Our Apprentice says…

Kate set up this shot by dropping the rings into a glass of ‘champagne’ in front of a glitzy lamp (it was actually fizzy water, but the warmth of the tungsten light made it look like champers). I set f/9 at ISO400, to ensure most of the ring was sharp, which gave a shutter speed of 1/125 sec – just fast enough to shoot handheld on the 105mm macro. A test shot, with the needle at zero, looked too bright and lacked sparkle, so I stopped down to 1/160 sec – this deepened the shadows, and stopped the highlights from blowing.