Day 170 - One more leaf

I don't think I will be doing many more leaves in the near future, although I did want to go out and shoot the leaves in the puddle behind my house.  The weather has been miserable all day, and I couldn't quite do that.

This leaf shot was taken for the Fall photography infosession I had planned for the photo club meeting.  Only 3 people showed up for it, and that too fifteen minutes too late - I had packed up already.  It's a little disappointing when you have worked hard on something because people ask you for it and then they just don't bother showing up or even letting you know they won't.  Oh well!  So much for that, but I have to say it was a learning process for me because I had to do some research besides really plan my images.

This was my first time shooting with a gray card to set the custom white balance.  Although I was shooting in RAW, I wanted to try the white balance in-camera to use as a sample image.

It was a pleasing enough shot, but later I thought I liked the shot taken with the "sunny" preset, better.  Saying this, I have to admit that the gray card came from behind my Photoshop Elements 8 Book for Digital Photographers by Scott Kelby.  And he had already added a disclaimer that the colours wouldn't be really accurate.  So, it's better to get an 18% gray card from a store.  I really like his writing and find it a very humourous instructional style.  I get a good laugh out of it.

Handheld @ 1/30s, f/5, EV -0.67, 109mm, ISO 100, Manual ExpoCustom White Balance

Handheld @ 1/125s, f/20, 84 mm, ISO 800, Manual Exposure

I bumped up the ISO really high on the second one because I wanted to get that lens flare through the branches, and this was the only way I could get a small aperture and a fast shutter speed.