Your point of view

Ok, first I'd like to disprove the prejudice that fantastic equipment gives a guarantee to create fantastic images. Just have a look at these two images:

Standing position
The tangling background disturbes the image.

Position slightly changed, separating focus-layers and placing some neat spots in the background.

More crucial for the result than the used material is the perspective. A small move of your viewpoint can change your image dramatically. This is especially true for small objects, when you can use your knees. But from my experience most of that work is done by your feet.
Or the other way: Both images show exactly the same flower and were taken with the same camera and the same lens. We just changed the camera's position and the eye behind the view-finder.