buttercup bokeh

buttercup bokeh, originally uploaded by Bexley98.

It’s been a quiet week in photography land, not much news.

Had a nice weekend, my parents came through for dinner and generally just chilled out. The sun came out for most of Sunday and I decided to capitalise on this rare occurrence by getting down to the river with my camera.

The bright light made things a bit tricky in terms of exposure, but I managed to get the above shot of buttercups by the riverside which I’m pleased about. I just need a third flower with starting with the letter “b” and I’ll have 3…which means I can do a triptych of “b” bokeh shots – this has suddenly become important!

Getting close up shots was one of my photographic new years resolutions, I’m think I’m starting to get the hang of it. Focus is the hardest part, especially when shooting outside and you have wind, insects and assorted other distractions to contend with. The above shot was taken at f3.5 with exposure compensation set at -0.7. I then did a bit of tweaking in Lightroom, I recently found the ‘vibrancy’ slider which is like a super saturation boost and I gave this a nudge to make the yellows pop a bit more along with dialling up the contrast.

I was thinking about cloning out the grass stems that are leaning on the buttercup, but felt they added to the shot so they’ve stayed in. The focus on the flower itself isn’t perfect, but it’s enough to describe the subject, hopefully people will be drawn to the yellow bokeh of the other flowers. At least, that was my intention.

Next weekend we’re off to Perthshire for the Rob Roy challenge, a charity run and cycle that my wife and a team from the office are competing in. I’m going along to take photos so hopefully it’s a good chance to get some more portrait/group/people shooting.