Iris ... for C&C ...

[IzzieK]

I have been trying to upload this pic I shot a few days ago. So I went to Flickr and uploaded this one for here.
Lens: 105mm
SS: 1/200
Aperture: F8
ISO 400
Manual; Spot metering

Perfect Iris angle by Izzie, on Flickr

Thank you for any comments and/or critiques...

[Dave Humphries]

After 'being late' to so many of your posts - I'm gonna be first this time Izzie

I have to say that's the perfect angle to capture an Iris (or I'll be in trouble)

Now, what might I do to it, if I had shot it?

a) I think I'd try to get a bit more tonal or edge separation between the fine yellow/white bits where they go in front of the background
b) There's a little "shark's fin" of leaf in the lower right corner which I'd clone out
c) There's an odd discontinuity along the top edge, I'm not sure what the cause is, perhaps a bevel border effect, or a canvas extension to give more 'headroom' which when clone filled wasn't resampled enough to ensure that edges were continuous - anyway, I'd fix it
d) I wonder if the yellows could be enhanced somehow

Hope that's helpful and thanks for struggling against the current TinyPic issues and finding an alternative, or we'd not have seen this.

Cheers, Dave

[bnnrcn]

Beautiful flower Isabel, lovely colors I agree with Dave about the BG , IMO some more seperation is necessary between the flower and the BG.

[Shadowman]

Nicely captured and different composition, such an interesting combination of softness and hardness, lines and colors.

[Wavelength]

Izzie, so lovely a flower...you may add a pinch more of contrast, i feel

[Rainforest]

Ooh yummy. +1 to John's comments and the above. They are hard to shoot. Yours is beautiful. :-)

[Stagecoach]

That's a good specimen Izzie and technically you have captured it well, but are you happy with it?

Personally, I find the busy background to the right does not help and competes with the flower.

[Geoff F]

Irises are so tricky to photograph. The intensity of those blues changes with the light angle.

Left side petal is a bit soft. As previously mentioned, possibly tone down the right side background a little. Always a difficult area with real life outdoor photography. Would it be possible to selectively add a little more highlight brightness to only the petals? Just a little would give them quite a 'lift'.

[bje07]

Beautiful flower Isabel, lovely colors I agree with Dave about the BG , IMO some more separation is necessary between the flower and the BG.

+1
you should try to use more opened lens (f/2.8 or 4 instead of 8) to blur the BG and maybe desaturate a tad the green.

[IzzieK]

Dear Dave...
Thanks for the comments and the critique. I had since managed to do the corrections you mentioned but I forgot to upload to Flickr or PBase because I got too tired gardening. I promise to do it in the early morning before doing my garden. I appreciate this very much. Learning is great.

After 'being late' to so many of your posts - I'm gonna be first this time Izzie

I have to say that's the perfect angle to capture an Iris (or I'll be in trouble)

Now, what might I do to it, if I had shot it?

a) I think I'd try to get a bit more tonal or edge separation between the fine yellow/white bits where they go in front of the background
b) There's a little "shark's fin" of leaf in the lower right corner which I'd clone out
c) There's an odd discontinuity along the top edge, I'm not sure what the cause is, perhaps a bevel border effect, or a canvas extension to give more 'headroom' which when clone filled wasn't resampled enough to ensure that edges were continuous - anyway, I'd fix it
d) I wonder if the yellows could be enhanced somehow

Hope that's helpful and thanks for struggling against the current TinyPic issues and finding an alternative, or we'd not have seen this.

Cheers, Dave

[IzzieK]

Beautiful flower Isabel, lovely colors I agree with Dave about the BG , IMO some more separation is necessary between the flower and the BG.

I did do a selection of the flower, inverted it and blurred the background a bit more. I will upload later on after waking up. Thanks for passing by and commenting.

[IzzieK]

Nicely captured and different composition, such an interesting combination of softness and hardness, lines and colors.

Thank you very much for commenting, John. You are very kind. I appreciate it very much.

[IzzieK]

Izzie, so lovely a flower...you may add a pinch more of contrast, i feel

I did that yesterday on my break and it changed to a different more vibrant colour but it was not the colour of my flower. I do tried changing the hue option, but I didn't like the colour either. I will plan my next move without changing the colour perhaps make a different background so the flower will stand up better??? I will see. I appreciate your passing by and commenting. You are very kind. Thank you.

[IzzieK]

Ooh yummy. +1 to John's comments and the above. They are hard to shoot. Yours is beautiful. :-)

I had shot a lot of my iris many times and they were all failures, there is always something wrong. This time I thought I had it and it is very nice that I have the members' eyes to take another look and give me advice on some more corrections. I have done what Dave advised and will load it up in the morning after I wake up. Again. Properly.

P.S. My crazy spoiled dog woke me or Bill up to take her out in the middle of the night so I am always up anytime between 1:30am to 4am if Bill decided to stay in bed depending on when she decides to jump up our bed. Silly dog is now snoring behind me with a belly full of corn beef rice and watermelon. We are just dog butlers...

Thank you so much for commenting Susan...appreciate it.

[IzzieK]

[QUOTE=Stagecoach;676731]That's a good specimen Izzie and technically you have captured it well, but are you happy with it?

Personally, I find the busy background to the right does not help and competes with the flower.

I will see what I can do further. I have two ideas -- separate the flower from the background, change the background colour that will suit it; and blurred the background some more to give attention to the flower itself.

Thanks you again for your help. I really do appreciate learning experience..

[IzzieK]

Irises are so tricky to photograph. The intensity of those blues changes with the light angle.

That solves one question in my mind. Thank you.

Left side petal is a bit soft. As previously mentioned, possibly tone down the right side background a little. Always a difficult area with real life outdoor photography. Would it be possible to selectively add a little more highlight brightness to only the petals? Just a little would give them quite a 'lift'.

Yes. You are right. I did it with the correction I made but forgot that I have these picture sharing sites I research yesterday. I originally have Flickr and Photobucket and loaded it from Flickr. Now I have PBase and will load the newer version in it for sharing here from now on. I will upload in the morning when I wake up again...I appreciate your passing by, commenting and critiquing. I have learned a lot from you too, thank you. again.

[IzzieK]

+1
you should try to use more opened lens (f/2.8 or 4 instead of 8) to blur the BG and maybe desaturate a tad the green.

I used a 105mm macro lens and I thought it will give me more DOF if I put it on F8. I forgot that trick about opening wide to blur the background better and I will not make any more excuses why I used F8 and you're there! instead. I cannot repeat this shot anymore as my irises were all gone. But I can edit some more...I will upload in the morning. Thank you so much for looking and commenting and offering corrections. I do appreciate it very much.

[DickyOZ]

Perfectly captured flower with excellent DOF. I think I would have been tempted to put a black cloth behind the flower to isolate it; the background is a tad busy and bright.

[Dave A]

Really nice exposure and clarity of the Iris. Shame about the busy background but sometimes it can't be helped.

Dave

[Geoff F]

I used a 105mm macro lens and I thought it will give me more DOF if I put it on F8. I forgot that trick about opening wide to blur the background better and I will not make any more excuses why I used F8 and you're there! instead. I cannot repeat this shot anymore as my irises were all gone. But I can edit some more...I will upload in the morning. Thank you so much for looking and commenting and offering corrections. I do appreciate it very much.

F8 is already quite wide for a macro shot, Izzie, unless you are going to stack several focus points. Otherwise you end up with a nice background but very little of the flower in focus.

When attempting this sort of scene I usually spend a bit of time cleaning up the background before shooting. Remove any light coloured bits of plant debris and anything with a definite hard shape. Also think carefully about the camera angle and is there an alternative which will give a cleaner looking background.