The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.
Description
Bee balm is one of my favorite flowers due to its complexity and I decided to photograph one from my little prairie. This is a 121 image stack in natural diffused light. Not a whole lot that I needed to do–warm up WB slightly, set black point, sharpen, 15 degree CW rotation, and final crop to 8x10.
Specific Feedback
The only nit I have is a small piece of a wrinkled petal observable in the center of the flower. An artifact from bumblebee activity so I decided to leave it in. Let me know if that imperfection bothers you enough for me to fic it in photoshop.
Technical Details
Z9 60 mm Micro (tripod) with specimen housed in my portable light box (1/15 sec at f3.2, ISO 1000 121 image stack with PMax.
Critique Template
Use of the template is optional, but it can help spark ideas.
Jim: Spectacular portrait of a wonderful subject. We tried some bee balm many years ago but it just didn’t thrive. Looks like yours is in great shape. Your tiny imperfection requires a lot of looking to see and for me it is a total non-issue. Really well done. >=))>
I can’t spot the imperfection at all, so no problem for me. Fantastic. Light and job with the stack. So tough to do with a flower with this much depth and detail. One thing that stuck out at me was the bract coming toward me and how it intersects with the leaf. I wonder how rotating the flower slightly so that the bract isn’t intersecting the leaf and that the leaf is free of the stem, too. Not sure if the flowers themselves are at too weird an angle if you do that. Just a thought on a marvelous treatment.
Very nicely done, Jim. I have a deep red variety and I’ve often photographed them, but for some reason have never bothered with a stack. It worked beautifully (and we’re supposed to get some cloud cover soon). I couldn’t find the issue you were talking about. If I were to change anything in this image, it would be to remove the tiny stick that somehow found its way into the center of the flower cluster.
You guys are killin’ me with your stacks!! I’m a dyslexic procrastinator, but have no excuse for not learning to stack. I have Helicon focus and this new A1 II is capable of shooting stacks, so
I HEREBY COMMIT TO LEARNING. (sometime fairly soon )
This is stunning. The colours and detail against the black BG are compelling. Since this is close to perfection, that center stick must go, and you might as well clean up the dark spots near the center.
Exquisite!
Jim, you caught this at a perfect time in its bloom cycle. I mostly see these with the petals as “fringe” with no flowers in the center. The colors stand out beautifully against the black background. In case you want to use this professionally, there a bit of green glow around the sepal that crosses the leaf on the left and there’s break through of the leaf’s edge through that sepal…yes, very few would notice those details…
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