Water Lily

[dm2000t]

I'd love to hear some ideas on how to compose this differently.



I didn't know if I shot it from an angle would help, by doing so you got some terrible background distractions..ie dirty water, ugly green pads and such.

Thanks in advance for every critique.....

[windrider86]

Knowing your camera settings (exif information) will play a huge part in giving you a critique. Could you post them for us?

[dm2000t]

Sure Sorry about that.
Camera: Nikon D70
ISO: 200
Lens: 70-300 @ 80mm
Fstop: F13
Shutter: 1/500

[dcclark]

I really like the straight-on angle -- although it's not quite straight on here, I think. I am a big fan of symmetry, which this indeed has.

As an alternate option, you colud try going 90 degrees around -- view the flower directly from the side, preferably when backlit (to get some nice complex shadows).

One other comment: it seems like your focus was off here. Maybe the central yellow area was in focus, but the petals around it seem to be out of focus. Not sure what happened, but at macro focal distances, depth of field can be hard to get.

[MSidPhoto]

I think that the in the center of the flower the yellow which is spread out looks artificial, and deteriorate the beauty of the white flower, reduce the saturation to reduce this "spread out" saturation.

As for the composing it differently, the nature has its own way to beautify things, dirty water might make this photo look better because of the contrast, same is the case with green pads. If you want a different composing, then try keeping your camera at lower angle then the flower....you might get interesting shots of what is surrounding the flower other than the water.
Use your imagination to the most. "Imagination has no bounds."
Play around with different angles and you'll see the interesting changes.

Hope this helps