This Challenge....

Manual focusing with a Lensbaby lens. The following shots were taken with a Lensbaby Sweet 50. What the heck is that?

Well the lens itself is odd looking because you can change the place of focus. Choosing your aperture and place of focus is a challenge. Most lenses are static, they stay in place and you focus on what you want composing your photo with a fair amount of ease.

The Lensbaby Sweet 50 looks like this. You can swivel the lens about to change the spot of focus you wish to have. The one pictured is a Sweet 35. To the right of the shot you can see the apertures that can be picked for shooting.

The lens can be locked in place so your focus point is in the middle or slightly off center. The smaller the aperture, the smaller the point of focus.

Why on earth would anyone want to monkey with something like this? This is considered an 'art' lens. It allows the photographer to step out of their comfort zone. The lens can create unique affects inside the camera. Meaning, no after processing needed in most cases.

The shots can create dreamy bokeh with dreamy distortions...or produce unusual effects in camera.
 

I shot this crab spider on a white moss rose. The focus was moved by me to try and catch this little spider crawling around on the petals. Was it easy? Oh heck no!

It wouldn't have been easy with any lens at all. It took me several tries and a lot of patience to get this one shot. I shot it at f 2.5 which didn't give me a whole lot of focus room. But I liked the challenge.

Here is another example. A spent sunflower in black and white.

I went to a larger aperture and backed away from the flower to capture just the flower in focus. I could have done this one with any lens, but I wanted to practice with this one.

These are a few of the other shots I felt worth keeping after walking around with this odd contraption on my Olympus camera. 

I used focus peaking which works most of the time to see what exactly was in focus. Not every shot came out as expected. 

This is an alphalfa flower blooming in a hay field.

A beautiful blue Chicory flower.

Highbush Cranberries

Nasturtium, ready to open.

In this shot, I shifted the focus slightly to the right on this oak tree. I wanted to show how the focus shifts and the areas around are 'blurred'. 

I'm fairly sure that this beloved tree will disappear once the loggers get to it. 

Sunshine walking past some Vervain flowers in her pasture. [Yes, she still needs a hair cut and a few burrs pulled from her mane]