The flowers that Bloom in the Spring

[JohnRostron]

I try to keep an ongoing watching brief over my local woodland, Coombe Wood. I maintain a diary of what I see there and what is happening there. On my recent visits this week, the first springtime flowers were out.

#1 is the very first Bluebell of spring. Its position was such that it was extremely difficult to photograph. I eventually got down to ground level (not easy with my knees) to discover I was on a slope down to the flower. I was also too near for the whole plant, so I confined myself to a close-up of a flower.

Sony SLT-A55V, f/13, 1/250, ISO 800, Sigma 80mm macro. Light supplemented by two sets of portable LED lights.

#2 is the Common Dog Violet. This was close to the entrance, giving some dappled light.

Canon PowerShot SX260 HS, f/5, 1/50, ISO 400.

#3 is the Sloe or Blackthorn, one of the earliest flowering shrubs, on the woodland edge.

Sony SLT-A55V, f/13, 1/500, ISO 800 (a setting suitable for inside the wood!), Sigma 80mm macro.

Comments welcome.

John

[deetheturk]

Nice set John, Mother Nature at her finest

[bnnrcn]

Nice series

[Downrigger]

Quite pretty, well done, John. The first a bit noisy, maybe, and are those sensor spots just above the blossom? I really like the background in the third, but I bet some would find it a bit distractingly busy. Awfully fine green in #2!

[JohnRostron]

Thanks David and Binnur for your comments.

Quite pretty, well done, John. The first a bit noisy, maybe, and are those sensor spots just above the blossom? I really like the background in the third, but I bet some would find it a bit distractingly busy. Awfully fine green in #2!

Mark, I cannot see any sensor spots. I will look at the original raw file of this and others taken at the same time. The background in the third was originally marred by an OOF branch across it, which I cloned out. The green of the Dog Violet tends to be brighter because they grow in sunny patches in the wood. Thanks for your comments.

John

[IzzieK]

I like #1. it has a nice texture to it vividly seen. The sensor spot is near the start of the bell shape at the top. There are two of them adjacent to one another almost vertically. I like #2 too because I like violets and purples. I think we have a similar variety here but the leaves on your side of the pond has more crinkle than ours. I do not like #3 so much. I think it is too dirty looking... that twig and little buds needs to be more emphasized. It is just my opinion...don't bank on it...Good job on all, John...

[Rebel]

Nice John, I've been looking for bluebells everywhere with no luck.

[Krawuntzel]

Hi John
as remarked by others for me #3 has a too noisy background - maybe a smaller f-stop would have corrected that?
#1 is my favourite: Mark's and Izzie's remarks on dust spots I do not see - the "spots" are disturbing though, so I propose to eliminate them. However, I do see a dust spot on the stem to the right in form of a quarter circle - eliminate it
If it were my photograph, I would crop more from the right, so that the triangle in the right upper half would also be eliminated.
Erwin

[JohnRostron]

Mark and Izzie: I show here two original files, taken a few seconds apart, from RAW (Sony ARW) and converted directly to jpeg, then resized to 800. If there were sensor spots, then they would appear in the same position on the frame, not on the flower itself. I cannot see anything like that. I agree that there are some flecks of what is probably leafmould on the bract (the blue leaf by the stem) and a few blemishes on the stalk, which I can easily clone out.
#1

#2


John

[IzzieK]

John....Look at the red circle...

[JohnRostron]

Thanks Izzie, I can see the one at the bottom, but not the other one. I have taken the two original images and merged them by focus stacking, and then cleaning up a bit. Here is the final version:


I have also further processed the Blackthorn flower. I cut out the flower and twig using Topaz ReMask, then added some more blur to the background, and cloning out some of the more distracting elements, then merged them again:


Any better?

John

[IzzieK]

The first image, the grey spot at the top now is doubled but the one down the stem is gone. It need a bit of cloning out. The second one is very much improved. I hope you do not mind my critique on these images. I do not know what screen you are using here, not that it is important really but sometimes it does. Here in my laptop I use a png image calibrator one member here uploaded in one of his post. I think his name is John. It works very well for him and he does not calibrate his monitor for all I know...I put this on my desktop and adjust the position of my screen to be able to see most of the rectangles. It is this one:

[JohnRostron]

Thanks to Mark and Izzie for spotting the spots. I tried photographing a nice plain surface (a blank screen!) and I could clearly see the bottom spot, but I could barely see the upper one. I then cleaned my mirror surfaces (front and back) with an airbrush. (The Sony A55 has a translucent mirror which stays in place.) I figured they could have been dust motes on the mirror. I also went through the camera's sensor cleaning procedure and then repeated the plain surface photos. No sign of any spotting now!

I think the reason I have not noticed these before was because, in most of my images, there has been a fairly varied image there, with little plain surface where spots would be noticeable. Once I used a uniform background I could see at least one spot clearly.

Izzie, I have been able to track down your Monitor Calibration Image from Dry Creek Photo (the source of your image above), complete with instructions!

John

[IzzieK]

Yes that is the one but I had not used it until John mentioned how good it is just as a calibrator instead of buying one...at that time of his post, I already have one for my upstairs desktop, so I used this one for my laptop because I travel with this one...

Thanks to Mark and Izzie for spotting the spots. I tried photographing a nice plain surface (a blank screen!) and I could clearly see the bottom spot, but I could barely see the upper one. I then cleaned my mirror surfaces (front and back) with an airbrush. (The Sony A55 has a translucent mirror which stays in place.) I figured they could have been dust motes on the mirror. I also went through the camera's sensor cleaning procedure and then repeated the plain surface photos. No sign of any spotting now!

I think the reason I have not noticed these before was because, in most of my images, there has been a fairly varied image there, with little plain surface where spots would be noticeable. Once I used a uniform background I could see at least one spot clearly.

Izzie, I have been able to track down your Monitor Calibration Image from Dry Creek Photo (the source of your image above), complete with instructions!

John