Penny - Chihuahua, Terrier Mix

[Lisa Chapman]

This is my puppy Penny. She is a Terrier, Chihuahua Mix. I just could not leave my camera alone and I can't go out to take pictures so, I decided to try and get a shot of my Penny! I took two. One black and white and one color. Which do you like most? I wanted her eyes in focus, her paw blurred, it worked! Hooray!
Feedback is appreciated, I love these shots, though I am biased LOL.





190mm Focal Length
3200 ISO
F/5 Aperture
1/50 Shutter Speed

 

[Jeff15]

Cute little dog...........

 

[smoke665]

Can't beat a doggy picture!!!

One thing to remember is DOF (depth of field) is a function of focal length, aperture, and distance from the subject. So assuming you were standing 8' away your DOF at f/5, 190 mm would be a little over 1 inch total. If you were 6' away your DOF dropped to less than 3/4 inch. There's nothing wrong with a thin DOF as long as you know exactly what you are focusing on. Here's a good online calculator to kind of help you get an idea Online Depth of Field Calculator plug in some numbers and watch how it changes. Also 1/50 shutter is hard to hold, without getting some motion blur in the shot.

 

[Lisa Chapman]

Can't beat a doggy picture!!!

One thing to remember is DOF (depth of field) is a function of focal length, aperture, and distance from the subject. So assuming you were standing 8' away your DOF at f/5, 190 mm would be a little over 1 inch total. If you were 6' away your DOF dropped to less than 3/4 inch. There's nothing wrong with a thin DOF as long as you know exactly what you are focusing on. Here's a good online calculator to kind of help you get an idea Online Depth of Field Calculator plug in some numbers and watch how it changes. Also 1/50 shutter is hard to hold, without getting some motion blur in the shot.

Yeah I wanted to play with my 75 - 300mm lens so my settings and choices were not the greatest. Motion blur? I don't see any motion blur though, only the blur I actually intended to have in the shot this time around. My camera was resting on a table which is why I didn't worry so much about the shutter speed. I wasn't actually having to hold it steady. I love dog pictures! My puppy hates the camera though, only reason I got these was because she was asleep! LOL. Thanks for the feedback! Maybe I'll try the same shots with my 18 - 55mm lens too and compare results. Experiment!

 

[SquarePeg]

Cute pup! Great job experimenting with dof and sounds like you visualized your shot in advance which is awesome. Dogs are difficult subjects to shoot straight on when they have a longish snout and you go with shallow dof because you sometimes end up with the nose out of focus or the nose sharp and the eyes oof. Because the nose is the first thing I see with the b&w, and it's oof, it's a bit distracting. For some reason, the color photo draws my eye up to the dog's eyes much more firmly which, those being in focus, make it nicer for me to look at.

Keep using the dog to practice. They are much more patient with us than our kids can be! Try taking an angle where you are not shooting directly head on toward her nose so you can get more of the nose in focus and get the eyes too. You can still keep dof shallow. This is not the best example because it's a close up but hopefully it will give you an idea of what I mean by the angle.

Untitled by SharonCat..., on Flickr