Every Picture Is a Compromise
Lessons from the Also-rans
Most photography websites show the photographer's very best work. Wonderful. But that's not the full story of a creative life. If we want to learn, we'd better pay attention to the images that aren't "greatest hits" and see what lessons they have to offer. Every picture is a compromise — the sum of its parts, optical, technical, visual, emotional, and even cosmic – well, maybe not cosmic, but sometimes spiritual. Success on all fronts is rare. It's ok to learn from those that are not our best.
This is a series about my also-rans, some of which I've been able to improve at bit (i.e., "best effort"), none of which I would consider my best. With each there are lessons worth sharing, so I will.
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Original digital capture
What I saw that I liked:Extreme shallow depth of field image are always fun. What I don't like in the picture:In the above (which I shot on purpose to illustrate this point), the background is bright, colorful and extremely distracting. What I learned:A shift of position yielded the version at left. I have darkened the background just a bit in processing. Of particular note with this image is that I shot it using m4/3 (a notoriously poor choice for shallow DOF). The trick about shallow DOF is to understand that the shallow DOF is a function of three variables — distance to the subject, focal length of the lens, and the aperture. To create this image, I used my long telephoto at 100mm eq. as close to the subject as I could get and still focus, and at f/2.8 which is the widest aperture for this lens. 2nd Chances: What I might try nextI think I'm done with this one as it is. |
