Tulip . . . more practice with the macro setting

[Kathy O]

Did a little more practice with the my Macro Setting on my camera . . . I think this photo is a little better than the previous ones I posted earlier but I still think the focus is a little soft and probably would have looked better without the tulip to the left. Comments and advice welcome!!

Kathy

[JohnnyG]

I think this would have worked better as a vertical composition which would eliminate the left side tulip. I think you are also correct in your assessment of soft focus.

[Kathy O]

I think this would have worked better as a vertical composition which would eliminate the left side tulip. I think you are also correct in your assessment of soft focus.

I will keep practicing, with each photo if I get a little better then hopefully I will get it figured out.

[Kathy O]

I think this would have worked better as a vertical composition which would eliminate the left side tulip. I think you are also correct in your assessment of soft focus.

Here is a cropped version of the first photo.

Kathy

[Victor Dallons]

Kathy:
One of the things that leads to soft images of a flower is that one of the color channels is blown out. In you tulip picture, the red channel is at the maximum level of 255 for much of the bright yellow area, and thus you have lost a lot of detail. The exposure meter in the camera looks at overall luminescence, not at individual color channels, and thus over exposes the image. A fix is to cut back your exposure by a stop in either manual mode or by using the exposure compensation. If you camera lets you view the histograms for the individual R, G, B channels, use those histograms to fine tune your exposure.

Victor