Dr Isaac Vaisman, APSA, PPSA
September 2026 - With Intention
About the Image(s)
A while back driving through Homestead we found this Sunflowers field. People were allowed to walk in and to photograph. Other people were picking some to purchase and give/take to somebody. This gentleman was with his had full
Image created with a Nikon Z9 with the Nikkor zoom lens Z 70-200 mm f/2.8 @ 200 mm and these settings: ISO 180, F/2.8 and 1/2500 sec. The image was PP in LightRoom and cropped.
8 comments posted
Interesting image, and it does have emotional impact. I am curious as to your selection of settings. It appears you wanted the blur of the depth-of-field that a large aperture gave you, but I'm curious as to what you AF settings were, as you have blur both in the foreground and background. Was that intentional, or was it just what your setting produced? Foreground blur can be avoided by setting the AF to spot (or whatever Nikon calls it), but here you took the image at 200mm, so apparently your intent was only to have the subject in focus. Was your intent? Posted: 09/01/2026 06:49:48
Alan, "so apparently your intent was only to have the subject in focus. Was your intent? " YES Posted: 09/02/2026 09:25:07
Then you succeeded splendidly! Interest is focused on your subject. But what AF did you use? Karol, in this same month has a similar picture where he used the AF setting at a relatively long distance for the lens to capture a similar image. Not having much of a creative ability, I never considered the use of those settings to produce images such as this. Seeing how both you and Karol employed this technique, I am now going to add this technique to my repertoire. Posted: 09/02/2026 10:18:18
I think the choice of perspective, photographing behind the person so that the handful of sunflowers in the midst of the sunflower field is really the subject, is very creative and interesting. For me, the background is somewhat unfortunate, with all of the vertical poles being a bit distracting to my eye. The unfortunate thing about realism images is the rule about not cloning anything out to make a cleaner composition! Posted: 09/09/2026 09:03:51
Aedeth, the best you can do is to use a wide open lens. In this case f/2.8 and get a blured background Posted: 09/11/2026 11:20:04
(Group 4)
Hi Isaac, you always manage to get an image that makes me smile. What a bright colorful and fun image that is cleverly executed to isolate the subject making us focus on him and wonder what his story is. I would like to see his face, but I also like the mystery the image suggests. A little crop from the left and the bottom might make the blur less 'in my face' but that's just my opinion. Posted: 09/11/2026 20:37:58
Jen, actually I kind of like your suggestion better Posted: 09/11/2026 22:15:28
(Group 4)
Perfect! Its a wonderful image. Posted: 09/11/2026 22:20:57