As exotic as this may seem, it was actually taken in my living room...
First time I ever had flowers with this plant, and my daughter went to get her gecko for a photo shoot.
Natural light only coming from the window as snow was falling outside (so not that much light to my taste). My daughter was holding a black cardboard for the background and my son was holding a white shoe box to reflect some light.
The gecko was having a feast with the nectar of the flower!
Even my daughter tasted it and said it was very sweet...
A little disappointed with my camera's performance with low light situations like this one. Too much noise for my taste...
Oh well, can't afford an upgrade so I'll have to do with it...

This was taken with the kit lens 18-55 since it allowed me to get closer to the subject than my 55 mm.

I think I enjoy shooting animals more than people....

Camera Canon EOS Digital Rebel XSi
Exposure 0.013 sec (1/80)
Aperture f/5.6
Focal Length 55 mm
ISO Speed 800
Exposure Bias +2/3 EV
Flash Off, Did not fire
Software Adobe Photoshop CS4 Windows

I like it, shame it is dark, but you probably could not do it better.

love the framing
but yes is a pity its a little dark

too dark

Good try Marie. If you can, try redoing the shot with your pop-up flash. Set FEC to -1 to -1 1/3 stops and put a piece of sketching paper or something that can diffuse the light 3-4 inches in front of the flash. I think you'd get slighty better results.

Edit: oh make sure to drop your iso too.

This post was edited by Eek on Feb 9 2011 06:58am

I have an XSi too, and I understand your unhappiness with the noise. I really tend to stay as low as possible with the ISO. It'll be refreshing when I upgrade to a new body...

As for your photo, I like the composition with the flower. The only thing would be, as others have said, that it's a little dark. That's just a matter of lighting. I like to look up lighting diagrams online to see what other people have done and just play around with it. I don't have fancy lighting but you can make due with just about anything.



And as Eek said, even the pop-up flash might have helped here but you should diffuse it definitely for a shot like this.

This post was edited by bergmann on Feb 9 2011 07:10am

i have often used folded over tissues to defuse the flash, it works great

Marie don't you ever discount post processing. Sometimes you can't get the perfect shot, but you did an incredible median exposure that lets you raise brightness where you need it and lower it where you don't. Try something like this in photoshop!

10/10.

Yeah, postprocessing does 50% of the work.
I would reccomend you to shoot in raw.

But then you'll be sacrificing IQ by adding some fill light and adjusting curves which will in turn increase noise levels. Doing NR will drop the IQ even more. There's just a satisfaction of doing it right in camera and start off with the best possible shot!

I'm not saying don't post process, but just don't rely on it.