Late Harvest Zin +Reference

[Lon_Overacker]

Have no idea if these are Zinfandel grapes… but the title sounded good…

Happy 2019! And my first post in Flora in the new NPN 2.0. Not your standard flora fare, but I think qualifies as Flora.

This was captured in early December, on foggy morning. I spent a good 2 hours wandering the outskirts of this vineyard. I was limited as well having to shoot through a fence

What technical feedback would you like if any?

Any/all. How is the bg softness? I actually applied Dennis’ technique of brushing some color at a low opacity around the bg. This also had an effect of softening as well.

What artistic feedback would you like if any?

Curious if the missing vine that these grapes are attached to is an issue? Does this look odd having the grapes hanging from no where? I may work on the full frame version.

Any pertinent technical details:

Nikon D800E, 28-300mm fully at 300mm f/6.3. I wanted the somewhat wide aperture to throw the bg out of focus. Then used a 4-image focus stack using the newly purchased Helicon focus software. I’m likin’ it!

Thoughts and comments always appreciated.

Lon

Edit. Thanks for the comments! @Dennis_Plank, I’m including an image with the vine, although still cropped left, right, bottom from original frame. As far as including the vine in the original frame - it really wasn’t by choice. I was zoomed out all the way to 300mm and I was prevented from getting closer. But I reprocessed from scratch to at least make some improvements.

@Harley_Goldman, thanks. As I mentioned, I cropped intentionally and I suppose it’s a given the grapes are hanging from the vine so maybe it’s not that important that one can see the vine. This view does provide context and becomes more of a vineyard environment image than anything else.

Thanks @Bill_Fach for the edit and suggestion. I cloned out that “blob” - most all the brown oof things were large sycamore leaves blown in a preserve across the road. I also cleaned up some other small areas and also used my new found technique of toning down some brighter areas. (Thanks Dennis!) As well as darkening the corners a little, but not as much as your example.

The top horizontal vine is attached to a wire which I grossly and tediously cloned out. In the end, I find the top corners a little messy. I think I’ll probably crop this one too a little tighter as Bill suggested.

Thanks again!

You may only download this image to demonstrate post-processing techniques.

[Dennis_Plank]

The background looks fine to me, Lon, and the grapes have me salivating (I think there’s a bottle of Zin in the kitchen). I’m not sure about the vine. It depends on what it looks like, I think. Since you included it in the original frame, I’m guessing it was interesting. If you want to post it, I’ sure you’d get lots of suggestions.

[Harley_Goldman]

Looks tasty. The missing vine does not bother me at all. It did not even register until I saw your comment. This turned out well.

[Bill_Fach]

Lon: As we used to say in NPN 1, “if it grows, it goes.” Marvelous subjects and I like your overall DOF/POF management. I’m OK with the BG in general except for that dark blob just underneath the grapes. I did a quick and dirty purge of that, cropped a touch tighter and just for fun darkened the corners. It’s great to have you aboard and hope you’ll keep posting. >=))>

[Harley_Goldman]

I find the addition of the vine detracts from the image rather than contributes to it. Good call on cropping it out.

[Dennis_Plank]

I agree with leaving out the vine. Lon. It certainly does get messy in the corners on the original and the vine isn’t really needed.

[Phil_Hodgkins]

I like this without the main vine at the top. I like Bill’s change, eliminating the vine and cloning out the hole in the bottom center. Not sure I agree with the vignetting.