Banana Rama + Capture Tips

Image Critiques Flora Critiques
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Sony A77II
Minolta 200mm Macro, CPL
ISO 400, 1/160 @ f8, -1.7FF
I indulged myself with a trip to the Mercer Arboretum Saturday. I was hoping to shoot some water lilies and had some luck but the real fun came in the tropical section. This is some form of giant banana plant. I left the pine needles for a sense of scale. The light was very nice with high overcast and no appreciable shadows or hot spots. I did use a polarizer and some fill flash on this image. The images to follow show the original capture with no flash and no polarizer, one with just the polarizer and one with just the fill flash. I’ve circled the two areas of the image that are affected the most.
Polarizers are generally underutilized in Flora photography so I hope you can see the subtle enhancements possible. More folks do use fill or reflected light to defeat or lighten shadows and while you can do similar things in post processing I like to get the capture to be as close as possible to the finished product. All comments welcome. >=))>

Banana-Rama-35094A77IIXXL
Banana-Rama-35094A77IIXXL1750×1167 1.81 MB

This is the first capture with no polarizer and no flash. Note the shiny reflected light on the red petal edge and the deep shadow below.

Banan-Rama-35089NP-NF
Banan-Rama-35089NP-NF1750×1167 1.39 MB

This is with the fill flash. Much better in the shadows but there is still the reflection on the petal edge.

Banan-Rama-35091A77II-XXLNP-FF
Banan-Rama-35091A77II-XXLNP-FF1750×1167 1.34 MB

And finally, here is the capture with just the polarizer. The reflection is nicely tamed but the shadows are pretty dark.

Banan-Rama-35097A77IIXXL-NF-P
Banan-Rama-35097A77IIXXL-NF-P1750×1167 1.22 MB

1 Like
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Thanks Bill. This is a great explanation and illustrations/photos of the various combinations of filters and how they can (or not) be useful. Thank you so much for taking the time to do this, for the explanations and for sharing it with the NPN community.

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Real interesting subject and great presentation. Thanks for the lesson on using a polarizer vs. fill flash.

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I enjoyed this very much, Bill. Thanks for taking the time to experiment, then share it with us. It is enlightening …(pun intended)

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Bill, what a lovely subject, well composed and presented. I appreciate so much you examples, reminding me once again that a polerizing filter and fill flash combo can work well in nature. I can’t remember when I have done that, it has been so long. So that was a nice lesson to remind me to think about using both.

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Looks good Bill. I have been waiting for my banana tree to bloom. It does not like Michigan winters! Very nice image and a perfect subject for polarizing the flash as well. I used to do quite a bit of cross polarization flash photography on small, shiny orchid flowers. Some color shifting is to be expected, but the subtle highlights are worth it…Jim

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I like the top image best but I’m confused. Is it with fill and polarizer? :thinking:

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Michael: Yes it is with both fill and polarizer.

1 Like
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Bill, a very interesting exposition. I do like the first post the best. The details and colors look the best. This shows very well how interesting nature can be. Using a polarizer is often valuable even on cloudy days.