Camera Club Practical Evening 19/03/2025
Blog post

On the 19th March 2025 we enjoyed a practical evening at the camera club trying out new things and camera settings with simple table-top projects.

I think a huge thanks goes out to all those who organised table-top projects which made the evening a huge success which was well received by all members.

Here are some of the images captured on the night.

Tulip with hessian background (Nick's images)

A big thanks to Debbie for this one. A simple setup of a tulip in a small vase against a hessian background. Here are three versions of essentially the same shot with various adjustments.

Camera setting...

• Tulip 1: 1/160th shutter speed, 65mm focal length, F5 aperture, ISO 1600 Auto adjustment in Lightroom Classic
• Tulip 2: 1/200th shutter speed, 65mm focal length, F5 aperture, ISO 1600 Manual adjustment in Lightroom Classic
• Tulip 3: 1/200th shutter speed, 65mm focal length, F5 aperture, ISO 1600 Manual adjustment in Lightroom Classic plus the addition of 3 additional texture layers set to multiply applied in Photoshop

Further images from Debbie's setup (Debbie's Images)

Debbie also tried various flowers and a different background. Here are some of her images from the night.

Further images from Debbie's setup (Julie's Images)

Julie also tried various flowers and a different background. Here are some of her images from the night, and I think one or two others inspired by the night.

Hazel's setup. White rose against a black background (Nick's images)

For these images, Hazel had setup a rose behind a persex screen and a black background behind and above. Strong side lighting was provided by her setup of Small Rig lights. A mist water spray was applied to the perspex screen to enable the effects captured.

I wanted to try out some High ISO images to see just how much noise would be captured, so I took all these handheld and pushed the ISO a bit. The first image was Auto Focus, so naturally the camera focussed on the water drops, so for the other two images I focussed manually.

Other camera settings as follows...

• Rose 1: 1/100th shutter speed, 105mm focal length, F8 Aperture, ISO 1600, Lightroom Adjustments
• Rose 2: 1/160th shutter speed, 105mm focal length, F8 Aperture, ISO 3200, Lightroom Adjustments
• Rose 3: 1/80th shutter speed, 105mm focal length, F16 Aperture, ISO 3200, Lightroom Adjustments

Sue's setup. Blue necklace on a blue background (Nick's images)

This is one that Sue set up in a mini light tent with a blue fabric base and background. Again I was trying out the high ISO setting and handholding, Also playing around a bit with exposure compensation and spot focus points.

Camera setting...

• Necklace 1: 1/160th Shutter speed, 105mm focal length, F16 aperture, ISO 3200, about 2 stops under exposure compensation (in camera) and Lightroom Adjustments
• Necklace 2: 1/30th Shutter speed, 105mm focal length, F16 aperture, ISO 1600, Lightroom adjustments

Further images from Sue's setup (David's Images)

David also tried his hand with a few different objects in Sue's mini light tent. Here are some of his images from the night.

Further images from other setups (Paul C.'s images)

Paul went for something different and had a go at polarised plastic.

Further images from other setups (Julie's images)

And something different from Julie.

Further images from other setups (David's images)

And something else from David.

Broccoli on a black background (Nick's images)

I'm not sure who set this one up, but I thought I'd give it a go, there's been quite a lot of adjustment in Lightroom with masks to darken the quite untidy black background and retain the detail in the veg. This was a bit of a grab shot at the end of the evening and really to try out masks and see what I could pull ot from quite a poor image.

Camera settings...

• Broccoli 1: 1/160th shutter speed, 63mm focal length, F4.5 aperture, ISO 1600, Lightroom masks and adjustments