Fred Bergman |
Shooting Macro's and Close Up's
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John A. Lind |
In the Field: In Studio: Selective depth of field is used to to blur background . . . in other words, lens aperture is stopped down only enough to make the flower itself sharp If in doubt I make several photographs using several lens apertures. If I cannot or do not want to use a small backdrop in the field, I try find a suitable blossom that can be compsed with a distant hedge or the grass lawn as background. Blurred out by effectively using selective depth of field, a hedge or grass lawn (without weeds) can look a very smooth green. I'm going to see if I can post a couple examples. -- John Lind
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John A. Lind |
Well . . . that didn't work . . . OK . . . we'll see if this works . . . with these two in my gallery: Using selective depth of field with lawn as backdrop: Using black backdrop in studio: -- John Lind
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Fred Bergman |
Thanks John, The answer and advice you provided will help me greatly. Most of my field work has been with natural light, I want to try my hand at artifical light in the field, and of course in a studio set up. I have no off camera lighting equipment yet, any recommendations for a tight budget to get started. Strobes, or hot lights. Again thanks for your advice, and those photos are fantastic. Fred
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John A. Lind |
Fred, Strobes (monolights) for studio work . . . and get a flash meter too . . . you'll need it . . . and read up on how to compensate macro exposures when using strobes. Hot lights are just that, hot. They can wilt the flowers and one must work with them carefully . . . burn and fire hazards when moving them and trying to use light modifiers (umbrellas or softboxes). In the field, if you use a remoted flash (with diffuser on it) that's dedicated to your camera system and connected to the hot shoe using the appropriate cord, its output will be controled by the camera's TTL metering and you won't have to worry about flash meter or exposure compensation as it's all metered through the camera lens. I've found diffused light using shoot-through umbrellas or softboxes to work best for me. Direct bright sunlight and strobes without diffusion are harsh, hard lighting. Each has his own style . . . for me, direct undiffused light lost the subtle textures I was looking for. In the absence of strobes, I've shaded flowers in direct sun with something handy (sometimes my own body) and then used a silverized reflector panel to get some diffused sunlight on them from the direction I want. You can get a relatively small one that folds up like the fabric windshield sun shades that have a spring steel wire around the perimeter. Folded up they're small, very light and portable . . . usually one side is optically white satin and the other is silverized. -- John Lind
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