Flower Critique

[Suzan J]

Hi Everyone:

This is my first post here. I was hoping to get some feedback on my flower pics. How can they be improved and made to look more interesting...


_DSC0119 by Soo J, on Flickr


_DSC0049 by Soo J, on Flickr

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Suzan (or Soo?),

Welcome to the CiC forums from me, great to have you join us.

#1 is quite a pleasing composition and the exposure is spot on - you avoided blowing the red channel, but I think it might stand some levels adjustment to raise the mid tones a bit.

On the left, there is something out of focus quite near the lens, which would have been better held back out of the way.

#2 is quite a busy scene and has that yellow bloom on the right, distracting our attention and taking our eyes out of the shot - you could afford to crop a little and clone out the remaining, well, that's what I'd do.

Personally, I'd prefer to see them bigger too; the 800, or even 1024 size, instead of the 500px.

You won't need this if they are sunlit, but have you heard of a technique called Local Contrast Enhancement?
There's a tutorial on it here at CiC, it may help give the overcast lit ones a bit more 'pop'.

They may also benefit from a bit more sharpening, but that will only be effective if you tailor it to the size of photo being posted and will be undone if you upload a large image, but only reveal the Flickr produced alternative sizes.

Hope all that helps,

[Suzan J]

Thank you for the advice, Dave. I have never done any post processing before, so this will be an entirely new adventure. I have Adobe Elements, but I do not yet know how to use it! I have looked at some of your tutorials on this site and I look forward to learning a whole lot more.

[Geoff F]

Dave has said exactly what I would.

To only extra advice I would add is before shooting have a good look at the scene and decide if anything needs changing to create a better composition. For example, old stems or flowers which could be removed; or stones on the soil which create excessively bright areas. Leaves at the 'wrong angle' can also produce exposure hotspots which can easily be removed.

But you aren't too bad in that respect with these shots.

[MajaMolly]

You captured really intense and vibrant color.