New here, new camera...would love feedback

Emsim421 · Mar 27, 2018

Hi all. I'm new here but not new to photography. It has always been a hobby, more or less. Mostly of my kids who rarely cooperate any more.

I just switched from a Nikon D90 to a Canon Rebel T6. Took this with the 75-300 lens that came in the 2 lens kit. It seems a little better than the 18-55, which I am hoping to upgrade that lens soon. I feel like I'm downgrading cameras but the price was right...for this to be only a hobby.

f 5.6/ shutter 1/320 /ISO 400

It was very windy outside and this thing was blowing everywhere. I would love any feedback.

D7K · Mar 27, 2018

Hey Emi, Welcome.. nice background falloff making the subject pop, maybe it's my old eyes, but on zooming in I am not 100% sure the focus has hit right, maybe the wind? maybe my eyes, (AF-C or AF-S?) Is the pic cropped from the original? It would have been nice to catch a few more / a little more of the leaves in the back, but that's just personal opinion really, I'm certainly no expert.

the most important thing is that you enjoy it, And Nikon > Canon huh!?

waday · Mar 27, 2018

The smooth background is very pleasing. The colors really work together to complement each other. I especially like that the subject and background are within the same color families.

Taking pictures of flowers is an art in and of itself. If you're looking for some really good examples, take a look at some of the work by members: @SquarePeg , @jcdeboever , and @oldhippy . There are other great flower photographers on here that I can't think of at the moment.

With respect to your image, the composition shows the flower at the bottom left portion of the picture, leaving a lot of negative space at the top and right. What was your vision in including the negative space? In some pictures, negative space really helps to tell a story regarding the subject. I'm not sure it helps in this image.

In addition, there isn't much stalk and the leaves in the back are a bit distracting. It almost feels as if the flower is trapped down in the corner of the image.

If I were to take a similar picture, I might look to take this in portrait orientation, with the flower being centered in the upper half. I'd either position myself so that there isn't much in the background to distract, or I might use my hand to move the leaves out of the way for the picture (making sure not to damage the plant).

snowbear · Mar 27, 2018

Welcome aboard. I'll echo what's been said - it's very pleasing but different cropping or orientation could be used to make a better photo.

@D7K - she did say she downgraded. In all fairness, though, I have one Canon (but a few more Nikon/Nikkormat bodies)

tirediron · Mar 27, 2018

Moved to an appropriate gallery.

jcdeboever · Mar 27, 2018

With hand held flower shots, I always try to at least have a shutter speed 2x the focal length and if it's windy even more. So with a flower shot using a 70-300 lens, if I'm zoomed in at a focal length of 200, the shutter speed would be 400 but ideally under windy conditions, 800-1000 would be my target in order to control the motion. In order to get that shutter speed @ f/5.6, I would need to bump my ISO higher to obatain that.

I think you did a pretty good job considering wind and all. Maybe a crop in post would dress it up. The lens built in stabilization probably helped you considerably here but for me, as a rule of thumb, I shoot in aperture priority, and use the ISO setting to obtain my desired shutter speed. That's my method and it works for me. There are other methods.

Emsim421 · Mar 27, 2018

@waday I think I was loving the blur I got from my bricks? Honestly, the bud is sort of standing there all alone. There are a few leaves in the original but nothing that seemed flattering to me I guess?

@D7K as far as focus I'm not sure. I know I was having a hard time getting it to focus because of it blowing in the wind so I was switching back and forth to try to get it go towards to rosebud. I just went back out to try to get a day 2 shot but the wind is worse today so I gave up. But I feel like I am struggling with focus so I know I need to work on that for sure.

@jcdeboever thank you for that info. I guess I feel like if I'm supposed to be shooting in full manual all the time. Doesn't hurt to change it up I guess? If the wind dies down I will go back out in AP.

I'm pretty sure I was holding the stalk to get the thing to stay still. Stinks to get a new toy and the weather not cooperate.

Thanks for the feedback.

jcdeboever · Mar 27, 2018

You can shoot in manual or whatever. My main point was to give you an understanding about focal length and shutter speed. In order to get that shutter speed up, using the ISO setting helps you get it there. You shoot them enough, you kind of know before you even look through the viewfinder. If I'm shooting full manual, I would have walked up to that at f/5.6 200 focal length, I would adjusted my shutter speed dial to 1000 and ISO at 1000 and tweaked the shutter speed for proper exposure.

SquarePeg · Mar 27, 2018

I like the light you captured and the exposure is great for the subject. The composition and focus are the issues. Composition has subject a bit low and there's too much space on the right - maybe a square crop or next time use portrait orientation for a single flower? The main thing that is off for me is that slightly out of focus little leaf pointing right at the camera. I think if you had moved a bit to your right so that wasn't the closest thing to the camera it would be a stronger photo. It really draws the eye away from the beautiful bud.

I prefer to choose my aperture and my shutter speed for flowers. A lot of stuff I read when I started was to shoot flowers at f/5.6 - f/8 but I like to either get very shallow depth of field for an artsy look or really stop down to get everything in focus (assuming the background is acceptable).

Seems like your main issue was the wind which forced you to stand in a certain spot to hold the stem. It's hard to take flower photos when it's windy! Ideally you want slightly overcast skies and no breeze at all. But, if you wait for perfect conditions, you may be waiting a long time. If I'm out and I see something I want to shoot and it's breezy, I'll sometimes go with that and try to make the wind work for me. Maybe use a slightly longer shutter speed and capture some movement deliberately. If that doesn't work out I have a small reflector/diffuser (one of those pop up ones that folds into a very small pouch) and if it's sunny or just a little breezy, I take that out of my bag and either diffuse the sun or try to block the breeze. Have to up the shutter speed if I'm shooting one handed! Also sometimes you can just change your position slightly and block the breeze with your body.

This is a shot I took on a very breezy day. I gave up waiting for the breeze to die down and lowered the shutter speed to 1/40. I like the way the flowers kind of look like they're dancing:

Designer · Mar 27, 2018

Emsim421 said:
Hi all. I'm new here ..

I would love any feedback.

Hi, and welcome!

asymmetrical balance is nice when it works, but in this shot I think the flower bud feels nearly pushed off into the corner.

I think a single bud can work, but you should make it the star of the show. I'm sure you've already heard of "the rule of thirds", so if you put the center of the bud at the third & third intersection, and frame it vertically, it might look better. (Maybe, maybe not.)

Do you have any more frame "real estate" available? If so, you should try that, or if you want one of us to do it, post the original shot so we can try it.

Meanwhile, your exposure is excellent, the background is nicely blurred, and it's a good subject, especially this time of year.

Emsim421 · Mar 27, 2018

SOOC If anyone wants to play, you are more than welcome to. I definitely have room to crop it much differently than I originally did.

Ysarex · Mar 27, 2018

Emsim421 said:
SOOC If anyone wants to play, you are more than welcome to. I definitely have room to crop it much differently than I originally did. View attachment 155597

OK, here's a couple thoughts then, and welcome to TPF.

Joe

birdbonkers84 · Mar 28, 2018

Emsim421 said:
SOOC If anyone wants to play, you are more than welcome to. I definitely have room to crop it much differently than I originally did. View attachment 155597

If you wanted to put the time in you could do this:

I've done nothing to the colours etc, you could spend ages playing with that, all I've done is change the crop and remove the background leaves (very roughly). But this is the idea I saw when looking at your already nice looking image.

Crop could still do with some tweaking. Move the flower more to the left.