Advice on improving my bonsai photography is requested

[Greth]

Definitely a lighting problem, esp pics 2, 3, 5, and 8 look 'washed out' due to probably flash overbrightness. This has led to a lack of contrast and depth of colour in the tree. Possbily you could trick the camera into picking up more of the range of shade variation in the tree by having a lighter background, would play with that too. But lighting is the main key, needs to be strong enough to avoid the flash, and not from a single point source (why they use those umbrella thingies) to avoid sharp shadows and an unnatural look.
I have 14 years of professional photographic experience, but all of it Black & White and using an electron microscope! If they were black&white and you threw me in a darkroom with the negatives, I would get em looking brilliant for you
A lot of what I learned is not particularly useful for digital photography in colour, but some of it actually does translate.

With zoom, you have to think about what you need from your final picture. If you are doing them for normal website use, you don't need trillions of pixels worth of detail, sometimes I find I get better focus and results when I stand back further, then crop the picture rather than trying to use the camera zoom. Of course, having a tripod would cut out movement problems, but I have small children to raise who need the money more than the camera shop, sigh, one day.

One final trick which has worked for me both with electron microscopy and with normal photography. Take loads of photos, try a lot of slightly different approaches, and learn to be a really good critic. You wil end up discarding lots, but you are far more likely to get some that really work out right. Fortunately it costs nothing to discard digital photos If you really want accelerated learning, note down what you did for each photo, then you can learn very quickly which ones were best.

Gorgeous trees by the way!

[Leigh Taafe]

Thanks Greth and everyone for your feedback. I have some deliveries to get done today - then I will be straight back out to take some more piccies - hopefully I can come up with something "special"!!

[Sime76]

Leigh,

There has already been some great tips so far.
I think the reason why some of your photos are overexposed (washed out) is probably because of the black back drop. The camera sees all of that black and will want to get the WHOLE photo (not just the tree) to be correctly exposed so it will overexpose to try and compensate. The same thing happens when your photographing a scene with alot of snow or white stuff, the camera will underexpose to compensate and the snow will look grey.
The way to correct this it to use the Exposure Compensation. Its a button that will allow you to dial in +or - exposure. If your gonna stick with the black (further away from the tree) try -1 stop of EC, you should experiment with less or more as well. There should also be a very similar function to control the power of the flash too.

With the lighting, you need some side lighting I think. If inside - use a window with good diffused light coming in (not direct sunlight). If outside you need late afternoon or early morning light or anytime on an overcast day. The flash could still be used to reduce any harsh shadows if any.

Re aperture settings, you want to set the exposure mode ( normally on the main dial) to Av (aperture priority mode) I would set it to somewhere between f8-f12, you could set from that range anywhere up to f22 but generally f8-f12, from what I have read you are getting the best image quality from a lenes and as long as your not zoomed up much there should be enough depth of field. You don't need to worry about setting the shutter speed its done automatically. A tripod or something to rest the camera on would be needed if the shutter speed is too slow however, but your lens has IS so as long as its not less than say approx 1/60th sec you should be ok.

Thats what I'd try for starters.

[Leigh Taafe]

Thanks for everyones help! I quickly rushed a picture with some of the things I have learnt. Still a way to go in my learning - but a damn sight better than where I started!!!

ShimpakuBetter.jpg

[Webos]

Huge improvement Leigh... Looks great! We'd all love to know What you did to create this last photo.

let us know what Shutter Speed, ISO, F-Stop, and what type of lighting you used.

Thanks

[Mojo Moyogi]

Much better colour Leigh, perhaps just a bit brighter.

Cheers
MM

[Leigh Taafe]

Thanks guys!

I had the camera on the "M" setting and just played around with the shutter speed until I got a "decent" pic! Thats all I did!

Oh, I did move the backdrop back from the tree, and moved further away with the camera. I didnt crop anything. I just used 2 x 2 halogen tripods pointing up and down on each tripod. I cant remember the shutter speed that created this one _ I might make some notes tomorrow.

Cheers,Leigh.

[Sime76]

All the settings are on the file, right click on it and select properties and then select the summary tab and then click the advanced tab.

[Leigh Taafe]

Ok - thanks Sime.

Focal length was 55
FNumber was 5
Exposure time was 1/13

There ya go

[dayne]

looksa alot better try a tripod from each side lighting the tree in the middle this should help any shaded areas becom better exsposed not sure but there could be a little bit of movement did u use a tripod and if so sometimes the cheaper ones can move when you push the button so try using the timer of 5secs then it will be still as the photo is tacken great learning though

[Leigh Taafe]

Thanks Dayne - you are right - I didnt use a tripod - still waiting for the one I ordered to arrive! And good tips on lighting too - I think I could probably light the tree up a bit better with some thought.

Cheers,
Leigh.

[Greth]

I would still like to see you try with a lighter background.
Sime is right, but maybe used too much technical language, where I tried to avoid it.
The camera 'sums up' the whole picture, from the darkest to the lightest colours, then adjusts to suit the medium level.
In your original pics, background is black, tree is much lighter, so it treats the whole tree as being very light, and doesn't show the whole range of shades which are actually there. (Washed out, tree looks pale)
If you used a white background, same problem, it would treat the tree as dark, and wouldnt show the tree properly. Tree would look dark and not show detail.
If your background is something about as medium darkness as the tree, then the camera will show the full range of shades present in the tree, and we get the best detail and image. There is quite likely another dimension of this, maybe reddish grounds will work better than greenish grounds, but my colour experience is minimal, so i cant quote on that.

[Psymo]

Looks like your on top of it now and when you get that tripod your going to have some great photography .

[Go_fish]

just a lighting issue. Try this.... As above or you could make you self
a light box from a large cardboard box to difuse the light.

Focusing will come with time. I'd be shooting at around f8-11 let the camera
work out a shutter speed. Iso 100-200.

Also set your camera to centre weight exposure as you really only want the tree to be correctly
exposed if shooting on a black backgroud.

Plenty of Photoshop help if need.

Benny

ps sorry for crappy photo iPhone

[Amanda]

Hey Benny, thanks muchly for that. I have a tripod and cam on order so this has helped immensely.