Lesson 3 – Motion & DoF

[MichaelS]

Hi,

here are my pictures. I am actually playing around much more with DoF lately as I have recently bought a 100mm macro objective. Motion results more challenging to me at this time as it does not always work out well. Anyway I will keep on trying… 🙂

Cheers,
Michael

[Duncan Rawlinson]

Hi Michael,

I’m glad you didn’t copy other students for your assignment. Student’s taking other student’s ideas is becoming a problem on here 😮

You have submitted two delightful photographs.

The fascinating thing about photography is that you can illustrate motion in many different ways.

For example you can freeze motion like this:

[attachment=3:13d4qs6w]matches.jpg[/attachment:13d4qs6w]
gotta match ? by laszlo-photo, on Flickr

Or you can blur motion like this:

[attachment=2:13d4qs6w]water.jpg[/attachment:13d4qs6w]
Two columns by SergioTudela, on Flickr

There are plenty of ways to do this.

In your case you’ve blurred the photograph like the assignment suggests.

You’ve done quite well with this.

It’s often difficult to do what you’ve done, which is keep part of the frame in focus and have other parts of the frame blur from motion.

Obviously you understand how to do this technically, but the point here is to know when to use it.

For example, when photographing a helicopter you can do it the wrong way and make it look like the blades are frozen in mid air like this:
[attachment=1:13d4qs6w]helicopter-bad.jpg[/attachment:13d4qs6w]
helicopter by Swift Benjamin, on Flickr

OR, a better way to do it is to show motion! Like this:
[attachment=0:13d4qs6w]helicopter-good.jpg[/attachment:13d4qs6w]
iraq by The U.S. Army, on Flickr

I think you understand my point. It becomes about choosing WHEN to use your techniques, not just knowing the techniques…

Now, DOF!

Oh how I love shallow depth of field.

You’ve shot a woman on the beach here and it’s a nice image.

You’ve chose a great time of day to shoot the image. Golden hour!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_hour_%28photography%29

As such the image has a nice warmth to it.

I would have preferred if your model was looking at the camera. Also her pose feels like she is adjusting her jacket, which also feels a bit at odds with the whole beachy vibe of the image.

Also, given the assignment was shallow depth of field or maximum depth of field this photo isn’t the most “shallow” you could make it.

Either way I know that you understand how to achieve motion and control depth of field.

The trick now, is to learn when to use them!

Also, please make sure you are actually shooting photos for the assignments and not picking photos from your image library 😉

Nice work here.

You are one of the best students to date!

[Author]

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