Your photos 98

Your photos (98)

Take Better Photos

Hints and tips
by Philip Grosset

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with comments from Philip Grosset

"Philip, I've just started to get serious about photography since recently moving to Colorado. I was wondering if you could take a look at these attached photos and let me know your ideas for improvements. The Mt. Evans photo was taken with a Nikon N70 with a 24mm lens. The shot of the goat was taken using a Nikon 70-210 zoom lens. Thanks,." (Bill Paustian)

Your use of a wide angle lens means that the whole picture is sharp and it's certainly colorful, but the total result is a little inconclusive. It might have been more interesting if you'd put more emphasis on either the foreground or the background.

I like this picture! Ideally, perhaps, the goat's head might have been even better a third of the way (rather than half-way) across the picture, then we could have seen more of the view, with the emphasis more on it than on the goat. But it's a fine photo as it is.

Reply from Bill Paustian: "Philip, Thanks for taking the time to give me your ideas! I agree with your comments about the picture of the goat, but not quite sure how to go about doing what you recommended on my wide angle shot of Mt Evans? I just purchased the 24mm wide angle and still learning how to best use it for Landscapes. Any recommendations you can provide in that regard? Your site is an excellent resource and has given me some good ideas that I plan on practicing next time I go out shooting. Thanks, Bill."

If you wanted to concentrate more on the foreground in the top picture, perhaps you could have used a much lower camera position to show a few of the yellow flowers in the immediate foreground in big close-up, with just a glimpse of the mountain in the background behind them.

If you wanted to concentrate more on the background, you might perhaps have shown less of the foreground, and composed the picture more like this.

"Hi, I'm into photography for about 6 months now, I did a lot of reading and a bit less practical shooting; I do fell my pictures are getting better, but there's still something missing. Hope you can help me find what it is. Common info: Camera: Nikon N65D (F65D - US) Flash : No flash used at these pics Film : Fuji Reala 100, scanned in the local lab at a pretty lousy resolution. Pics background:
1. 28-80 (at ~60), with exposure ~10 sec. Caesaria, Israel. The image had undergone some color work at Photoshop, no cropping. Yellows were brightened + saturated, blues - darkened. Do you think a tighter cropping would help? Or it is better to leave it this
way having the rule of the third working for the image?
2. 80-200 (was held in reverse at 80, focused on inf.) No tripod, exp=~1/60. Basically the same question - to crop tighter at the bottom of leave the focused flower at the 1/3? Not touched in Photoshop.
3. 80-200 (was held in reverse at 80, focused on inf.) No tripod, exp=~1/60. The greens were a bit enhanced in the Photoshop, no cropping. Does this image lose because the main subject is centered?
4. 80-200 (was held in reverse at 80, focused on inf.) No tripod, exp=~1/60. The greens and reds were a bit enhanced in the Photoshop, no cropping.
Thanks a lot. P.S.: If you decide the cropping is needed for some of the pictures I'd like to seem the cropped proportionally so the height/length ratio is preserved. Thanks again." (Daniel Schwartzer)

Your photo on the left works quite well. However, I think I prefer it cropped, as on the right, but leaving the tower still a third of the way across the picture from the right. The colors look just a little unreal but the result is quite pleasing. There's no way I can crop and preserve your original height/ratio. That's something you have to sort out when you take the photo!

There's attractive coloring in this photo, but too much of it is out of focus. Even so, it makes an attractive picture, with the one sharper bit neatly positioned at the intersection of thirds.

None of this is really sharply in focus, as my close-up on the right shows. If it had been sharper, I think the result would have been more pleasing if the leaf had been moved a bit off-centre, and you'd moved in closer, as on the right.

Once again, your photo on the left is far from sharp. It would have been improved by coming in closer, as in the middle version, if both the red areas had been really sharp. So I've concentrated, on the right, on the sharpest area, but even this part isn't really in focus. It's a good idea to throw the background out of focus - but not if it takes up most of the picture! You've got a nice eye for color. Sort out the focusing - and you'll produce some really first class pictures.

Reply from Daniel Schwartzer: "Thanks so much Philip. Actually I've managed to see the pictures even before receiving the mail. Now regarding the comments: The flowers pics that I took were all hand-held with quite a long exposure + the (heavy) lens in the other hand stuck to the body the other way around. The real problem was that the depth-of-field was no more then a few millimeters. That's for the defense. I have played with the possible croppings of the first picture for quite some time, but had never managed to find the proper cut. I really like your choice. Regarding the colors, I suppose you are right too. The original picture is attached. I like your other croppings as well; I have almost got there, but I was afraid to leave out other parts of the picture. Thank you so much Philip, your input was important - even though I did my homework and played around a lot with the pictures, I never got what you've shown.Thanks again, Daniel."

This is your original picture. I must say I really prefer the colors in it!

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