Only the basic understanding of fundamentals, critique please

[SoCarRob]

Hi guys, I'm very new to the world of DSLR photography and have only a basic grasp of the fundamentals. It's difficult to know where to improve without some feedback from someone more experienced giving you some feedback. My gear consists of a Canon EOS Rebel T5 with the kit lens and an EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 III. I'd like some critique on a few shots I've taken under different conditions if you would be so kind:

 

[dasmith232]

You've already got the link to information about exposure.

Another really important topic area is composition and the elements of design. Composition is a huge area that encompasses all the subtleties of exposure, contrast, framing, leading lines, depth, and so on. And another really important area, especially if you're wanting to capture people, is posing.

Either of these topics is bigger than what could be easily posted into a thread. I'll touch on one of my pet peeves and then point out a book or two.

Don't shoot down at your subjects... Sorry, that's just my thing. Psychologically, I think that aiming down towards the person is to put them at a lower stature than you or the viewer of the photograph. Get down on a knee or otherwise scrunch down to capture the kids at eye level. You did that for the reptile, but not the kids. There are plenty of exceptions to this or any other rule, but that's just an opinion that I have.

Now, one advantage to shooting more at eye level is you start to get more interesting backgrounds than just the ground or furniture. As an example, in the first picture, there's a distinct line between the sidewalk and the ground cover that leads right into her head. Plus there's the blue chalk/paint mark on the sidewalk too. These don't help your portraits.

If you're the type to pick up a book, then I like "The Photographer's Eye" by Michael Freeman. It talks about many elements of composition. There are many additional books, with some being deeper or more advanced in the concepts.

Also, there's another website with lots of tutorials about using your camera that would be good to review: Photography Tips and Tutorials for Beginners

In the meantime, think "backgrounds" and "direction of light" when you take pictures. Developing that habit will likely serve you well for all types of photography going forward.

 

[weepete]

1. Good exposure and the lighting looks ok to me but there's no reason to shoot this in landscape format. A portrait orientation would have been more appropriate IMO. Background is not great either, which gives a careless look to the shot. There's a blue chalk? mark on the pavement touching her head which is distracting. With kids it's usually better to get the camera down to their eye level rather than looking down on them.

2. Focus looks ok, nice background blur and exposure looks fine but there's no composition to lead us in to the frame and the flower is central and quite small leading to a very static image.

3. A bit too close to the bottom of the frame but the symmetry almost works. Focus, exposure and black point all look good on this though.

4. Similar to 2. Tiny flowers, largely centrally composed main focal point. White highlights in the flowers look overexposed and lack detail and again nothing to lead us in to the image. You've got two cut off flowers, one on the left and one on the rightthat break the edges of the frame. There is however nice left to centre lines from the flower stalks and nice fight to left lines of the leaves.

5. Quite "flashy". By that I mean it looks like on camera flash quite close with lots of fall off. Getting the flash off camera slightly and using a diffuser may have helped a bit.

6. Background has that big black triangle of material on the left hand side, you've cut off the the poor lads fingers, and again no reason to shoot in landscape with central positioning of the subject again.

 

[SoCarRob]

Thanks for the feedback! While I wasn't trying to go so much for composition as I was trying to get a handle on balancing aperture, shutter speed and ISO, this gives me more to think about than I realized. Of course the composition is important and I should have been thinking about those things too! I have much to learn.

 

[snowbear]

Welcome aboard. It's a good idea to number your shots - it makes it a little easier referring to them.
My thoughts: overall, I think they are pretty good.
The lizard - I really like this one - nice colors, technically good, decent composition.
The dandelion - also good, fills the frame. I'd consider a square crop; likewise with the purple flower
Blue flowers - my least favorite, only because the flowers take much less space the surrounding grass.
The children - I would try to get on their eye level, so you're not shooting down on them; the same level as the lizard. I'm not sure about the background in the last one; maybe a bit too dark; I'm not sure. On the first, be aware of the backgrounds - there's a blue utility mark "growing" out of the side of her head. It should be fairly easy to clone out.

 

[SoCarRob]

Would this be a good crop from 1 to 2?

1:


2:

 

[dasmith232]

It's better in that the main focal point is (slightly) more dominant in the frame. Square formats are good for pictures where there isn't a horizontal nor vertical bias in the framed elements.

Think of your pictures as visual stories. What is this image about? What is it that draws you into that picture? Are there other things that you can include that support that story? Then frame things to include those elements. Is there anything that does not support that story? Then frame things to exclude those elements.

As photographers, it is very common to forget about the other things in the frame. Think of a landscape painter (with brushes and oil paints). Then imagine that painter painting a beautiful scene (of whatever), and then for no particular reason, also paints into the picture a plastic grocery bag from Walmart caught in the base of one of the trees. They would never do that! But as photographers, we do that all the time that we don't frame things to exclude the Walmart bag. Include things to support the story, exclude things that don't.

So I did a quick Google image search on "small blue flowers". I randomly picked one of those pictures that was similar enough to your picture to make a comparison...
http://previews.123rf.com/images/ks...-flowers-in-the-grass-Stock-Photo-flowers.jpg

Look at that picture and notice that the blue flower is adjacent to the stalk that supports it. I'm not much of a flower or botany person, but I can imagine the symbiotic relationship between the flower and its stalk. Not a great story, but there's some context. Also notice that in the background are some color splashes that are totally out of focus but are discernible as more flowers. Now the story starts to emerge. It's about this one flower standing apart from the others. Also, notice how the featured flower is "pointing up" in the frame and is placed just slightly low in the frame, giving it room to "reach up".

Granted, this isn't a very interesting story, and I'm having to "stretch things" a bit to make this description work. But we're working with a pretty generic subject. So we'll just go with that.

Getting a technically correct exposure is the easy part. Actually, it *can* be hard to get, but compared to the much more difficult task of artistically side of building a complete and compelling image, it's easy. The artistic stuff requires a totally different way of thinking. Exposure is left-brain stuff. Art is right-brain stuff. Many hobbies or other activities favor one or the other. Photography requires both!

You're getting the technical part going. Your exposure are doing fine and will only get better. Now it's time for the fun part!

 

[SoCarRob]

I'm still very new at this and I appreciate all the advice. I'm slightly left brained to begin with but I don't think that's going to help with choosing which flower in the field makes the best photo. However I think with a little help I can learn to narrow it down a little.