Project 52 by Kerry S

I've been having a play with still life this week - and am loving it.
This shot was staring me in the face whilst at my Mother in Laws, one of her Orchids was struggling in the heat and was looking quite sad. The afternoon sun coming through the window, was perfectly illuminating the orchid and the black back drop is just her Television :) Everything was just there for the taking :D The only processing I've done is too crop it a little and a very slight adjustment to the exposure.

http://i39.tinypic.com/cqhqo.jpg

Very nicely done Kerry. I like the way the flowers get brighter as you move down the image. I wonder how cropping off most of the plain black on the right hand side would go ? There may be differing opinions on this.

Dave

Thanks Dave. I did originally have a lot more negative space on the right which I actually did like, but cropped anyway. Personally I dont mind the extra space :) As you say, there will be differing opinions though.

Nice one Kerry. The lighting and translucence of the petals against the black background looks lovely.

Wendy

It is nice Kerry. I like the progression of the buds themselves.

Beautiful shot Kerry. The lighting is great!

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Originally Posted by Goldcoastgolfer

Sorry Wendy - it's not a feature built into the D7000 - just the D5100.

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I have to apologise again Wendy - I'm afraid I misinformed you. You can actually do miniature convesions in the D7000. The feature is hidden in the "Retouch Menu" amonst a bunch of other potential interesting on board processing features.

I've been obsessed with my new Macro lens this week. I convinced my son to pose, poor thing :) With macro this close he had to be as still as possible, very hard to keep your eyes open when theres a fat lens in your face LOL. I've borrowed quite a few books from the library on Macro so I'm sure you'll be seeing a lot more Macro from me in the coming weeks ;) The battle I've found is the DoF, but I'm really enjoying learning more and more about this form of photography.

http://i44.tinypic.com/2zgb76g.jpg

I had another look at this and as much as I love the eye itself I think the eye brows at the top left are probably better cloned out.

Kerry I agree with Mal the brow needs to go, but the image is great other wise.

Finally got around to cloning the eyebrow out :)
http://i43.tinypic.com/2whdtvp.jpg

So here we are at Week 6, wow, time is flying :eek: Continuing again with Macro, I took this little fella whilst in Victoria last weekend. I did walk right past him, Mal pointed him out to me, it was quite funny, him whispering for me to back up and slowly, slowly take the shot LOL. I dont know what it is, but I just never have the knack for finding bugs - I think it must be a girl thing :)

So, I dont normally do 'Bugs' so feedback very welcome. If I could have gotten him from a different angle I would have, but I was just worried I'd scare him of.

http://i40.tinypic.com/1zozvvc.jpg

That dragonfly works well. Plenty of focus depth combined with a good angle.

And an angle which made the depth of field extremely critical.

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Originally Posted by kezmal

So here we are at Week 6, wow, time is flying :eek: Continuing again with Macro, I took this little fella whilst in Victoria last weekend. I did walk right past him, Mal pointed him out to me, it was quite funny, him whispering for me to back up and slowly, slowly take the shot LOL. I dont know what it is, but I just never have the knack for finding bugs - I think it must be a girl thing :)

So, I dont normally do 'Bugs' so feedback very welcome. If I could have gotten him from a different angle I would have, but I was just worried I'd scare him off.

http://i40.tinypic.com/1zozvvc.jpg

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Hi Kerry,

Nice shot with a reasonable background.

I'm nosey, so I had to find the EXIF data: Nikon D5100 + Tamron 90mm 1/250s f/11 iso 250.

Regarding your fear of it disappearing; the answer is to take the initial shots, and when they cannot be improved, move closer or around for a better angle and shoot again, slowly moving/advancing - but it sounds like you didn't even try ;)

When you have time to do this properly (not on a family walk), you can always hang around, they are creatures of habit and will often 'fly a patrol' then return to the same spot. Then you can move a little closer to their perch before they return from patrol.

I often shoot these with my 70-300mm, at 300mm, at minimum focus distance, I have tried with the 105mm macro once, but for the same size in frame, I needed to be 3 x closer, so well done for this.

Cheers,

Looks like you have a really sharp image for a subject size that is difficult to get entirely in focus. Great job! I've been told that dragonflies in particular will repeatedly return to the same landing location so even if he does take flight you might be able to get into a better position and re-adjust the camera settings before he returns.

Another technique you might be able to try is a ranged manual focus. Try to determine the manual focus range from soft and close to soft and far for the subject. Once you have a feel for how much of a twist you need to use on the lenses focusing ring to run through the focusing range for this subject, shoot continuous while rotating the focusing ring through the range.

You could end up with 4-8 images, most of which will have some part of the dragonfly in focus. From this set you could choose the best shot. If the dragonfly hasn't moved while you shoot continuous, you could have an excellent stack of image for a focus stacking project on a live subject - something that can be very difficult to achieve, but extremely rewarding when it works.

The continuous firing and focus ring rotation technique will take some practice, perhaps initially on a small but static subject.

Hope this helps!

Hi Kerry, I really love what you are doing with your macro shots. The eye has such a nice look to it - hard to explain, but I really like the way the skin tones contrast with the eye.

I'd be thrilled with the dragonfly shot, great background and compositon. I can't give any feedback because I've never taken a dragonfly shot this good, I'm learning along with you from what others have posted.

Wendy

Personally I love this one as it captures the detail in the post without taking away from the dragonfly. I'm wondering now what it would look like as a B&W...

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Originally Posted by Dave Humphries

When you have time to do this properly (not on a family walk), you can always hang around, they are creatures of habit and will often 'fly a patrol' then return to the same spot. Then you can move a little closer to their perch before they return from patrol.

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This guy did actually fly around for a while but decided to zoom off somewhere else. We didn't actually have the kids at the time either but it was a really hot day. From memory I think Kerry managed to get just under 2 feet away before it decided to take off. I was pretty impressed given she's doesn't normally take photos of bugs close up - well done honey :D

Thanks so much everyone :) As Mal said, he did fly about a bit, tried returning to his pole, but was a bit nervous I think. It was an awfully hot day, we'd been out and about in Ascombe Maze in Victoria for a few hours, (where Mal got his Portal shot in his Project 52) being a Pommy white Red Head is much like being a vampire out in the sun - I'd had enough, was burning up and we were heading for shade when this guy happened along. I did try 'a little' Dave :D but he was a bit skittish and I was too hot. I might need to stick to Winter bugs LOL.

I'm a bit late with Week 7, I've struggled to get out and take some decent photos (honestly havnt had the time or energy). So I thought I would post some photos of my candles that I make. I've been concentrating on getting my little candle business organised over the past few weeks, getting decent photos and advertising material done. By posting my photos here, it is no way intended as advertising, what I'm after is opinions on how to make my Product stand out.
Thanks :)

http://i40.tinypic.com/2ccs8c2.jpg

http://i40.tinypic.com/33o4gfa.jpg

http://i40.tinypic.com/28k0v2b.jpg

Kerry, these are great. Adding additional colour with the masks and varying backgrounds is a brilliant touch. I look at these photos and I can literally smell you candles. They smell great, btw. ;)