I took this on a nature trail at a local botanic garden, and the flowers just struck me a so graceful. That’s what I tried to emphasize in the processing.
Anything really, but I am wondering if I should clone out the “stuff” on the smaller of the unopened flowers, or does it make the scene more “real”?
Taken with a 105 macro with a 30 shot focus stack - ISO 400, 1/15 sec, F9. Processed in Lr, Helicon Focus and Ps. Luckily there wasn’t much wind!
Hi Larry, I’m not much of a macro/flower guy, but I do have a couple small suggestions here!
I think the “stuff” you mentioned on the smaller unopened flowers is a nice detail and is not distracting to the composition at all.
I’m not sure if you manually dodged the flowers up to separate them from the background, or if you applied an Orton/glow effect, but that feels a little too strong to me. If you’re concerned about keeping the scene “real”, it “breaks the fourth wall” for me by making the image look post-processed (not that I have any issues with processing, I just don’t want it to be so apparent what was done when I’m viewing the results!) It’s most visible around the edges of the flower petals and particularly around the skinny little things sticking up against the darkness in the upper left (see, I told you I wasn’t a flower guy!)
There is also the more in-focus area of green leaves that converge in the upper-right corner. Because they’re more in focus and because they converge, they draw a bit of attention away from the flowers. I would experiment with blurring and darkening these green leaves slightly in this area, so they match the rest of the background a bit better.
Lastly, the bottom flower feels a little “dingy” so perhaps the darker pink areas of it could be dodged up a bit with a light pink color to match the cleaner upper flower.
Otherwise, it seems like a very nice flower macro photograph to me!
Thank you Alex. I will take a closer look at the glow I added and the other suggestions. I appreciate the time!
Hi Larry! This is a Beautiful portrait. Your point of view and composition are excellent. I agree with Alex’s suggestions, especially about the glow.
Thanks Steve. I’ll have to rework it without the glow - it was a “phase” I went through 
Hi Larry,
I like your comp, but the saturation is fairly heavy especially with greens. Tame down the saturation and this should make a wonderful print…Jim
Thanks Jim. I lowered the greens and the red in the stamens/pistil - looks better!
