Common Houseleek flower

[Bo_]

I took a shot of this nice Common Houseleek in our garden today. I had for some days seen one of the many buds come into flower. It is right beside our carport. I thought that it was the right opportunity to improve my skills with my new 450D.

What do you think of this attempt?
- is the DOF ok?
- is the background to "fuzzy"?

Should I have waited until the insect was gone?

I did the shoot without my tripod and with the kid lens.

The EXIF: Exposure: 1/50s, Aperture: f/5.6, Focal Length: 55 mm, ISO Speed: 200 (see the rest at flickr).

[jiminyClickit]

Bo_,

Hope all is well at the "crime scene" and that that's the last time you have that sort of visitor.

We were talking about "hens and chicks" (a Midwest (US) nickname also) yesterday. I had no memory of them flowering like this. Very strong contrast and interesting shape.

I would crop about half of the background away, though, because it adds little while stealing attention away from the bloom. I do squares a lot, but if you put this flower slightly higher and on the left in a crop of all sides (left more than right, top more than bottom), a landscape would be OK. Well done, again

[Bo_]

Thanks - we are in the process of buying the missing things. It's funny that I still find things that are missing - and therefore I have to contact my insurants com-pany to inform them about another stolen thing. They are (still) very under-standing.

About the Hen and chicks - I wasn't aware of the diversity until my wife came home with a lot of new types of Houseleeks. This was the first that has blos-somed - and there are a lot to come. So I have good opportunity to reshoot the picture with your (and others) advice.

[jiminyClickit]

And always through your discerning eye.

[Bo_]

An updated version of the hen and chicks flower! I tried to reshoot the picture and crop closer around the flower - an almost square crop (as JiminyClickit sug-gested). To get that close to the flower I changed to my 70-300mm Sigma zoom lens and used a monkey-grip to get the camera steady. It was a difficult shoot because it was windy and the sun was changing all the time. Normally a little wind will not move a houseleek - but this was so intense that the flower moved around. So I had to sit patiently and wait for some minutes without wind and at the same time hope that the sun did not change at the same time. But after all I think I got a reasonably good picture… At least I don’t think that I would have been able to take the same picture with my (missing) old S3IS.



EXIF: Camera: Canon EOS 450D, Exposure: 1/125s, Aperture: f/5.6, Focal Length: 300 mm, ISO Speed: 200!

[Nathan deGargoyle]

RFor the first one I think the DoF is too narrow. It leaves the flower disconnected from it's base which doesn't seem right for a house-leek.

The second one is perfect!

[Shutterbugdeb]

Really great second shot. Well done!