My Amaryllis is in Bloom

[Etienne Cassar]

Any suggestions as to how I can improve these pictures?

[PeterAit]

Any suggestions as to how I can improve these pictures?

I have 2 suggestions. First, how about a black or at least dark background? Second, reduce the exposure - some of the whites in the flower look blown out, with no detail.
Good luck.

[Etienne Cassar]

I have 2 suggestions. First, how about a black or at least dark background? Second, reduce the exposure - some of the whites in the flower look blown out, with no detail.
Good luck.

Thanks Peter,
I am no pro to argue but according to the histogram the whites are not blown out.  Shall I reduce the exposure slider in camera raw slightly to get some details showing in the whites of the flower?
With regards to the background I was thinking about a black one and will certainly give it a try.  Or better still try to find a dark green background perhaps, because I'm afraid that a black background will make it too contrasty.

Thanks for you suggestions.

Etienne

[Ed Blagden]

Doesn't look blown to me.  Seconded about the black background though.

The flower looks strangely crunchy, and I wonder if you might have oversharpened it a smidge.  If you are using lightroom try the "portrait" sharpening preset as a starting point and then tweak from there.  Also, try a little (not too much) negative clarity to give it a softer and dreamier appearance if you like.

But at the end of the day it is your image, so it is really up to you how you want it to look.

Ed

[Etienne Cassar]

Gave it a try with the black background.  What do you think now?  Also shall I go for this kind of crop or is a closer single flower crop better.  I am quite undecided about this.  
With regards to sharpening I didn't know whether to go for a portrait type of sharpening or one with a smaller radius and high detail to get out the texture of the flower.  Thanks for pointing it out to me.  As to the negative clarity I thought about it too and I think that I will give it a try.  Thanks for your help.

[bjanes]

Any suggestions as to how I can improve these pictures?

I agree with the other posters that the background could be improved. The image does look crunchy with poor gradation. Oversharpening might be involved. There is no clipping of the whites,  but there is marked saturation clipping of the reds in the highlights and of blue and green in the shadows. The effect of the highlight red clipping is obvious, but the effects of the shadow saturation clipping are more subtle as explained here (see How Levels works on color images). Shadow clipping of the non-reds removes those colors from the image, increasing saturation in the reds and possibly causing a color shift.

[attachment=18388:Amarylli...sto_sRGB.png]

The saturation clipping can be removed by converting the image to ProPhotoRGB, but the conversion can not recover data that have been clipped and permanently lost. Paradoxically, tere is no change in the appearance of the image when it is converted to ProPhotoRGB (afterall, the purpose of color management is to preserve the appearance of the image).

[attachment=18389:Amarylli...ProPhoto.png]

If you are working with raw files (and you should be in this case), render into ProPhotoRGB. This will likely avoid the saturation clipping. However, the resulting image will likely exceed the gamut of your output device (screen or printer) and you might want to decrease saturation a bit. I am not that experienced with this type of editing, and input from more experienced members would be welcome (Where are you Schewe and MarkDS?).

Bill

[Ed Blagden]

Gave it a try with the black background.  What do you think now?  Also shall I go for this kind of crop or is a closer single flower crop better.  I am quite undecided about this.  
With regards to sharpening I didn't know whether to go for a portrait type of sharpening or one with a smaller radius and high detail to get out the texture of the flower.  Thanks for pointing it out to me.  As to the negative clarity I thought about it too and I think that I will give it a try.  Thanks for your help.

Much better - a lot more impactful, don't you think?

As regards framing (I think you meant that rather than cropping the image in post processing) this really is a matter for you.  Personally I think the image is a bit busy and maybe one flower would be better, but as I say it all depends what you are trying to achieve.  You're the photographer after all.

Incidentally, when you post images here I would suggest you limit pixel dimensions to 1200 max width x 850 max height.  For those of us viewing on a "standard" 1280x1024 monitor anything bigger is not necessary.  In fact, because the video card has to down-res oversized images on the fly, the bigger images look fuzzier than when viewed at native resolution.  Also, set the jpeg quality to around 80%.  If you do both these things then the jpeg will usually be no bigger than 500KB and will look better too.

Ed

[Etienne Cassar]

Bill I am working on a RAW file and in the Prophoto RGB colour space.  I have converted and downsampled the image to sRGB before submitting it online.  Thanks for the link explaining about levels.  
Thanks EdB.  Yes Framing will be a better word.  In fact I have two different sets of photos, with different framing.  With regards to posting images here thanks for pointing it out.  I have output the image at the lowest possible size from camera raw and then did not bother to down-res it further in photoshop.  I will next time round.

Etienne.

[bjanes]

Bill I am working on a RAW file and in the Prophoto RGB colour space.  I have converted and downsampled the image to sRGB before submitting it online.  Thanks for the link explaining about levels.  
Etienne.

Etienne,

The picture with the black background is not only more pleasing, but the saturation is reduced and there is no saturation clipping in sRGB. The gradation appears much better--a beautiful picture. What did you change?

Bill

[Etienne Cassar]

Ok I decided to go for a single flower picture with a bud slightly out of focus in the background.  Illumination was with a flashgun with diffuser from top and slightly to the front, and a fill in flash mounted on the camera with diffuser as well.  What do you think now?

Thanks.
Etienne

[EduPerez]

I too found the first pictures a bit over exposed, and the background distracting; the second example is much better, but both the background and the flowers have a bluish tone. The last one is even better than the others, almost perfect; if I had to change anything, I would try to diffuse the light a bit more, and avoid the shadows inside the flowers.