Monday 24 January 2011

WPC 2011 - Week 4 - Colourful

When I saw this week's WPC 2011 subject of Colourful, I was really worried (details of what WPC 2011 is to be found here).  I didn't really want to go running to my wool stash, because I take photos of yarn all the time.  This challenge is supposed to be about stretching my abilities, so I wanted to try something different.  The trouble is, in January in the UK everything is grey, grey, grey!  I didn't know what to do, so I thought I would let my mind churn it over.  Then today I went to the shop, to buy my lunch, and what should I find in a box by the door, but these little beauties.


Aren't they fab?  They were only £5, which seemed well worth the money, for the amount of colour they bring into my house.

I took over 50 shots of these tulips and I tried using a flash, using the photo tent, without a flash, increasing exposure, changing ISO.  I did lots.  I was very proud of myself for trying so many different ideas.  Most of them didn't work very well, but I tried.

After much playing with cropping and fill light etc, I managed to winnow my selection down to three shots.


I had forgotten how much fun it is to make collages with Picasa ;-)  I am pretty happy with all three of these images.  I took all three inside the photo light tent.  I could never get such a clean background without it.  I think it makes the photos look pretty professional, and means there is no distraction from the background.

The photograph I decided to submit to the Group Pool is bottom right in the collage.


It is interesting when I look at the settings for each of these photographs.  The longest exposure was for the top right photo.  I really loved this photo too, as I believe the colours are the cleanest and brightest.  However in this image, and the large one on the left of the collage, I am not keen on the way the leaf cups the orange flower.  It seems such a small thing, but it spoils both these images for me, despite having slightly stronger compositions than the one I submitted.

The photograph I selected had 1/60 exposure time, ISO of 200 and normal sharpness.  The white balance is set as cloudy.  As you may guess from the details I'm including about the photograph, I still haven't read my new digital photography books.  I will get to them this week.... I hope.  This lack of research means I am probably listing NONSENSE!!!

Even without knowing what I am doing, I feel that my photographs are getting better, if only because I am trying lots of different things with one particular item.  I have to say, I'm really enjoying these weekly challenges.  It's just as well really, I've got 48 more to do!

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