Second visit to the hives set amongst some beautiful Canterbury mountain landscapes yesterday.. It was icy cold with a sprinkling of snow on the ranges, and extremely boggy underfoot. The bee activity seems less somewhat this visit, so I’m assuming that the heavy rain recently has not been the best for their communities.
I came back to capture the image with the trees in the background as the last roll had some issues. I got a bit lost and discovered more hives and new places/ angles to capture them, so that was great.
Thoughts? Metering was somewhat better this visit and I set the ISO to 250 vs the rated 400 which helped boost details in the shadows. I’m still not 100% happy with it though, so have some more experimentation to do. I’m also leaning towards a less contrasty image, with details across the tonal range for this series. Feedback from group critique noted how flat the images looked and by adding more tonal range this seems to have been remedied when tested with a series of A4 prints.
I can’t afford to hand hold my second camera that is loaded with Portra 400 at slower shutter speeds though as I move towards more critical portrait image making, so I’ve ordered a second Manfrotto tripod plate to make switching between cameras on the tripod the only option moving forward. I’ve done pretty well hand holding my TLR’s when required at dusk, but feel better with this decision. I’m happy with the composition of this second set as I find my feet in week 3. I’ve also secured multiple portraits of beekeepers in the coming week so now time to move onto capturing the connection of people to their environments (aiming for both home and on location). Colour imagery has become more of a focus for this project too (fuelled by feedback), and I’m becoming more conscious of ensuring I shoot more, especially for portraits in home environments.
