Do these shots benefit from f/1.4 or is it excessive?

I'm pretty new to the forum and this is my first submission for critique.

I recently picked up a Canon 50mm f/1.4 and took it with me on a tour in a Japanese garden. Because this extremely shallow depth of field was something of a novelty, I took (almost?) all my shots wide open.

Do you think it actually added to these shots or do you think it's too much? Do you tend to shoot wide open on lenses with bigger apertures? Would you say "just because you can doesn't mean you should?" When I shoot in broad daylight with my Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8 I often set it to f/4 anyway because the images seem sharper that way, so I already understand that wide open isn't always the only way to go...

Any other comments are welcome, too, even if they're not related to aperture and DOF.

Really like the first one, limited dof works very well.

1st one is awesome, it couldn't have been any better.
2nd would have been boring if everything was on focus I reckon, so it's good too.
As for the 3rd one, more DoF would have worked well too I think, but the shallower DoF give some relief and dimension to the image.

I think you did great.

Thanks for the feedback guys!

I should have also asked about color. The bottom (third) one looks pretty natural to my eye, but do you think the top two have too much of a yellow tint? Would you change that at all?

#1 for a desktop wallpaper FTW!
#3 almost looks like a tilt shift, nice shot, colors look natural

nüborn wrote in post #10722799
#1 for a desktop wallpaper FTW!

Thanks! If you do want a larger version it's available here at various sizes:
http://www.flickr.com …in/set-72157624683176102/

No. 3 works best for me. Nice job, it's my favorite lens on a crop body.

I really like those first two. Great shots!

I wouldn't worry about the yellow tint. The leaves still look green, and the slightly yellowish cast on the background provides a nice look to it. Leave it alone and print it.

Thanks for all the feedback. Much appreciated!