The photo was taken as a part of an assignment in the course Exploring Perception. I used a bowl of water and a Gerbera flower as the background, the subject was a leaf that was floating with a water droplet. The photo was taken in the evening so I used a flash, the flash was positioned above the camera, to soften the light a large diffuser was used 1.5m x 1m. The idea behind the photo was to exercise manual focus and manual exposure and a shallow depth of field. Exposure: Camera was set to manual mode. The shutter speed was 1/160 that was determined by the sync speed to the flash. To get the interesting part of the subject leaf (water drop) in focus with appropriate depth of field aperture of f/9 was required. The flash setting was adjusted to the aperture setting of f/9. Interesting observation was camera measuring mode was set to matrix / pattern and indicated -1.3EV. Manual focus was used.

ILCE-7RM2 with FE 90mm F2.8 Macro G OSS | Exposure 1/160sec @ f/9 | ISO 100 | Focal Length 90mm
Purple Gerbera Leaf in Water, by Ola Cedell

Award Winner: Photo of the Day | May 12
Award Score: 70 (Value 13, Clarity 13, Composition 18, Style 13, Skill 13)
Photo of the Day Award Category: Close-Up Photography
Photograph Location: Malmö, Skåne | Sweden

Photographer: Ola Cedell (Malmo, Sweden) Registered
Born in southern Sweden in 1969, Ola Cedell moved to Melbourne Australia in 1996, then to Aachen Germany in 2001, and returned back to southern Sweden in 2003. Food has been a big part of Cedell’s life, as he always enjoys tasting and trying new things. Besides his engineering career, he has been enjoying amateur photography since 1996. Nowadays, Landscape and food photography are his main categories, i.e. for the catering company Gazpacho. His inspiration comes form all around the world, but mainly in southern Sweden as well as France Alpes/Provence.

Portfolio: http://www.cedell.se
Website: http://www.gazpacho.se
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ola.cedell