The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.
Description
Some Pink Lady Slippers lean over with the weight of their blossoms and I liked the placement of this one on a blanket of moss since it was so hard to find any clean-ish backgrounds in the bog where they grow. Plus, who doesn’t love a bed of bright green, springy moss? It was kind of fun to walk on - like a mattress. A water-mattress that leaked since my shoes were a bit wet when I was done.
I took several shots with an idea to stack them, but the wind shifted everything between shots and they just wouldn’t line up. So this is a single file, but I think it’s sharp where it needs to be and the fall off is natural.
Specific Feedback
It’s a bit of an odd duck, but I like it since it is fairly typical of how these grow. I cleaned up a little in the field, but left those old leaves as a sort of base or anchor element. Do they work? I also cleaned up a lot in Photoshop, but don’t think I went too far. Any other thoughts are welcome.
Technical Details
Tripod
Lr for some wb correction and to create a less contrasty image to go into Photoshop. Started with a Linear Profile as well. Ps to create a more even mossy backdrop and do do some light channeling using a variety of masks. A slight crop.
Kris, your description of the scene transported me to that place. I could feel the moisture under my feet and the softness coming from the moss.
The leaves at the bottom of the frame do not bother me. If I cloned them, I would have also cloned the others above the flower stem. So, I’d simply leave them as in your edit. The one thing that is not working for me is the space between the Pink Lady Slippers and the left frame. I think my eyes are being fooled by the long stem from the base to the flower. I don’t know what the image would look like with a bit more space on the left (maybe too stretched?), but that stem is so long that I feel some constraint on the left side. I hope you don’t mind my trying what I just wrote here. I used the PS’s Generative Expand to add a little more space on the left. What do you think?
Cool subject! I wish to protest that you have such lovely little things growing in the forest – no fair at all!! I get poison oak (much less attractive than poison ivy) and rattlesnakes.
Interesting idea from @Egídio, and normally I like breathing room, but I wonder about a little less added space. (Neat trick, though!!) For me, the lovely foliage has so much visual weight that it balances the overhanging bloom. The DOF feels perfectly natural and I don’t see any signs of cleanup.
Thanks @Egídio - there might be room in the original file, but the generated expansion you did looks pretty good. Glad you could connect with the environment, too. Bogs are one of my favorite ecosystems because they are so odd and relatively nutrient-poor which requires plants to adapt in curious ways, such as becoming carnivorous. Orchids are not, but they are some of the jerks of the flower world due to how they manipulate their pollinators and often don’t reward them with nectar.
Thanks @Diane_Miller - the forest floor is a wondrous place around here if you can stand the bugs. I recently spent a little time near another bog and found this same orchid growing there and thankfully right on the edge. Maybe next year if I’m feeling especially brave I’ll take a look and see if any bloom.
I wrote a post about these beauties a while back -
I think the dead leaves at the base make a great anchor for this beauty, Kris.
When I look at this image I keep feeling like it’s on a hill or something-caused by the angle of your camera to the flower. I think you’d get a much more interesting image by getting down closer to it’s level and maybe using a fairly long lens so you can get back a ways and get the moss background with a reasonably low angle shot (take a groundcloth!).
Strange about your perception of the hill. The camera was basically on the ground for this - quite close to ground level with the flower and the moss, but I did want to be slightly elevated so the leaves of the Lady’s Slipper would show well. I used my wide/normal lens at basically what amounts to 60mm so not very long. The problem with trying to get farther away is everything in between. It’s a bog - lots of plants and trees, not to mention odd little hummocks that make the ground very bumpy and not flat. I can always try next time and maybe in a different bog with clearer sight lines.
