Dandelion

[Grumpy John]

A dandelion.
Could I please get some C & C on this image, it just doesn't do anything for me.
I had the lens stopped all the way down to F32.0 to get as much DOF on the "head" as I could.

Canon 7D MkII Tokina AT-X PRO D 100mm F2.8 Macro.
F32.0, 1/30, ISO1000

[kevinj]

Does not look right,at f32 you should have good DOF,looks very soft on my screen,almost like you`ve missed the focus point.Did you use a tripod for this?

[Grumpy John]

Does not look right,at f32 you should have good DOF,looks very soft on my screen,almost like you`ve missed the focus point.Did you use a tripod for this?

Handheld Kevin, could be part of the problem.

This info from another forum "It is soft on places because of the depth of field. Stopping down to f32 simply worsens the problem by generating diffraction and degradation of image quality. You can't get enough DOF by changing the aperture."

An edited version. I desaturated and darkened the background. I think this helps a bit.

[Isac]

I agree with the other forum guy's comments John. A PP fix would be to sharpen in Lum-4. I only sharpened, no noise reduction.

[Grumpy John]

You got it to really pop Isac. I must delve deeper in to Luminar.

[Isac]

The Luminar sharpening AI leaves Photoshop for dead so now you have the best of both worlds. It's great to have it as a PS plug-in filter.

[Ironwood]

I agree with the comments you received elsewhere John. F32 was detrimental to the image, I would have chose f8-f16, most likely f11. The secret is getting the focal pane in the right position. To get the most from this type of image, I would suggest a tripod, and using liveview ( does Canon call it liveview like Nikon ? ) with manual focus to get the rear of the focal pane on the stem. This would give the front of the flower the best chance of being in focus.
This is easier for me to say than do, as I’m afraid I have become too lazy, and try to get the shot handheld and with AF, looking through my photos from 5 or so years ago, I was getting better images back then, than I am now, because I was doing it like I described back then.

[Grumpy John]

I agree with the comments you received elsewhere John. F32 was detrimental to the image, I would have chose f8-f16, most likely f11. The secret is getting the focal pane in the right position. To get the most from this type of image, I would suggest a tripod, and using liveview ( does Canon call it liveview like Nikon ? ) with manual focus to get the rear of the focal pane on the stem. This would give the front of the flower the best chance of being in focus.
This is easier for me to say than do, as I’m afraid I have become too lazy, and try to get the shot handheld and with AF, looking through my photos from 5 or so years ago, I was getting better images back then, than I am now, because I was doing it like I described back then.

I was under the impression, like many other people, that all you needed to do to get more depth of field was to select a higher F stop. Then I learned about diffraction, it's like being back in school, I'm learning something new every day.

Here is a Dandelion I did using focus stacking. Easy to do indoors, it would be a nightmare to do in the wild.

dandelion