Project 52 by Divya ( DesertRose )

[DesertRose]

Week 36

Hello Everyone

It's been a month since I started learning photography. With this project I would like to practice whatever I have learn. This week it's about "Depth of Field ". The photos were taken on September 1st, too bad I didn't notice this thread before. Comments and Critics are mostly welcome

Thanks

Divya

[Geoff F]

I'm not familiar with that camera, Divya, but you do seem to have a lot of focus depth for F5.6. However, is that a camera which has something around F8, or less, as maximum aperture? I am used to considering settings like F5.6 as as being wide open.

And with those low shutter speeds I assume you used a tripod.

With regard to the actual photos. Well done for a beginner.

The first looks a little soft. How much sharpening did you use. Possibly, resizing for the internet has softened it slightly. I usually add a little extra Unsharp Mask after any substantial downsizes.

And for flowers etc, I often selectively apply sharpening so only the intended subject gets sharpened.

But on the other hand, excessive sharpening is often worse than too little.

With the second image, I would crop slightly closer by removing a little from the top and left side to reduce the area of distracting out of focus background blooms.

ps. Is that a spider web running from the flower to the mid lower edge?

[DesertRose]

With regard to the actual photos. Well done for a beginner.

Thanks Geoff

I use Nikon D 3100 with 18-55mm lens, the photo were taken at F5.6.Didn't use a tripod, the shutter speed for both the images are 1/50 and 1/30 respectively.

Thanks for the suggestions, will implement them

didn't notice the spider web in the 2nd image

[FrankMi]

Hi Divya, I use a D3100 as well! Nice camera!

If you are outdoors shooting flowers and you have even the slightest wind you'll need a shutter speed faster than 1/50 sec. If you are shooting these at F5.6 and 1/30, you are most likely at ISO 100 and can safely go to about 800 for these images. That will allow you a faster shutter speed and a little better DoF with a smaller aperture opening. Both should help make the images sharper and still leave plenty of room for Bokeh.

[cliffmccartney]

Hi Divya,

Great shots. #1 looks a bit soft to me, but the shallow DoF works. The other red flowers in #2 make the background a bit busy for my taste.

[DesertRose]

Thank you Frank and Cliff.

I have sharpened the first two images in gimp. I am a complete novice at post processing, so let me know if some improvements have to be done.




Week 37

For this week I have taken a reflection photo. My first reflection photo . I have cropped and sharpened it a bit in gimp, what I have learnt in the first two images. Comments and critics are welcome

Thanks

Divya

[Geoff F]

For me, Divya, you have a light problem with that camera angle. You have exposed correctly for a bright sky which has left everything else a bit dark.

I think I would try to lighten the mid tones a little.

Ideally, working with an adjustment layer and mask which could be edited to selectively avoid any over exposure problem.

Even so, I would probably have to except some sky over exposure.

The basic composition, and focus, is good.

[DesertRose]

Thanks Geoff

I have changed the sky a bit, added some clouds and also lightened the image. Hope i didn't overdo it. It's just been two weeks and I have learnt a lot

As usual comments and critics are welcome

[DesertRose]

Week 38

This week is about water droplets. I have seen many pictures of waterdrops. Just wanted to try it

Comments and critics are welcome



Thanks

Divya

[FrankMi]

Looks like you've succeeded!

The brown in the background could be distracting for some. The really sharp leaf on the far right could as well. Things that are really different in an image tend to grab the eye so you usually want to use those attributes to draw attention to the main subject wherever you can.

I like the way the water drop pattern is repeated in the background, almost like a subdued reflection!

<Edit> I just noticed the updated flowers you posted earlier. Nice improvement!

[Geoff F]

Your pond photo edit looks much better.

Photographing water droplets is never easy and these have worked reasonably well; but I agree with Frank about the leaf in the top right.

[DesertRose]

Thanks Frank and Geoff

[ronlane]

Love the water droplets. Looks good.

[DesertRose]

This week I went to an Aquarium. It's my first time taking the photo of a moving subject especially in low light conditions. It was tough but learnt a lot . Here are some of the best pics.Please let me know which one is better. Comments and Critics please

Can someone tell me how to remove glass reflection while processing the images, for now I am just blending them into the background. Is there any other way ?













Thanks

Divya

[DesertRose]

Love the water droplets. Looks good.

Thanks Ron

[FrankMi]

Can someone tell me how to remove glass reflection while processing the images, for now I am just blending them into the background. Is there any other way?

Hi Divya, I just ordered and received a rubber hens hood that can mask out stray reflections when shooting through glass. The best part is that they are under $10! Here is a link to a posting concerning shooting aquariums using the rubber lens hood and some shooting tips.

http://www.flickr.com/groups/nikondi...7627701641799/

[DesertRose]

Thanks for the link Frank, it's very helpful

[DesertRose]

This week I have taken a sunset photo. I have saturated the colors a bit and also sharpened the photo. The foreground has come out a bit dark, I tried to increase the brightness but it was making the sky dull so I let it be. If there are any corrections to be done let me know

Thanks

[Geoff F]

That is a common problem, Divya.

Simple answer, crop tighter to reduce the dark area so it doesn't have so much impact. But in this case it would mean losing the water.

Alternatives:

Shoot as a HDR and merge a number of photos shot at different exposures. But this requires suitable editing software and shooting carefully on a tripod without any subject movement. Which can be a problem if you have leaves blowing in the wind etc.

Use a graduated filter during shooting. A bit of extra expense and something else to carry around just in case you might need it. This can work well with suitable skylines but it doesn't look good in every case.

Edit with some form of layers and masks to apply adjustments selectively. For this type of scene, if HDR shooting isn't suitable, I normally shoot Raw then create two conversions with different exposures and merge them together, with a suitable mask to only show the required areas. Needs suitable software and a little bit of skill; but not overly difficult. Even a simple Curves adjustment on a layer can be masked and edited to give some improvement.

Apply a bit of brightness using an Adjustment Brush. A simple editing option but I have never found this quite so effective as the previous suggestion.

And that is just a few ideas; without doing too much thinking.

ps. The underwater shots are interesting. And always difficult. When shooting through glass try to keep the lens square with the glass. Some people get good results with one of those rubber lens hoods (mentioned in another recent post).

An unedited sample photo with glass reflection may give us something to experiment with.

The last photo in the set is the only one which doesn't work so well due to a fous problem.

[DesertRose]

Edit with some form of layers and masks to apply adjustments selectively. For this type of scene, if HDR shooting isn't suitable, I normally shoot Raw then create two conversions with different exposures and merge them together, with a suitable mask to only show the required areas. Needs suitable software and a little bit of skill; but not overly difficult. Even a simple Curves adjustment on a layer can be masked and edited to give some improvement.

.

Sounds interesting, would like to try it out . I recently got Lightroom 3 software from a friend, I think this might help.

Thanks Geoff