The black & white treatment works well here, and the level of texture and detail recorded in the front chess pieces are served well by it. However, the piece on the right-hand side is cut off awkwardly, with an odd patch of blur, and it feels like there is a little too much space to the left. The depth of field is nice, but a slightly different crop (or arrangement of pieces at the front) might have made for a stronger composition.
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Dahlias make wonderful subjects for close-up photography, but if the focus is even slightly off (as it is here) the picture loses much of its impact. For shots like this a tripod is essential, and it can also help to use a garden cane or other support to hold the stem steady. The ISO here is 100, which is great, but if you are handholding it might be worth boosting it to facilitate a shorter shutter speed, which will help to freeze any movement.
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**This contest is open to photographers ranked 1000+ in this week’s <a href="https://www.photocrowd.com/photographer-community/">Leaderboard</a>.** Still life and macro photography are natural buddies, and there’s so much fun to be had when you’re exploring a still life subject with your macro lens, filters or extension tubes. There are surprising textures, shapes and compositions everywhere you look, and often rendering the subject difficult to identify, such is the ability to change how something appears when it is shot close-up.
