Photo Critique: Mushrooms by spongebob lover

[Llarian]

http://img390.imageshack.us/img390/4948/img17627jq.jpg

Camera: Canon Powershot S400
Shutter: 1/20s
Aperture: F/2.8
ISO Unknown (not in EXIF)
Focal Length 7mm
No Flash
Exposure Comp: 0 eV

 

[CarlaW]

Die sit look a little fuzzy to you too?

 

[Mauisreef]

Die sit look a little fuzzy to you too?

:lol: Beer googles Brah!

 

[spongebob lover]

i was actually trying to focus on the zoos but the stinking corals didn't work with me .

 

[NaH2O]

So here's my question for the expert....is this a result of no tripod being used, or being too close to the tank, or none of the above? Other possibilities?

 

[shallowreef]

my guess it was too close. Gabby what type of camera are you using? if its just your average camera than chances are you will never get amazing shots. Pretty much all the shots i have posted are from a regular camera and as you can see they almost always look a little fuzzy or blurry. My fiance has a cannon camera she used in highschool for photo class. I use that every now and then and i get amazing shots.

I vote either to close or perhaps you might want to try a better camera.

 

[Llarian]

Too close or an inaccurate autofocus is definitely part of it. You can see the focal plane on some of the liverock in the background.

There's another problem too that would have shown itself if the focus were on the zoos like Gaby intended. To try to prevent blurring, the camera has the lens aperture all the way open (F/2.8). However, the depth of field get narrower the wider the aperture is. If you look at the depth of the field in the in-focus area on the rock, its only about 3/4" of an inch thick. Even if the focus were correctly on the zoos, the photo would probably have looked out of focus because of the narrow depth of field.

My suggestions? Get a tripod so you can stop down the aperture a bit more (Maybe F/4 at least?), move the camera back a bit (you can always crop later), make sure you're in the camera's "macro mode" if it has one for taking photos this close to the subject.

Most of the compact cameras can get quite close to the subject, but they usually require being put in a "macro" AF mode to do it. I'd venture a guess that was a large part of the problem here, but I didn't see the AF mode in the EXIF data so I can't say for sure.

-Dylan

 

[spongebob lover]

well i was holding the camera so yeah definetly out of focus.
The camera doesn't have for macro i think this camera is more for like the family pictures than for taking coral pictures because it never really did a good job taking tank pictures even from farther away.

what's a tripod ?

 

[Llarian]

Yes it does. =)

Press the button on the back of the camera with the flower on it until the flower shows up on the LCD on top of the camera. You're now in macro mode.

From what I'm reading, you should be able to focus down to 5cm distance from the subject at full wide. (Obviously much further away at full zoom.)

(7mm is full wide on that camera, so you should be able to be nearly on the glass and still focus on those zoos)

See if you can find the Macro mode and give this photo another shot perhaps?

-Dylan

 

[spongebob lover]

lol !! well thank you for letting me know because i though it didn't have it since i thought only expensive cameras have it .

I'm gonna try to give it another shot, I'm just gonna have to be patient with the camera because it was broken before and so it doesn't wanna work that good .

 

[Sherman]

Piping in on an old thread....

Gaby, it looks like your camera wasn't perpendicular to the glass. Your camera has to be perpendicular, or the glass/acrylic will give you distortions. This is especially true with macros. Hand held is difficult, but make sure you're squared up with the glass, both vertically and horizontally. The more you get away from perfect square, the more distortion you're going to see.

 

[spongebob lover]

thank you Jason
Yeah i'm trying to take better pictures, of course it's gonna take me years before i can take pictures as good as yours .
i remember you said in one of your threads to use something to put your camera on so you don't have the shaking from your hands , so that's my first baby step .

 

[Sherman]

Yeah. Before I had a tripod, I literally wadded up a jacket on a chair and placed the camera on it, like a bean bag. Then I just used the timer.