Milkweeds

[Caroline Darmo]

Nikon D200
Nikon 70-200 2.8 VR + TC 1.7
Focal length 120mm
f 5.6, 1/5 sec
ISO 100
EC + 0.3

I was out looking for fall colors and stumbled upon these Milkweeds . The yellows and greens caught my eye. Please let me know what you think.

[Alfred Forns]

I think it is stunning !!!! Love the saturation, strong composition with its careful (very) framing and just the right amount of blur !! Big Congrats !!!

[denise ippolito]

Caroline, I like it also. I think the colors are strong but not over powering. I also happen to love milkweeds. I think they are so interesting.

[Julie Kenward]

Beautiful colors, Caroline! Good saturation and a good composition.

[Arthur Morris]

I too like the careful side-to-side framing and the colors but the degree of blurring does not do anything for me. Perhaps a long shutter speed might have been more to my liking. Alfred taught me a great trick. Carry at least a nine stop ND filter to achieve slow shutter speeds in brighter lighting conditions to avoid having to work at small apertures and spend hours cleaning the resulting dust spots. This is especially true with older cameras that do not feature the auto sensor cleaning (that has proven to wok amazingly well.

[Cindy Crawford]

Very pretty composition-the blur makes me a little dizzy....but the basic idea is there. Overall, I DO really like this!

[Caroline Darmo]

Thanks for the comments guys. Artie, is there a particular brand of ND filters that you would recommend?

[Arthur Morris]

Hi C, No particular brand... The hard ones to find are the drop-ins for the big lenses. Best of luck. ps: try e-mailing Alfred Forns--he is the expert.

[Chris Starbuck]

Caroline,
For front-filter lenses (like yours), I think the ultimate is Singh-Ray's Vari-ND (77 & 82mm only).
http://www.singh-ray.com/varind.html
2-8 stops of variable ND. Much more expensive than fixed-NDs (even 2 or 3), but less to carry around. On my wish list.

I should note that the Vari-ND is essentially a pair of crossed polarizers, so you can't use it together with a polarizing filter, unlike fixed-NDs.