Cherry Tree - into the sun

There was some lovely light in Surrey today, so went out to take some landscapes near Newark Priory, and walked past this cherry tree with the sun directly behind it. I thought it looked promising, so thought I'd give it a go and try and 'hide' the direct sun behind a branch.

I'm reasonably pleased with the result - but would welcome critique and suggestions to make this sort of shot work better. Shot with K-5iis and DA 18-135 at 18mm and 1/125 and F22.

Phil

Its a very striking effect with bold colours, deep contrasts and the glare of the sun coming straight at us!

I feel that camera settings may have reduced its effectivness a bit - f22 has not done any favours to the image quality I feel - this aperture is likely to be beyond the threshold where 'diffraction' creeps in, and this is apparent possibly with the rather unsharp appearance of the tree & blossoms. Also a wider aperture, perhaps f11 (?), would have given you a snappier shutter speed which would also have helped sharpness.

I suggest you try compositions of this type of tree which are more extreme at both ends - so either right up close with flowers right in your face and the background out of focus, or further back to see the whole tree.

But as I said at the start, great bold colours and its shows the beauty of a new spring.

Nigel - thanks.

I went for f22 to maximise the "star burst" effect from the sun coming through the tree; frankly I forgot about the likely diffraction effects. Next time it might be better to use a star filter and get a bit further back from the tree.

Phil