Karine Ardault

butterfly

When arriving at the house tonight, I saw a big butterfly busy feeding on some flowers. I jumped out of the car to grab the camera. This beauty was so busy eating that it did not notice me and I could snap around freely.

Thank you little butterfly for making my day!

Adventures in the garden

it was hot today in Arusha. Dry, dusty hot. Before the sun was completely down, I managed to get out without risking a heat stroke. Armed with my camera, I decided to capture the ordinary of the garden life.

The golden hour…always magic. I played with depth of field, the sun and went for an awesome bokeh.

this little guy was busy feeding itself in the orange flowers. I used the flash as the light was quite low and I wanted a sharp image without noise/grain.

Our last visitor standing still… her/his body all fluffy….

Hope your week-end was restful.

Ladybug

Yesterday night, I found this little ladybug or ladybird on the back of my dog. If ladybugs are to be found in this part of Africa I think that I do not see so many of them compared to Europe. I find it a little bit strange as we have so many flowers in the garden to welcome them. It is not only in my garden that I do not find them but in any place I would expect to find them. I could not resist to quickly grab the camera and the led lamp.

Though she was constantly moving and with the lack of light, she was not easy to capture (in camera). She was very active cleaning up her front legs. The photo below was taken without a tripod with the Nikon 60mm macro lens at f/5, 1/160s at 1 000 iso. I used the led light for extra help. I was about 20cm (less than 8in) from her.

She was quite funny to observe.

I prefer the name in French: coccinelle (pronounced co-xee-nel).

In the Studio - Portrait session

We had a friend at home and I could not resist asking her posing.

So we had a photo session with the latest studio equipment I received (I had to try it no?). For those who have asked for it on Facebook, here are some first photos of our Friday photo shoot. We divided in two parts: in the studio and in the garden.

The photo below is one of my favorite.

This beautiful lady might become my favorite model (replacing Ben???): she is beautiful, really enjoy posing, and she gave me that wow feeling when editing the photos. I think I should kidnap her for more pretty soon.

We first dit a shot under studio condition with a flash ligth (Elinchrom BX 500ri) mounted on one of my photoflex softboxes. A photoflex starlight continuous light in a photoflex softbox was there for the fill in light.

If someone could explain me how to mount the Elinchrom BX 500 RI on the photoflex speed ring for Elinchrom without pain or reciting 127 mantras, please comment below!

There was minor editing for all photos This is mainly thanks to the Passport color checker (for the color photos): importing in lightroom, applying propoer color profile, a 30-second-edit in photoshop and about a minute for the color toning or conversion in black and white.

Oh I love this serie.

Everything becomes so sharp with a flash.

All photos inside the studio were taken at f/11

to follow soon: the garden session!

in the garden with….

oh, oh My… following our session in the studio (which is the living room a bit transformed!), we sent to the garden to enjoy the magic hour.

This is my favorite part of the session, and isn’t she stunning?

 

The sun was going down very fast and playing hide and seek behind the trees but it was totally worth it.

I love the one below. it might be my favorite.

 

Big nice flare on the one below.

 

Above and below are the same but different editing.

the editing process was a little more visible on the garden session photos than on the studio photos but I kept it to a minimum.

 

Really, I had a lot of fun during the session. All went great, was so natural,

I had difficulties just to make this short selection as i love all the photos.

 

 

Oh, and this one below!

 

 

Thanks, Tara. Let’s do that again!

all photos taken with Nikon D300…

lazy sunday

Been a bit lazy these days.

Though I had a great photo shoot on Friday. I tried to make some photos outside this afternoon but the clouds were playing way too much with me and driving me nuts. However I managed a few shots including the one below.

D300, Nikon 50mm f/1.4, reflector