Pond Photo Tips

[buckry]

It was requested I post some tips on how to get more beautiful pond photos, so I'm obliging, and here is my first official tip:


Always have your pond running in a diagonal from lower right to upper left or vice versa. Try to get low and close to the area in the lower corner, and let the pond stretch away from you. If there is something that you are taking a picture of inside the pond, like a large lily or a flower, put that item about 2/3's the way down from the top and about 2/3's the way in from either the left or the right. This puts your main element at the spot that will have the most impact. Finally try to use something to frame the shot, bushes, trees, cattails, something to be along the edges, top, and or bottom.

In this shot you have two items framing the pond, the bridge on the left and the rocks on the right. It's just like a nice wooden picture frame, it makes your subjet, your pond, really pop.

The water starts in the lower left and heads generally to the upper right. In my shot I don't really have a central subject, I would say it was just to show the water, so the center of the water is about 2/3's the way down. Even showing my ugly deck, this shot is perfectly balanced and very pleasing to look at. I think my only complaint would be the cattail on the bridge, would look much better a lot closer to the edge of the frame.

Also, notice the frog on the rock under the elephant ear. I had no idea he was there. Too funny.

Ok, that's my first tip, I'll try to take another shot soon with some good tips.

 

[Waterbug]

I always think I move as the shot is taken. I wouldn't say pictures are blurry but should I be using a tripod or something?

What camera features should I be looking for?

 

[buckry]

For camera shake your best bet is to take your pictures at a time of day when there is enough light to require a nice fast shutter speed. 1/60 is probably the starting point, but if you can get to 1/100th even better. I usually do my stuff in the evening, the sun has lost a lot of it's oompf, but it's still shining directly on my pond. The shot above was taken at 1/60th of a second at ISO 200.

If your camera is showing you the shutter speed as you take pictures and they're 1/10th of a second or 1/2 a second, that's too slow to handhold. I would probably bump the ISO, unless it's already maxed. If you bump it to 400 or 800 you can bring that shutter speed right back up and handhold.

When you are handholding a camera in dubious conditions I treat it like a gun. I have this special hold for the camera, I lock my elbows in, I find a nice steady position, a lot of the time sitting is best, then right before I take the shot I take a breath, and just as the breath is done, i push the shutter release.

 

[j.w]

Is that why those camera dudes are always down on one knee or bouncing around here and there a lot?

 

[buckry]

Well, yeah probably, getting down on a knee definitely gives you stability, and the low angle is always more dramatic. Bouncing around is probably just their desire to not miss a single shot. If they're getting paid especially, every winner is money in the bank.

 

[addy1]

Always look at the background i.e. stuff in the picture, clutter etc that you don't notice. Cute kid btw on the deck.

My dad was a great photographer, he had us shooting black and white photos, made our bathroom a dark room when we were kids. He always stressed frame the item, then look at the rest of the picture, make sure there is no "junk" messing up the photo.

like this shot, decent but not great, anti heron fencing showing in the reflection, flowers up near top of photo , black gutter drain and fence showing

back ground clutter..........lol I was hanging over the deep end of the pond edge, trying not to fall in to catch the reflection..........then noticed all the muck in the background.

This one the water is tilted, but caught the reflection nicely, To make it nicer I should crop the floating burlap covered island on the right side of the photo. Take a ton of shots, then one or two is noteworthy, love digital, can just delete the yuck shots.

 

[j.w]

Yep addy I see what ya mean and that last one turned out really nice!

 

[buckry]

Framed all wrong though, gotta move that flower down in the frame, it's way too close to the edge. Need to give it some room to breathe. Both on the top and to the right. As much as the burlap is ugly, that space over there is important. The tilt is really nice, it makes it look like the flowers are leaning into the shot, having that leading space over there is critical. The final shot looks like it would be a fine postage stamp or as the main detail shot of that flower on Wikipedia, but as a photo, as art, it makes me think, where is the rest of it? Sorry to nitpick, I won't do it in any other threads, but this is a photography thread, I have to do it here. It's state law.

 

[addy1]

lol nitpick away!

I would have moved it down but the chicken wire , anti heron stuff, was too obvious and it was too darn hot to go and move it out of the way of the shot. Maybe next time I play around.

 

[buckry]

You know what you do, when the world you are photographing doesn't cooperate, just photoshop it. I hardly ever worry about stuff like that any more, especially with clients. I took a portrait of a girl on these cool metal steps last month, the metal was awesomely rusted, the background was this amazing brickwall, and the ground was covered with cigarette butts. Yeah, I saw them, but I'm not going to pick up nasty cigarette butts. 60 seconds in photoshop got rid of all of them, plus even got rid of some pebbles, and a piece of dead grass.

For my fun artistic stuff I try to limit that, but with customer stuff, it's not art anyway, just make it as good as possible so I can get paid.

But I'm having the same issues photographing my pond, my house is way less attractive than my pond, plus my gutter is right there, AND my air conditioner condenser, ugh. And the lack of grass right now kills the whole effect.

 

[addy1]

laughing Yep I have a great photo program, can do cloning etc, Just lazy this time lol. Next time will add dimensions and clone out the yuck

 

[brokensword]

Mentioned in another thread that using a polarizer can cut reflections and glare, should the sun not be cooperating at the time you're taking pics. Course, more advanced than most, probably.

I think basics should be attacked; such as using the inversion of the aperture to give you a basic shutter speed, i.e. if you're using a 50mm lens, shutters speeds that are safe are 1/50. I realize most cams have shake reduction (or some derivation) but it's still a good place to start. Use a fast enough shutter speed and most blurry photos will go away. Course, this won't change the fact that if your subject is moving (fish, for example) that shake reduction isn't going to freeze the action. Fast shutter speeds will. And fill flash, but that too is probably more than most are going to get themselves involved with.

I think pics which are most interesting tend to be those that DO incorp the light creatively and offer angles of view from which we don't necessarily see often, such as pond level shots of a frog/turtle/koi as they are emerging/swimming in the water.

And though you may not have articulated it Buck, the rule of thirds might be trotted out for other budding(or not) photogs; place your subject in one of the 4 placements(intersections) created by dividing your frame into 6 portions (two lines horizontally, 1/3 and 2/3 bottom to top, and the same vertically). Most of the time, seems critics don't like 'centered' subjects, though truth to tell, I often would rather as most lenses are optimized for center placement (for sharpness, though I know sharpness is not the end all be all of what makes a photograph good or not) anyhow.

As noted, REALLY LOOKING at your background before you take the snap is important; clutter and unnecessary props take the eye from your subject. Not sure how many can get creative with their DOF, but fast lenses (apertures at or near f2.8) give more pleasing out-of-focus backgrounds which make your subject 'pop' much more/better; creates a more artistic impression, imo.



Just some further thoughts to add to the conversation.

Michael

 

[Waterbug]

In these pictures the water looks a lot greener than it did in person.

The bottom of the pond did have algae, but still, the water in the picture seems greener than in person. Any tricks to make the picture match closer to what is seen?

 

[buckry]

Oh wow, no. I'm having the same problem. The first picture I took after getting that thin layer of algae I ran straight to my computer and started a post asking "WHY DOES MY POND LOOK SO GREEN?" I think it had the word lagoon in it. Yeah, you can tell the water itself is clear because the fish are pure orange, but other than photoshoping the bottom I'm not sure how to make that look closer to reality. I think the problem is magnification and refraction, it's taking that color and funneling way more of the light to your camera than it should. Someone mentioned a polarizing filter, those are for reflections, but possibly it could have an effect on this. Beyond that, any kind of color correcting filter you might use is just going to make the fish look drab even if the water looks better. I'll research it and see just what is going on here, glad to know it's not just my pictures that make the water look like it should have alligators in it.

 

[brokensword]

WB, in doing some preliminary research, there's some question as to what kind of camera you're using. That is, a dslr, film, point and shoot, camera phone? Not sure, but it might be part of the problem. Tomorrow, when I can get out at midday, I'll see if I can replicate the 'green' factor as shows in your pics. I don't have a PS, but do have a dslr, so I'll be approaching it from that direction. If you're using a camera with user presets and outputting jpegs, that could account for the oversaturation/greenness. Anyway, let me know so I can forward such info to the photog forum to which I also belong. It's an interesting question, to be sure. First response has you having a 'green floating algae laden' pond. I chuckled and told the poster if he knew whom I was talking about (you), the water condition would be the LAST factor to consider re photographic representation!

In these pictures the water looks a lot greener than it did in person.

The bottom of the pond did have algae, but still, the water in the picture seems greener than in person. Any tricks to make the picture match closer to what is seen?