If you’re not familiar with the pink shell azalea, they grow at 4000’ elevation and higher in the southern Appalachians, specifically in N. Carolina. They are interesting and difficult to photograph in that the shrub flowers before it greens in, making compositions difficult without isolating the group. They are quite lovely to see and I found a grouping of them off NC215. As always, comments welcome…in particular, being new to macro work, I’m struggling with compositions that are more interesting or tell a story. Any advice on macro composition is greatly welcome.
What technical feedback would you like if any?
What artistic feedback would you like if any?
Pertinent technical details or techniques:
(If the background has been replaced, etc. please be honest with your techniques to help others learn)
If you would like your image to be eligible for a feature on the NPN Instagram (@NaturePhotoNet), add the tag ‘ig’ and leave your Instagram username below.
I think this composition works very well, Jim. The out of focus blossoms and twigs in the background give a great sense of what this plant is all about while the in focus blossom cluster provides a great accent point. My only suggestion would be to have tried to find an array that would put the in-focus cluster either slightly higher or slightly lower in the frame rather than vertically centered.
Jim: Wonderful scene and I like all of your comp and DOF/POF choices. My only small suggestion would be to make the OOF stem touching the main bloom go away. I did some quick and dirty cloning/CA work for your consideration. I know it kind of disembodies the partial bloom but I hope that’s not too noticeable. Well done. >=))>
There are many compositions that would work with this image. You’ve chosen to showcase the flow of the branches at varying distances from the in-focus bloom. Content aware could clean up some of the brown branches that aren’t flowering or you could use a vertical crop to highlight the in-focus bloom. All good, just personal choices.
This captures the feel of azaleas beautifully, Jim - they often do seem to fly across their branches, and the distancing you’ve gone for here expresses that perfectly. I do like the fact of a lot of oof blooms but just wonder whether the odd one more in focus might also work ?
@Ian_Wolfenden- I superimposed some lens blur to the image excluding the in-focus cluster… I can experiement with that by pulling back some of this superimposed lens-blur and see what it looks like…interesting point! Thanks for your comments.
Interested in others thoughts on these repost images. I took @Patricia_Brundage’s advice and did do a separate crop…not sure if it’s pleasing framed centrally. The other is a bit more cleaned up regarding the OOF competing stem as @Bill_Fach mentioned. Any thoughts welcome. Thanks again everyone!
