Garden adventures

[dan-the-man]

Looking for some advice on how to improve my photography, be it these photos or just general advice.

Also interested in comments regarding editing and manipulation. Unfortunately some of these are heavily cropped which has reduced the quality.


http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4255edit.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4264edit.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4276edit1.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4288edit.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4289edit.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4311edit.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4311edit1.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4313edit.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4319edit.jpg

Comments appriciated.

Cheers

Dan

P.s. What's the reason for the background 'sparkle' on the image of the bee?

[Reef bloke]

Pic 1 is quite funky,id like to see the spider pic in colour as it looks nicely focused and colour really brings out garden nature esque style shots imho.Id be tempted to crop the leaf off the right hand side though as it is a bit of a distraction,even more so in colour i would imagine.
I would imagine the sparkle is due to light on the leaves that has been diffused due to DOF,probably round due to aperture shape but someone with a more technically sound explanation might chip in there.

[dan-the-man]

Cheers Tony, I'll have a play around. :thumbsup:

[Nath]

It's bokeh which by definition is the amount of "out of focusness" of background images.

The shape of the sparkles is determined by the number of aperture blades in the lens itself. The more blades the more natural (and circular) the pattern appears to be (and normally the more expensive the lens).

In mirror lenses for example the bokeh shape appears as a doughnut (eeeuw).

You can obviously influence (and highlight) the effect by having a larger apperture and thus narrower depth of field as you've done here).

Some nice shots there though. In particular I like no. 2

My only other comment would be that with a lot of those crops you're losing the ability to stick to the rule of thirds (some photos do work without it though) and thus the ability to line up the subject matter in a natural and pleasing way to the eye. Try to think about the composition more when taking the picture and it will give you better scope when editing.

[dan-the-man]

Cheers Nath, have been reading about bokeh and it's quality. Unfortunately the sigma lens I have is pretty poor tbh, but I do like bokeh in that image.

Thanks for the comments. I do need to think more about the composition when taking the actual shot, I can see this is the difficult bit and probably why good photographers take hundreds on images before using only one.

:)

[Nath]

Actually I'd say that the good photographer would take less photos. It's only the advent of digital that has allowed us to shoot to get it right. In the days of film it was all about planning and understanding the shot. I remember when I was 8 years old and my dad planned a photo of a humming bird in Grenada for 3 weeks. He took only 2 shots both of which were perfect.

[Reef bloke]

Factoid- Bokeh is taken from Japanese and means fuzzy/blur.
Ill get me coat lol.

[dan-the-man]

Following on from the advice given (cheers guys), here are a few more from the garden.

Thinking more about composition when taking these rather than just cropping. :p

As it was a dark day the ISO was set far too high :o, and so most images are too grainy, hence the black and white editing.


Firstly the colour version of the spider for Tony...

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4319edit1.jpg


Then two cropped versions of the same image - I think the second works better, thoughts?

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4371edit3.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4371edit4.jpg


A little experiment with contrast and brightness - think I blew it with the second one but I still like it.

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4380edit1_2.jpg

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4380edit1_1.jpg

And the final one. I know the fly is out of focus but it's the detail on the flower and the added interest of the fly that makes this image imo.

http://www.ultimatereef.net/uploader/2008Q3/IMG_4382edit.jpg

Comments welcomed! :thumbsup:

[Frogfone]

Ok had a play with the spider in Photoshop
http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m18/frogfone/fd48c5dc.jpg

just played with the levels and sharpened it abit to highlight the spider. I would have liked to bring the web into more prominance but it's hard working from low rez web pics.

I have to say i think B+W and garden pics don't mix to well as B+W is all about contrast and tone and garden pics are all about colour and shape. the only one that i think works well in B+W is the spider as it adds a certain amount of menace to the subject that works well. next time you try spider and web pics get a bottle spay and lightly spray the web. the droplets help to highlight the web and add interest.

here's one of my fly/flower pics in colour to try and illustrate what i mean. I have tried to find something similar to yours but left it in colour and tightened up the composition a bit, again just crop, lvls and sharpened.
http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m18/frogfone/3e3c27f8.jpg

i would say have a look at other peoples work and see what you like and don't like, then copy the stuff you like, it may seem like cheating but think of learning the guitar you practice songs you like by other bands before trying to write your own.

HTH

Roddy