Red amaryllis and paperwhites

[Brownbear]

And thank you for sharing... Here is hoping you post a lot more flowers. I may not always comment but your flower shots are beautiful and inspiring... Keep them coming!

Christina, thank you.

I love gardening and flowers. My amaryllis give me great joy in the winter when there is little else blooming.

Marie

[Marie Hass]

From top to bottom (and oldest to youngest):

Aphroditie
Red Lion
Orange Sovereign



Not one of my best pictures, and for that I am sorry. Just wanted to show as many as possible that are blooming.

marie

[Marie Hass]

Aphrodite, Red Lion and Orange sovereign are just about finished. They are on their last blooms. Amaryllis Cybister "Chico" is blooming now. Red Pearl and Ruby Star are budded out and will start to bloom in the next 10 days. Here they all are.


Front row, left to right: Red Pearl, Orange Sovereign, Ruby Star

Back row, from left to right: Aphrodite, Red Lion, Cybister "Chico".

I will post more pictures as I take them.

Marie

[IzzieK]

I love gardening too Marie but my specialty are roses. I suck at growing camellias and any apricot tree that were there before when I moved residence died. This year I will try irises. My husband loves them because of his mom.

I love all your shots and your presentation of them. They are superb. Can you tell? -- my favourite colours are red and orange though I wouldn't have any of them as my car colour...

[mknittle]

Beautiful flowers Marie.
My wife is fighting orchids now I think I will stick to bonsai though.

[Marie Hass]

Dear Izzie and Mark, I love all kinds of gardening, but somehow I do well with indoor plants. My new house has lots of wonderful windows and all of my plants are just flourishing. For that, I am truely thankful.

Marie

[Marie Hass]

Amaryllis Cybister "Chico" has bloomed!!!!!!

1.


2.


I will have about a 24 hour window before the flowers start to fade.

Comments? Critiques?

Marie

[FrankMi]

Amaryllis Cybister "Chico" has bloomed!!!!!!

1.


2.


I will have about a 24 hour window before the flowers start to fade.

Comments? Critiques?

Marie

I've got to admit Marie, I've never seen this kind of Amaryllis before so I had to show it to my wife as she has a number of Amaryllis around the house. I also had to look it up on the web to learn more about it. The Cybister Chico reminds me in some ways of the delicate pedals on the Rocky Shoals Spider Lilies that grow in the shallows of the Catawba River near here.

As beautiful as the flower is, I'm not sure that a stark white background shows it off at it's best. I'm thinking of how the white portions of the delicate pedals seem to get lost against the white background.

I think I would experiment with a light blue, grey, or even a black background to see if it looks better that way.

Perhaps someone that is more knowledgeable than I with photographing this kind of flower can chime in with their thoughts?

[Stagecoach]

Hi Marie,

Not sure what the best background for these would be, very much a matter of personal preference. If I was you I would have a go at black and hopefully you could retain the good lighting.

What also struck me was whilst lovely images there is possibly room for change to give them more impact. So, I opened the first gave it some LCE and sharpening increased the canvas size as I feel they are cropped a bit tight and IMO it gives it more impact but not to a stage where it looks cooked. I will post an example if you like.

Grahame

[Marie Hass]

Grahame,

Please do post!!!! I did not get home in time tonight to try a black background. Hopefully the flowers will hang in here another 24 hours until I can get more pictures. I removed them from the window in hopes that the lack of direct light will slow the blooms a bit.

Marie

[Stagecoach]

Grahame,

Please do post!!!! I did not get home in time tonight to try a black background. Hopefully the flowers will hang in here another 24 hours until I can get more pictures. I removed them from the window in hopes that the lack of direct light will slow the blooms a bit.
Marrie

Here it is


Not saying it's better, just another option that can be explored maybe.

Grahame

[Marie Hass]

Dear Frank and Grahame,

I really appreciate your commentary, I will try a black background this afternoon.

Marie

[Brownbear]

Hi Marie,

Your images of the Amaryillis are very pretty. I like the white background but wonder if the white needs to be a little less bright/contrasty to match the delicate beauty of the flower? Or the flower needs more contrast to match the bright white?

Of the two I'm leaning toward the 2nd close up of the flower with a little more space around it.

And I'm very much looking forward to seeing your next set.

[FrankMi]

Hi Marie,

I played with this for a while but could not get it to where I wanted it to be, mainly because of masking issues. Sometimes the best approach is to reshoot, if at all possible. At any rate, I hope this will give you an idea, poor as it may be, of what a darker background might do for a situation like this.

Let me know if you want me to remove it. I am hoping that your amaryllis holds in there long enough for you to reshoot with a darker background.

[Brownbear]

I do like Frank's vision of the black background. The only other thing I can think of for the white background is if you can make it high-key.

[Marie Hass]

Got some pictures taken with a black background!!! Will post in a bit.

[Marie Hass]

Frank, is this more what you were thinking of?





I have more, but am so befuddled with a head cold that I would rather wait to process them.

I think I have one more day. Hopefully I can get home to shoot at a more leisurely pace without fear of loosing daylight, tomorrow.

Marie

[FrankMi]

Frank, is this more what you were thinking of?



I have more, but am so befuddled with a head cold that I would rather wait to process them.

If I need to do better, I think I have one more day. Hopefully I can get home to shoot at a more leisurely pace without fear of loosing daylight.

Marie

Stunning! Tiz a beauty to behold.

By shooting against a black background, you eliminate the white halos that I couldn't mask out in post processing. The best I could do was to minimize them by not going all the way to black with the background.

Yes, that works very well for me, the big question is how do you like it?

[FrankMi]

I do like Frank's vision of the black background. The only other thing I can think of for the white background is if you can make it high-key.

I did play with Marie's image in high-key as well Christina. It has a soft wispy look about it. Different, and quite pleasant.

[Marie Hass]

I do like the black background. I realized I made the same mistake last year, and only took pictures with a white background. I probably would have left it as was again this year if no one suggested anything different.

Added a quick and dirty picture of the whole plant to my above post. It is quite exotic looking. I know I need to do a better job cleaning up the background.

Marie