Peekaboo

[henk]

Just wanted to make some nice shots today... and the newts were quite cooperative

 

[henk]

Well I see some didn't load up ; I try it again

(Message edited by henk_wallays on January 06, 2007)

 

[jennifer]

Lovely photos. They really capture the personality and character of this "under-hyped" species.

 

[emelie]

oh those are cute! what kind of newts are they?

 

[jennifer]

I meant to say "under-hyped" SUBspecies. They are Cynops ensicauda ensicauda, a.k.a. "brown newt" or "swordtailed newt". See:
http://www.caudata.org/cc/species/Cynops/C_ensicauda.shtml

The other subspecies, C. e. popei, gets a lot more photographs taken. But who needs white spots?

(Message edited by jennewt on January 06, 2007)

 

[mark]

Great shots as always Henk. Just out of interest do you use a flash? Your lighting looks very natural but the shots are very sharp. I have sometimes achieved lighting like that using a bounce flash or remote flash. I've noticed that many of you recent shots have this soft, natural light that they didn't have previously. What's the secret?

 

[henk]

Nice eye Mark, indeed I did something different with the last shots. the ones I posted before were mazde without flash and long exposure settings ( 2 sec shutter time) at aperture F8. The problem is the animals do not always sit still for 2 sec...

These are shots with flash at 1/80 sec at F5 (which makes the image smoother and less depth of field.. s o somewhat more "dreamy"). How did I get the extra light then in the tank : well I just added a 2Nd TL light in pointed at the back end of the tank (a fluorescentont one).

And with that extra light they started thinking it was spring ... and reproduction time too..

 

[mark]

Thanks for divulging those camera settings, Henk (will be trying those myself

). I think it works well and the lighting looks just right. “Dreamy” is a good look for many macro shots in my opinion. A lower focal depth works nicely as long as the right bits are in focus.

What kind of flash do you use? I’m guessing it’s not the in-built flash. Do you use it off-camera or is it mounted?

 

[henk]

No Mark, I do use the built in flash ... but it is set on fill in flash mode and set to either -2 or +2 dfepnding on the volume of available light.