Tubular flowers, not bells.

[flavio]

During lunch time, I spotted these interesting tubular flowers. They are red in the outside but yellow-orange inside. This particular one got hit by a strong ray of light on the outer tube and this is my effort to get the light effect within the flower. I played with the DoF hoping the flowers in the background become less distractive distractive. What do you think?



EXIF data:

Camera: Canon PowerShot SX100 IS
Exposure: 0.003 sec (1/400)
Aperture: f/5.0
Focal Length: 6 mm
Exposure: +0.38
ISO Speed: 100

[adversarian]

Just as a starting note, I'm a total amateur and am just trying to give some insight.

To me the background isn't distracting from being busy, so much as it is from being so bright in comparison to the warm lighting of the flower in focus. In order to have made the image less busy I personally would have zoomed in more on the flower, to catch as much detail as possible while cutting away the busy ( and bright ) background.

I do like the glow effect. I can see why you wanted to capture it! Again it feels like the photo would have benefited from being closer to the flower, so we could see more detail and get a better warm-n-glowy feeling from the lighting. It would've made the center of the flower less out of focus as well.

I like the colors. Regarding composition the flower is well placed. The bit of plant directly underneath the flower that's cut off does nag at me a bit. Due to the placement of it I'm wondering if a vertical shot would have been more suitable? However I do like how there's so much empty space to the left, making the flower seem to open up and glow in that direction.

I love your idea for the shot. It could've been done a bit better but I understand that in the moment it can be hard, especially with this kind of lighting where you're worried you're going to lose it! Remember that when it comes to the DoF, you can easily make the background blurry with an editing program. Here it seems like you might've sacrificed the center of the flower to keep the blurry background.

I added you as a contact on flickr. I'm loving your photography!

[flavio]

Great comment. Thanks for taking the time.
Later, I'll go back to that plant and see if I can get a better shot (with my point and shoot)!

[flavio]

This one was challenging but I think the resulting image is pretty good!
What do you think about this one?



EXIF data:
Camera: Canon PowerShot SX100 IS
Exposure: 0.001 sec (1/800)
Aperture: f/5.0
Focal Length: 6 mm
Exposure: 0.00
ISO Speed: 200
Exposure Bias: 0 EV

[bigpipe]

lek, the colour compositon is correct, red on green background but why the picture is not sharp? Too slow shuttle speed? Is your IS on?

[flavio]

The wind never stops to move these delicate ones. They are a moving taget at less than 2 cm from the glass. I took several shots in the same situation. Same came out sharp but the flower would't pose for me the way I asked and the composition was much less attractive. What puzzels me is that things around the flower a the same focal distance are sharp. It might have something to to with the light inside the flower (???)