Ok guys,lay it on me

[zenya]

I know this is not reef related but I need some critical eyes to tell me what is wrong with my picture So...let me have it

Greg, I know you have pointer or two to give me

[magnum420]

I think it looks pretty good. They only thing that stuck out right off the bat was it looks like there is a little bit of overexposure on the bottom pedel. did you use a flash?

I might have tried to slow down the shutter a little more and adjust the ap. a bit to get a bit more of the flower in focus.

Both of these are very minor IMO. Both could also be because I am looking at it with a pretty crappy monitor. My monitor at home is 10x better than my one at work.

What camera did you use with what settings?

Later
MAg

[magnum420]

I was just looking at some other pics and I realized how bad my monitor makes some pics look. I better hold off any critiques untill I get home and can see the pic on a good monitor.

Later
MAg

[got chow]

Zoom in closer! The areas surrounding the flower are extraneous IMHO and can be cropped out of the picture. Take a closer shot, and fill the entire frame with just one flower.

I do see the overexposed area on the bottom petal as well, and I guess it does stick out a bit compared to the rest of the picture but not horribly.

Minimize the aperture or maximize it so that either you have a very shallow depth of focus or a deep one. It may look really cool one way or the other, with only 1 part of the flower in focus or the entire thing focused. Try that out...

But don't take my words on it, I'm no professional!

[zenya]

Thanks for the review,guys I really appreciated.

Brian,

I'll give it a try,sounds like a really neat idea

[gregr]

hi Gene-
you got some good advise already.
flower photos are hard to do really well in my opinion... like landscapes- it takes a lot of mental effort and lots of little camera movements to get the angle just right and then you have to figure out the right amount of depth of field and proper exposure.
i have the same problem as MAg right now- i'm on my laptop and it just doesn't have the contrast range as my crt at home
anyhow- i like the idea of zooming in to concentrate on one bloom- it makes for a simpler composition and hopefully a bigger impact.
regardless- i like it how it is too
greg

[mebarryb]

I use a water bottle to lighty spitz a flower, when its damp it seems to absorb light and not reflect it as much plus it can darken the colors to make seperation of color more dramatic. Plus somtimes a water drop or 2 can add a cool effect. Just dont over do the water, if dont want the drops smooth out the petals.

[zenya]

Thanks you guys I'm righting them down, don't worry.
I never thought of adding a few drops of water...that should be cool, thanks, mebarryb!

Greg, I'm going to need some dictionary to figure out what you said...but I'll work on it.

[gljjr]

My first thought when looking at it is that I would try to move the center of the flower one way or another using the rule of thirds. Other than that I really like it!

When doing flowers I like to have the main flower in the foreground in the lower left or right third of the frame and then see if I can get a couple small buds in the background in the upper two thirds that are way out of focus. Unfortunately I don't have any on a disk to show you as I haven't taken any for several years now.

Another trick I like to do is to use a very long lens to shorten the depth of field and then take the pictures from slightly farther away. I used my 400mm for this a lot. It allows you to get the one bloom in focus and then any others around it are usually just color for the background. It can give you a really neat effect.

[zenya]

You mean something like this?

[gljjr]

Well.... almost. That is why getting composition of a flower is so hard. The flowers themselves need to be arranged correctly and then you have to compose the shot correctly.

In this shot the top of the rose you want to look at is cut off. So you would want to move the rose down in the picture so that it isn't cut off. Then you would have the problem that the rose on the left would be too much in the picture for the composition to look right. The rose in the lower left is about perfect for this shot as you can still make out what it is but it doesn't detract from the shot.

Please note I am by no means an "Expert" I would say that Travis and Greg are much better photographers than I am. I'm just telling you what I have read/learned over the last 20 years or so of playing with cameras. At one time I wanted to do what Greg and Travis have done and do photography for a living. Unfortunately life had other plans for me.

[gljjr]

Although I'm not happy with this picture in many ways as it is not as sharp as I would like, I really like the composition. As soon as I get my tripod back from my daughter I'm going to try this shot again but with a wider depth of field. I took this one handheld and I just couldn't hold the camera steady enough.

[zenya]

Thanks,Gary, for great tips and advise on composition,something I'm definately going to practice a whole lot
For some reason I can't view your attachment as link does not work for me Can you double check if it's working for you?I really like to see your picture.

[gljjr]

Sorry, It's not working. Try this instead...

[zenya]

Thanks,Gary! Nice pic indeed I see what you mean about focused and another object not so focused being a benefit in the composition,especially if they are of different color. I loved it