petercbrandt Loc: New York City, Manhattan

If you can reshoot change the color setting to incandescent and even lower. In Photoshop you can use 'replace color', chosen from below the selection with curves. Use cursor on the dense part of the yellow-brown and then desaturate. At the top of replace color you can select the amount of fuzziness.

E.L.. Shapiro Loc: Ottawa, Ontario Canada

I did a quick test- The candlelight in the background is way below 2,000K. to get the background jet black the correction renders the statue as bright blue. The background is underexposed as well and it goes gray rather than black so burning in or cutting in a new background would be necessary. If you darken the all over image or increase the contrast the statue becomes very dramatic.

JohnSwanda Loc: San Francisco

You could select the background and desaturate it.

Horseart Loc: Alabama

OR, you can move the black background WAY back behind the statue, close down your aperture til the subject is so dark you can barely see it and use a diffused flash. The flash will light up the subject from the front while the candle lights it from behind and depending on the power of the flash, you should get exactly what you want. I had the P510 and it worked for me.

EOB Photo

Another option is to correct the background in post processing. This helps eliminate the noise in the black background. (I did not spend a lot of time on this so it could be improved further but it will give you some idea if this is really what you want.

fotkaman Loc: Earth

[quote=tramsey]The shot was taken with the only light source as a candle three inches behind Christ's head and about six inches or so from the back ground. Why did the black background which is black board especially made to create a black background. So on a retake what do I do different to maintain the black color[/qu

Low Budget Dave

I suspect you used Auto ISO. In order to get the "average" brightness of the scene up, the camera pushed you into some huge ISO number. I didn't check the picture, but I bet you are up past 10,000 ISO.

When you are shooting in candlelight, you have to use full manual. In this scene, I would suggest ISO 3200, shutter speed as slow as you can get, and F-stop as wide-open as you can get. (You might have to manually focus, because most cameras will not autofocus in rooms that dark.)

Anyway, if you are shooting at F2, 1/30 second, ISO 3200, and the light level (appears to be) -3EV, then what you will end up with is an almost-black statue against a dark black background, with a very faint candle-colored outline.

robertjsmith

Just a personal comment, I think the image looks better than it would with a black background. Very nice image indeed.
Bob

Thomas902 Loc: Washington DC

"So on a retake what do I do different to maintain the black color..."

Have you considered using the inverse square law and move the background far enough away as to not register on the image sensor. This is the norm not the exception in handling this illumination issue.

Food for thought: The "color" of a black background is totally dependent on the color temperature of the illumination source. One can easily turn black matte any hue/chroma one desires by changing the color temperature of the source. *in this case 1800 degrees Kevin (+/-) It is the intensity of the illumination (at the object) that controls how bright it renders. Did you use a light meter placed adjacent to the black background tramsey? That will allow you to control how near/far it needs to be in order to create the desired effect which a narrative calls for. There are compelling reasons why commercial shooters use light meters. They are highly useful in skilled hands.

Please note that the meter in your camera is typically a reflective type and will average everything to an 18 percent gray card. However if your camera allows "spot metering" you might be able to better expose when dealing with broadly diverse sources...

btw, the Nikon p510 likely does not have the dynamic range to achieve much in the way of an effective rim light from a single candle (even locked down on a tripod)... might rethink your illumination scenario... (as others have suggested)

What I find interesting is an overwhelming desire by others to use post processing as a "fix"
While a "working" commercial photographer would undoubtedly deploy the inverse square law and meter the scene to obtain the desired outcome...
Maybe get it right in camera? enough said.