Last year, I bought myself a Lensbaby Composer. If you've never heard of the Lensbaby, it's a company that makes lenses, optics, and accessories geared at producing very funky photographic creative effects. The Composer in particular produces pictures that basically look like they're in focus on one spot, and smudged everywhere else. The cool thing about the Composer is that it pivots along a ball-and-socket joint, so depending on how you angle your lens, the focus area (aka the "sweet spot") changes, and the amount of smudge changes. The size of the focus area depends on the aperture you're using. The bigger the aperture, the smaller the focus area (due to shallow depth-of-field). The kicker (as if the smudgy, pivoting pics weren't enough) is that the lens is completely manual. Manual focus, and manual aperture change. The aperture is controlled by different-sized aperture rings that must be put in and taken out manually. Needless to say, it's a bit of a pain in the arse.

I tried the Lensbaby Composer at one of my local photography stores one weekend last year, and thought it was pretty cool. But I had to sit on it for a couple of days before I finally decided to buy it. When I got home, I was super-excited to try it out. I spent the evening playing around with the lens, and was disappointed that the images turned out very blah, and didn't seem to be in focus. And so, after $250 and one evening of play, I put it away. And it gathered dust in the back of my closet.

Then, a couple of weeks ago, my Lensbaby found a new reason to live. It all started because I was walking around Urban Outfitters one day. I went there specifically because I'd read about some Hipstamatic-esque analogue cameras that they sell at the store. After looking around, I found this darling piece of equipment: the Lomography Fisheye 2 camera. And it only cost $80! I've always always always wanted a fisheye lens, but could never justify getting one. The fancy-pants Canon L-series fisheye lens runs around $1,500 - YIKES! Thanks, but no thanks. Not for something that is mostly a just-for-fun type of lens. So obviously the Lomography Fisheye 2 camera seemed like a reasonable alternative.

That evening, I excitedly told my hubby about the camera. And then the pointed out the fact that it would be fun for like two seconds, after which I would probably be annoyed by the fact that it was a film camera. Touché, hubby...touché. And then he suggested that I check out the Lensbaby lenses to see if they had any affordable fisheye lenses. And lo and behold, they did! Enter the Lensbaby Scout with fisheye optic. It was EXACTLY what  was looking for. And at $250, the price was right. So I ordered it, direct from the Lensbaby site. Which, by the way, is cheaper than going through a site like B&H Photo (though I still love them too), because Lensbaby ships using USPS, which means low low customs brokerage fee, AND it arrived in Toronto really really fast. Thumbs up!

And while I waited for my Lensbaby Scout to arrive, I decided to dust off the Lensbaby Composer and give it another shot. And am I ever glad that I did. This time, I armed myself with some reading material, and took the lens outside. I basically found out that I didn't have the diopter set up properly on my camera (much more forgiving with "regular" auto-focus lenses), which is why my pictures looked like crap. That and when I tried tilting the lens too far to the side, my sweet spot got lost outside of the lens' visible range. I have to credit the book, Lensbaby: Bending Your Perspective for giving my Composer some new life. So, enough talk. Let's see some pictures!

Picture of my daughter, taken with the Composer at f4.

My obsession with snails continues...again, at f4.

To see the full Composer album, check it out here.

And then my Scout arrived in the mail, and I rejoiced. Even moreso when I took it out for a spin. I absolutely looooooove the super-wide angle. I decided to take it out for a spin around downtown Toronto. I think I died and went to photography heaven. Seriously.

Toronto Financial District.

I love streetcars!

So much fun for close-ups!

To see the full album, check it out here.

I can't wait to try some more photography with these two lenses. I have a couple of family photoshoots coming up, so I am totally excited to try these out during those sessions. Stay tuned for more photographic fun!