Spider!

This is a photo of a spider taken in a beautiful forest in the UK.

How did you get a black background?

Having a black background adds a dramatic effect to the photo and also focuses your eyes on the main subject. To get this effect you have to eliminate the flash from hitting the background. So In simplicity, the object must be far away from its background. You cannot have say; a spider on the floor, as then the flash would hit the floor, which would then illuminate the photo. For my photo however, the spider was in a web hanging from the tree. There were plenty of feet between the web and the tree in the distance, so that the flash would not hit the tree and ruin the shot.  There’s also one more thing. The in-camera settings.

First you want to set your camera to the maximum sync speed (speed which your shutter and flash can work together. 1/200 for me).  Next set your iso at 100. The last thing is to set your aperture. Start with a low aperture of say 5.6, take a picture (no flash) and see if the photo is black. If not, close down the aperture more. Say to 8.0. Keep stopping down the aperture until you manage to get a fully black photo. Once you’ve got that sorted, you can turn on your flash and your good to go.

November 24, 2013 | Categories: Macro, Spiders | Tags: Adobe Photoshop, arts, black background, Edit, illustration, iso, Macbook Pro, Macro, Nikon D3200, photographer, Photography, Photoshop, software, spider, spiders, technology | Leave a comment