Hi Leia, note that I'm just a hobbyist too! But I love getting out and taking pictures as do you.
I've certainly run into the effect that you're showing in the above photo. There's a neat shot among these flowers, but how to get it?
There is some combination of following that is quite likely to help. While trying to get the shot it's up to you to try them all in any combination to see if something "pops-out:"
(The mechanics of the camera toward the below choices: Aperture Priority ("A" mode), so that you get to choose the aperture that the camera shoots at. Camera set to auto-ISO too, and the exposure compensation ("-3 ... 0 ... +3") set to around "-1" to keep the skies from saturating. If you're shooting into the sun, set exposure compensation to around "-2" or so, then boost light of the subject and foreground back at your computer. Again, this keeps the photo away from being so saturated that detail is lost in significant portion of the photo.)
1) Raise the aperture number until just a few more things are in focus. Don't go for higher aperture than that for a shot like this: there's a neat effect here when foreground and background have a nice blurry smoothness, 'bokeh,' leaving just the subject in sharp focus.
2) Sometimes when you're close to the subject, the aperture number can't go high enough to get all of what you need in focus. When you step back a few feet (sometimes more) and then refocus, more of your subject will be in focus. You'll probably need to crop the resulting photo on your computer to get back to the shot you want. (As long as you don't have to down crop to a very small region of the original photo, the 'image quality' won't suffer.)
3) Frame the shot a bit differently. Pretend you are at the surface of a sphere surrounding your subject. Go to different points on that sphere to see if there is a location where the subject is suddenly separated from everything else. Here, the subject is three or such (i.e., often an odd-number) of the flower stalks. The rest of the flowers should be part of the foreground or background, so separated by space and/or by "blur" from your subject.
There's a lot to think about and balance when getting your shots! Along with the above, I try to pay attention to the background too:
1) How much blur is "just right?" (Raise or lower aperture accordingly.)
2) Even when the background is blurry, sometimes something in the background really adds to the shot. Try to find whatever that is.
3) If there are leaves or anything else translucent in your subject, having the sun shining from behind them can make them glow. Or produce a glowing outline to your subject ...
Don't be afraid to "rearrange" the subject, foreground, or background objects if you can. If there's a twig that's "photobombing" your shot? If you can reach it, move it out of the way. If having something in the foreground would add to the shot (often it does), look around: can you move something into the shot to make it better?
Finally, I mentioned a "sphere" being something to imagine yourself on. Don't stay at the same height for all of your trial shots, change the height that you're taking the shot from as well.
Sometimes I'll take eight or nine shots of something, just varying a few things at time a little bit, from the above lists. Back home at the computer, I'll review them, to see which one of the shots is best to start editing from.
I've certainly run into the effect that you're showing in the above photo. There's a neat shot among these flowers, but how to get it?
There is some combination of following that is quite likely to help. While trying to get the shot it's up to you to try them all in any combination to see if something "pops-out:"
(The mechanics of the camera toward the below choices: Aperture Priority ("A" mode), so that you get to choose the aperture that the camera shoots at. Camera set to auto-ISO too, and the exposure compensation ("-3 ... 0 ... +3") set to around "-1" to keep the skies from saturating. If you're shooting into the sun, set exposure compensation to around "-2" or so, then boost light of the subject and foreground back at your computer. Again, this keeps the photo away from being so saturated that detail is lost in significant portion of the photo.)
1) Raise the aperture number until just a few more things are in focus. Don't go for higher aperture than that for a shot like this: there's a neat effect here when foreground and background have a nice blurry smoothness, 'bokeh,' leaving just the subject in sharp focus.
2) Sometimes when you're close to the subject, the aperture number can't go high enough to get all of what you need in focus. When you step back a few feet (sometimes more) and then refocus, more of your subject will be in focus. You'll probably need to crop the resulting photo on your computer to get back to the shot you want. (As long as you don't have to down crop to a very small region of the original photo, the 'image quality' won't suffer.)
3) Frame the shot a bit differently. Pretend you are at the surface of a sphere surrounding your subject. Go to different points on that sphere to see if there is a location where the subject is suddenly separated from everything else. Here, the subject is three or such (i.e., often an odd-number) of the flower stalks. The rest of the flowers should be part of the foreground or background, so separated by space and/or by "blur" from your subject.
There's a lot to think about and balance when getting your shots! Along with the above, I try to pay attention to the background too:
1) How much blur is "just right?" (Raise or lower aperture accordingly.)
2) Even when the background is blurry, sometimes something in the background really adds to the shot. Try to find whatever that is.
3) If there are leaves or anything else translucent in your subject, having the sun shining from behind them can make them glow. Or produce a glowing outline to your subject ...
Don't be afraid to "rearrange" the subject, foreground, or background objects if you can. If there's a twig that's "photobombing" your shot? If you can reach it, move it out of the way. If having something in the foreground would add to the shot (often it does), look around: can you move something into the shot to make it better?
Finally, I mentioned a "sphere" being something to imagine yourself on. Don't stay at the same height for all of your trial shots, change the height that you're taking the shot from as well.
Sometimes I'll take eight or nine shots of something, just varying a few things at time a little bit, from the above lists. Back home at the computer, I'll review them, to see which one of the shots is best to start editing from.
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