think I never share this beside keep telling my gang, how I shoot MACRO (my version of composition shot)
It may different or same with other people view but I am sure I am still shoot based on these rules up to today :D
1. story/actions
every photographer is always look for story for their picture and me too .. but if I only base on this then I may have <5% of my total shot up to today ... as bug/wild life is not just controllable by us and we just don't know when it will eat, fly ... communicate .. stand at right position .
But this is a primary point I look for my pictures
2. beauty of the bug
this applied on majority of my pictures. As I always try to show the beauty of the insect/wild life in best angle that I can approach and again this is not controllable by us. but I am just trying my best
e.g.
angle 1
angle 2
angle 3
for above pictures
- I rarely shoot @angle 1 & 2 except rare bug and the only possible angle
- to shoot this "long-legged" weevil, I will prefer shoot from top as this will show how the leg length compare to the it's body
- but then this is very subjective, some people will feel the beauty of the bugs may in different angle .. so .. Just shoot it, if you think... it is good/best angle for you to see the object .....
3. standard shot
I call this standard shot or science class picture, as this will show the view where help you to recognize of the object. But I will normally shoot this as I want to ID and sick of bug/insects pictures collection :D
e.g.
4. close-up
some people call magnification shot, this is another favor from me as this show something that human eye cannot see
e.g.
face of the little jumping spider
face of the same weevil
- without close-up we may not imagine how it look like
- may look easier, but it is not easy for me as for the magnification 3-5:1. We need really close to the bug and limit but very thin DOF and with difficult control of lighting
- someone will say, just crop it lah, why shoot with closer and difficult lighting ... but then this is different people preference... I am ok with crop :D .. but for me closeup no crop more than 10% for sure else I will go re-shoot
there are few more general thing that I look at which apply for all above
i. green/clean Background
- yeah this is important to have but not a must for me ..
e.g.
a.
b.
the picture "a" meet action/story shot but I just can't control the Background as it may scare the spider to leave the prey away ... and I decide to capture one shot then follow but the other with BG control (how I control the BG had been discuss before @
http://liewwk-macro.blogspot.com/2009/02/macro-pp2-how-i-control-background.html ... but then "a" still my preference compare to "b" which have clean and green background
ii. more Depth of Field
It is definitely a main concern of MACRO shooter where the DOF is always not enough (and what DOF macro shooter looking at was discuss @
http://liewwk-macro.blogspot.com/2008/10/what-depth-of-field-dof-you-have-while.htmlsometime less dof mean OOF for the picture, so we need minimum DOF on the "eye" to consider the focus picture .... but as long as it focus on the important part of the object. then DOF will not be a must archive point for my case
