[nichpr]

Those magic moments when life bursts forth, when mother nature works her wonders are moments to savor. Looking forward to your comments.

[Rob Barron]

I totally agree with all you have said Paul, nature is full of wonder and a joy to behold

I think the picture has potential but I feel it is at least half a stop over exposed. I'd drop it down with a shallow S curve to add a bit more contrast as it is a bit flat. There is more in this pic for you to bring out but that just shows the picture itself was well seen, just needs a couple of tweaks to give it more impact.

Any idea what plant this is by the way?

Cheers,
Rob

[nichpr]

Thanks Rob for your usual on target critique.
I took another run at the image by reprocessing from raw. In ACR I dropped the exposure by -25 and nudged up the contrast slider just a bit. In Photoshop I bumped the contrast a bit further in a new adjustment layer, bumped up the saturation of the reds, and moved the white slider in levels a bit to the right. Finally just a smidge of smart sharpening and here is the result.



Have no idea what plant this is... maybe some of our fellow Pixaloers might recognize it.

[chrisa]

I think you're new version has much more punch. It also looks clearer for being just that bit bigger.

Think composition could be improved slightly by either focusing more tightly on the emerging shoots, or coming back a bit more to include more. I'm finding that nearside half shoot distracting as it is neither in nor out of the picture.

Sorry can't help with the plant name.

[Rob Barron]

That's a big improvement Paul, has got much more punch to it. May I suggest one other thing? I think the top could be cropped to just remove the bottom of the leaf/petal at the top of the central stem. I did it moving the image up the screen and it works well because it gives the picture a greater sense of completeness and keeps the eye on the main area which is where I feel we want to be.

Lovely work, well done.

Rob

[nichpr]

Thanks Rob. As always your comments are constructive and appreciated.
BTW this was taken with my new 50mm 1.4 at f4 - really pleased with the bg

[Rob Barron]

Lovely lens there Paul and the bokeh of the BG is very nice indeed. Bet the BG looks soft as silk at 1.4 but a swine to get the rest of the subject sharp as your DoF would be tiny.

More please

Cheers,
Rob

[nichpr]

Yeah, the dof would have been about 1/2 inch for this shot at f1.4 That's precisely why I went to f4.