Jim's Greenhouse

[Jim_Mercer]

Still not decided how many are dead as recent weather and watering seems to have revived some plants

Looking through the door

To the left

and to the right

I was going to add some more detailed pictures then found the 5 attachment limit so the links below should take you to my photostream on Flikr where I have created a set for the greenhouse tour http://www.flickr.com/photos/23418154@N ... 546051586/


tour026 by aCactus2008, on Flickr

[Cactus Jack]

Hi Jim , very nice , they are well packed in but looks good .

[Julie]

Jim has forbies! Everything is going to be okay.

It's not a proper collection unless there is a forby in there somewhere.

[Morgans Beauty]

very nice coloured crassula-bonsais in there jim!!! thx for showing us your holiest

[Jim_Mercer]

Now that I have allocates spaces to my purchases at Harrogate and the North West Cactus Mart and finding a few gaps which might mean I might take a trip to Spalding tomorrow but I also realised that there is no easy space available for taking photographs if I want to isolate a plant from its neighbours. Recent photo sessions have involved moving at least three plants off the staging (and onto the floor).

Today's solution is a small piece of extra staging

The stage

The back of the new piece slots into the existing staging - the fixed backboard should mean I am not tempted to leave it in as a permanent fixture as if I did that I am sure some plants would find a permanent home on it.

I think I will leave the hardboard unpainted as it does give a fairly neutral background

Rebutia pygmaea

One reason for not painting it is I cannot decide what colour it should be, for most of my recent pictures I have used some cheap craft paper from a multi-colour pack and the new staging was "designed" to make use of this paper and allow a bit of space for me and my tripod.

Stage set

Results

Mammillaria

Rebutia again

Comparing the two Rebutia pictures makes me think that I am getting a much greater depth of focus using the "standard" lens on my EOS450D but the macro lens does have the advantage of a longer focal length so less danger of casting a shadow.

[Acid John]

Jim can you close you macro lens down to say F22 and then take a longer exposure, that should give you a nice depth of view.

[Jim_Mercer]

Switching to av mode it seems I can go as far as f57 but the resulting shutter speed really requires tripod and remote release even in bright sunshine. This was taken at f40..

As taken

..which brings about the next question, how much editing should you do in your preferred photo editing software

In most of my pictures I have limited my editing to changing the background to a single solid colour and some slight tweaks to brightness & contrast. While reducing the above image down to a suitable size for uploading I noticed lots of dust/pollen on the petals. A few clicks of a healing brush and the spots are gone.

Healed

[BrianMc]

Hi Jim,
No wasted space in your greenhouse .

As far as photo editing goes, speaking as a professional photographer/retoucher, its best to get it right at the photography stage - time is money! Photo editing is for things that cannot be avoided or have been carelessly overlooked

A little soft brush or blow of air before photography can save more time at the computer later. Looking at a macro shot one often sees things not visible to the naked eye, so its always worthwhile to look at the subject through a magnifying glass first.

Your picture of the rebutia against the hardboard is certainly unclutured and focuses the attention to the plant, but I must just pull you up on your terminology. The hardboard cannot be termed 'Neutral'. In photographic terms 'neutral' indicates that it has no colour cast (ie. perfectly balanced - white, grey, or black) something which obviously does not apply to the hardboard.

The longer focal length of your macro lens, due to the laws of physics, means that it inheritantly has a shorter depth of field when photographing from the same distance with the same aperture, but I'm guessing the macro lens is capable of stopping down smaller.

[matchat]

Hi Jim, you mention that stopping down as far as f57 requires a tripod and remote release. I see that you already have the tripod which should really be used in macro photography anyway. You don't need a remote release though, just use the self timer function on your DSLR and step away until the camera takes the picture.

[Jim_Mercer]

Using f57 seems to confuse exposure meter, but winding back to f40 appears OK - not sure how real these values are as the lens itself only goes down to f32 but I am also using the life size converter and then there is the 1.6 focal length factor for the APS-C sized sensor. Using self timer would mean trying to find appropriate menu option which I would then forget to reset

I already have a remote control - a very cheap purchase from Amazon at a fraction of the price of the "proper" Canon part.