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Thread: A Lonely Blade

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    Default A Lonely Blade

    Another image from my "test drive" of the 1Ds Mk III.

    I thought the single blade of grass made an interesting subject against the background of a fallen rose petal.

    Canon 1Ds Mk III, Tamron 90mm f/2.8 1:1 Macro lens. Handheld while laying on the ground. 1/800th @ f/2.8




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    Brendan Dozier
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    Very clean & simple abstract, Jason, solitary blade at a diagonal and the BG color and light really make the composition. The low dof works works fine for me. Way to get on the ground and try for something unique!

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    Thanks Brendan, much appreciated. I've always enjoyed experimenting with different shooting perspectives, and the great thing about digital is, that it doesn't cost anything to do so...unlike with film.

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    Hi Jason;

    I love the concept here...very creative! I agree with Brendan, I think the low DOF works in this instance...I think I may have liked it more if the focus was more on the tip. The BG is beautiful...if it were mine, I might have made the composition a little less centered..love the drama created in the image by the deep red against the stark silhouette. Nicely done!

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    Quote Originally Posted by John Storjohann View Post
    Hi Jason;

    I love the concept here...very creative! I agree with Brendan, I think the low DOF works in this instance...I think I may have liked it more if the focus was more on the tip. The BG is beautiful...if it were mine, I might have made the composition a little less centered..love the drama created in the image by the deep red against the stark silhouette. Nicely done!
    Thanks John, much appreciated. I guess the blade of grass wasn't completely parallel with the focus plane, which I just assumed it was. Even though I shot it @ f/2.8, if it had been, the entire blade still would have been in focus, including the tip. But I guess it was angled "away" from the focal plane ever so slightly, which caused both the bottom portion, and the tip to be out of focus. Just shows how shallow the DOF really can be. But I really wanted to use a large aperture so the background would appear nice and "soft".

    The image is actually a crop of the full frame, as there was another half blade of grass sticking up into the frame to the right of the one in the photo above, that was quite distracting, so I removed it. (Haven't really "mastered" cloning techniques of Photoshop yet.)

    Once I get my own 1D/1Ds body, I'll also be able to take more time, and take full advantage of all the focus points available, so every shot won't be "centered"...or use the center spot, focus, and recompose.

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    BPN Member Steve Maxson's Avatar
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    Hi Jason. A very cool perspective and the rose petal makes a great background. Like John, I would wish that the tip of the blade was sharp. You might try zooming in on the image to about 300% and then carefully cloning away the OOF edges around the tip and sides of the blade - this will result in an image with more "apparent" sharpness in that area. You have a textured effect around the darker edges of the image - almost as though this were printed on canvas. Was this intentional or is this the result of a very large crop? It's an interesting effect, though I'm not sure that I like it. You get high marks for creativity with this one!

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    Thanks Steve, very much appreciated.

    The "textured" effect is a result of the cropping...purely unintentional.

    I might try and "play around" with cloning out the OOF edges around the tip, and sides of the blade, just to see what happens. Thanks for the suggestion.

    (Actually I just had a look at the original full frame image @ 100%, and I don't think cloning would help sharpen the tip, or edges of the blade too much) It's just too shallow of DOF. Which was sort of the trade off I guess...I wanted the shallow DOF to completely blur, and soften the background, yet it didn't keep the blade of grass completely sharp.

    I think I'll post the full frame, uncropped image later tonight for comparison sake.

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    Publisher Arthur Morris's Avatar
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    Interesting concept and design. Love the soft colors. Working on tripod and creating two images, one at f/2.8 and another at f/22 and then combining them just might have worked well....
    BIRDS AS ART Blog: great info and lessons, lots of images with our legendary BAA educational Captions; we will not sell you junk. 30+ years of long lens experience/e-mail with gear questions.

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    Thanks Artie. That's a great idea about the dual image blending. Never thought of that. Might just have to give it a try. Thanks for the suggestion.

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    Publisher Arthur Morris's Avatar
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    YAW; we all need to learn to think digitally while we are in the field :).
    BIRDS AS ART Blog: great info and lessons, lots of images with our legendary BAA educational Captions; we will not sell you junk. 30+ years of long lens experience/e-mail with gear questions.

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    I guess you CAN teach an old dog, new tricks after all.

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    Hi Jason. I was just looking at your image again and the textured look I referred to in my previous comment (which was very obvious) - is not there at all now. Must have been some odd computer glitch on my end. Please disregard my comment on that topic.

    Quote Originally Posted by Steve Maxson View Post
    You have a textured effect around the darker edges of the image - almost as though this were printed on canvas.

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    Hi Steve, thanks for the update. Just looked at it again myself, and yeah, now that "textured pattern" effect isn't there. It's also not there on the full frame image I posted either. I guess it was a computer glitch since I noticed it before myself.

    My first thought was, "Hey I thought you could crop 1Ds Mk III images until the cows came home, but I guess this (the textured pattern effect) proves you can't." But now I guess you really can crop 1Ds MK III images pretty severely. haha

    I also realize now I should have tried some vertical compositions as well, but I didn't want to overstay my welcome with the test drive.

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