Category Archives: still life

Smoke

still life, studio

Something I wanted to try for quite a while….. Smoke….

Well here are some of my efforts. I used an insence stick as my smoke source and my Metz flash at 1/16 power. I used my EF-100mm macro lens but in hind sight this was not the best choice as I didn’t give myself much room to step back and take a wider view with cropping afterwards. Trying to focus on a moving smoke column when you are close up with a macro is a nightmare. The flash was placed around 50cm from the smoke (at about 2 o’clock from the camara position) and used without a diffuser.

Grape

still life

Yesterday had a fun and informativfe evening at my photo club in The Hague (Images Photo Club). Of course I entered the Photographer of the Year competition with my first entry and got nowhere (nothing changes). Anyway the winner was a smasher so I don’t feel bad. Here’s my entry. The competition title was “Green”.

grapje = joke (NL)

Strawberry Milkshake

still life, studio

Something I always wanted to try and finally decided to make a go of it…. A high speed photo of an object falling into a liquid. I decided a strawberry into milk would make a suitable subject and it fitted well with a task I had been set to capture something that suited the title “bon appetit”. My setup was basic with my  two Metz flash heads set at 1/32 an 1/64 power and placed diagonally at 45 degrees from the camera (one bottom left the other top right. As this was my first try at such a thing I simply left the heads unmodified but believe a diffuser would have been to my advantage to try to remove some of the shadows. I dropped that strawberry into the milk so many times the poor fruit started to become strawberry jam. It was not easy to synchronize the shot and hitting the milk. More often that not it was too early but mostly just too late. Also it does splash a bit. Next time I’ll wrap some cling-film around my flash head bodies. Anyway, here are some results….

Anyone for Tea

Flowers, Gardens, still life

Went to the Keukenhof this weekend.

If you’ve never been then it’s well worth battling the crowds for. I didn’t go to take photographs per se but I took my camera anyway. Who wouldn’t.

Th weather was cold but sunny. The longish winter we have had did mean that the amazing bulb displays were a little behind schedule. However the pavilions were magnificent. Displays of orchids or flower arranging or just gazillions of tulips were very spectacular (as were the prices in the restaurant).

Instead of row upon row of flower photos I have chosen just one. Taken with natural light in the flower art pavilion, the lighting was rather subdues and as my camera was hand held I upped the ISO and took a good stance. Back home, the arrangement and colours really spoke to me as a sort of abstract collage. I decided to try something new and exported the adjusted shot to Photoshop as a smart object. This allows the RAW file to be adjusted at any time. I then duplicated this, resulting in two smart objects. I then blended using differing blend modes and double clicked on the duplicate smart object layer to allow me to adjust exposure (just like HDR). Here’s the result. I could have started masking etc., to enhance certain parts of the photo. Maybe I will do that later and make a large print of it.