Did I Finally Make a Pleasing Blur?

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Some really good photographers obsess over making “pleasing blurs,” and I must admit, when I look at their images, I see glimpses of my own bad shots that I deleted because the bird wouldn’t sit still! But sometimes when I’m out shooting and the action isn’t all that exciting, I’ll take my second body and experiment. Usually I delete the results. But with this one I think I might be onto a nice-looking image. It’s a clump of pink salvia at Bok Tower Gardens. I was waiting for the hummingbirds to come back, and while I waited, I focused my Beast on the clump and then took half-second exposures as I panned the tripod up and down. The light levels were really low that day, so I got away without using neutral density filters. I thought the pink-and-green stripes were kinda pretty. What surprised me most about my experiment was that I needed to pan faster. It seemed so strange to be moving during the exposure, and in order to achieve a nice blur, you really do need to move!

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One thought on “Did I Finally Make a Pleasing Blur?

  1. The answer to your question is a resounding YES!!! Well done, Jess. But I don’t recall ever obsessing over my “pleasing blurs”. What’s that? Oh! Nevermind…

    One more day of work for me and that’s it for the year. Time to go shooting! Let’s get together soon and get some “pleasing non-blurs”.

    :-)

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