Hi Greg,
Don’t think I’m dumping on you, because that is not my intention. I think these are pretty good seeing that you just got your camera. Flower shots can be rather boring. You will see a lot of flower pictures that are nothing more than a picture of a flower, with the flower set dead center in the picture. This might be fine to identify the flower in an encyclopedia, but it doesn’t make a very interesting picture, unless there is something really unusual about the flower; maybe the color, or the shape, or a bee, bug, etc sitting on it. The picture has to have a reason for the viewer to view it, and capture their interest.
I like the first one for the subtle colors, and I think it is the best of the three. The composition could be better, the flower is dead center in the frame, remember the rule of thirds. I would also like to see a little more texture in the petals, so maybe the lighting or the exposure, or both, could be a little better.
The composition is better on the second picture, although your DOF didn’t get the entire flower in focus. I get the feeling that the leaves were the actual focal point in this photo. The leaves are very sharp. I would rather have the entire flower in focus than the leaves.
In the third photo, the flower in the lower right looks like it is starting to wilt, the colors have begun to fade and the flower is not all that attractive any more. Also the flower is outside the DOF and its softness I think distracts from the picture. I would have cropped the picture to something more like this.
Morris offered me some very good advice when I displayed some pictures of flowers, try some different angles. So I went from this
to this
and then the sprinklers came on and I went out when they shut off and the flowers were all wet and I came up with these, again using Morris’ suggestion to try different angles than just straight-on flower shots.
Some water droplets on the flowers adds highlights, and gives them a fresh dewy look, even in the late afternoon. I have a friend who owns a wholesale florist shop and he takes thousands of flower photos. He taught me to use a spray bottle and mist some water on to the flower to achieve that fresh dewy look. Another trick is to use the flash, the one on the camera will usually do just fine; this will darken the background and thereby highlight the flower.
--
Brooks
http://www.bmiddleton.smugmug.com
I daresay one profits more by the mistakes one makes off one's own bat than by doing the right thing on somebody's else advice.
— W. Somerset Maugham
