five tulips

[chauncey]

I think maybe that it looks okay...what say you guys...could I improve on it?

[Marie Hass]

Hi, Chauncey,

I almost wish I could examine this lovely image bit by bit to appreciate it. Lightbox does not do it justice.

Very pleasing.

'Rie

[IzzieK]

William I do not think this is well balanced. You should cut the bottom of the plant if you wanted to make it bend natural at the side. Leave the centre one as is then work your way to the side as it follow the curve. One thing you can use is a craft foam pad or a craft ball. You can easily buy this at a craft store or even Jo Ann's or Michaels. Also those green coloured plant wires to arrange them to bend as you please to pose them correctly or whichever way you wanted to pose them. This shot above looks to me like the flowers are on the way to about lose their energy. Plump them up and spray them then wait a bit before taking a shot. Maybe just demonstrate the freshoness of one instead of the limpness of 5? What do you think?

Oh my goodness! after reading what I wrote I forgot to ask if these are cut flowers or in a pot? Which is which? I would hate to have a plant cut off but I still stand with the floral wire though....

[IzzieK]

I forgot to mention, there's a little dot near the top of the second flower to the right...hey I gave you a good one, didn't I? Wait till the morning...you'd be so busy responding to this post. I will pray for you as I am going back to bed now.

[Downrigger]

Beautiful, William. I cannot decide though, whether the base of this satisfies me. On the one hand, these seem to spiral up from nowhere, but on the other I cannot figure out how things at the base could be different and still achieve this excellent result.

[Shadowman]

Nice capture. Have you tried photographing from the left; with the lower stem pointed towards the camera to get a sense of depth?

[Mike Buckley]

Wonderful composition! I'd like to see softer shadows on the flowers to enhance their delicacy.

[Wavelength]

Beautiful...can you please tell where were the lighting sources placed ?

[DanK]

Chauncey,

Very nice.

I should know by now, but I don't--do you prefer to be addressed as Chauncey, or as William or Bill?

I disagree with Izzie about the bottom: I think it is very well composed. My one suggestion about the composition is that I would crop a bit, with more off the top and right. There is more negative space than you need, and the crop would move the bottom to roughly 1/3 of the way across. I don't know whether you allow edits, and if not, I will delete this, but here is the sort of thing I had in mind:



My one other suggestion is predictable. We all have our signature songs, and this is one of mine. I think the lighting is on the harsh side. it's a very nice image regardless, but I think it would be even nicer with a more diffused, gentler lighting.

Hope these are helpful.

Dan

[Marie Hass]

Funny, I did not think the lighting too harsh at all? Strong, yes, but it shows off the folds and pleats of the petals and leaves.

I love the swirl from right to left of the leaves. The flowers complement that line.

The empty space at bottom left allows the flower to fall into it. Or it could be a placeholder for your copyright.

'Rie

[chauncey]

do you prefer to be addressed as Chauncey, or as William or Bill

Chauncey works, but will answer to anything.
I never object to someone having and displaying a different take...should you ever want an original, just ask.

Lighting...for the most part I used four 100W LED's blasting off the walls and ceiling of my painted white 12x12 office. Additionally, used 2 of these lights, http://www.amazon.com/Dimmable-Digit...s_3109915011_3 as side lighting, and,
a candle providing minimal front lighting for interest.

I was unable to do a reshoot on the bulbs due to my having a brown/black/non-green thumb,
petals started falling off...only had the damn plant a week.
Did reshoot the stems for this version this morning.

As usual, I used my 180 macro lens, then stacked and merged to an obscene 92" wide.
I am discovering that downsizing a big image does seem to impart unneeded sharpening to an image.
Maybe I should back-off my usual 100 sharpening to the RAW images in LR on these large images.

Anyway, here's the latest version taking a lot of what was offered into consideration.
I'm thinking that the stems tend to overwhelm the bulbs...

[Mike Buckley]

Overall, I prefer the second one because the mood created by the lighting is important to me. I prefer the composition of the first one mostly because of its nice asymmetry. I prefer the lighting of the second one because of the softer shadows on the flowers.

When using so much negative space in the second one, consider adding a gradient to the background. The floral arrangement is symmetrical but there is more space on the left than the right, so consider making the two spaces equal. Also consider eliminating some of the space at the top (though keep in mind that I almost always prefers tight crops).

[DanK]

I much prefer the first to the second. The second has too much negative space (I thought even the first one did, although less), and the centering and symmetrical arrangement of the stems makes the second much less interesting as a composition, IMHO.

Re the lights: I'm curious what you think of them. I have been interested in LEDs for photo work for a long time, but I've avoided them so far because of some negative reports about their color balance. Do you find that these small lights are OK? And when you wrote 100W LEDs, do you mean actual 100W, or 100W-equivalent? I think the brightest I have (100W incandescent equivalent) are about 20W.

[chauncey]

I see what you're saying Mike...probably isn't oblivious but I decreased the size of the left images and increased the two on the right to give an illusion of more depth...change varied from 94-105%.

[skitterbug]

I can't offer any advice since I'm no expert but I can say which pic is pleasing to me and that is #1. Number 3 is too unnatural for my taste. I wouldn't find tulips growing in this form in my garden. I much prefer foliage/flower pics to be as they are seen when growing rather than being artificially arranged. JMO of course!

[chauncey]

Dan, the LED's that I use are these...http://www.amazon.com/Cree-18-Watt-D...ed+light+bulbs
installed in Home Depot shop lights and are dimmable. I like the other ones for macro.

I wouldn't find tulips growing in this form in my garden

Garden...what's that? I buy mine at Home Depot.

[DanK]

Chauncy,

Thanks. for household use, I usually buy Phillips now, but I haven't explore the panels for macro yet. Will definitely get to it at some point.

This time of year, our garden is buried in snow, so I buy many of mine cut at a local farm store.

Dan

[Marie Hass]

I got my 100W LED lights at Walmart. Make sure they are "Daylight". Average temperature should say "5000". 2000 is too warm and difficult to correct.

'Rie

[Mike Buckley]

Garden...what's that? I buy mine at Home Depot.

Mine are made of polyester or silk. They never die.