Close Up and Macro Photography – Ken Payne – Friday 16th October 2020.

Last night Ken Payne joined us via Zoom to give us his presentation on close up and macro photography. His presentation included the following elements:

· Getting the best out of an image.

· Flower close-ups

· Photo stacking

· Presentation of some of his flower images

· Some recent infra-red images.

Ken began by showing us the very simple set-up he uses in his kitchen using natural light to illuminate many of his images from either the side or the back; the remainder being taken outside, mostly in his garden.

Ken quite often uses extension tubes to with macro lenses to provide greater detail. Since this produces a very narrow depth of field it requires photos to be taken at different focus points then stacked using software to produce front to back sharpness of the flower. He very clearly demonstrated how to photo stack, using for just a few images in the stack, Lightroom and Photoshop. For a greater number of images, he demonstrated 2 methods. Firstly, taking images into Bridge, then Camera Raw and finally Photoshop. Secondly, using specialized stacking software (e.g. Helicon Focus) in conjunction with RAW editing software (e.g. Lightroom).

He emphasised the importance of trying to find different angles and shapes within the flowers and plants, not always going for the obvious, and his many beautiful images illustrated this point clearly.

He finished the evening by showing us some of his recent infra – red images.

Our thanks to Ken for a very informative and interesting evening, and for sharing some of his lovely images.

Next week Sharon and Robert Prenton Jones will be giving a talk – ‘The art of Composite Photography’.