The sudden thought that my Olympus Micro Four Thirds camera may be sensitive to infrared light had me jumping out of my chair, looking for the TV remote control. Modern controllers change TV channels using that wavelength of the electromagnetic spectrum, and the camera has no anti-aliasing filter in front of the sensor. A swift test - shining the remote control "torch" into the lens during a long exposure - quickly established that I was barking up the correct tree.
I've shot mono infrared film in the past, and the way to get the best results was to use the right filter for the job. I still have a screw-in R72 filter, but the thread size didn't match the lens I intended to use for some tests. A couple of blobs of Blu Tack solved that problem, and I set off out to see what I could achieve.
Metering for a subject is virtually impossible since ordinary camera light meters are not calibrated for wavelengths invisible to the naked eye, so some bracketing of exposures is involved. However, the electronic viewfinder proved its worth by getting me in the ballpark straight away.
Results are disappointing when compared to infrared film, and the above image needed a fair bit of work in two software programmes to get anywhere near what I had in mind. But it has started me thinking, once again, that having a spare digital camera converted for infrared photography is the only way I'm going to get the look I want.
Olympus OM-D EM-10 MkIII with 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 Pancake lens. 1.6 seconds at f/8. ESP metering. Hoya Infrared (R72) filter. Monopod. ISO 640. File processed in Affinity Photo and Silver Efex Pro 2.
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