How would you have tackled this situation?

[KarlosFandango]

I spent an hour or so down the local river with the dog and camera in hand. It was a very sunny day but quite shady beneath the tree canopy. The dog was quite happy running around chasing stones so I took some pics of him.

I wasn't overly happy with the outcome. There were a few decent pictures but alot had problems with them. I needed the shutter speed cranked up to try and capture the action but the shade meant I had to raise the iso and have the aperture fairly wide.

This one was shot a 640, f5.6, iso 400 at 250mm



Would a faster shutter speed have made it crisper or is it a focusing issue? Also would a polarizing filter have helped with the water reflections?

[Jenx]

Better?

[Simpo Two]

As far as I can tell it's in focus. What don't you like about it? Did you want to freeze the dog completely?

[VxDuncan]

Looks okay sharpness wise. Would benefit from a bit more contrast, but that's not always possible, unless you give the mutt highlights!

[CVP]

Tricky in that you have a dark dog with a dark background in the shade, not an easy combo to get an image that jumps out and hits you in the face.

Your focus appears to be right on so there's nothing wrong there.

If you were to reshoot at another time maybe you could try shooting from a bit lower, just above the eater to make the dog loom larger in the frame or experiment with fill flash or get really close in and use more of a wide angle lens.

Cheers

Chris

[CVP]

Tricky in that you have a dark dog with a dark background in the shade, not an easy combo to get an image that jumps out and hits you in the face.

Your focus appears to be right on so there's nothing wrong there.

If you were to reshoot at another time maybe you could try shooting from a bit lower, just above the eater to make the dog loom larger in the frame or experiment with fill flash or get really close in and use more of a wide angle lens.

Cheers

Chris

[KarlosFandango]

Thanks for the feedback.

That is probably one of the better ones but I guess as mentioned it's trying to bring out the best with all the dark colours going on. One thing I didn't like was how the fur appeared with water on. I know he's no show pooch but it looked like the fur was matted and manky. I tried getting low but the risk of filling my pants with water whilst squatting was a bit of a danger.

How would the flash alter the image if it had been used?

I've tried adjusting the image in DPP, but in PS for some reason I can't open raw images even though I've downloaded the raw plug ins.

[ThatPhilBrettGuy]

Can you put the raw or full size images somewhere? Never obvious what's going on with web sized things....

[Scho]

the light looks a bit flat to me.

go back when the sun's rising/going down. maybe find a bit of water with the sunlight falling on it but bot on the background? should make your mutt pop a bit more :-) you will get more texture too.

[CVP]

KarlosFandango said:

How would the flash alter the image if it had been used?

Sometimes can help give a nice catchlight in the dog's eyes so that these hold your attention. On the other hand you can also often get some very odd refelctions making the dog look like he's got cataracts !!

I think we should call in Herr Carter as he seeems to have the knack with getting Charlie to look good

Chris

[Simpo Two]

KarlosFandango said:

One thing I didn't like was how the fur appeared with water on. I know he's no show pooch but it looked like the fur was matted and manky.

Well the camera never lies

MMaybe you thought it should look better than it does, when in fact that's how it actually looked? Given that background I'm not sure how it could be improved. I doubt the built-in flash would do anything at that range in daylight.