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A couple of flower shots at the Botanical gardens taken with the Sigma 150mm Macro exploring the effects of perspective and DOF on image. Which do you think is most effective?
Comments welcomed



cheers
marco

I like the portrait orientation as it does not cut off the flower stem in the background even though it is not in the dof. Although the higher perspective and dof of the landscape shot is make the flower much clearer.

Nice shots.

Craig

Hi marco, that first shot is superb. The second one is great but I really like the composition and colours in the first

Beautiful Marco. Super sharp and the colour is superb

I love them both Marco..If i was you i'd get a HUGE print of each and put them in different rooms in your house!

Liam =]

the top one does it for me

Marco I just love the first one. Perhaps just a little more cropped off the right hand side. But it is a great image.

Definately the first for me, I can see how the flower is suspended from the stalk, almost floating in air in the second, and the DOF gives the background *just* enough detail to be interesting enough to balance the amazing detail, sharpness and color of the flower... Looks brilliant...

Thanks for the gracious comments and suggestions guys. I'm slowly coming to grips with the Sigma 150mm
cheers
marco

Hi Marco, I like the first image the most. In the first image, the main subject at bottom left seems to work better than centred at the bottom in the second image. Probably a rule of thirds thing. I say that because if you crop some of the green off the right hand side in the first image to put the flower more central, it looses some impact. I also think the darker out of focus are top left in the first image works well.

I too have the Sigma 150 2.8 macro. It's sure taking me some getting used to. Do you find the AF hunts a fair bit and has trouble locking the focus in?

By the way, did you use a tripod for these shots. I find that even at f16 and above it's really difficult to get sharp focus without a tripod. You just sway a little forward or back and you loose the sharp focus. Do you usually use AF or manual focus?

Cheers
John

I would have to say the second is the wall hanging

Nice shot

Thanks for the comments John and Paul. You are right John I almost always use a tripod. Handholding at large apertures is murder. Plane of sharp focus is so narrow the slightest wobble back and forth and you have an unsharp pic unless you are rock steady and that's not me i'm afraid. I also used some reduced (-1.7) fill flash from off camera SB600.
Yeah the lens can snap to focus instantaneously at times and at others, usually when low contrast or no defined edges it will hunt but then again I manually focus all my macros. It is a superb lens once you start to understand its nuances. Happy shooting.
cheers
marco

Marco, when I first got the lens I started to manually focus my macros, but I found that when I was super close, it looked sharp in viewfinder but didn't come out sharp. By super close, I mean about .2 meter, even though it's only supposed to focus down to .38 meter. I guess that might have been my problem, trying to push the lens past it's limits. I'll go give the manual focus another go.

Cheers
John

Hi Marco, both really good, but the first one does it for me. The darker background on the left hand side of the first shot makes the object jump out a bit more. I also like that it's off-centre, that makes it a bit different.

Marco, both shots are great, but the first one is a ripper - it's so sharp and clear, and the flower is beautifully set apart from the background. Exceptional stuff!

Frank

It's no 1 for me too. The composition is great & the colours & sharpness are excellent. The darker background behind the the flower also helps to isolate it more than in the 2nd one.

Marco - Gorgeous, simple and yet so beautiful, the colours are excellent and just 'pop' of the screen. At first I couldn't decide which orientation I liked the most, but in the end I favour the portrait, but I still like the landscape one as the seperation from the background is better.

lovely comp osition and colour contrast saturation
this is nature at it's best


never seen that type of flower what is it?