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West Australian Wildflowers

PostPosted: Fri Sep 19, 2008 11:16 pm
by Merkyone
After a lengthy period of illness, this was my first serious attempt to take some decent photos.

My previous attempts at macro photography of this sort have been failures; hopefully these photos do the beautiful wildflowers of the south west of Western Australia some justice.



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Re: West Australian Wildflowers

PostPosted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 1:00 pm
by zafra52
I like them in this order 2,1 & 4. Number 3 looks a bit out of focus. I don't know if you have, but I also suggest you always use a tripod when taking close-ups to get the sharpest pictures.

Re: West Australian Wildflowers

PostPosted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 6:25 pm
by Killakoala
Lovely. West Aust is so fortunate to have some of the best flowers in the country. I was just over there for a week and I regretted not taking a camera with me. The flowers were growing wild just about everywhere.

I do like your images but I would like to see a bit more contrast to make the images really explode in colour and depth. Your subjects and compositions and very nice. Thanks for sharing them with us.

Re: West Australian Wildflowers

PostPosted: Sun Sep 21, 2008 9:40 pm
by Merkyone
Thanks guys for your comments.

zafra52- the shutter speed for most of the photos I was snapping was reasonably quick, I didn't think a tripod would help much. I'm probably mistaken and am kicking myself as I dragged it around with me on each of my expeditions! I know what you're saying about the third photo although there is something I like about having one flower in focus and the others out of focus. Maybe the composition doesn't suit.

Killakoala- the flowers around WA are just amazing, aren't they? I'll play around with the contrast a bit but I suspect my equipment is not up to scratch for this type of photography. I am using a D40 with the 18-200mm VR lens and taking my chances with natural light. Thanks for your comments about the composition! :)

Re: West Australian Wildflowers

PostPosted: Sun Sep 21, 2008 10:38 pm
by Geoff M
Merkyone wrote: I am using a D40 with the 18-200mm VR lens and taking my chances with natural light. Thanks for your comments about the composition! :)


A Canon 500D filter attached to the front of the 18-200VR works well for close ups, increasing the versitility of the 'all round' lens just a little more.

Re: West Australian Wildflowers

PostPosted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 6:48 pm
by zafra52
Adam, sometimes when you do macrophotography you haven't got much depth of field and hence the second flower is out of focus. It is the main subject, in this case the whole flower, that needs to be in focus. But, don't worry we all learn from experience. I like to study my mistakes and see where I went wrong, an let me tell you I have made enough mistakes to write an encyclopedia of photography! :D

Re: West Australian Wildflowers

PostPosted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 7:57 pm
by Catcha
2nd shot has a nice DOF .......