, it has been a fun and interesting project.