natural places ( endroits de la nature ) Graminées (graminaceous plant)

If this is "from life" and the background wasn't artificially supplied, then it is a very nice job of both exposure control and framing. Good work. Info on camera, lens, tripod or not, ISO and exposure would be nice since you are addressing photographers.

C Peter, thank you. It was taken outside the monastery in the village of Lagrasse in Languedoc, France, very roughly 50 Km west of Carcassone. I believe the monastery construction followed the presence of the crusaders under Simon de Montfort, when they were intent on eliminating the Cathar religion in that area (and Simon in acquiring new lands).

 

You can just barely make out a 4 or 5 foot stone wall top in the background. As a backlit shot, I tried different exposures with my 4 MP point and shoot digital (Kyocera L4V) at maximum resolution (jpeg fine in this case) and low ISO (100) in order to miimise noise. The lens is normally at f2.8 at the normal lens angle I chose (about equal to a 40 or 50mm lens in 35mm), but I cannot tell you the shutter speed as the screen on the back of the camera, which would allow me to check that, has now gone black (too expensive to repair). I presume it was about 1/250th or 1/500th of a second. At any rate, easily fast enough to allow me to get away with handholding in this case.

 

I would have preferred my Leica M4-P for this one, but it was loaded with Pan-F black and white film. The lighting was fortunate, as we were in the monastery garden only briefly that afternoon. The wall and background was in shade and dark enough not to register very much. I did have to point the camera somewhat selectively to avoid adjacent brighter backgrounds.