Rongnongno Loc: FL

I just do not know what.

First:
1) the focus is slightly off
2) the aperture is too small resulting into a too short (narrow) depth of field
Both 1 and 2 can be corrected using stacking.

You may consider that the format ratio is off but that is a choice so not an issue.

There is something else that makes me question the whole image but I cannot pin point it.

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'Blue bells' found growing wild near a foot path in France.

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NMGal Loc: NE NM

You must be very hard to please. Personally, I like it.

drmike99 Loc: Fairfield Connecticut

I like the aspect. I don’t know what you mean by a short or narrow aperture. I like the picture.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

I corrected the wording.

SonyA580 Loc: FL in the winter & MN in the summer

To me the composition is such that my eye darts from one flower to the other. There doesn't appear to be a definite subject.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

Now that you point this out...

I think you are correct.

Thank you.

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Still not good. I could eradicate the two other bells but that is way too much edit in my opinion.

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Toment Loc: FL, IL

The center is the focus plane, the other flowers are hampered by the lack of DOF. The picture is a little dark. I tried increasing brilliance and it’s much better. In most still life’s like this, the subject is closer to the out of focus subjects, more compact I guess.

R.G. Loc: Scotland

You mean either the f-stop is too small (i.e. low) or the aperture is too wide. Aesthetically speaking, the shot is lacking a pleasantness that I would expect from this type of shot. While the background is very blurred, it's lacking a softness that I would want to see. In particular, that bright, worm-shaped area just to the left of the centre bloom is distracting. My other suggestions would be to lighten it slightly and to soften with denoise slightly - even the centre bloom could do with a touch of softness.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

You are absolutely right. My 'correction' made it worse!!!!

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

Insufficient or too shallow Depth of Field is due to TOO LARGE an aperture.... NOT "too small".

That's a common mis-statement, because the lower f-stop number = larger aperture. The thing to remember is that an f-stop is actually a fraction: "f/x" or "focal length divided by a denominator". So the larger the denominator, the smaller the aperture (and the deeper DoF will be). We tend to make it worse by often writing "f2.8" instead of "f/2.8" (for example).

Can't tell what f-stop you used, since the EXIF has been stripped off the image (which bothers me! ) I was looking for the EXIF to see what shutter speed was used... Because if it was relatively slow, even a slight breeze might have cause some of the blurring due to subject movement.

This shot would have been a good candidate for "focus stacking". It might be difficult or impossible to shoot just using small apertures. You might never find enough DoF. In fact, a super small aperture that increased DoF, might well mean loss of fine detail to diffraction.

The aspect ratio of the image doesn't bother me at all. In fact, to me it just seems appropriate.

Not a fan of heavy vignetting, though I often do some subtle burning in on image edges and corners.

Something else "bothersome" might be the background. It's strongly blurred (would have been less so if a smaller aperture were used), but still rather "busy". Might have been interesting to see how it would look with a plainer background. I've used colored cloth or poster boards as backdrops at times, to make a delicate subject like this stand out better.

Just for example:

For this image I used a cloth backdrop that happened to be a close match to the colors of the flower...



For this I used a black velvet backdrop...



But that's not always necessary. Here using a 500mm lens that's unusually close focusing very strongly blurred down a fence and woodpile roughly 15 or 20 feet behind the flower...

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Recompose, no real center of interest.

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

Seems like we're getting pretty rough on you!

Sorry... We're really just trying to help! This is intended to be "constructive criticism".

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

OK, I tried it.
one version with the colors warmer. Perhaps a color temp in between these would work better. As is I go for the cooler one.

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krashdragon

The subjects ( flowers ) are vertical.
The crop is horizontal.
Just feels like it's missing something...

Scruples Loc: Brooklyn, New York

I think this is an excellent capture. But if you feel there is something wrong then let's look at where the light originates from. The light is from the left. There will be slight shadowing but I don't see it. The background seems to be blurred as in a short depth of field. But again it is not a turning point of the photo. The unflowered blossoms pick up the sunlight but that is not an issue here either. Please don't be so harsh upon oneself.

In spite of what you claim, this is still an excellent capture!