Silky Astrophytum flower

[Aloinopsis]

This one particular Astrophytum flower looks very silky so I took pictures of it in different lights.

It's nothing special but it's so beautiful!

[walker87]

Very nice!
Lovely iridescence about it!

[DaveW]

Nice pictures. You have managed to hold the highlights and retain texture in them on most of the petals so they have not burnt out. Always difficult on shiny flower petals. The strong coloured lights are producing a colour cast on some of the pictures though, which to me does not enhance them. Probably you would have been better using white light and coloured background cards? I prefer the last four pictures.

Using coloured lights for effect is more photo club photography than record or natural history photography, therefore it depends what final use you want to put the pictures too? If you use white light and a black or grey background so as not to produce a colour cast you can change the background colour in post processing as I did here:-

http://www.cactiguide.com/forum/viewtop ... 33&t=38264

[Aloinopsis]

Everything was done outdoors as the clouds moved overhead and the lights changed. I didn't use any kind of bulbs so I didn't have much control over it.

[leisurely]

Nice job with the photography Dave. Looks like you know your stuff. Sometimes I get lucky and get quality such as you have shown but certainly not as a general rule. But I can name numerous excuses for my failure.

[DaveW]

An overlooked accessory if you are shooting in bright sunlight, which some countries experience more than the UK is a diffuser. Not those used on flash guns, but basically ripstop white nylon on a folding frame that simulates a light white cloud over the sun (supposedly the best type of photographic lighting) and therefore cuts the amount of contrast in the picture making it easier to stop the highlights on the petals burning out to texture-less white areas. These are available on EBAY usually of Chinese manufacture a lot cheaper than photoshops sell and quite good enough for our purpose.

See:-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVV4mcfygQo

We were taught in night school photography in the monochrome days the only parts of a scene that should print out to paper base white on the printing paper (meaning that part of the negative was completely transparent) were specular reflections off water or chromium plating, meaning all other highlight areas should show slight texture or density on the negative. The same still applies in digital, the highlights should not actually burn out.

One thing available on many modern digital cameras that was not available on film cameras is the highlights indication or "Blinkies" as it is often known. Something that usually has to be turned on via the menu if available (see your camera manual) since the camera usually comes with it turned off. Depending on how high end the camera is the more auto information is available, but few of us need more than the basic blinkies, and if you get these flashing you just take another picture reducing the exposure until they disappear. A luxury you did not have with film since you did not find out overexposure until the film was processed and then often too late to take another picture.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQjDDM4WSIo

[mikethecactusguy]

Pretty.