YES! The shallow DOF is intentional. Photo is from the NC/SC meeting at the Carolina Raptor Center. I was about to leave and saw a brochure right by the birds, and the Owl is a bird with some attitude, so placed the brochure and snapped away. I have others with deeper DOF where you can read the text on the brochure... but the owl did not cooperate in them. His eyes reflecting the fill flash give him a sinister stare that fits the text.
Statistics
Place: 212 out of 253 Avg (all users): 4.2644 Avg (commenters): 3.8824 Avg (participants): 4.0862 Avg (non-participants): 4.3799 Views since voting: 906 Views during voting: 413 Votes: 295 Comments: 18 Favorites: 0
The Owl looks fantastic but the words are very blured. Maybe if you had cropped off the lower words they would not have such an impact on the rest of the photo.
Perhaps you could have put the text in the background. The completely out of focus text in the front isn't working for the picture. It's almost impossible to read, so it doesn't exactly fit the challenge too well. The owl, however, looks great.
OK - I KNOW this is DUDLEY from the Carolina Raptor Center, and we were right there when you took this shot! There was a group of DPC'ers there, why didn't we get to meet you??? Nice shot of the old boy!
You need to do a google search on "hyperfocal" distance - and then you could have had the words and the owl in focus. The words here just detract from the image.
A hyperfocal distance chart for your lens would make it much easier to get this shot. Without that, try a wide open aperture, a high fstop, and focus on the text and not the owl.
Add photograph to your favorites
Add photographer to your favorites
Photographer found comment helpful.
