When looking through the viewfinder it may appear that you have plenty of light, but generally
you won’t have nearly enough. A small aperture requires a LOT of extra light. Whether you are
shooting indoors or outdoors, the smaller apertures you will be using in macro/close-up
photography will almost always mean that you’ll need to find a way to get more light to your
photo sensor.
To get enough light for a proper exposure, here are three possible “fixes.”
- We can provide additional light sources.
- We can decrease the shutter speed. Allowing the shutter to remain open longer lets more
light reach the sensor. - Finally, we can increase the ISO speed which means that we will need less light for our
exposure.
Each of them has benefits and drawbacks that we will discuss shortly.
*****************If you hadn’t noticed, being a creative photographer is really little more than working your
way through all the various options, choices and problems until you arrive at what you
consider to be an acceptable destination. The way you deal with all these issues is what will
set you apart from the crowd. A camera on automatic CAN’T make the kind of creative
decisions you will encounter.
*****************Reflectors
Our first option; providing additional light sources - can be accomplished in several ways...
Two of the more popular ones are; using a reflector or using some sort of flash unit.
If you are on a budget, the easiest and least expensive way to add more light is with a reflector.
Commercially they come in various sizes and colors. The most common colors being: white,
black, silver and gold.