Are Lens Hoods Wrecking Your Photos In Cold Weather?

[BLev65]

I thought I'd post an example of what I love about cold weather photography... This was my first picture (well 3rd on the card) I took in 2024. We've had miserably ugly weather, but I decided I just needed to shoot something. To be clear, other than using a tripod, I did a lot wrong. Out of desperation I shot my Z9 and 400 f2.8S w/ internal 1.4x and external 1.4x attached. What's more, the final picture was a DX crop. It was about 6 degrees out and windy. I left the lens hood off to reduce one thing that might contribute to heat-induced distortions.
In the last few years, I've spent my winters looking for and photographing minimalistic wildlife landscapes like this...
regards,
bruce

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

 

[gKhan]

I thought I'd post an example of what I love about cold weather photography... This was my first picture (well 3rd on the card) I took in 2024. We've had miserably ugly weather, but I decided I just needed to shoot something. To be clear, other than using a tripod, I did a lot wrong. Out of desperation I shot my Z9 and 400 f2.8S w/ internal 1.4x and external 1.4x attached. What's more, the final picture was a DX crop. It was about 6 degrees out and windy. I left the lens hood off to reduce one thing that might contribute to heat-induced distortions.
In the last few years, I've spent my winters looking for and photographing minimalistic wildlife landscapes like this...
regards,
bruce
View attachment 79014

Nice picture, I like it. It kinda tells a story.
You inspired me to go out now and take a walk and some pics, but I glanced at my home weather station. It says temp is one degree and wind chill is -6. The Nati'l weather service says wind chill is supposed to be minus 22 later this afternoon. I think i'll wait til tomorrow, when the temp is supposed to go up to 4 degrees. Thanks for posting.

 

[Ken Miracle]

Parts of FCP are so pretty in the snowy weather, not sure that I would be ambitious enough to xc ski though, tobogganing yes lol. I spent many years calving and riding horse back in this cold, cannot say that I miss the calving part. I love the cold down to about -40-45.

You just brought back a flood of memories to this 75 year old.

I used to help my uncle calve at his place west of Twin Falls Idaho. When I started in I was very young and small and my job was indoors out of the cold. I was in charge of warming towels in the 2 dryers and getting them for my aunt and doing other misc. things in their big mud and laundry room. My "bigger" cousins were in charge of carrying calve into the mud room to my aunt. My "biggest" cousins helped their dad and uncle pull calves etc.. My first outdoor job was scouting for cows in need of help and alerting my uncle and cousins and carrying calves to the mud room. By the time I was old enough to help pull calves my "biggest" cousins kids were helping with towels in the mud room.

Calving, branding, dehorning time was a family affair with my grandfather and grandmother and me coming from town.

I also helped feed occassionally. My uncle used a hay sled/wagon runners or wheels depending on the winter pulled by a team of mules. I was in my teens when he switched to a flatbed truck when his team got to old to work. My first job was cutting the twine on the bales so my "bigger" cousins could break the bales apart and toss them on the ground. Eventually I graduated to that job My biggest cousins use to help load loose hay with a derrick and feed with a pitch fork before my uncle got a baler.

 

[LouiseDan]

You just brought back a flood of memories to this 75 year old.

I used to help my uncle calve at his place west of Twin Falls Idaho. When I started in I was very young and small and my job was indoors out of the cold. I was in charge of warming towels in the 2 dryers and getting them for my aunt and doing other misc. things in their big mud and laundry room. My "bigger" cousins were in charge of carrying calve into the mud room to my aunt. My "biggest" cousins helped their dad and uncle pull calves etc.. My first outdoor job was scouting for cows in need of help and alerting my uncle and cousins and carrying calves to the mud room. By the time I was old enough to help pull calves my "biggest" cousins kids were helping with towels in the mud room.

Calving, branding, dehorning time was a family affair with my grandfather and grandmother and me coming from town.

I also helped feed occassionally. My uncle used a hay sled/wagon runners or wheels depending on the winter pulled by a team of mules. I was in my teens when he switched to a flatbed truck when his team got to old to work. My first job was cutting the twine on the bales so my "bigger" cousins could break the bales apart and toss them on the ground. Eventually I graduated to that job My biggest cousins use to help load loose hay with a derrick and feed with a pitch fork before my uncle got a baler.

No one escaped being put to work hahaha.
Farming and being meat producers sure isn't for the faint of heart. I remember feeding with teams, no cab tractors, keeping water sources usable and ice free or at least opened up so they could drink, spending hours feeding small squares to 500+ head of stock, keeping horses saddled and switching them out after a few hours. Certain things I still miss doing and others not so much LOL. Hours spent in corrals waiting for calves to be born so that you could grab them and get them to a warm dry spot, fighting mom off while you try to save her calve's life, getting mom to accept that calf after you got it warmed up and dry was always an iffy situation and could take a lot of work. It is a very rough, labor intensive life but so rewarding.
I left the farm 5 years ago after getting hurt by cattle too many times and being told "she raises a good calf" instead of "yes, we'll ship her". I grew up with rodeo stock and it was nicer to handle than our beef cattle are.

 

[BLev65]

Nice picture, I like it. It kinda tells a story.
You inspired me to go out now and take a walk and some pics, but I glanced at my home weather station. It says temp is one degree and wind chill is -6. The Nati'l weather service says wind chill is supposed to be minus 22 later this afternoon. I think i'll wait til tomorrow, when the temp is supposed to go up to 4 degrees. Thanks for posting.

Thanks for the note... It's -7 deg F this morning, but after yesterday's frigid shoot, I decided to stay home and process some work. Tomorrow it will be -6 deg with part sun in the AM... while it will hurt, I will be out for a sunrise shoot at my swan spot. If the wind is negligible, I'm hoping to catch some swans on the pastel water that is ever-present on super cold days... After that, it's back to bed to defrost the frozen fingers

 

[Ken Miracle]

No one escaped being put to work hahaha.
Farming and being meat producers sure isn't for the faint of heart. I remember feeding with teams, no cab tractors, keeping water sources usable and ice free or at least opened up so they could drink, spending hours feeding small squares to 500+ head of stock, keeping horses saddled and switching them out after a few hours. Certain things I still miss doing and others not so much LOL. Hours spent in corrals waiting for calves to be born so that you could grab them and get them to a warm dry spot, fighting mom off while you try to save her calve's life, getting mom to accept that calf after you got it warmed up and dry was always an iffy situation and could take a lot of work. It is a very rough, labor intensive life but so rewarding.
I left the farm 5 years ago after getting hurt by cattle too many times and being told "she raises a good calf" instead of "yes, we'll ship her". I grew up with rodeo stock and it was nicer to handle than our beef cattle are.

One of my "biggest" cousins was a rider, roper and crazy enough to jump off a perfectly good horse onto a steer. He raised rodeo stock for sale and his own use and they were easier to deal with than the rangeland herefords, angus, charolais and crosses the family raised.