Otto Scheopfle would be proud: every year thousands of people pack their cameras and flock to his surnamed beautiful 70-acre botanical garden and natural woodland that is now part of the Lorain County Metro Parks.
However, he probably would be puzzled at the difficulty of taking a first-rate close-up digital flower photo. After all, film cameras never presented the photographer with such an abundance of buttons, dials, and settings — so many chances to go wrong.
 |
Let’s try to figure this out step by step.
First, when you visit a garden, try to pick a semi-cloudy day. Bright sunlight will cast rigid shadows over just about everything. Not good if you’re trying to get that gentle flowing rose pic.
|
Soft Light means Intense Colors
|
|
 |
 |
|
No, I didn’t bring a water bottle, It really did rain that day
|
|
Next, pack the right equipment. A macro or close-up lens will help you get more of a life-size image of the flower but is not essential. Now set your dial to portrait mode or if you’re using aperture mode, chose a low number f-stop such as f 2.8 or f 4.0. This will throw a nice blur on the background.
Last, take lots of pictures from different angles. I can’t say how many times, I’ve stood in one place, taken a bunch of shots with slightly different f-stops and after looking through the 3-inch display, thought I had an award winner.
However, when I would later check the image on a computer monitor, all sorts of distractions would emerge from the background. Odd bugs, dead leafs on nearby flowers, wire nametags, even a cat. Well, this little guy followed me around for most of the day, but I did manage to keep him out of most of the pictures.
| Just looking after the garden… |
 |
Next up – a wild, buckin’ rodeo.
[Excerpted from Photography Insights, Volume 2, by Scott Ober, MD, Copyright © 2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED]