Italian Garden

This is my first post in the critique section. I posted a little more about me in the introductory section.

This is a photo I took while visiting Italy in April. It was a cloudy, and obviously, rainy day while we were staying at a winery resort in Tuscany. They had a beautiful garden that had a balcony lined in these small yellow flowers. Most were in tight clusters, but this one had bloomed and separated just enough to capture it alone with a macro lens.

Nikon D50 + Tamron 90mm Macro
Post processing on curves and color balance in PS4.

Thanks in advance for the comments and critique! Any feedback is appreciated :)

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j6...0805oneweb.jpg

Welcome and glad to see your first post here! I like this much. you have some warm and beautiful tones with the browns and creams. Very good sharpness although maybe a bit more depth of field would be nice.
The leaf behind the stem at the top, in the bg bothers me somewhat. I might try to subdue it somehow. I don't mind the space at the right side but perhaps cropping this to an 8x10 formatthings up and make this a bit stronger. Not sure, I would have to see and compare because I do like the extra space and the mood that it brings with it.
Very nice image, thanks for showing.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gahspidy

...The leaf behind the stem at the top, in the bg bothers me somewhat. I might try to subdue it somehow. I don't mind the space at the right side but perhaps cropping this to an 8x10 format things up and make this a bit stronger...

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Thanks for the critique. I never noticed the leaf as being distracting. Here is another version taking your critique into consideration. What do you think?

http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j6...DSC_0805RR.jpg

I do like the first but also think following Gary's suggestions has helped in your edit.

Beautiful picture. Look forward to seeing more from ya!
db

Lovely! Your edits are perfect, very nicely done. There are no distractions now and there is still enough space to the right to keep the openess and mood, but cropped enough to bring the flower up close.

Wow, thank you so much! :) Thank you for the feedback in making the photo better.

Congrats on the sticky!

Totally unexpected! Thanks again :)

Congrats on the sticky, Denise. Your photo works well, as the composition is excellent, the exposure pretty much perfect and the DOF is quite alluring. I like how you didn't over-light it, which would have destroyed the mood. While the DOF is mysterious, I do wish it had a little more .. from the EXIF, maybe f8.0 instead of the 5.6 you used. I also think that it could stand a tad more saturation.

Anyway - great work, and for your first posting in the Critique forum a great way to splash in.

G

I love it, and I actually like the uncropped version better. The colors are perfect. A little more DOF would be nice, but otherwise I think it is great!

Thanks guys. Sorry, I was out of town for a few days, then started classes, so I've been super busy!

GB1 - it's definitely the upload and/or color profile if it's looking dull to you. It has very rich color on my end. I hate web uploads for that reason, ugh.