Macro shot!

[skipjack]

How do you guys think of the picture. I found it too empty so I cropped it quite tightly? Should I leave more space or should it been cropped even more tightly?

[lolasputnik]

I find the focus is a bit unfocused, are you using a macro lens? The crop is good, maybe add a bit of greenery so crop a bit less?

[PhotoNewt]

Unfortuntely, the subject is out of focus. When doing close up or macro work on flowers the main point to focus on is the center - the pistil.

If you have a chance to repeat the shot, change the focus mode to manual and focus on the center. Change the aperture from f/5.6 to something like f/11 or f/16 to help keep the petals in focus with larger DoF.

[skipjack]

Wow thanks but somehow i've already adjusted the manual focus myself but it does'nt seem to be in focus. Any suggestions?

[PhotoNewt]

How did you take the photo, handheld or with a tripod? For close up work is highly recommended to use a tripod since very little movement on your part will throw your focus off. At an aperture of 5.6 your focus zone is quite small and leaves no room for error. With extreme magnification (using a macro lens and/or extension tubes) you will need a focusing rail to help achieve critical focus.

When doing this type of work two additional tips will help you achieve the sharpest possible image. Read your camera manual and learn how to activate the mirror lock function - this locks the mirror up when you press the shuttter release before opening the shutter curtains eliminating any possible camera vibration caused by the movement of this mirror.

You should also use the self-timer function to take the photo rather than pressing the shutter release yourself, this will eliminate any possible vibration introduced by the pressing of the shutter release.

Remember,

even minimal camera shake = blurry macro photos

tripod, mirror lock and self-timer shutter release = no camera shake

[skipjack]

Thanks newt! The tips were really helpful! I think that I will try it out the next time I take some macro shots. Thanks again!

[dlaf]

How big was the original photo, skipjack? There's a lot of noise that looks like it's coming from blowing up a small, small area of a large photo. If that's the case, what will help there is getting closer and filling the frame more and/or more mps that allow you to crop smaller pics. (Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.)

[PhotoNewt]

Originally Posted by dlaf

How big was the original photo, skipjack? There's a lot of noise that looks like it's coming from blowing up a small, small area of a large photo. If that's the case, what will help there is getting closer and filling the frame more and/or more mps that allow you to crop smaller pics. (Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.)

You are absolutely correct. As a photographer you should always try to frame your shots right the first time so you discard as little image as possible on cropping - cropping should fine tune the image, is not intended to make an image (there are exceptions here though like a picture within a picture).

One thing I learned early on that will help you is "frame bracketing": frame your subject and take the shot, then turn the camera around and take the vertical or horizontal as needed, then zoom in closer (or use the "foot" zoom) and take another, then zoom out click again. If you can, walk around the subject and look for other angles, then start again.

The more shots you get on the spot, the more photos you will have at the end to choose the best one with minimal cropping. You also need to learn to edit your shooting sessions aggressively - this means discarding as many bad shots as you can before starting any post-processing.

Originally Posted by skipjack

Thanks newt! The tips were really helpful! I think that I will try it out the next time I take some macro shots. Thanks again!

Glad I could help. On last thing regarding the self-timer; if your camera is like mine it has two or more self-timer settings - mine has 2-sec and 10-sec timers. For macro and telephoto work (using the mirror lock on telephoto is also essential for sharp pictures) use the longest self-timer rather than the shorter: reason for this is to allow any vibration introduced by the mirror lock function to disspate completely before taking the picture - this is not so critical when using a wide angle, mirror lock here is not so critical and a short timer delay will do just fine.