Damp morning

As usual in the morning I sat outside on our veranda eating my breakfast when I chance to look over my shoulder and spotted a large spiderweb decorated with raindrops. All thoughts of food were driven from my mind and I dashed inside to get my camera. Too often shots appear and there is no camera handy - but when I am at home; well! I am spoilt for choice!

So out came the Olympus with the 40-150mm lens attached and after a couple of bad starts managed to get both the exposure correct for the dull day and the dark background and the focus "somewhere near" correct. I wish I had the eyes of a teenager!

Because of the tele lens - I did zoom in - I was able to throw out the background focus to what has become known as "bokeh" and keep the pearls of moisture on the web clear.

F3.5 shutter 1/125 second 96mm

With a point and shoot camera the separation of foreground from background can still be achieved although maybe not with such a bokeh effect of the background - use the zoom no matter how small - it will change the automatic exposure which is the same as changing the "f" number on an SLR to a smaller number and this reduces the depth of field (so not EVERYTHING is in focus). Aim the camera so that the spot focus grabs the web then, with the shutter half pressed in to hold that focus, realign the camera so the framing of the image is the way you want it to be.

AJ