Subject Not in Focus

[joetography]

I am a beekeeper, and I take pictures that are pretty close up, not quite macro.  That is because the subjects are small, so the facets of their lives are tiny.  I'm trying to understand what the problem is with this photo when the clarity of the eggs is on par with others of the same subject.  What I have noticed is that the other photos have the eggs only, no bees for context.  Any guidance would be very appreciated because I don't want to waste my time or anyone elses.Bee Eggs

[Abambo]

Please give the exact refusal reason. This is important so that we do not need to guess.

The picture looks for me out of equiliber, because the bees are cramped in a corner without obvious reason. The overall composition of the picture is bad. I do not think that all element of a picture need to be in-focus, but the eye should not be drawn to the out of focus elements and so making them more important than the rest of the picture.

[joetography]

You're right.  I did confuse the issue by not properly recalling the exact text.  Lesson learned.  The bees are not the subject, the eggs are. When you consider the bees as the subject, the photograph makes no sense, as you say.

Here are the search results I reviewed before submitting this post. https://stock.adobe.com/search/images?filters%5Bcontent_type%3Aphoto%5D=1&filters%5Bcontent_type%3Ai...

This is the information from the text box:

Beeswax Honeycomb and Bee Eggs Newly Laid by the Queen

Submitted 7 days ago

IMAGE OUT OF FOCUS

Thanks for giving us the chance to consider your image. Unfortunately, during our review we found that it's not completely sharp and in-focus when viewed at 100%, so we can't accept it into our collection.

To learn more about the reasons we decline certain images, including focus issues, please visit this page: https://www.adobe.com/go/stock-contributor-help

You might also find the Academy Board Forum to be a helpful resource. You're welcome to post your image there for constructive feedback from a group of your peers. Here's the link: https://forums.adobe.com/community/stock/contributor/critique

File ID: 306757518

Original name: Hive2_20150620_11.jpg

[Abambo]

It's unfortunate, but the fora do not allow for high resolution pictures to be uploaded. Look at your image, the main subject at 100% and determine if that is 100% in focus. The small preview I see let's me doubt about that.

If you want us to have a qualified look at your picture, you need to load it to dropboc^x or similar and post a link to it here. You may apply a watermark to protect your picture, but be sure to watermark in a sense that it's possible for us  evaluate the picture.

[Test Screen Name]

It can be easy to lose track of the aims of Adobe Stock. It isn't a test, a competition, or a gallery. It's a commercial service, dedicated to meeting to wishes of people who use stock photos. Now, the people who buy stock photos are not, by and large, experts in photography or beekeeping. They want something, most likely, to sell a bee-related product, a vague nature concept, a work ethic, or a weird world concept. So, they will assume that out of focus is a bad photo and move on (or assume THEIR customers will assume THEY don't know what they are doing, even if they understand completely). So Adobe's focus rules are applied simply because out of focus work is hard to sell, even if the in-focus work is impossible to make. Remember, too, the public are completely spoiled by nature photography that may have taken months to set up and is chosen for being perfect. I don't know what the photographers here would feel about using Photoshop to add some perfect bees from your other shots... but I'd say it was fine, this is a commercial product, not a nature show.

[ricky336 · Accepted solution]

Hello,

Simple reason is that the photo overall is out of focus therefore the rejection reason. Even though the eggs in the centre is in focus, the out of focus parts distract from the subject.

So, I'm afraid that you need to take this picture again. It is not so much that you didn't focus properly, but rather your f-stop was too large/wide, so the depth of field was too narrow. Think about your f-stop, because you have a shallow depth of field when taking close up photos. I would say in this picture your f-stop was something like f 4. 

The honey comb should also be in focus.

It's back to the drawning board.

[joetography]

Wow!  Thank you!  That's very helpful.  I can definitely try again in the spring.  Very much appreciated!