I may have mentioned awhile back that I would be getting a new Lensbaby lens for my birthday. What with travel and jet lag and trying to catch up from being gone it has taken three weeks to get the new Velvet 56 into my hands. With a minimum focus distance of 5″ this lens has the most macro capability of any of my Lensbabies. I’m currently taking an online class in color so I set out to kill three birds with one stone by completing my color homework, testing the new lens and getting something done for the 100 days project. I’m not sure I succeeded, at least from the color standpoint. To my eye the burgundy cloth and the burgundy hydrangeas were about the same tone. But the camera wanted the flowers to be pink and the cloth red. So, I adjusted the color toward blue and added two bluish toned filters to try to bring it back to what I was seeing in the studio. I used the little bucket and a tin ceiling tile for neutral tones to play against my color. One thing I have noticed so far is that while the velvet 56 can stop down to f1.6, I haven’t been able to get anything in focus at that aperture…it may work better in full macro modes, we’ll see. In any case I look forward to playing with my new toy some more in the days ahead.