leaves around flower

[noob_dphoto]

I am a noob when it comes to taking pictures. I have very little understanding of aperture, shutter speed, light, focal point and the likes. I am confused as to which one to select to be creative. Why choose a different aperture except for the largest to keep the subject in focus and blur the background or for the smallest aperture to keep both foreground and background in focus. I have a film slr but gave up on it since it was expensive having blurred pictures developed. Hence, I bought a digital point and shoot camera with zoom and build in (automatic) creative features, years ago.

I am learning to frame and compose. I tried to get some ideas/photos from others and implement them.

With the attach picture, I am torn apart whether to completely blur the background (like upper left quadrant) or to have the leaves slightly blurred but not completely (like in the lower right quadrant). I somewhat prefer to have some of the leaves completely blurred and some more define in this case which seems to add to the whole composition rather than just completely focusing on the subject. Completely blurring the background seems to make the flower to be floating and it seems artificial. While if the leaves around it is somewhat blur/define, then it looks more natural. Is it about creativeness versus more natural looking without making the whole picture a clutter? Is it a matter of making the background not busy at all or is it about the whole composition?

I came across vignetting while reading but I have no clue on how to apply it - do one need a filter, is it a camera feature or technique? Could it have improve this picture?

1) What does the community think about blurring the background completely or not (composition wise)?
2) Regarding the subject,
2a) does anyone felt that petals are velvetty (soft and silky) or are they out of focus?
2b) How about the amount of light that hit the petals - does it seems to show some amount of shadow to detail the ruffles?
3) What is the reasoning why the flower seems to be floating? Is it the contrast?

Camera: Canon G2
ISO: 50
Aperture: f/2.2 (Aperture Priority selected)
Shutter speed: 1/40
Macro setting: On
Auto White Balance
Spot AE Point: Center
Metering Mode: Center-weighted Average
Sunny but this flower is located under a shadow
Flash: Off
Exposure: 0
Exposure adjustment: 0

PS
I am not sure if this belongs to composition, framing, wild life, or macro thread. But definitely, I would like it to be criticized.

[tvoelcker]

My first thought when I opened the picture was that it is very soft ( the rose is a bit out of focus ).
Second thing was the picture is a bit heavy on the right hand side with there being more foliage to the right than the left leaving things a bit unbalanced.
Sorry I don't have the time to answer all your questions since you did a great job with your post.
However, hopefully by bumping it up, you will get some other comments.

[neltron3030]

Here are my thoughts:

1) What does the community think about blurring the background completely or not (composition wise)?
For bokeh shots, you really want to have something in focus and lots of blur in the rest of the picture to make the main object really stand out.

2) Regarding the subject,
It is a little on the boring side. There isn't much to the composition that makes it unique.

2a) does anyone felt that petals are velvetty (soft and silky) or are they out of focus?
Out of focus

2b) How about the amount of light that hit the petals - does it seems to show some amount of shadow to detail the ruffles?
Is really irrelevant unless points 2 and 2a are addressed.

3) What is the reasoning why the flower seems to be floating? Is it the contrast?
It is the focus

[Loving It]

Is the flower the subject or the leaves? In this case the flower is the subject so all the focus should be on the flower. The leaves are there to accentuate the flower, not steal the spotlight. That is why most flower pictures have the leaves in the background blurred. Your shutter speed was 1/40. Did you use a tripod? In my experience, anything less than 1/100 should have a tripod to make sure subject is sharp. When you shoot the flower again, I would also get closer to the flower so it fills most of the frame and also place it off center a bit. If you are not sure about the blur, set your camera on Aperature mode and take a picture at each aperature then compare. Good luck.

[navcom]

Aperture is very important in photography. It does two things.

First, it controls the amount of light entering the lens. You can use this to increase or decrease your shutter speed to get certain effects. If you are shooting in low light, you will need a larger aperture to get a faster shutter speed. If you want to stop motion (silky waterfalls as an example), you can use a smaller aperture to slow down the shutter speed and blur anything that is moving (water, etc.).

Second, aperture controls depth of field (probably the most-used part). The smaller the opening (larger number), the more of the image will be focus from front to back. The larger the opening (smaller number), the less of the image will be in focus.

With these two things in mind, understand that the lens gives you the best quality in the middle aperture range (f/8-f/13 or so). At it's widest opening (smallest number), the image will lose quality and become washed out. As it approaches it's smallest opening (largest number), you start having diffraction issues, which causes the image to lose sharpness.

In general, it's best to always avoid the bottom 2 stops and top 3 stops to get as much image quality as possible. Sometimes you have to go there because the photo requires it, but try to avoid it if possible.

So, choosing an aperture is always a trade-off....

- If you need the light, you must go to a large aperture but forfeit DOF and possibly wash out a bit.
- If you need really narrow DOF, you must also go large
- If you need a huge DOF, you might need a really small aperture and thus lose some sharpness.

So, with your flower picture, you are trying to achieve a narrow DOF, which means a smaller aperture. I would stop down a bit from what you had...maybe f/5 or so...and use as much zoom as you can (which also gives less DOF). Just make sure your flower is in focus.

[noob_dphoto]

Originally Posted by tvoelcker

My first thought when I opened the picture was that it is very soft ( the rose is a bit out of focus ).
Second thing was the picture is a bit heavy on the right hand side with there being more foliage to the right than the left leaving things a bit unbalanced.
Sorry I don't have the time to answer all your questions since you did a great job with your post.
However, hopefully by bumping it up, you will get some other comments.

Thanks for the reply.

I check the flower again and all the pictures I have taken, it was really soft. I check most roses on this forum, most of them have good light on them while the flower I took was under a shade.

I noticed that too but I choose this photo to make it easier to explain my point and for everyone to see the difference when the leaves are blurred or not.

[noob_dphoto]

Originally Posted by neltron3030

Here are my thoughts:

1) What does the community think about blurring the background completely or not (composition wise)?
For bokeh shots, you really want to have something in focus and lots of blur in the rest of the picture to make the main object really stand out.

2) Regarding the subject,
It is a little on the boring side. There isn't much to the composition that makes it unique.

2a) does anyone felt that petals are velvetty (soft and silky) or are they out of focus?
Out of focus

2b) How about the amount of light that hit the petals - does it seems to show some amount of shadow to detail the ruffles?
Is really irrelevant unless points 2 and 2a are addressed.

3) What is the reasoning why the flower seems to be floating? Is it the contrast?
It is the focus

Thanks.

1) I guess I was not clear on my question or I was misleading. The subject does not necessarily be a flower, it could be a bridge with a cityscape background. The question is, if the background complements the subject and not detract from it, when does the photographer/storyteller totally/slightly blur the background or include the background?

2b) It could irrelevant, but it is nice to know if it could be improve upon or it adds value to the picture so that the your comments can be factored in when taking my next picture.