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Thread: Verbena Bush

  1. #1
    Member erikzen's Avatar
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    Verbena Bush

    I took some shots of a lovely verbena bush in my yard, mostly because my wife wants to get rid of it, but also as an excuse to take more photos. I don't fight my wife on too many things but I think it would be a shame to get rid of this bush and I thought some lovely photos of it might convince her otherwise. Also, if I do give in, I'd like to remember it.

    lighting was not great, as it was very overcast. I'm also wondering if I can get the camera to take a bit sharper pictures. What do you think? Any suggestions?



    Cropped and lighting tweaked



    Original shot unretouched



    The whole bush



    With fill flash used

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  2. #2
    Member Shooter Tiff's Avatar
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    Re: Verbena Bush

    Do you use a tripod?
    Are you using manual focus? Thats the best for macro type shots.
    I like the first the best. although it seems almost a shade dark to me.
    The second seems to be off a bit in the white balance.
    My other complaint is that they seem to be all straight on shots.
    Maybe try some more creative angles and keeps flowers that don't need to be there out of the shot.

  3. #3
    Member erikzen's Avatar
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    Re: Verbena Bush

    I didn't use a tripod or manual focus for these shots. I will give that a try and see what kind of results I can get.

    The first and second shots are actually the same shot. The first I cropped and tried to adjust the lighting using fill flash in PS. The second one is just as it came out of the camera. I could go back and try to lighten it up a bit. How do you know/see/feel if a shot is too dark. Same question for the white balance, how do you know what is "right"?

    Good suggestion regarding composition. I felt the same way when I was cropping the shot. I wished I had done a better job of isolating one individual flower. I will try some different angles.

    Thanks for the feedback!

  4. #4
    Senior Member brmill26's Avatar
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    Re: Verbena Bush

    Having done some flower shots myself this Spring, I quickly figured out it's much more difficult than it looks! So with that said, these aren't bad. The first one is the best. The white balance is a little warm on the rest. The last shot looks a little over exposed.

    The first shot's exposure looks about right to me. It's very, very easy to over expose white flowers and lose the detail in the petals. So I actually prefer the surroundings to look "dark" in order to preserve detail, while the white flower still looks quite bright anyway. Tiff is right about the framing; unique angles are quite difficult to find, so that'll be a good challenge for you.

    What I would change is depth of field. Use a wider aperture to isolate the flower better and blur out the background. And to assist you in doing that, get as close to the flower as you possibly can. The method I typically use is focusing all the way down to minimum distance, then I move the camera back and forth to place the focal plane. Tip - always keep the stamen in focus, which you did here.

    As far as sharpness, you're pretty much at the mercy of the lens. Macro photography more than just about anything else will really give away the resolving power of a lens. It may also help, if you have Photoshop, to shoot in RAW and convert in PS. You might get a little extra detail - but don't expect big changes. It will make it easy to fix the white balance as well.
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  5. #5
    Member Shooter Tiff's Avatar
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    Re: Verbena Bush

    The only reason I say it's dark is because... it looks a little dark to me. I compare it to what I have seen in the past that people here have considered well exposed and what has been considered dark. This place is really good for learning things like that.
    Another thing is it might look dark on my screen and not on your because my screen is not properly calibrated and I don't know if your is or not.
    Do you know how to read a histogram?
    That can really be the most useful tool.

    As far as white balance, the second shot just looked like it had a green wash to me compared to the top shot witch seems to have fairly nice whites. so that makes me think your white balance is off.

    I'm not the best person to answer all these questions but I am getting a pretty good understanding the more I read the critique forum and get out and try everything I learn.

    Good luck
    Tiff

  6. #6
    Senior Member AgingEyes's Avatar
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    Re: Verbena Bush

    I like the first pic the most. Glad that you cropped the second one You may also remove the white petal in the top right hand corner and the other one on the lower right hand side along the frame of that photo. The top part of the flower could be a tad brighter, too, but not too much.

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