Amateur Photographer Magazine

 Masterclass with Clive Nichols - Botanic Gardens - Cambridge University Botanic Garden

Monday 7th June 2010

Garden expert Clive Nichols shows four readers how to combine colour texture and compsition to create plant portraits with a professional edge. Gemma Padley joined them in Cambridge and left feeling inspired.

• Location
  Nestled in the heart of historic Cambridge, the University Botanic Garden was established as a teaching and research resource by Professor John Stevens Henslow in 1831. There is a dedicated Cambridge University Botanic Garden Flickr group at www.flickr.com/groups/cambridgebotanicgarden. Amateur photographers are welcome to take pictures in the garden for private non-commercial use, but you will need to apply for a permit if you want to use a tripod. Contact Cambridge University Botanic Garden, 1 Brookside, Cambridge CB2 1JE. Tel: 01223 336 265 Email: enquiries@botanic.cam.ac.uk.
  
  
• Opening times
  From April until September the garden is open daily from 10am-6pm. Please note that the garden closes earlier during winter. Visit www.botanic.cam.ac.uk for details.
  
  
• Admission charges
  Adults £4, adults over 60 and students £3.50, children under-16 free
  

As spring begins to stir and plants come into bloom, now is the perfect time to get out into the garden and capture some colourful close-ups of flowers. For this month's Masterclass, Clive Nichols and four AP readers travelled to Cambridge University Botanic Garden to capture creative plant pictures bursting with life.

While it is not difficult to take a reasonable photograph of a flower, producing a skilful image takes a bit more thought and care. The aim of the day was to concentrate on photographing plants in the garden and glasshouses at close range, using natural light, a diffuser and a reflector to create top-quality images. Through a combination of careful framing, subtle manipulation of available light, precise focusing and aperture control, the readers were able to do this.

Clive was on hand throughout the day to offer advice on how to obtain a correct exposure and shared his tips on how to handle the variable light. 'You need to be aware of how the light is changing,' says Clive. 'Select what you want to photograph and manipulate the light to achieve the desired effect. Think about how the light is falling on the flower and decide what effect you are trying to create. Are you trying to “warm up” the image? If so, you may want to use a gold reflector.The challenge is to bring out the character of each flower.'

Spending most of the day in the seasonal winter garden, but not forgetting the glasshouses, Clive provided a brief overview of the flora that was on offer.
'I like to walk around a garden to get an idea of the types of plants that are growing,' he says. 'It's important to get an overall view of the garden and then decide what you are going to home in on. It gives you a plan of action and a sense of direction.'

The readers brought their own cameras, tripods and a selection of macro and telephoto lenses with them, and they used a gold reflector and diffuser supplied by Clive.

Your AP Master…

Clive Nichols
Clive is one of the UK's most respected garden photographers. With more than 20 years' experience, Clive's images have been published in numerous books, calendars and magazines. As well as being one of AP's Photo insight experts, Clive runs regular workshops for the Royal Horticultural Society and is a judge for the International Garden Photographer of the Year competition.
Visit www.clivenichols.com

The AP readers…

Valerie Barnes
Valerie, 58, from High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire, enjoys photographing flowers at close range. 'Today I learnt how much of a difference using reflectors and diffusers makes to an image,' she says. Valerie uses a Canon EOS 30D with a 105mm macro lens.

Maurice Sadler
Maurice, a retired engineer, lives in Taunton, Somerset, and has been a garden enthusiast for as long as he can remember. 'I have a better appreciation of how to use light in my images after today,' he says. 'Clive's tuition was first class.' Maurice uses an Olympus E-620.

Carl Franklin
Carl, 48, lives in Kent. He started photographing gardens five years ago and has won several RHS photographic awards. He recently began submitting images to a garden photography stock library. Carl uses a Canon EOS 5D Mark II with 180mm macro and 24-70mm lenses
plus extension tubes.

Graham Brown
Graham, 45, lives in Southampton, Hampshire. 'I had a really great day and took a lot of useful advice away with me,' says Graham. 'I learnt how to use backlighting to create impact and to pay greater attention to the background.' Graham uses a Nikon D2X with 105mm and 180mm macro lens





Would you like to take part?
Our Masterclass series has taken on a new format. Every month we will invite three to five AP readers to join one of our experts on an assignment over the course of a day. The experts are Lee Frost (landscapes), Brett Harkness (portraits), Paul Hobson (wildlife) and Clive Nichols (gardens). This is Clive's first Gardens Masterclass and he will also appear in August and December. Lee will appear in June and October, Paul will appear in May and September, with Brett in July and November.

If you would like to take part, visit www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/masterclass for details of how to apply. Please remember to state which Masterclass you would like to attend and make sure you include your name, address, email address and daytime telephone number in your application. Each participant will be able to use his or her own camera, lenses and other equipment.

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