Close-ups & bokeh

[budakpg]

This is my first attempt at close-ups and bokeh. Could I get some tips in improving my shots. Thanks

[ShaolinTiger]

Interesting, wouldn't really call them macro though frankly we usually reserve that for something close to 1:1 magnification!

The first one has too much void space IMHO and it's very central.

Try and avoid central compositions.

The second is nice but the background is very distracting, I think if you took if from a lower angle and shot up it would be much better.

#3 and #4 are not so great for me, not close enough to the subject to make an impression.

[noruazumi]

i think they got too much spaces and like ST said, too central.
can these be considered as close-up? i guess it is ok to call them as one.
but not macro, i guess. :redface:

but i really love the black & white tone of these shots.
usually i love high contrast black & white, but in this case, they are so nice.

[budakpg]

Thanks ST for the tips. As rightly pointed out, these were taken with 50mm prime with no magnification. And the last two were taken with Zuiko 50mm/f1.8 with a 1.5m shortest focussing distance.... I was playing around with testing bokeh of that lens, so I guess I need a bigger subject to test it with, eh?

noruazumi,

Thanks for your comments. I am glad that you like the high tonal range of the photos. I took them on film and scan them. I am just trying to get back into photography after leaving them for more than 20 years. Slowly but surely....








*please use multi-quote function to avoid double/multiple posts. thank you.*

[alancheong7]

Me like #1, #2 and the grain ..... #2 the gates or grill spoil a bit otherwise .... #1 can try cropping off some space

[Freaky]

Good try, but it's really difficult to get close-up with a 50mm...

If you have limited equipment, learn to use them to your advantage, buy maybe composing your pix differently to fill in some of the dead space.

Also, another matter, flowers in black n white seldom works...

[leslie]

budakpg macro on B&W film :P ok CAVEMAN...come come......budakpg Caveman is well.....another Old timer like you hahahaahahaha ......mind my comments...who used to shoot macro on film until he migrated to a D200 :D

[budakpg]

budakpg macro on B&W film :P ok CAVEMAN...come come......budakpg Caveman is well.....another Old timer like you hahahaahahaha ......mind my comments...who used to shoot macro on film until he migrated to a D200 :D

leslie, I do close ups (wouldn't call them MACRO though as magnification is less than 1X) when I want to test the lens that I just acquired, but more to test the bokeh of the lens. I am just learning about bokeh and enjoying experimenting with some of the techniques that I learnt from my B&W sifu. Not many come out good, mind you. Now I shoot a lot of portraits and street photography. I have posted a few of my photos in the portrait section, but those are my colour shots. :)