The major leaves have the color as in nature. For the background, I have tuned down the colors to better match the mode of the photo.
Olympus EM-1x, 1/80, f/2.8 60 mm macro
What technical feedback would you like if any?
Due to a “crop factor” camera, I sometimes struggle to being able to isolate the subject, since larger DOF. Any tips and tricks how to achieve a nice blurred background in post-processing is appreciated. I use Luminar 4, but I guess Lightroom/Photoshop approaches also will give me insight!
Ola, this is a lovely image of the berry and it’s leaves. I like how you positioned the leaf behind the berry, to frame it in from the background. As for post-processing to improve DOF, I am not the one to speak. There are a lot of photographers on here that are very good at post-processing, and I’m sure they can give you guidance.
You shot this at f2.8, which certainly softens the background a good bit normally, and so in this image, I would say that the background foliage was fairly close to the subject. As a rule, I try to keep the background that I would like to be out of focus further from the subject than my camera and lens are from the subject in front. That will give you a better chance of having the background out of focus, maybe nice and smooth, depending on the length of lens, etc. I really like the shades of green in this image, with the one lonely red berry. Very well done.
A very nice artistic shot. It might be a bit too somber looking for my taste but still a very shot and you have created a mood. And the subject is well seen. I like how you have back stopped the red berry on the leaf as well as kept the bottom leaf in the photo. I am not of a post processor but there are filters in PS that could be used. And possibly a negative dehaze in LR. Shirley offered a good suggestion of a bg further away from subject. A longer focal length lens will also have a shallower dof.
Ola: I really like your comp and subject. I’ve just started using Luminar and suspect it tries to bring out BG detail that might not show up using Lightroom or PS. However, you can do some creative masking in Luminar that would let you select the leaves and berry and then blur the BG with the software. Despite your concerns about the crop factor this doesn’t really look like it was shot at f2.8. I have a 100mm f2.8 macro and know it would not give this much DOF even on my APS-C sized sensor at its most open setting. Regardless of the technical issues this is an intriguing and very pleasing image for me.>=)>
