For almost a week I have been documenting the bloom of an Amaryllis we received as a gift. The main reason I did this was to gain confidence when utilizing a high iso on my 7D. This camera is not know for it’s high iso capability so for the past year with that fact in my head I was guilty of underexposing images due to the fact that I was scared to go above a setting of 1600. Many times I am unable to use flash and find myself fighting for light.
For those who do not know what iso is, it is an integral part of the exposure triangle which allows more light to reach the cameras sensor. The main drawback is an image that turns out dirty. By this I mean it may have noise or grain showing. Until recently consumer model cameras were incapable of producing acceptable images if the iso was raised. I have been shooting a lot of studio stuff the past few months and dance season is right around the corner. I need to try and establish some further confidence when I need a shutter speed of 1/500 and the only way I can get there is with an iso of 2500+.
So, I set my iso to 2500, aperture to f4 on the trusty 24-105 and varied the shutter speed based on lighting conditions. The only constant light I had was the heating lamp pointing into the dragon tank. Indirect at best. Normally I would turn on the room light, and sometimes the sun came in through the windows.
We had the plant almost three weeks before it began blooming and once it started it was quite cool watching it open. The first hint appeared on Dec 23. I tried to capture an image every 12 hours or so.
During the 26th growth was rapid!
LR4 Noise reduction was used to clean them up a bit, but overall I am very happy with the results. If this is any indication then I have been missing out on some very good captures exposure wise. I remember one thing from my boy scout days,sitting around a fire repeating these words until it was figured it out…
o-wa-tana-siam
Mr. 7D you have restored my faith, if you need to raise the iso to get a good exposure, go for it. It’s OK……I should have listened to Jared Polin a long time ago….
Happy New Year!
Thanks for stopping by! Till next time….
Twilight and Dusk 