Backgrounds

The following are three pictures of the same flower, with the change that all three have different backgrounds. The way I see it, this changes the whole mood of the picture and it is crucial that you think about it before snapping away. I know I've said other times that the more pictures you take, the more good pictures will turn out, but it is also true that the more you think about a picture (its light, its shadows, its background, and plenty of other aspects) the more likely it is to be truly great and not merely nice or pretty.

Here's picture number one. Against other green plants and with the lowest aperture settings, I think that it gives out optimism and brightness.





This is picture number two. It was taken against a fence and it looks a lot sadder somehow. Sure, the flower stands out a little against the grayish brown fence, but certainly not as much as it did against the green plants.



And here is a mixture of the two. I found a leaf and placed the flower right on top. On the one hand, I like it because the colors turned out well and it reminds me of a painting, but on the other hand I got the impression it looked a little amateurish.

So I suppose you've guessed that my favorite is the first, but which one is yours?

Wish

In this picture, I also used the lowest aperture settings. By the way, I will admit that I don't know much about aperture and other settings like that, but, like I have done, I would encourage you to stop using the "auto" settings and try new things. At first, your pictures may not be that great but the more you try different settings, the less you will want to use "auto" and the better your pictures will turn out.

Also, for this picture of a dandelion, I used slightly low exposure in order to make the lovely petals stand out more and the background less, something that I also achieved with the aperture, giving the picture a very shallow depth of field, which is what makes those nice little blurry dots in the background, which are called a "bokeh" and really add personality to your images.