Orchid edge

[Dave Woeller]

Still working to improve my macro skills and wanted to share this shot for thoughts and suggestions. Thanks for your time.
Canon 50D, 100mm 2.8 macro (the old one), 1/2 sec @ F 3.5, evaluative metering, ISO 200, Aperture priority, 0 EV

[Julie Kenward]

Dave, IMO, the lower left area is too OOF to be the main part of the FG. You also lose your crisp edge towards the bottom of the right side. For those reasons, I think a horizontal crop of the top half of the image works better in this case. It gives you the best part of the crisp diagonal line and leaves at least a little of the FG area in focus - not that this is a recipe for sucess every time but, in this case, I think it works for a stronger composition.

[Dave Woeller]

Wow ! Pretty large crop, but I definately see your point and feel it's a big improvement. Gonna keep pluggin away at this. Heading for Longwood Gardens this week. Heaven help them :eek:. Plan on doing some IR also.

[Mike Moats]

Hey Dave, I agree with Jules on the OOF bottom edge. but I don't care for the cropped version as it doesn't have enough there to hold my interest. I much rather the long interesting curve in the original, even with the slight lose of focus at the bottom of the curve. But do agree it would have been better in focus.

[Dave Woeller]

Thank you Mike. I really appreciate your input also. These are all bits of advice that I can use down the road and will help me to grow. It's nice to have differing opinions presented because it really makes me stop to think just where it is I want to go. Thanks again to all those who spend the time and thought to guide us who are entering unknown areas.

[Ken Childs]

LOL!
Here's another opinion that's somewhere in the middle. I think I'd prefer it cropped, but not as much as in Jules' version. Taking off about 15 to 20% from the bottom would look good, IMHO.

[Roman Kurywczak]

Hey Dave,
What Ken said! I think the star is the curve so keeping as much in works for me too. I looked at cropping off the left.....to keep proportions but felt this was enough of a balance for my tastes. Nicely composed overall!

[Dave Woeller]

Well, obviously the f 3.5 is what hurt me the most here, so I guess a lesson learned is to shoot , or at least view several different apertures on a subject till I get more experience. Thanks Ken and Roman for even more thoughts and possibilities.

[Ken Childs]

Even after you get more experience, shoot different apertures and several different angles. I sometimes find that a shot I knew was going to be awesome actually wasn't when I looked at it on my pc and one of the shots I didn't have high hopes for turned out to be the best one of the session. IMO, it's much harder to be sure of a sure thing when you're shooting these shallow DOF shots.

[Dave Woeller]

Thanks Ken, I will certainly use that advice in my next sessions.