a little red rock, couple of yuccas

Tango

i enjoyed a little hike the other day, not the best light, but ok...
(getting out is like winning the lotto for me, except im not sure what winning to lotto is really like:D )

im just learning a new 300mm prime and macro,
if you gurus notice anything i should be aware of please let me know...
i did everything with intent, but now that i have the images off the card
im not sure i made the right choices, so if there is anything from poor
composition to poor aperture choice to focus or exposure...
whatever pls...point it out. (oh, and im open to any good points too:D )

1. (only 24mm the rest are 300mm & macro)



2.



3.


4.



5.



6.



7. (bees not bunnies)


8.



9.



10.

Eia

I'm sure not an expert but I Love, love, love the color in these!

#3 and 7 are my faves. 3 has that miniature look to it that makes it odd and the colors are great. 7 is a stand out for me because of the color and texture. Yes I could tell they were bees...giant bees!

I like the texture in the rock for #2 but my eyes keep focusing on the foreground. Still like it though.

hawkeye978

Aaron,

Like the set. Love the details in the rocks in number 2. Wonder if the color would be helped by using a LAB curve adjustment? I'm also intrigued by #3. I wonder how a tight crop on the left tree(?) would look including just the plant and the rock underneath. Kind of like a desert Bonsai?

Jack'll do

Lovely set overall Aaron. I like the colors and textures in these. I think 3# would be much improved with a narrower DOF though. The first time I looked at it my eyes were immediately drawn to the slightly OOF background and for a moment I wasn't even aware of the trees which didn't immediately pop out. That distraction was not as evident on subsequent looks at the image so I guess it was a "first impression". Nevertheless I think a nice bokeh (or at least a much more OOF BG) would greatly improve that image. It will be intersting to see if anyone else has that experience.

Hikin' Mike

Nice series!

NeilL

Congratulations Aaron on your new fabulous gear!

These shots make me smile. Somehow they remind me of a first date - a little fantastic and a little wide of the mark.

All of them are strangely uncomfortable to my eyes. In many of them this is due partly to visual rivalry - this has a technical meaning in psychophysics, and is the cause of some anomalous visual effects. In #4 for example my eyes see either the background (which has a distance/magnitude ambivalence which exerts a magnetic pull) or the flora - not both together, integrated into the frame. This is not helped by there being no visible physical connection between the flowers and the rocks. Perhaps bokeh/OOF has to be used more carefully with a long lens and landscape so that there is a broader DOF and therefore a visual link via sharpness from foreground to background? Or the other way, a very definite pushing the background towards unrecognisability?

Another cause of eye strain is in foreshortening. To me #2 is uninterpretable, because all points in the main mass have exactly the same distance and magnitude cues. In other words, there are no independent cues to establish the fore to back distance. Lack of visual cues again causes the wall behind the long single flower stem in #1 and #7 to appear to my eyes to be 1m high in the first and 200m in the second.

When you are in the surroundings your eyes usually have plentiful information to arrive at the reality of the scene. Through the camera and long lens though, a vanishingly minute portion of that information is available. So maybe keeping that in mind you might try composing with a long focal length lens to include essential information that the photo viewer's eyes will need to arrive at the reality of distance, magnitude and relationships (unless you really are aiming for surreal?!).

#10 I like most, tho it's not sharp.

dlplumer

Super Aaron. I particularly like # 3 clap

Dan

anwmn1

Here is my opinion on these....

1. The color in this shot is great. The foreground in particular is very strong and the Yuccas against the sandstone is also quite nice. The problem with this shot is that there are several places that your eyes focus on but there is not that one strong focus point that makes the shot. The photo leads your eyes from front center to back left - they Yucca is just hanging out there off to the right.

2. This reminds me a lot of the area around page and the lines you have in the rock are much better than I captured/ Similar to the first one it is lacking a real focus point. Yes the rocks are cool but they are just rocks. I think you could have gone for a more abstract look here to achieve a better shot.

3. I am digging the depth of field on this one! Like others suggested I think it would benefit from a crop. For me the sky in the top left is a distraction and I would crop that out.

4. This is a pretty good shot and using the sandstone as a background to help give depth to the Yucca was a great idea. For me the poppers on the Yucca are too hot though.

5. This one is not working for me. The Yucca's are too hot -especially against the dark background.

6. Same as #5. Too hot - maybe a black and white-

7. Great light and color. The bees actually bug me I think if you would have gone for a comp where there is no sky- just the Yucca, sandstone, and shadow it would have worked much better.

8. This seems a little hot to me as well but I like it. I like abstract and it is a good combination of shapes and colors.

9. Good catch.

10. I like the idea of this a lot too. I think you can get some more color out of the plant by darkening the green a little bit. Good depth of field.


Overall a very good outing though Aaron. Must be nice to have some new gear.

Tango

i appreciate everyones comments, truly a lot for me to think about until my next outing!...

thank you, thank you, thank you...