Wildflower meadows

[snapapple]

Wildflowers are really blooming on my favorite hill. But, it's been so foggy in the early morning that the light is very flat. I've worked these up a bit and added a gradient to the plain white sky. Let me know what you think.
http://SNAPAPPLE.smugmug.com/photos/24732694-L.jpg

The Cleveland Sage
http://SNAPAPPLE.smugmug.com/photos/24732663-L.jpg

Just cropped out the sky here.
http://SNAPAPPLE.smugmug.com/photos/24743765-L.jpg

You can really see the fog here.
http://SNAPAPPLE.smugmug.com/photos/24732677-L.jpg

And one special little flower
http://SNAPAPPLE.smugmug.com/photos/24743761-L.jpg

[ginger_55]

Snappy, in general those are beautiful. I love the one with the fog. Just totally love it.

The first ones kind of hurt my eyes. I am a bit different, I like my flowers kind of gentle: except some kinds, often wild ones.

These either look over sharpened, or over saturated, or both, IMO, but then I said the same thing to Harry, almost, and we know he is good! So maybe it is just me.

ginger

As I said, I do like the fog one just right off! (Then again, I pretty much like fog in any photograph)

[Mitchell]

I like the last one the best, but the color seems off on my monitor. It may just be over saturated, or perhaps the hazy/foggy day gave you a white balance problem. The others just seem to lack a focus to draw me into the photo.

mitch

[jwear]

the last one :thumb the sage and one more did not load up :scratch

[snapapple]

Thanks Ginger, Mitch, and Jeff,

I appreciate your taking the time to comment. I think the major problem with the flower shots may have been the 400 ISO. I think it made the shots a bit grainy so it spoiled the detail in the flowers. I raised the levels to get more distinction and just got deeper contrast. I'll have to try to reshoot when the sun comes out.

I processed the single flower over from the beginning. What I had done was click "auto levels". When I went back and tried the levels myself, I noticed that the separate color levels all went flat at both ends. When I try to bring the blue up to where it's not flat, the picture goes blue. There is a lot of grey in this shot so it just turns blue. I think "auto levels" just brings all the colors up out of the flat line so that's not a good choice here. Doing it myself, I was able to get this. Hope you like it. I'd appreciate any feedback.

http://SNAPAPPLE.smugmug.com/photos/24856331-L.jpg

[ginger_55]

That is such a pretty yellow flower, and the composition is good. If it were me, I would desat the blue a bit. I mean to say, I would dump the blue, but maintain some color. If you are ever going to get noise it would be from blue, that is what the books say anyway, also, I don't see a need for the blue, I think it fights with the yellow and that is why people may have trouble find the spot to look at. green would be more natural. Yellow brings UP green nicely, often too much. Green sometimes brings up green, but yellow always does for me. Then if it is background, I find a way to tone it down. Not complicated like a mask, I just lower the sat on the green, if that doesn't work, I lower it on the yellow. I know the flower is yellow, but it will probably hold.


OK, I don't usually write "helpful" posts. I think it is time for food.

So glad to see you!

ginger

[snapapple]

That is such a pretty yellow flower, and the composition is good. If it were me, I would desat the blue a bit. I mean to say, I would dump the blue, but maintain some color. If you are ever going to get noise it would be from blue, that is what the books say anyway, also, I don't see a need for the blue, I think it fights with the yellow and that is why people may have trouble find the spot to look at. green would be more natural. Yellow brings UP green nicely, often too much. Green sometimes brings up green, but yellow always does for me. Then if it is background, I find a way to tone it down. Not complicated like a mask, I just lower the sat on the green, if that doesn't work, I lower it on the yellow. I know the flower is yellow, but it will probably hold.


OK, I don't usually write "helpful" posts. I think it is time for food.

So glad to see you!

ginger
Thanks for the input, Ginger. I think the last picture is pretty close to the actual color. The green leaves are sage, and they are grey-green. The dead twigs in the background are grey and there are some brown. That grey seems a touch purple to me, so maybe turning down the blue more would help. But, it does look less blue than the first flower. I'm not even going to try anything on the other shots. Just tossing them is the best solution.:D

[Phil U.]

What I had done was click "auto levels".

Yea, I learned pretty early that auto levels adjusts each of the color channels seperately and can mess with your colors. If the color balance in the original is good, I find that "auto contrast" does a good job in most cases(or if you're using a levels adjustment layer click on the options button and choose "enhance monochromatic contrast" - same thing)

I agree with the other comments everyone else has already made...

[Dee]

http://SNAPAPPLE.smugmug.com/photos/24856331-S.jpg

I'm from NY/NJ originally and the light is definitely different out here in the San Francisco area.

Colors are different too -- you have that sagey green just about exactly right and your browns look great. So I'd say you have the color adjusted just right.

With all the rain we had you must be in flower heaven right now!

Flower photos are difficult, I keep trying to take masses of flowers, but it just doesn't work unless I can get something eyecatching in the image. For example, get one or two flowers in the foreground in sharp focus and let the background colors go blurry. Otherwise I find it just looks like specks of color scattered in the image.

I wonder, or sometimes think, some photos are only good for large photos, 16 x 20 or larger to be truly effective. That way you can see the detail. When shrunk for web size the colors (flowers) look like daubs...

Hope I expressed that the right way
:):

[Steve Cavigliano]

Very nice Snappy :thumb :thumb


Love the colors in the first shot and the sky gradient looks pretty good :clap I also liked the little yellow flower and your 2nd edit looks better to me. The first one looked too cool (too blue or cyan) to me.

I don't know what post processing sw you're using, but if it's Photoshop, you might want to download the Velvia-Provia V2 action, by Paul Bleicher from here (http://www.atncentral.com/download.htm). It can really brighten up colors shot under flat lighting :D


Steve

[snapapple]

Very nice Snappy :thumb :thumb
Love the colors in the first shot and the sky gradient looks pretty good :clap I also liked the little yellow flower and your 2nd edit looks better to me. The first one looked too cool (too blue or cyan) to me.

I don't know what post processing sw you're using, but if it's Photoshop, you might want to download the Velvia-Provia V2 action, by Paul Bleicher from here (http://www.atncentral.com/download.htm). It can really brighten up colors shot under flat lighting :D


Steve

Thanks Steve. I appreciate your comments a lot. I'm using Photoshop CS2, just got my upgrade. I downloaded that action. Now I'm going to see if I can figure out how to intagrate it with the program. Hope you'll help out if I have problems with that. It sounds like a cool thing. I've never used "actions" before. Thanks for the tip.

[Steve Cavigliano]

Thanks Steve. I appreciate your comments a lot. I'm using Photoshop CS2, just got my upgrade. I downloaded that action. Now I'm going to see if I can figure out how to intagrate it with the program. Hope you'll help out if I have problems with that. It sounds like a cool thing. I've never used "actions" before. Thanks for the tip.Snappy,
Make sure you move the action into the CS2 "Actions" folder. Once you've done that, next time you open CS2 go to the little arrow on right side of the Actions Pallette and click it. It should give you a little drop down menu. Select "Load Action". That should display all the actions located in the CS2 Actions folder. Select Velvia-Provia and bingo it will be added to your Actions Pallette.

Once it's in the pallette, click on it and it will expand downward and let you choose whether you want to use the Velvia action or the Provia action, It will create a separate copy that you can use as a layer (Select all, copy, paste) or you can use it as is. One warning, the default settings are at 70% which can be very vivid with some pics. Just adjust the slider to the left to reduce the effect :D

I know, wayyyyyy more than you wanted to know....LOL

Good luck and feel free to pm me if you have problems :-)

Steve